Parenting Is A Real Gas For One Lucky MOFO

Dear Devra and Aviva:
My son's 6th grade teacher called me from school yesterday. My son has apparently been disrupting class with an overabundance of flatulence. I am so flattered. To think that this teacher took time out of her busy day to let me know my son is farting out of control is truly a parenting pinnacle. My grandmother would be so proud! So I had a talk with him when he came home. He actually admits that he has full control over his emissions and was doing it on purpose to make his friends laugh and probably to repel girls at the same time. He asked me if he was in trouble. I said not yet, but if it continues, you probably will be. What exactly does "in trouble" mean anyway? And should I have punished him for his outrageous method of self expression? It was all I could do not to laugh out loud when I had the teacher on the phone. Perhaps I should be taking this more seriously?
Signed,
Mother of the Flatulent One


Dear Mother Of flatulent One,
You should be so proud! Not only does the teacher take time out of her busy day to discuss this with you, but your son can do this on demand. What a talent! Personally, I don't think I could take it too seriously. It probably would be appropriate to discuss with your son that this type of forced behavior is really not acceptable in public and is certainly disruptive in the classroom. If he truly possesses this amazing talent for flatulence on demand, he should save it for when it is really needed - long lines that he would like to get to the front of, perhaps? A little talk about not always needing to be the "class clown" or center of attention may also be in order. It is possible that your son is just looking for a little attention and taking the time to talk with him about why this is so could be very enlightening and beneficial to you. So, MOFO, keep your sense of humor and use it to teach your child when he should talk things out instead of letting one rip.
Oh, and better to laugh out loud with the teacher on the phone than...
Aviva

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Football and Fatherhood

My husband and I were watching football on Sunday. The Broncos were playing the Jets. During the game one of the announcers commented about how one of the player's had a "really difficult week" as his wife's father was very ill. Which meant, as the announcer continued, the football player had to take his children to school, get their lunches set up, get them to afterschool activities, etc. My husband made the observation "Why do they do that?" I asked "Do what?" And my husband said "Make it sound like that guy never does anything for his kids unless he has to because his wife isn't there. How do they know he doesn't do that stuff all the time? How do they know what kind of father he is? Why not just say the guy is parenting his children alone this week? It's tough to parent alone, whether you are used to it or not. It's still parenting. They made it sound like that father is a babysitter!" It's not okay to call dads babysitters, fathers are parents, and what they do is called parenting. We are mothers, it is not okay to call moms babysitters, we are called parents. Now we just need to get society to call em as we see em! Now everybody, play ball!

Weird Parenting Methods

So, I'm checking out the stats about our website and under "Key Word Search", I see someone found our website by entering "Weird Parenting Methods" into the search engine. Is this a bad thing? No, not at all, because in our presentations and in our book, we encourage parents to take a look at everything out there. The beauty of parenting is we can adjust and adapt a variety of techniques to work with our family and family members. Parenting is not "one size fits all" . And as Erma Bombeck once demanded to know, "One size fits all? All of what?" I could not agree with Erma more! Aviva and I think what sets our philosophy apart from the pack of parenting experts is we encourage parents to trust our gut (that's right, I said "our", because Aviva and I are in the trenches right along side you, as experts as well as mommies!) Aviva and I believe you should check out the wacky, or weird, parenting ideas as you may find an instance where one might work for your family. Maybe you can tweak it a bit for a better fit, but if you don't check it out to begin with, you won't have it in your reserve, right? Since yelling was identified as the number one guilt inducer in our Mommy Guilt Survey, let's get out there and grab some of those other parenting techniques and give em a whirl! Feel free to post some here in the comment area, because we are all experts here!

It Has Arrived

The little ghosts, goblins, princesses and superheros are coming down from their sugar highs and the holiday season is officially upon us! It starts earlier and earlier each year, doesn't it? Our stores are already filled with Christmas items and my living room still looks like a scary Halloween disaster. OK, maybe my living room is always a little frightening but, what can I say, we actually live in ours.

My kids spent no less than 2 hours sorting out candy. We are trying a new approach this year. Instead of mixing, matching and trading then hoarding candy in secret stashes around the house, everyone put their bags together and it's a free for all. The kids carefully sorted chocolates, hard candy, suckers and chewy things into separate containers that are being kept out in the dining room for everyone to share. They finally realized that they still had last years sweets hidden away and needed to throw them out. The new theory is, eat it until you can't stand the thought of it anymore and hopefully visitors will help dispose of it more quickly this way. I'll keep you posted on the results. So far, though, no candy fights, no sick kids and everyone seems content (of course, I am probably eating more than my share of chocolate, but, hey, I am woman!). Oh yeah, my 4 year old son also announced that we should bring the bucket of extra candy to kids who don't have any. You see, even candy presents a learning opportunity.

So what's next? Parent/teacher conferences, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Chanukah, New Years - and for us, 3 December birthdays as well. This is definitely an extra crazy time for our household. What can we do to keep some sanity around here and keep our kids from becoming greedy, over scheduled, over sugared little tyrants?

I'll offer a few tips but we would love to hear suggestions from all of you as well!

There seems to be more pressure every year to do things during the holidays so the first thing we are going to do is... do less. We are staying home for Thanksgiving with a few close family members this year. We love large gatherings and usually host them but our lives need some down time now. With a teenager, a preteen and a preschooler, we run in at least 3 different directions every day so we are all looking forward to sleeping in and sticking around! Feeling guilty about not spending the holiday with everyone? No! Feeling blessed to be able to spend it enjoying my own kids - without the hassle of entertaining anyone else or hustling my kids around to clean up and get ready for company.

Next, we will follow the 4 year old's lead. We will make a visit to an organization with a donation of some sort. The kids always pull out books, toys and clothes to share with others and we talk about the different places we can bring them. One of our favorites is a home for abused children - it gets little publicity and does so much to help!

Finally, we will do our best to appreciate each other as a family. Busy lives often mean less time to spend together, so that will be our focus for the hectic season this year. What's yours?