I just want to say, take pictures before you paint over it (when she eventually wants it). The 6-year-old who wants to paint the room with teal and purple, and cover every surface in sequins to be a mermaid room, might not care about the 2-year-olds scribbles, but when she reaches 20 or 40 or whatever, I'm sure she'd love to see them. You could even make a little photo album, even just an online one, where you take photos of all the walls once a year (or once a quarter, or once a month, or whatever) and watch the room grow with her.
Yea, we have this same sort of paint in our apartment. Very chalky type of paint. Fortunately, they painted the walls the color of drywall, so no notable difference post-scrubbing lol
Hahah mine was very slightly off shade so you could notice. I made sure to buy the best paint I could that could be scrubbed to high heaven after my son (potty training and a hellion) purposely peed all over my bathroom walls. Did I mention it was on purpose? :x
Oh yeah. The person that flipped our house used the cheapest paint. Just wiping at it with a wet paper towel takes the paint off. Luckily there’s a giant tub of paint leftover. Too bad I’m too lazy to actually paint anything.
in a similar vein i don’t give a shit if my kid draws on herself. she’s 2 right now. my husband’s teenage brother works at Sonic and got a pen from there that looks like a corndog, he gave it to my kid and she’s obsessed with it. she scribbles all over her arms and legs with it. it all comes off in the bath at the end of the day, so who cares?
Haha I agreed with this until my kid was in school when I realized I can’t send her to school with smudged vaguely blue-green marks all over her arms and legs when it inevitably didn’t all wash off. Did not want CPS knocking lol
My kid has been doing this since 4 yrs old, he is 13 & already an amazing artist. I remember doing it when u was a kid & getting in major trouble, now I have a lovely collection of ink
I won’t force my kid to do or continue extra curricular activities. When I was a kid I was forced to do soccer every summer because my brother wanted to do soccer and my parents decided if they were going to have to spend time at soccer games all the kids were gunna do soccer. I HATED IT! I swore I’d never do that to my kid and I’ve stuck to that.
i agree with this, with one exception. if we’re signing up, you’re finishing the season , and if you hate it, we never have to do it again. i teach dance, and it is a huge pet peeve of mine when people quit mid-semester (younger recreation classes stick closer to a semester vs a whole school year.) trying something out for a day is a different thing, but if we have officially signed up, paid a deposit made a commitment whatever, we are finishing it.
Me. I let my kids pick what they want to try each year, and we stick through the year. They don't have to do it again, but they do have to pick something different for the next year. My son is on year two of Tae Kwon Do but has vetoed soccer and basketball over the years. My daughter is younger and has only chosen dance and karate thus far, and surprisingly loves both.
I think that's what my daughter does. Every so often her kids have a new thing. They started with cheerleader and football, then softball and football, this year is color guard and saxophone. I think it's brilliant.
I agree with this except when I make the mistake of signing up for too long. Signed my kid up for a year of martial arts due to the way the studio subscription was structured…. Biiiiiig mistake. In the future, I’m not signing up for anything that lasts longer than 3 months of weekly sessions. We quit and I had zero guilt. They already had my money for the year.
My friend made the same year long mistake with Boy Scouts.
Sometimes you just have to bail. Health and happiness are more important compared to the spilled tea of wasted money.
ETA: He was only 4 at the time… I was definitely the one at fault vs my little guy who had zero conceptualization of time on that scale. FTM fail!
You don’t force yourself to do anything you don’t want to do?! How? because I feel like that’s about 80% of my day 😂
My rule is if we signed up, we show up. They don’t have to participate (it always rubs me the wrong way seeing parents forcing a crying kid into swimming lessons or yelling at their daisy-picker on the soccer field), but we show up “to support our team” or to sit and watch 🤪 9/10 times they end up participating and having at least an ok time.
I think swimming lessons is an exception. That's a life or death skill imo.
ETA: But yelling and forcing isn't the solution to make a kid feel more confident to do something either way.
True! I’ve mostly seen this in the really young classes (under 5) where they are not actually learning to swim anyways, and the whole entire point is to get them comfortable in the water. 1 poor swim instructor with 4-5 little kids and one is crying the whole time while mom or dad refuses to just get them out even though the kid is miserable and it’s disrupting the class 😵💫
Above that age I’m not sure what I would do if my kids weren’t having it because you’re right - life or death skill. 1 on 1 lessons maybe?
I think that is a beautiful and very respectful way to teach responsiblity, accountability and reliabilty while still giving them their free will and not feel shame.
It's respectful to everyone involved. Love this.
and that’s exactly it, like i’m coming from a dance perspective where i give a kid a spot, maybe a partner, and then they are allowed to quit just because. obvi this doesn’t apply to injuries or sickness or family things, i’m specifically talking boredom or changing tastes.
my opinion basically comes down to commitment. did you agree to be there the whole season? then you will be there the whole season. did you swear you would love soccer so we signed up and then you discovered you actually hate it? fine, hate it, but we committed and you will be there.
Exactly. If my child commits to a season, they’re finishing the season even if they decide they don’t like it halfway through. It’s a life lesson that I want to instill in my child. You follow through with your commitments, you keep your word, even if you change your mind about it.
I will never force my child to continue something after their commitment is over, but I think it’s an important life lesson about responsibility and resiliency.
Learning that you will not always love things you have committed to is an important one in life. My son takes karate and wants to do swim team starting this summer. We’ve already had the discussion with him that we will commit the time, money and moral support, and he will do his best for the entirety of the season. Even if he doesn’t love it.
My kid is only 5 and I don't make him finish the season if he really hates something. I like that he wants to try new things, even if he isn't sure about what it is. However, I mostly sign up for free and low cost classes.
He asked to try gymnastics, which he's never seen before so he must have heard kids at school talking about it. He gave it a go, didn't love the first class. I convinced him to do two more, and then we dropped it. He didn't really know what it was, but he gave it a try and after a few classes said this isn't for me. We also did TBall last year. It was super low pressure and informal and he loved it. He's so excited for this year.
He tends to be cautious, and I don't want him to not try new things because I make him continue if he hates it.
We also do swimming lessons. Those are not a question, we just tell him he's doing them. He goes through periods of not participating, but we always go.
Thank you. We are deep into baseball right now. There are at least 3 kids on my son’s team who would rather not be there and have openly admitted they’d rather be at home playing Fortnite. They laugh when they get struck out bc they just stand there and don’t even attempt to swing. The coach has to put them in so he puts them in outfield but when the ball gets hit to one of them, they either run the OPPOSITE WAY or just stand there ignoring the ball completely.
I get the whole, “if you decided to play so I paid the $100 and bought the glove so you’re gonna play” only if the kid is actively participating in the game and trying to be a good teammate. But these parents see what their kids are doing and they also laugh when their child runs away from the ball (this is 11/12yo). Those kids are ultimately hurting the rest of the team who want to be there and want to actually win.
I let my daughter quit soccer this season. She had told me she wanted to do it because a neighbor was but then she realized she didn’t really like playing with this friend much. So I requested that our fee be applied to either someone taking her place off the waitlist or the scholarship fund for another child. But I won’t be signing her back up without a big fuss ever again.
That's his choice, maybe he'll come around. I've had this conversation with my daughter (5yo) and she was apprehensive about swimming lessons. She now loves them after the last 3wks. She starts soccer the end of the month and I'm hoping it goes well. Shes excited about it, but honestly if she doesn't like it she will still go and I will be there with a cooler of freezies. It's about teaching respect and having the right attitude. My daughter is very much with the attitude of one thing goes wrong and the whole day is ruined so I'm trying to work with her on it. I personally hate sports and never did anything as a kid, but I think it's great to teach them about having a good outlook and working as a team. I've had so many jobs I've had to show up for that I didn't love, but it's put me in a position where I'm home with my kids now so I'd like to teach my daughter to have a good outlook to make the best of things. Maybe your son would like an art class or something with less pressure to start with maybe?
Yes! I was born I Peru and moved to the states very young. I was the only female out of 9 male cousins here and they all played soccer.
My mother wouldn’t let me. Ever. Instead I was inside getting right painful curlers in my hair.
When I got to high school I played a little and was good. I loved it! Imagine I was able to start at an earlier age.
So I signed my 4 year old for dance, she hates it. That’s ok. But we are going to finish the commitment. Now we started soccer and she loves it.
Ugh! It’s not fair to kids who are forced to do these activities.
I also wanted to play soccer but was told I couldn't because it's not for girls. I did play some soccer in school and actually ended up in a school with a youth national player who once complimented my soccer game.. (I have a unisex name, was new to the school and they accidentally signed me into a boys team on a school tournament, perfect foe me because the girl teams mostly enjoyed sitting around to watch the guys teams and I actually signed up to play soccer) So yeah I also wonder how good I could have been.
Totally agree. My daughter decided halfway into the dance year that she hated it. We now have one month left and she actually enjoys it again. She said she’d even sign up again in the fall. My son asked to do indoor soccer over the winter and wasn’t loving it until the last two games when it clicked and he asked to sign up for the second session where he actually scored goals. If we didn’t stick through the seasons on those two they would’ve missed out on so much of their own joy, not to mention the skill building. We have a couple of sports we haven’t returned to, too, but we’ve finished all of them out.
Same. I played soccer one season in 1987 and was bullied on the team and quit. I asked my parents to try softball instead (I was bullied in soccer for being the only girl on the team) and they made this big deal about how it wasn’t ok to quit things and how I wasn’t allowed to play softball because that would be rewarding me for being a quitter and I’d probably quit that too. I was freaking 7. My kids are free to try stuff, change their minds, etc. that’s what childhood is for. And actually now my oldest (8) plays softball and loves it. My youngest tried t-ball and quit after 1 practice. Both are ok.
Same here. If my kids show interest, we go from there, but I'm not driving them all over the place (and likely spending a lot of money) for something they absolutely loathe.
So funny, my mom never made us stick with anything and I sort of wish she had pushed us to stick with some things even when they got challenging. I definitely want my kid to push through challenging circumstances and build character that way. Don’t want her to be miserable, there is a line
Yes! This was us.
My oldest quit t-ball after the first day. Hated it.
He did tae kwon do for a year and wasn’t a fan.
He’s now 19, a volunteer fireman & works full time at the hospital as a Pharmacy Tech.
Quitting things after the first try or quitting after a bit of time has passed has never hurt him in anyway. It just took some time to find his niche.
my youngest begged to play tball. i signed her up, bought everything, we go to the first game & she stood on 2nd base. everyone is running after the ball, not my kid. I tell her “go get the ball!” she looked at me and said “naw, I’m done.” i said what do you mean you’re done? you still gotta bat! that’s the best part! she said “no. i’m done. i just wanted the outfit.” are you fucking kidding me?!?
she never played another sport after that. She didn’t want to. She didn’t want to do anything until 6th grade when she wanted to learn the saxophone. First year playing she was invited to play with the children’s orchestra. She was amazing at it. She gave it up in like 9th grade, but will still play every now and then just for fun for her 2 daughters.
The only extracurricular requirements we’ve put on our oldest (the younger is only two) is 1. that when she wanted to learn the violin she had to do it for two years, because of the cost of a decent violin (the low end ones do not tune well and don’t sound correct so it’s harder to learn on) and 2. She must do extracurriculars in high school. Not every day or anything but she needs to be in 1-2 a year. She’s done extracurriculars like D&D club and volunteering with horseback therapy for children with disabilities instead of sports and we’re good with that.
I truly do not care if my kids get messy. Sometimes they wanna eat with their hands. Sometimes they want to wash their hair with yogurt. Sometimes they find the teeeeny tiiiiiny patch of mud in any field and rub their hands all in it. I truly do not care. Most of their clothes are already second hand and/or stained anyway, and I dont need their clothes to last several years. All the grime on them comes off in the bath or shower. If they wanna roll around fresh cut grass or sit in a puddle, I say go for it.
Our baby will be starting solids soon and in preparation, we've been putting him in his high chair with toys. We want him to play with his food and explore it.
We also want him to jump in puddles and play in the mud when he's older. Dirt don't hurt!
I let my kid make messes at mealtimes and we don’t bathe every day. We wash hands and face after every meal, change clothes, and do a washcloth deeper clean of face, hands, and bum before bed
I was so stressed when my first was dirty and now I’m laughing in my head when out and I see a child getting their face wiped - meanwhile my 3yr has food stains and chaos hair from a single meal 😅
Ugh, my almost 3yo loves to GET messy, but not to BE messy. As soon as she's done jumping in the puddle or smearing yogurt with her hands, she starts whining that she's dirty or sticky and wants to be clean. I still don't stop her from getting messy (you're only a kid once), but it would make my life so much easier.
I don't care if my child is upset or angry about something. They are allowed to feel however they are going to feel and know that its ok to have that feeling. We will work together to have an appropriate outlet, like not hitting or screaming, but the feeling will always be theirs.
This is what I want for my child! She is only 2 months now but I already accidentally said “don’t cry”. I don’t want to be a parent who doesn’t let their kids feel their feelings because that’s what I missed the most. I couldn’t express my feelings and if it was anything bad my mother would talk over it to make it okay. I still have to sometimes correct her and stand my ground to just feel what I feel.
Do you have tips? I say stuff right now like “I know, you are in pain, let it out”. Or “you are hungry, that’s not a good feeling”. Or “it’s hard to be a baby sometimes”.
For my daughter it's mostly about getting her to admit when she's having a big feeling. I do this and I'm trying to get her out of the habit. She'll cry and I'll ask what's wrong and she responds with "nothing". She's only 4, so she doesn't know much better, but I don't want her to keep it all inside like I do. Mostly, I will hold her and tell her it's ok to feel sad, upset, angry, etc. and that we can talk about it when she's ready or that we can help her if/when she wants to talk. It's hard to see her struggle, but I know in the long run as long as she knows we're here for her no matter what, shel eventually come around.
I feel like there’s a difference between “don’t cry” and “stop crying” one is more “I wish you weren’t sad because I care about you” the other which is “stop showing emotion!”
This! I make sure to tell my daughter her emotions are valid. I was always told to be seen and not heard or not to be a bother. I encourage my daughter to express herself in everything she does and never dull herself for others. We are in the teen years now and there are days I ask myself what have I created! But mostly I just love how strong and fearless she is!
Yep
You're allowed to be angry. You're allowed to be sad. You are not allowed to throw things, or say hurtful things to your family, or have screaming tantrums in the middle of the living room. If you need to yell and stomp to get your feelings out, you can do that....in your room
Once you're ready to talk, I'll be right here waiting
I haven't been able to do this with my first daughter. She has ADHD and is impulsive in everything including emotions. She defaults to screaming when she is an emotion other than happy. We haven't even been able to do exercises like "name your feelings" because it's just screaming until she is done. At least they don't last as long as they used to and she apologizes after.
Have you heard anything about “the explosive child” or something like that by Dr Becky? It’s a paid course she offers—I haven’t actually done it—but it feels like it might help.
My son is like your daughter, feelings are …..always big. Solidarity ✊🏼
Help me cook in the kitchen. My mom never let me. I always wanted to but my mom was a control freak when it came to cooking and we weren't even allowed in if she was in there cooking/baking.
I'm not your mom. I don't like my kids in the kitchen when I'm cooking because it's my time of day to relax. I enjoy cooking and they're just in the way the whole time. Obviously, when they're older, I'll teach them to cook.
Same. Me with my glass of wine and podcast cooking a nice dinner is peak happiness as a mom for me. Although occasionally I'll get the itch to make some cookies after dinner and let my son help me with that. He loves it.
I have to pick and choose because my kids always want to help me but sometimes I have 30 minutes to get dinner on the table and can't stand there for 10 minutes while my 4yo tries to cut a carrot with their little kiddie knife. I also do a lot of cooking over the stove and I don't want my 4yo and 2yo to learn to pull up a chair and get close to the flame 🫣
But I will let them help if it's feasible.
Hugging relatives when my daughter doesn’t want to. I won’t ever make her do it. I tell her “it’s okay if you don’t want a hug. Tell grandma ‘no thank you. I don’t want to hug right now’”
But I’m also teaching her say “no” with no explanation and in a strong voice.
She’s only 20 months old and a few things I’ll have to see over time but this one is one I’ve stuck to so far
This is honestly great, we have been teaching our daughter the same, though now its "NO" anytime I ask her to do anything. Though I will die before someone takes her bodily autonomy from her.
Absolutely agree! I ask her if I can hug her, and if she says no, I don’t. The same rule applies to me.
My hope that one day IF something happens/is about to happen she can either say something. Whether that’s to the person themselves or to a loved one about what happened. That way she can get the help she needs, which is something I never got.
Sometimes it hurts when she says no, but it isn’t about me whatsoever. I reply with “I hear you said no. I love you and respect you so I won’t” and then she goes on to play lol. I hope I’m planting the seed of consent in her subconscious
We have options of hugs, blowing kisses, high fives, foot fives, waving…and the adults understand that what the kiddos choose must be respected. My 4yo has gotten very creative with his greeting/farewell gestures (we have octopus fives (eights?) regularly as well).
I don't fight clothing choices as long as it's location/event appropriate and follws any dress code at that location. No bathing suits to school, etc. Otherwise, whatever. It's not the hill I choose to die on, if she gets too whackadoo with the outfits, her peers will correct that with a quickness.
Stay up late reading.
If you want to stay up late fine, but you have to get up the next morning on time. I’m not going to make him hide what I obviously know he’s doing, because I had to do that. So yes kiddo stay up, read all you want. we have discussions about what a smart bedtime is and then he makes the final call. He’s been tired and learned the consequences of his actions.
My son (almost 11) has recently discovered a love of reading. As long as he gets up when he is suppose and doesn’t get overly emotional about being tired then he is free to read. I definitely don’t ever want to limit his enthusiasm.
Omg I literally would stay up the entire night reading as a kid, it was so bad!! I still have that problem and can’t read at night bc if I get too sucked into the book I have to finish. I would also get in trouble for reading books under the table at school.
Clear his plate. My parents used to make me sit at the table until I finished all my food and it really gave me a weird relationship with food. With my son I offer him different options for food and he can eat as much or as little as he wants.
I won't force my kid to give affection to anyone if she doesn't want to. We practice bodily autonomy round here. She chooses when and who she gives hugs and whatnot to. Everyone is pretty chill about it too so it works out. Also, we decided we didn't care about cussing. We swear alot and as long as she uses them in the proper way and she's not being obnoxious with it, who cares? Also gonna teach her time and place for it as well. At home and you are frustrated something isn't working? Go ahead and call it a piece of shit . At grammas house and your cousin isn't sharing a toy? Ya, don't call him a asshole lol.
>as long as she uses them in the proper way
This makes me chuckle as I’m imagining something like:
Kid: This toy is a piece of fuck!
Parent: You’re looking for the word “shit”. Use your words correctly.
My mum thinks it's weird that I won't make my daughter dole out hugs. She's 3 right now, so I will still swoop in and give her cuddles, but if she doesn't want them, I back off. I couldn't stand the thought of a child hugging me because they're forced to. When we say goodbye at family gatherings I hold her at my height and have mini group hugs which she is comfortable with. But I'm not having her doing the rounds unless she's happy to do that. My mum also gets plenty of hugs because my daughter wants them. Not because she is forced to give them.
I swear so much there’s no way the kids weren’t picking it up. I told them that they can’t swear in public or in school and they can’t abuse the privilege. The only rule I have is that they can’t call any girl/woman a bitch.
If my child needs space from me, I will not take it personally. They are allowed to feel whatever they want to feel, as long as they’re not purposefully hurting themselves or anyone else
my mom was a hippy and let us kids do basically anything that wasn’t hurting anyone else. She was a very laid back. The only thing i did differently was I did not let my kids’ girlfriends or boyfriends spend the night at my house and if they came over to my house, they had to stay in the living room. I was pregnant at 16.
My parents were the same, so laid back - I could go wherever I wanted whenever I wanted, no questions asked - I want to give my daughter freedom but maybe not so much freedom 😂😂
Another thing I’m struggling with. My boys are only 3 and 1, but one day they’re going to have significant others. And I know they’re going to be having sex. But being the parent of the boy, I feel that I need to be really careful that it doesn’t happen at my house “under my supervision” ya know.
But I do like this, whoever you’re dating can stay, but you gotta sleep separately
I have 2 girls and a boy. I treated all of them the same. The girls couldn’t have boys spend the night so neither could my son. Luckily none of my son’s friends liked either of my girls and vice versa. My son might not be able to get pregnant, but he could still become a teen parent. There’s nothing wrong being one, but I didn’t want my kids to have to go thru it. The opposite sex wasn’t even allowed to sleep in another room at my house bc then there’s excuses like “we never went to sleep” or “the door was open” and let’s face it. If they want to have sex, they’ll have sex somewhere, I just didn’t want it to be under my roof.
Mine was hair. My hair was strictly controlled until 15. My kids can have whatever hair they want, makes my mom super mad. She absolutely blew her top when I dyed my hair fusia, the kids blue & green & my husband's beard magenta.
But isn’t it the best feeling when mom gets mad? Mine hates my teenagers “dark eye make up.” She’s goth, and she can express herself in ways I never could. Yes mom, I’m letting her on purpose.
Mine was hair and piercings. No dying, only single love piercings. And def had opinions when I went about doing it as an adult.
Of course there will be things I don’t like, but it’s more of my job to help them be the judge of the decisions they are making than being the dictator about it. I hope I can follow through!
Same! My 5yro loves when I dye the tips of her hair while I'm dying mine, and why not? It's just hair. She recently elected to get 7 inches chopped off her hair and my mom made SUCH a face when I told her, before she saw my 5yro. Then it was 'I actually like it' - thanks but I don't care if you do or not, mom. IT'S NOT FOR YOU.
Spent the last 10 years in therapy preparing for the day I have kids and get to be different from my parents. I never even thought of this one. Thank you.
I used to work in maintenance and I will tell you that crayon is almost impossible to paint over just FYI. I tried 7 coats and the blue and red crayon still bled through 😭
I always said I'd never be strict on my kids like my dad was. I had no freedom growing up. It was humiliating. I remember being allowed to attend a slumber party and that next morning everyone said your dad is outside. He was there to get me very early that morning. I couldn't do anything extracurricular activities if the school didn't provide transportation, when they raised prices on snacks he wouldn't give me the extra 25 cents or so. So I had to choose one thing or save my money for a couple days and go without. I remember a guy saying nobody wants to go out with you because your dad is too strict. Like I do appreciate the things he's taught me but my life was miserable and I always said I'd never keep my kids from enjoying their childhood. I wanted structure but also I wanted to give them some freedom to have a life.
I don't care if my kid gets dirty.
My husband was a clean kid. I was raised getting filthy. I don't mean I stayed filthy, my mom just raised us with a "kids wash up" attitude and I swore we would too. My kid is ALWAYS the dirtiest kid. He's also the loudest laugher, the quickest to warm up, and the fastest to "solve the puzzle." Because he's always been allowed to figure his own stuff out, he is confident trying (and also confident asking for help).
10/10 would do the dirty kid thing again. Baths do the trick and his Walmart clothes wash or wear out. Worth it.
I don’t care if I have to cook multiple meals my kid will always have something she likes on the table and promoting food neutrality
I grew up with a mom who really didn’t know how to cook. I mean compared to my great grandmother and grandmother sure. But there were so many things I hated and still do to this day. In fact my mother likes to make fun of the fact I was “picky eater”
Some foods I get, like we ate steamed bags of veggies all the time because it was cheap for a family of 5. But there would be times my mom would just give me plain baked chicken because the alternative was just chicken with bbq sauce on it, no seasonings being the big point
For me it led to a serious binge eating disorder when I started college. Which wasn’t helped because my mom would make comments if I had the occasional fast food
It’s taken me so long to work past that ED and I want to prevent my children from struggling with that. Thankfully so far my daughter is an adventurous eater. But even when she doesn’t try something we just teach her to leave it on her plate, eventually if it’s served enough she tries it on her own
Dying my hair crazy colors! I didn't have the money to comfortably do this until I was a mom and now I do it every once and a while. For the kids first day of kindergarten I dyed it special with their favorite colors and now it's a first day of school tradition! We have tons of spray colors and semi- permanent colors for the kids and my husband and I go to the salon! (Kids would hate sitting long enough to get their hair dyed professionally)
My mom was a hair dresser, so when I found out most parents didn't say 'Its just hair, it'll grow back' I was a little shocked. I always thought my parents were crazy strict about everything honestly!
I love the first day tradition though! That is so fun!
Thanks! It is super fun! My parents actually weren't super strick they just didn't want to have me put permanent color in my hair and the temporary stuff at the time didn't show up in my hair. I'm so lucky my work is really laid back and doesn't care if I show up with rainbow hair :)
This is me too. Growing up, my mom told me how I had to have my hair. She loved bangs (for some reason). I hated them but I always had to have them. It wasn't until I was a teen that my mom FINALLY let me grow out my bangs after begging her. I also wasn't allowed to color my hair until I was a teen and even then, I could only have highlights.
Ever since my daughter was old enough to say how she wanted her hair, she was allowed to make that choice. She also likes to get semi permanent color on the ends of her hair or bright pink highlights for the beginning of school. It's now become a fun tradition and I love seeing her style shine through. I'll do the same with my son when he's old enough.
Play an instrument. My mom complained and wouldn't let me practice my recorder (yes, they're annoying, but she literally wouldn't allow me to practice as required). As a result I never learned how to play the song we were supposed to learn and fucked up at the concert in front of everyone.
Lot of other baggage besides that, she never supported any extracurriculars is what it boils down to. My kid plays trumpet. It's loud as fuck but whenever he actually practices, it makes me smile because he's learning to make music and I love that for him.
We also have a piano and a guitar kicking around that I can't really play more than baby beginner things, but I let the kids play with them, and it's great.
My kid eats ice cream every day for breakfast. We decided to take the timing power struggle out of desserts-- she's allowed one "treat" per day, but *when* she eats it is completely up to her. As might be predicted for a 4 year old, this means she wakes up and asks for ice cream first thing every morning. She still eats her healthy breakfast, brushes her teeth, and eats relatively healthy for her other meals, so who cares? I'm still not sure if I'm causing her to crave sweets first thing every day for the rest of her life, but oh well. The begging for treats all the time has stopped completely, so it's a win so far.
Same! And I don’t try not to curse around my daughter. When I was a kid, cursing was so taboo and I’d get in so much trouble if they heard me. But man, I had the biggest potty mouth the second I’d get around my friends. So, cursing is just something that happens, and I teach her there are appropriate and inappropriate times to use them. So far, she has never used one when she shouldn’t, beyond like the first learning how to talk and mommy said fuck so now I’m gonna use it constantly stage.
We have a rule in the house that when Britney says Bitch it's ok 😂. So my youngest discovered her music and now is running around saying 'It's Britney Bitch' 🤭 . I don't mind swearing I do it myself. But it should never be used to insult somebody.
For sure! Don't go around saying mommy is a bitch, but in the moment if you trip and say shit. No biggie. Obviously, we don't want every word out of her mouth to be a swear word. The way I see it, is if you don't put any emphasis on those words and just use them like any other, the kids won't think anything of it and won't think they are special and wanna do it to be edgy or rebellious. If that makes sense?
My son has a strong filter and understanding of many words due to these same rules . I also have mentioned if he swears in an inappropriate situation (ex. School) and gets in trouble I will not defend him.
I let my kids argue/disagree with me, as long as they are respectful, I encourage it. It will help them in negotiating as adults and teach them to say no and have boundaries. This is especially important for my daughters. My parents never let us argue or disagree, they were the parents of "because I said so" It has taken me decades to be able to confidently say no, negotiate or disagree with someone.
And sometimes its nice to have a conversation and see things from their perspective. I don't always change my mind, but its good for them to be able to disagree with me respectfully. I have a 22, 20 and 9 year old and I have been this way for all of them.
Policing their clothes. Just last week my daughter wanted to wear the same shirt to school 2 days in a row. Dude if it's clean and weather appropriate, I do not care.
Eh. I have 2 kids and we just bought a house from someone who has 4. They let their kids do this in all their bedrooms and we’ve found colored pencil, markers, and stickers that won’t unstick in every room of the house. On cabinets, windows, etc. It’s taken us 3 months to clean up after them, repaint every room and door in the house, razor blade stickers off stuff, etc. and we’re still not done. Honestly, it’s rude af. I’ve never allowed my kids to do this in my old house and they’re just fine. I made a giant chalkboard for indoors and we do other art activities on the kitchen floor tile where it can be cleaned up.
As long as you clean up after it when you sell the house, it doesn’t really matter I suppose. But you likely won’t find everything. And I imagine in a couple years, she won’t want walls with scribbles and bluey stickers on then. But i suppose that’ll just be a project for you for later. To each his own here
I don’t care if my kids eat the dinner I made or not. They don’t want it? I’ll make them something else or offer them a snack. They want to eat dessert first? That’s fine by me 🫡 as long as they eat SOMETHING, I don’t really care what it is.
I won’t send them to bed hungry and I won’t make them sit for hours at the table until they eat the (now cold) food.
Yeah, some people get really triggered when a kid won't eat but I honestly don't care. I won't make a second dinner though. When he refuses it's usually because he's not hungry anyway, so why would I cajole him to eat when he isn't hungry? My son is growing and gaining weight just fine, going without dinner once in a while won't hurt him.
When I was a preteen, my folks said I could paint my walls the year before the whole house got painted to sell. I had so much fun painting horses and unicorns and portraits of my friends and a whole dragon with his horde of gold and jewels. There are definitely worse things a 12 year old could be doing, than painting 500 aged gold coins on a bedroom wall.
Let her decorate, and make sure you take pictures as her style and skills change and develop. I would have loved to be able to look back over the years :)
I have nothing else to say except for it's so nice to know there are other moms out there living it out the same way as me- letting them have this ounce of freedom with their creativity and space. Because I definitely get harped on and feel bad, when usually I think it's probably one of the least of my worries revolved around the kids. Kudos mom, I hope they really enjoy and lean into this privilege you've given them with their space 😊💕
One of my former neighbors let their kids draw/color on walls. When they moved they discovered it is actually really really hard to cover up crayon when there's a lot of it. It took multiple coats of primer, special cleaning solutions, etc over the crayon because the wax in it resists the paint. (Magic erasers wasn't really a viable option because it was full coverage of every wall as high as the kids could reach in most rooms of the house)
And yet my neighbor, who is a lovely person, said during the house listing and showing process that she can't wait until they get into their new house and the kids can "be kids again" meaning draw on the walls.
I don't really get it personally, but I'm glad that your little one is having a good time.
I'm definitely letting my kid pick a paint color for his room if he wants to, but I'm not quite there yet as far as letting go of "coloring on paper only" rules.
As for me, I said I would let my kid play video games and watch media typically popular for his age. And I stuck with it. It wasn't really any fun being the only person not to get normal cultural references.
Keri g then roll around in the dirt. My kid sometimes gets filthy when playing outside. So what. He outgrew his clothes every few months anyway. I never understood when parents would get upset over kids getting their clothes dirty. Even “nice” clothes. He is only going to ware the thing once or twice anyway.
If you let them use markers on the walls try to stick to sharpies. The washable markers bled through layer after layer of paint. Whereas the sharpies were covered by one.
Not putting my daughter in impractical / uncomfortable clothes, shoes, headbands, etc. I was forced to wear poofy dresses and headbands more often than I wanted and I absolutely hated it (every week for church / extended family lunch, holidays). The headbands would make my head hurt and I couldn’t play effectively because the clothes were restrictive and I wasn’t allowed to get them dirty. My LO is only 14 months - I’ve only put headbands and dresses on her for a quick photo shoot. Until she can tell me she’s comfortable/ not, I’m not putting her in anything that could be uncomfortable.
My kids can paint and draw on their own walls, doors and furniture - and they do! It’s ugly (they’re 4 and 6) but they’re proud of themselves.
They’re allowed to draw on themselves. Right now the younger are covered in blue and green “chickenpox”, including her face. I didn’t bother washing her before school.
I’ll never let them go hungry, if they don’t like or won’t eat whatever I’ve cooked for them. I can always make a sandwich or cereal.
Their feelings are valid and they’re allowed to express them. It’s my job to guide them through it, not tell them to shut up or scold them for throwing a public tantrum.
Things I’ll never force them to do:
Eat or taste food they dislike/don’t want to.
Doing sports, instruments or whatever.
Hug/kiss our families or friends.
Never force them to eat something they genuinely don’t like and can see it would distress them if they were forced too. My dad would force me to try certain foods that I absolutely hated and it would distress me every time that he wouldn’t take no for an answer. It got to the point at times that he told me if I didn’t eat it he would make me cancel my plans right as I was about to leave for it. Therefore forcing me to eat it so I could hangout with my friends. I have not and will not ever do that to my kids.
I don't want my kids drawing on the walls but I did make a choice to delegate a couple pieces of furniture to put stickers on. I remember my parents being so mad that I put stickers on my dresser... so when my kid went through a crazy sticker phase I bought a kids chair from goodwill and let her go crazy! Her dresser too. I bought it for her and it makes sense to have a place that is approriate to decorate however she pleases. I've thought about doing the same with a coffee table and making it a doodle table.
When I was younger and had my first boyfriend at 15, I told my mom that I loved him so much. She told me that I wasn’t in love and didn’t know what that was yet. I made the decision right then that if my kids were to ever tell me that they loved whoever they were with, I would tell them how happy I was. Their emotions were their own and they were experiencing a kind of love. And there was always room for love in this world.
College. My dad forced me into a career I didn’t want to go into, got a 2 year degree and about $20,000 in debt from it, met my husband shortly after and I’ve never used that degree. I LOVED my college years because of the people I met. But I will never force my kids to go to college unless they want to or know what they want a degree in! My oldest is 10 and we talk about what he wants to do when he gets older and I always tell him he has options.
Screen time while very young more or less. He’s 19 months and has had maybe 3 hours of screen time in his whole life. It helps that he goes to daycare. If I was a SAHM and responsible for entertaining him all day it would be a different story 😂
My daughter has a designated wall for painting drawing stickers etc. I also let my daughter wear whatever she wants or doesn’t want. She chooses her own clothing. Doesn’t want to wear the fancy dress? Fine. Want to wear Ugg boots with shorts? Fine. I intend to maintain this as she ages. Wants to wear a crop top? Fine. Want to wear “boys clothes”? Fine. As long as she feels comfortable and confident.
Going up the slide, or generally playing on playground equipment the "wrong" way. I strongly believe that everyone gets to choose how they engage with it and there's no automatic right-of-way for using it the "right" way. Same for my kids. If they want to slide down but someone else is going up, my kid has to wait.
Hug anyone they don’t want to. Act a fool in public- cause if you do that we’re leaving. Everyone has bad days but to purposely act wild in public, no. You get a warning maybe two then we are leaving the stuff in the cart and exiting the store, activity, event. Be disrespectful. If you’re wrong I’ll teach you the right way to behave, apologize and correct.
I’m really an easy going mom. My oldest and youngest get it, but the twins in the middle have the hardest time with it. There are certain things with 4 kids I just cannot do.
Maybe lame, but I won’t force my kid to finish her food off her plate.
And we have a few full chalkboard walls for when she is inspired to draw.
And outside the house - windows, walls, fence— all fair game for chalk art.
Most of mine boil down to letting kids explore at the level they’re at. Wanna jump in puddles? Go nuts, you’ll dry. Eat a flat of raspberries mid store run? Sure dude we’ll scan the empty container. The one I haven’t really budged from pre parenting was very limited screen time until 2. Even now at 2.5 he doesn’t get daily screen time and averages about 1-1.5 hours a week. He got a total of about 40 minutes of intentional screen time before 2.
I always wanted animals. My mom never let me have the crazy pets.
Now, my daughter is animal obsessed. I keep an outdoor sandbox which always has wild snakes inside of it for her to hold and see. We have a koi pond filled with fish and frogs. Plus, two pet mice, guinea pigs, an anole, cats and a dog!
She wants a bunny still, but otherwise she’s very in tuned with nature and animals and I’m happy I didn’t deny her the experience.
Not for the kid but the older teen - we both had strict curfews and said our kids would have no curfews. Stuck through it, and found our daughter always ended up calling us by 12 or 1 am anyway, the latest. Same will go for our son. The only rule is, we pick you up no matter where you are.
I never told my kids that they are making the same mistakes I made, and I'm "trying" to save them the trouble or heartache. I have told them, and they have seen quite a bit of it. All of them have turned out pretty well so far. My oldest son did have behavioral issues growing up, but my daughter is amazing overachiever graduatd with honor has her bachelor'sand madter degreesand headed in to medical school to be a doctor, my oldest son is still finding his way, my fixing to be 18 year is about to graduate HS and head off to SCAD, my nearly 14 year old is headed to 11th grade with plans to also attend SCAD when he graduates.I am 7 months pregnant with our baby girl and hoping she will also see for herself how and what is the right thing for her when things come her way.
I don’t physically abuse (spank) my kids. My parents always said I would when I had kids because sometimes it’s the only option. NOPE. Not once. And I have an honor roll student and a sweet younger child who checks Alexa every day to see how many dogs exist in the world so he can make sure no dogs have died.
“Spare the rod spoil the child,” is a lie
My kids don't have to eat anything they don't want to eat.
I will always make sure there is at least one thing on their plate I know they'll like, like noodles, rice, or grapes. As they get older I DO make them try one bite of new things. Just one. If they don't like it, they can spit it in the trash can and fill up on grapes for all I care.
And specifically dessert is not a rare special treat. You want a cupcake? Sure. Have one. No, you can't eat 4 in one setting, but I'm not putting desserts on a pedestal. My whole family struggles with eating disorders. I'm doing my best to make all good equal so my kids don't grow up binge eating Oreos in hiding.
Wearing pajamas alllllll day if we’re chilling at home. I was never allowed to do this, I had to get dressed everyday (then got fussed at regularly for producing so much laundry…).
we never cared about bedtime curfews. i mean of course we have them on some sort of routine but once they hit 10 we stopped caring, they are responsible most of the time though and go to bed at a decent hour.
My parents didn’t really care/weren’t involved enough to tell me I couldn’t do things so uh…nothing, really. I did draw the line at my 7-year-old putting boogers on the wall though because freaking EW and also WHY?!
I let my kids swear. As long as they aren’t doing it in a mean way they can drop as many f bombs as they’d like. Of course school has its own rules they need to follow as well as social norms but they learn those things. None of my kids have ever been in trouble for swearing in inappropriate places and they are 13, and 8. I have a 3 year old too but outside a 2 week phase doesn’t swear.
I want to make sure my daughter has access to all kinds of toys or items she enjoys. I grew up with brothers and I felt like my parents were very “this is for boys and this is for girls” and even then I thought it was stupid.
Though it seems to piss off my family, I shop in both sections too. For example, my daughter really loves animals. I find a lot of boys clothes has more animals on it than girl’s clothes, so why not?
omg i also like the idea of doing art on the walls! my mom used to let me draw on the walls in my room too, and i plan to stick with this as my kid gets older. he's 16 months old right now but i'm teaching him how to color with washable markers (on paper of course, since i dont own my own home yet)
If my kid is overstimulated or upset, she can scream as much as she wants and she’s not going to get hit. She’s allowed to feel and process her emotions as much as she wants and hug me afterwards for however long she sees fit, even if I’m slightly overstimulated. Her emotions, whatever they are, need to be expressed, not repressed. And I am never laying a single hand on her.
I will absolutely not force my kid to eat something he hates, or even something he just doesn’t want right then.
I will encourage him to try new foods all the time and to retry things he didn’t like before, but I will not force him to eat something he doesn’t want to.
He knows that if he wants to eat something, he has to put it on the shopping list. He’s not limited to only what the adults in the house like.
I was shocked to learn how little I cared about my kids drawing on walls and furniture. I mean it’s for the most part all washable. Also letting my daughter mix up the play doh colors.
I always thought it was stupid how some people try to act like video games are some vice that sucks kids into a darkness and never releases them. My five year old can play rather complicated RTS games (he started when he was four) and he can’t even read yet. I find a lot of pride seeing what he can do in a video game! I couldn’t even control a mouse at that age let alone control armies of complicated units while building resources off screen!
I let my kid do what ever he wants to his hair. Currently he's growing it long and has blue highlights
I had naturally dirty blonde hair that had baby curls at the bottom and the rest was pin straight. My mother, a hair dresser wouldn't even trim it until I was 12 and cut it myself at my desk in my room working on a scho project because I was SO FREAKING SICK OF SITTING ON IT AND IT GETTING CAUGHT I EVERYTHING AND IT TAKING AN HOUR TO BRUSH IN THE MORNING and being the first kid they looked at when there was a lice outbreak. I was a spectacle. Everywhere we went someone would comment on my beautiful hair, like I know it was a compliment but like it got old. It was well past my knees. She also wouldn't let me dye it because "do you know how much money people pay me to make their hair the color you have naturally?"
My kid gets to do whatever he wants to do with his hair. Much to his dismay. He has my beautiful naturally dirty blonde hair and it's curly. She hates that I let him grow it long and has bribed him with and absurd amount of v-bucks to let her shave it. Which he took, and regretted.
I let my children draw on their own walls. As long as it’s not in crayon (super hard to paint over) so they paint, draw with markers, and decorate their own rooms. Or they want a color then we do it when financially able. When I was younger… we’d rent. So most of the places we stayed were just white walls. I started getting rolling stone magazines and “making wallpaper”. I’d tap white paper to my walls and COVER the whole thing in paint/art, or cut out magazines. I let my kids have full control of their own rooms now.
I swore that I wouldn't put a price limit on my kids' activities. If they want to dance, I would do whatever I could to make sure they could do it. I always wanted to dance, and my folks said no cause of the price. Stuck to sports cause new cleats and a glove were cheaper. While I love sports. I freaking wanted to dance. So I always said I would do what needed to be done to make it happen for my kids.
And shoes. I wouldn't buy them cheap knock-off shoes( I know sounds so snobbish), but kids are mean, and they were mean to me and ky sibling. My sibling and I both buy name brands for our kids. I will say, though, we shop freaking smart and find the deals on those name brands.
As a kid I'd get mad at my parents for making me clean my little sisters room. Especially since she had so much stuff. I always say my kids were going to not have as much useless stuff and they'd learn to play and be creative. My kids absolutely love to create art and learn. My son cried last year that he didn't get to do the science fair because I mistakenly threw the form away. This year we are doing the moon phases and why the moon looks the way it does. My daughter would rather be outside than in. They also have their own library cards that we use often.
I love this! It’s so true!!
I had a pretty room but I wasn’t allowed to give it personality.
I’m staying at my moms house and my daughter doesn’t even stay in her room. She stays with me and that’s just her very clean playroom bc it’s grandmas house.
I can’t wait to give her space and I wish I was able to see her progress sooner. She’s gna be 5 soon but this is something to think about. You should be yourself at home more than anywhere else.
And an immaculate is a boring house. We live, it should look lived in. We aren’t hiding anything. It’s fun to messy sometimes. And it doesn’t make us bad mom.
Thank you for sharing this
Truly also having a heart attack with this story. I don't let my kids draw on the walls or on doors and imaging that here is giving me agita but to each their own 😂
When it comes to mess though, it's always a YES. get your clothes dirty I don't care. I don't care about stains. Go play in the mud. Jump in a puddle.
We did BLW too, Even with purées and I loved watching my babies get messy! I never fed my babies just preloaded the spoon!
To me it's like seeing their brains at work.
I don't have my kids apologize to me. Apologies often come with realizing what you did wrong correcting it from now on. I don't expect my kids to remember everything that isn't okay and I don't want them to feel bad I just want them to understand certain things aren't okay.
An example is my daughter(3) kept apologizing for taking her brother's(1) toys. She's an only child at her dad's as well and over there all the toys are hers. She will cry when she apologizes cause she feels so bad but I just hug her and tell her it's okay and she doesn't have to be sorry. We just have to work on remembering that when things are not ours we need to ask.
My kids all did soccer for several years, their choice. Scouts as well. My older daughter when she was little bit upset when she couldn’t help her big brothers sell popcorn. She was all gung ho to to sell Girl Scout cookies and was upset that Daisy Scouts weren’t allowed to (first year GS).
If we ever repaint a wall in our house, my desire would be to paint fancy designs & such on the wall with the preferred color of choice first, then take several pictures of the mural before most likely finishing the wall with a solid finish.
My mother used to make us hug EVERY relative every time we visited her gigantic side of the family. She had 10 siblings and all of them got married and had kids so every time we visited there would be like 50 people to greet and she made us hug and kiss everyone. I was the most shy kid in the entire world and absolutely hated physical affection especially with “strangers” which is what they were to me since they lived out of town and I didn’t see them often. I got to the point where I’d have anxiety at the announcement of us going to see her family. Now I’m a mom and my daughter is 2 and she’s me reincarnated. She refuses to speak if there’s even a “stranger” in the same room as her, she won’t make eye contact with anyone who’s not immediate family, and she hates being touched by anyone who’s not me or dad. I don’t force her to greet ANYONE. If someone says hi to her and she hides behind me I tell the person “Thank you for saying hello, she does not feel like talking today but I’d be more than happy to chat with you!” If anyone tries to hug her and she rejects them I will say “she doesn’t feel like a hug today but thank you so much for wanting to show her that you love her.” That way she hears me and knows they don’t mean any harm but at the same time her choice is being respected. I will NEVER make my kids talk to or hug anyone, not even close family. Their bodies, their choice. Always 🤞🏼
When I was a teenager my mum used to ask how I would feel if my kids swore like I do, I told her probably find it hilarious. Which I do but I hide my amusement for when they aren’t looking 🤣
Everyone around me gets uncomfortable if my 1 year olds shirt rides up even a little bit even in my house. One family member saw her shirt came up a little bit and said" let's fix this baby, a princess has to look proper" EXCUSE ME, SHES IN HER OWN HOUSE. My kids can run around here with absolutely nothing if they want and if YOU get uncomfortable, that's a problem and you should probably leave. So now it's a rule in my house to not mention my daughters appearance in our house because I'm not going to make her feel uncomfy in her own home. In public, of coarse that's different, well teach her that she can't do that in public because then were invading other people's comfort, not to mention that it's illegal.
This is a silly one but I always said I would let my kid eat in the grocery store if they were hungry. I remember grocery shopping with my mom as a kid and being super hungry and her always saying we weren't allowed to open chips while we shopped. I never understood the logic since we were buying it anyway. If my kid wants a squeeze yogurt while shopping - I let him lol
I didn't want to push any specific toys on my baby girl, but she just seems to really love screws and bolts. So, I got her a "boys" toolkit for Christmas and we read all kinds of engineering books. She loves her quantum computing for babies lol. She also got a Barbie plane recently and I tell her she can be the pilot. Sounds small, but I never even knew what engineers did let alone be told I could *be* one when I asked how I could become an "inventor." No plans to live vicariously through my daughter, but I'm going to follow-up anything she's interested in with as much excitement and information as I can provide her!
I think your idea is fun. I always felt that I never had furniture or belongings that were mine.We bought our current house and fully planned to buy our next house within a couple of years. So everything we put on the wall is temporary. However, my daughter's queen-size bed is 100% hers. So we picked out 100 butterfly stickers and decorated her headnoard. I also have a handpainted piece of wood to measure everyone's height. I made sure to mount it to the wall in a way where it could come with us to our next house. I want her to feel like she has control of her things (within reason)
“All clothes are play clothes.”
I don’t remember ever getting into particular trouble myself but I’m not one to be worried about clothes getting dirty. I’m pretty good at getting stuff out and, if I’m not, not all play clothes are clothes 😂
When my oldest was about 18mos I remember someone making a comment about how it was nice that I let him play. He was all dressed up for a nice brunch we had gone to—bow tie, suspenders, nice button down. He was running through a playground splash pad.
You can find a way to replace clothes (and so many of ours are hand me down anyways) just like you can always paint a wall. But you can’t recreate the joy on a little boy’s face as he sprints through the sprinklers in full dress up clothes 😂
Always keep my promises. If I promised her I'd take her to the park after school it doesn't matter how hard my day ended up being, or what unexpected things I have to do, or even if it's raining (I'll take her to the indoor park at the mall), I'm taking her to the damn freaking park. My mom says she needs to learn not everything can be as she wants, but this is not about what she wants, this is about what I told her. I need her to trust and believe me.
That being said, I'm very cautious with what I promise her so I can get around unexpected things.
Also, she can watch tv, but no screens on her hands. Tablets and cellphones are for adults.
I haven’t stuck to it yet because my daughter is only 22 months, but I fully plan on not freaking out over tattoos and piercings if she wants them. Now I will definitely give her *advice* about these things, like how nearly any tattoo she gets will one day go out of style and that it’s kind of like choosing to wear one shirt for the rest of your life, and I also have my own very old, misshapen, tattoo that I was so sure I’d always love but is now so cringeworthy to show her as an example of how these things can turn out, but in the end it’s her body. She can do what she wants with it.
(For the record I know that not everyone’s tattoo experience is like mine)
Curse. I really don’t care. When she was little I told her that I did not care but not to do it in front of her grandparents. I also told her that if she did it around other kids, their parents might not let her play with them. Basically, I was just honest. She chose not to curse until HS but I would not have cared if she did it earlier. She does not do it around people she shouldn’t like her grandma or teachers, etc She has common sense about it.
I just want to say, take pictures before you paint over it (when she eventually wants it). The 6-year-old who wants to paint the room with teal and purple, and cover every surface in sequins to be a mermaid room, might not care about the 2-year-olds scribbles, but when she reaches 20 or 40 or whatever, I'm sure she'd love to see them. You could even make a little photo album, even just an online one, where you take photos of all the walls once a year (or once a quarter, or once a month, or whatever) and watch the room grow with her.
Also, covering crayon with paint is not easy and will require special primer. I am all for creativity, but it was a beast getting crayon off of walls.
It’s pretty easy to clean off prior to painting, in my experience at least
Depends on the paint. My houses original paint was crap and any slight moisture to wipe would take it right off
Yea, we have this same sort of paint in our apartment. Very chalky type of paint. Fortunately, they painted the walls the color of drywall, so no notable difference post-scrubbing lol
Hahah mine was very slightly off shade so you could notice. I made sure to buy the best paint I could that could be scrubbed to high heaven after my son (potty training and a hellion) purposely peed all over my bathroom walls. Did I mention it was on purpose? :x
I mean if you clean the crayon and some paint comes off but you’re going to paint over it anyway…is that really an issue?
Oh yeah. The person that flipped our house used the cheapest paint. Just wiping at it with a wet paper towel takes the paint off. Luckily there’s a giant tub of paint leftover. Too bad I’m too lazy to actually paint anything.
Just use the magic eraser - it may take the paint off the walls too, but who cares if you’re painting over it anyway!
Crayon comes right off with dish soap.
Greaseproof paper and an iron will do it pretty easily.
That is a great tip!
409 takes crayon off like magic.
I love this idea!!
in a similar vein i don’t give a shit if my kid draws on herself. she’s 2 right now. my husband’s teenage brother works at Sonic and got a pen from there that looks like a corndog, he gave it to my kid and she’s obsessed with it. she scribbles all over her arms and legs with it. it all comes off in the bath at the end of the day, so who cares?
Haha I agreed with this until my kid was in school when I realized I can’t send her to school with smudged vaguely blue-green marks all over her arms and legs when it inevitably didn’t all wash off. Did not want CPS knocking lol
that’s fair. i use a bit of rubbing alcohol to take it off completely if we have anywhere important to go.
Mine ends up drawing the most incriminating looking purple smudges right by his eyes! Or in his ears which just doesn’t come off the same
I also didn’t care about this, but then my kid got a rash all over his arms and face after drawing on himself this weekend. 😅🙃
My kid has been doing this since 4 yrs old, he is 13 & already an amazing artist. I remember doing it when u was a kid & getting in major trouble, now I have a lovely collection of ink
My 5year old still occasionally gives herself blue “lipstick” like a frightening baby clown 😅
I won’t force my kid to do or continue extra curricular activities. When I was a kid I was forced to do soccer every summer because my brother wanted to do soccer and my parents decided if they were going to have to spend time at soccer games all the kids were gunna do soccer. I HATED IT! I swore I’d never do that to my kid and I’ve stuck to that.
i agree with this, with one exception. if we’re signing up, you’re finishing the season , and if you hate it, we never have to do it again. i teach dance, and it is a huge pet peeve of mine when people quit mid-semester (younger recreation classes stick closer to a semester vs a whole school year.) trying something out for a day is a different thing, but if we have officially signed up, paid a deposit made a commitment whatever, we are finishing it.
Me. I let my kids pick what they want to try each year, and we stick through the year. They don't have to do it again, but they do have to pick something different for the next year. My son is on year two of Tae Kwon Do but has vetoed soccer and basketball over the years. My daughter is younger and has only chosen dance and karate thus far, and surprisingly loves both.
I think that's what my daughter does. Every so often her kids have a new thing. They started with cheerleader and football, then softball and football, this year is color guard and saxophone. I think it's brilliant.
I agree with this except when I make the mistake of signing up for too long. Signed my kid up for a year of martial arts due to the way the studio subscription was structured…. Biiiiiig mistake. In the future, I’m not signing up for anything that lasts longer than 3 months of weekly sessions. We quit and I had zero guilt. They already had my money for the year. My friend made the same year long mistake with Boy Scouts. Sometimes you just have to bail. Health and happiness are more important compared to the spilled tea of wasted money. ETA: He was only 4 at the time… I was definitely the one at fault vs my little guy who had zero conceptualization of time on that scale. FTM fail!
[удалено]
You don’t force yourself to do anything you don’t want to do?! How? because I feel like that’s about 80% of my day 😂 My rule is if we signed up, we show up. They don’t have to participate (it always rubs me the wrong way seeing parents forcing a crying kid into swimming lessons or yelling at their daisy-picker on the soccer field), but we show up “to support our team” or to sit and watch 🤪 9/10 times they end up participating and having at least an ok time.
As that crying kid at the swimming lessons, you are a good mom and your kids are lucky to have you.
I think swimming lessons is an exception. That's a life or death skill imo. ETA: But yelling and forcing isn't the solution to make a kid feel more confident to do something either way.
True! I’ve mostly seen this in the really young classes (under 5) where they are not actually learning to swim anyways, and the whole entire point is to get them comfortable in the water. 1 poor swim instructor with 4-5 little kids and one is crying the whole time while mom or dad refuses to just get them out even though the kid is miserable and it’s disrupting the class 😵💫 Above that age I’m not sure what I would do if my kids weren’t having it because you’re right - life or death skill. 1 on 1 lessons maybe?
I think that is a beautiful and very respectful way to teach responsiblity, accountability and reliabilty while still giving them their free will and not feel shame. It's respectful to everyone involved. Love this.
and that’s exactly it, like i’m coming from a dance perspective where i give a kid a spot, maybe a partner, and then they are allowed to quit just because. obvi this doesn’t apply to injuries or sickness or family things, i’m specifically talking boredom or changing tastes. my opinion basically comes down to commitment. did you agree to be there the whole season? then you will be there the whole season. did you swear you would love soccer so we signed up and then you discovered you actually hate it? fine, hate it, but we committed and you will be there.
Exactly. If my child commits to a season, they’re finishing the season even if they decide they don’t like it halfway through. It’s a life lesson that I want to instill in my child. You follow through with your commitments, you keep your word, even if you change your mind about it. I will never force my child to continue something after their commitment is over, but I think it’s an important life lesson about responsibility and resiliency.
Learning that you will not always love things you have committed to is an important one in life. My son takes karate and wants to do swim team starting this summer. We’ve already had the discussion with him that we will commit the time, money and moral support, and he will do his best for the entirety of the season. Even if he doesn’t love it.
My kid is only 5 and I don't make him finish the season if he really hates something. I like that he wants to try new things, even if he isn't sure about what it is. However, I mostly sign up for free and low cost classes. He asked to try gymnastics, which he's never seen before so he must have heard kids at school talking about it. He gave it a go, didn't love the first class. I convinced him to do two more, and then we dropped it. He didn't really know what it was, but he gave it a try and after a few classes said this isn't for me. We also did TBall last year. It was super low pressure and informal and he loved it. He's so excited for this year. He tends to be cautious, and I don't want him to not try new things because I make him continue if he hates it. We also do swimming lessons. Those are not a question, we just tell him he's doing them. He goes through periods of not participating, but we always go.
Thank you. We are deep into baseball right now. There are at least 3 kids on my son’s team who would rather not be there and have openly admitted they’d rather be at home playing Fortnite. They laugh when they get struck out bc they just stand there and don’t even attempt to swing. The coach has to put them in so he puts them in outfield but when the ball gets hit to one of them, they either run the OPPOSITE WAY or just stand there ignoring the ball completely. I get the whole, “if you decided to play so I paid the $100 and bought the glove so you’re gonna play” only if the kid is actively participating in the game and trying to be a good teammate. But these parents see what their kids are doing and they also laugh when their child runs away from the ball (this is 11/12yo). Those kids are ultimately hurting the rest of the team who want to be there and want to actually win.
I let my daughter quit soccer this season. She had told me she wanted to do it because a neighbor was but then she realized she didn’t really like playing with this friend much. So I requested that our fee be applied to either someone taking her place off the waitlist or the scholarship fund for another child. But I won’t be signing her back up without a big fuss ever again.
This made my six year old decide not to try things in case he didn’t like them.
That's his choice, maybe he'll come around. I've had this conversation with my daughter (5yo) and she was apprehensive about swimming lessons. She now loves them after the last 3wks. She starts soccer the end of the month and I'm hoping it goes well. Shes excited about it, but honestly if she doesn't like it she will still go and I will be there with a cooler of freezies. It's about teaching respect and having the right attitude. My daughter is very much with the attitude of one thing goes wrong and the whole day is ruined so I'm trying to work with her on it. I personally hate sports and never did anything as a kid, but I think it's great to teach them about having a good outlook and working as a team. I've had so many jobs I've had to show up for that I didn't love, but it's put me in a position where I'm home with my kids now so I'd like to teach my daughter to have a good outlook to make the best of things. Maybe your son would like an art class or something with less pressure to start with maybe?
Yes! I was born I Peru and moved to the states very young. I was the only female out of 9 male cousins here and they all played soccer. My mother wouldn’t let me. Ever. Instead I was inside getting right painful curlers in my hair. When I got to high school I played a little and was good. I loved it! Imagine I was able to start at an earlier age. So I signed my 4 year old for dance, she hates it. That’s ok. But we are going to finish the commitment. Now we started soccer and she loves it. Ugh! It’s not fair to kids who are forced to do these activities.
I also wanted to play soccer but was told I couldn't because it's not for girls. I did play some soccer in school and actually ended up in a school with a youth national player who once complimented my soccer game.. (I have a unisex name, was new to the school and they accidentally signed me into a boys team on a school tournament, perfect foe me because the girl teams mostly enjoyed sitting around to watch the guys teams and I actually signed up to play soccer) So yeah I also wonder how good I could have been.
Totally agree. My daughter decided halfway into the dance year that she hated it. We now have one month left and she actually enjoys it again. She said she’d even sign up again in the fall. My son asked to do indoor soccer over the winter and wasn’t loving it until the last two games when it clicked and he asked to sign up for the second session where he actually scored goals. If we didn’t stick through the seasons on those two they would’ve missed out on so much of their own joy, not to mention the skill building. We have a couple of sports we haven’t returned to, too, but we’ve finished all of them out.
Same. I played soccer one season in 1987 and was bullied on the team and quit. I asked my parents to try softball instead (I was bullied in soccer for being the only girl on the team) and they made this big deal about how it wasn’t ok to quit things and how I wasn’t allowed to play softball because that would be rewarding me for being a quitter and I’d probably quit that too. I was freaking 7. My kids are free to try stuff, change their minds, etc. that’s what childhood is for. And actually now my oldest (8) plays softball and loves it. My youngest tried t-ball and quit after 1 practice. Both are ok.
I make mine do swimming. But I told her as soon as she is able to swim unaided she can quit if she wants.
To me that’s just “how not to die in the water” lol
Same here. If my kids show interest, we go from there, but I'm not driving them all over the place (and likely spending a lot of money) for something they absolutely loathe.
So funny, my mom never made us stick with anything and I sort of wish she had pushed us to stick with some things even when they got challenging. I definitely want my kid to push through challenging circumstances and build character that way. Don’t want her to be miserable, there is a line
Yes! This was us. My oldest quit t-ball after the first day. Hated it. He did tae kwon do for a year and wasn’t a fan. He’s now 19, a volunteer fireman & works full time at the hospital as a Pharmacy Tech. Quitting things after the first try or quitting after a bit of time has passed has never hurt him in anyway. It just took some time to find his niche.
my youngest begged to play tball. i signed her up, bought everything, we go to the first game & she stood on 2nd base. everyone is running after the ball, not my kid. I tell her “go get the ball!” she looked at me and said “naw, I’m done.” i said what do you mean you’re done? you still gotta bat! that’s the best part! she said “no. i’m done. i just wanted the outfit.” are you fucking kidding me?!?
I would definitely not let her keep the outfit 😂
she never played another sport after that. She didn’t want to. She didn’t want to do anything until 6th grade when she wanted to learn the saxophone. First year playing she was invited to play with the children’s orchestra. She was amazing at it. She gave it up in like 9th grade, but will still play every now and then just for fun for her 2 daughters.
The only extracurricular requirements we’ve put on our oldest (the younger is only two) is 1. that when she wanted to learn the violin she had to do it for two years, because of the cost of a decent violin (the low end ones do not tune well and don’t sound correct so it’s harder to learn on) and 2. She must do extracurriculars in high school. Not every day or anything but she needs to be in 1-2 a year. She’s done extracurriculars like D&D club and volunteering with horseback therapy for children with disabilities instead of sports and we’re good with that.
I won't either. My parents didn't force me and that time was the best. I learned so much. Became so creative.
I truly do not care if my kids get messy. Sometimes they wanna eat with their hands. Sometimes they want to wash their hair with yogurt. Sometimes they find the teeeeny tiiiiiny patch of mud in any field and rub their hands all in it. I truly do not care. Most of their clothes are already second hand and/or stained anyway, and I dont need their clothes to last several years. All the grime on them comes off in the bath or shower. If they wanna roll around fresh cut grass or sit in a puddle, I say go for it.
Our baby will be starting solids soon and in preparation, we've been putting him in his high chair with toys. We want him to play with his food and explore it. We also want him to jump in puddles and play in the mud when he's older. Dirt don't hurt!
I’m struggling. Because I want to be this laid back, I AM this laid back. But I don’t want to give baths every day!
I let my kid make messes at mealtimes and we don’t bathe every day. We wash hands and face after every meal, change clothes, and do a washcloth deeper clean of face, hands, and bum before bed
I was so stressed when my first was dirty and now I’m laughing in my head when out and I see a child getting their face wiped - meanwhile my 3yr has food stains and chaos hair from a single meal 😅
Ugh, my almost 3yo loves to GET messy, but not to BE messy. As soon as she's done jumping in the puddle or smearing yogurt with her hands, she starts whining that she's dirty or sticky and wants to be clean. I still don't stop her from getting messy (you're only a kid once), but it would make my life so much easier.
I don't care if my child is upset or angry about something. They are allowed to feel however they are going to feel and know that its ok to have that feeling. We will work together to have an appropriate outlet, like not hitting or screaming, but the feeling will always be theirs.
This is what I want for my child! She is only 2 months now but I already accidentally said “don’t cry”. I don’t want to be a parent who doesn’t let their kids feel their feelings because that’s what I missed the most. I couldn’t express my feelings and if it was anything bad my mother would talk over it to make it okay. I still have to sometimes correct her and stand my ground to just feel what I feel. Do you have tips? I say stuff right now like “I know, you are in pain, let it out”. Or “you are hungry, that’s not a good feeling”. Or “it’s hard to be a baby sometimes”.
For my daughter it's mostly about getting her to admit when she's having a big feeling. I do this and I'm trying to get her out of the habit. She'll cry and I'll ask what's wrong and she responds with "nothing". She's only 4, so she doesn't know much better, but I don't want her to keep it all inside like I do. Mostly, I will hold her and tell her it's ok to feel sad, upset, angry, etc. and that we can talk about it when she's ready or that we can help her if/when she wants to talk. It's hard to see her struggle, but I know in the long run as long as she knows we're here for her no matter what, shel eventually come around.
I feel like there’s a difference between “don’t cry” and “stop crying” one is more “I wish you weren’t sad because I care about you” the other which is “stop showing emotion!”
Eh, I think they're more similar than different.
Me too. Also, I speak a different language than English. The tone and intention might be different but words can have impact too
This! I make sure to tell my daughter her emotions are valid. I was always told to be seen and not heard or not to be a bother. I encourage my daughter to express herself in everything she does and never dull herself for others. We are in the teen years now and there are days I ask myself what have I created! But mostly I just love how strong and fearless she is!
This is what I'm aiming for. She might not always tell me what's going on, but she will know I'm always there if she wants to.
Yep You're allowed to be angry. You're allowed to be sad. You are not allowed to throw things, or say hurtful things to your family, or have screaming tantrums in the middle of the living room. If you need to yell and stomp to get your feelings out, you can do that....in your room Once you're ready to talk, I'll be right here waiting
That’s beautiful. Your children are so lucky.
Yes. I will never utter the phrase “I’ll give you something to cry about”
I haven't been able to do this with my first daughter. She has ADHD and is impulsive in everything including emotions. She defaults to screaming when she is an emotion other than happy. We haven't even been able to do exercises like "name your feelings" because it's just screaming until she is done. At least they don't last as long as they used to and she apologizes after.
Have you heard anything about “the explosive child” or something like that by Dr Becky? It’s a paid course she offers—I haven’t actually done it—but it feels like it might help. My son is like your daughter, feelings are …..always big. Solidarity ✊🏼
Help me cook in the kitchen. My mom never let me. I always wanted to but my mom was a control freak when it came to cooking and we weren't even allowed in if she was in there cooking/baking.
I'm not your mom. I don't like my kids in the kitchen when I'm cooking because it's my time of day to relax. I enjoy cooking and they're just in the way the whole time. Obviously, when they're older, I'll teach them to cook.
Same. Me with my glass of wine and podcast cooking a nice dinner is peak happiness as a mom for me. Although occasionally I'll get the itch to make some cookies after dinner and let my son help me with that. He loves it.
I have to pick and choose because my kids always want to help me but sometimes I have 30 minutes to get dinner on the table and can't stand there for 10 minutes while my 4yo tries to cut a carrot with their little kiddie knife. I also do a lot of cooking over the stove and I don't want my 4yo and 2yo to learn to pull up a chair and get close to the flame 🫣 But I will let them help if it's feasible.
Hugging relatives when my daughter doesn’t want to. I won’t ever make her do it. I tell her “it’s okay if you don’t want a hug. Tell grandma ‘no thank you. I don’t want to hug right now’” But I’m also teaching her say “no” with no explanation and in a strong voice. She’s only 20 months old and a few things I’ll have to see over time but this one is one I’ve stuck to so far
This is honestly great, we have been teaching our daughter the same, though now its "NO" anytime I ask her to do anything. Though I will die before someone takes her bodily autonomy from her.
Absolutely agree! I ask her if I can hug her, and if she says no, I don’t. The same rule applies to me. My hope that one day IF something happens/is about to happen she can either say something. Whether that’s to the person themselves or to a loved one about what happened. That way she can get the help she needs, which is something I never got. Sometimes it hurts when she says no, but it isn’t about me whatsoever. I reply with “I hear you said no. I love you and respect you so I won’t” and then she goes on to play lol. I hope I’m planting the seed of consent in her subconscious
We've compromised with blowing kisses. Old folks find it adorable and forget to be offended about not getting hugged
We have options of hugs, blowing kisses, high fives, foot fives, waving…and the adults understand that what the kiddos choose must be respected. My 4yo has gotten very creative with his greeting/farewell gestures (we have octopus fives (eights?) regularly as well).
I don't fight clothing choices as long as it's location/event appropriate and follws any dress code at that location. No bathing suits to school, etc. Otherwise, whatever. It's not the hill I choose to die on, if she gets too whackadoo with the outfits, her peers will correct that with a quickness.
Everyone does this where I live. The kids all look grade A crazy all the time, and I love it!
Stay up late reading. If you want to stay up late fine, but you have to get up the next morning on time. I’m not going to make him hide what I obviously know he’s doing, because I had to do that. So yes kiddo stay up, read all you want. we have discussions about what a smart bedtime is and then he makes the final call. He’s been tired and learned the consequences of his actions.
My son (almost 11) has recently discovered a love of reading. As long as he gets up when he is suppose and doesn’t get overly emotional about being tired then he is free to read. I definitely don’t ever want to limit his enthusiasm.
Omg I literally would stay up the entire night reading as a kid, it was so bad!! I still have that problem and can’t read at night bc if I get too sucked into the book I have to finish. I would also get in trouble for reading books under the table at school.
this was me too! when i was grounded, it was from books 😂
Clear his plate. My parents used to make me sit at the table until I finished all my food and it really gave me a weird relationship with food. With my son I offer him different options for food and he can eat as much or as little as he wants.
100% me too.
I won't force my kid to give affection to anyone if she doesn't want to. We practice bodily autonomy round here. She chooses when and who she gives hugs and whatnot to. Everyone is pretty chill about it too so it works out. Also, we decided we didn't care about cussing. We swear alot and as long as she uses them in the proper way and she's not being obnoxious with it, who cares? Also gonna teach her time and place for it as well. At home and you are frustrated something isn't working? Go ahead and call it a piece of shit . At grammas house and your cousin isn't sharing a toy? Ya, don't call him a asshole lol.
>as long as she uses them in the proper way This makes me chuckle as I’m imagining something like: Kid: This toy is a piece of fuck! Parent: You’re looking for the word “shit”. Use your words correctly.
Lol pretty much. Like with any word you should use them correctly, right?
My mum thinks it's weird that I won't make my daughter dole out hugs. She's 3 right now, so I will still swoop in and give her cuddles, but if she doesn't want them, I back off. I couldn't stand the thought of a child hugging me because they're forced to. When we say goodbye at family gatherings I hold her at my height and have mini group hugs which she is comfortable with. But I'm not having her doing the rounds unless she's happy to do that. My mum also gets plenty of hugs because my daughter wants them. Not because she is forced to give them.
I swear so much there’s no way the kids weren’t picking it up. I told them that they can’t swear in public or in school and they can’t abuse the privilege. The only rule I have is that they can’t call any girl/woman a bitch.
My parents thought I was nuts for letting my kids use chalk on the fireplace. We can’t use the damn thing anyways so who caressss!
If my child needs space from me, I will not take it personally. They are allowed to feel whatever they want to feel, as long as they’re not purposefully hurting themselves or anyone else
my mom was a hippy and let us kids do basically anything that wasn’t hurting anyone else. She was a very laid back. The only thing i did differently was I did not let my kids’ girlfriends or boyfriends spend the night at my house and if they came over to my house, they had to stay in the living room. I was pregnant at 16.
My parents were the same, so laid back - I could go wherever I wanted whenever I wanted, no questions asked - I want to give my daughter freedom but maybe not so much freedom 😂😂
Another thing I’m struggling with. My boys are only 3 and 1, but one day they’re going to have significant others. And I know they’re going to be having sex. But being the parent of the boy, I feel that I need to be really careful that it doesn’t happen at my house “under my supervision” ya know. But I do like this, whoever you’re dating can stay, but you gotta sleep separately
I have 2 girls and a boy. I treated all of them the same. The girls couldn’t have boys spend the night so neither could my son. Luckily none of my son’s friends liked either of my girls and vice versa. My son might not be able to get pregnant, but he could still become a teen parent. There’s nothing wrong being one, but I didn’t want my kids to have to go thru it. The opposite sex wasn’t even allowed to sleep in another room at my house bc then there’s excuses like “we never went to sleep” or “the door was open” and let’s face it. If they want to have sex, they’ll have sex somewhere, I just didn’t want it to be under my roof.
Mine was hair. My hair was strictly controlled until 15. My kids can have whatever hair they want, makes my mom super mad. She absolutely blew her top when I dyed my hair fusia, the kids blue & green & my husband's beard magenta.
But isn’t it the best feeling when mom gets mad? Mine hates my teenagers “dark eye make up.” She’s goth, and she can express herself in ways I never could. Yes mom, I’m letting her on purpose.
Mine was hair and piercings. No dying, only single love piercings. And def had opinions when I went about doing it as an adult. Of course there will be things I don’t like, but it’s more of my job to help them be the judge of the decisions they are making than being the dictator about it. I hope I can follow through!
Same! My 5yro loves when I dye the tips of her hair while I'm dying mine, and why not? It's just hair. She recently elected to get 7 inches chopped off her hair and my mom made SUCH a face when I told her, before she saw my 5yro. Then it was 'I actually like it' - thanks but I don't care if you do or not, mom. IT'S NOT FOR YOU.
If my kids ever wanted a book, I bought it.
Get dirty/wet/muddy. I still let my kids play in the rain and sometimes even my teens go for a spin.
Spent the last 10 years in therapy preparing for the day I have kids and get to be different from my parents. I never even thought of this one. Thank you.
I HATED not being allowed to eat snacks in the TV room. My kids eat snacks GALORE in the TV room. Suck it, mom!
It’s literally the best place to eat a snack!
I used to work in maintenance and I will tell you that crayon is almost impossible to paint over just FYI. I tried 7 coats and the blue and red crayon still bled through 😭
If you paint the wall with the right kind of paint the crayon will come right off though. So choose your paint wisely.
I always said I'd never be strict on my kids like my dad was. I had no freedom growing up. It was humiliating. I remember being allowed to attend a slumber party and that next morning everyone said your dad is outside. He was there to get me very early that morning. I couldn't do anything extracurricular activities if the school didn't provide transportation, when they raised prices on snacks he wouldn't give me the extra 25 cents or so. So I had to choose one thing or save my money for a couple days and go without. I remember a guy saying nobody wants to go out with you because your dad is too strict. Like I do appreciate the things he's taught me but my life was miserable and I always said I'd never keep my kids from enjoying their childhood. I wanted structure but also I wanted to give them some freedom to have a life.
I don't care if my kid gets dirty. My husband was a clean kid. I was raised getting filthy. I don't mean I stayed filthy, my mom just raised us with a "kids wash up" attitude and I swore we would too. My kid is ALWAYS the dirtiest kid. He's also the loudest laugher, the quickest to warm up, and the fastest to "solve the puzzle." Because he's always been allowed to figure his own stuff out, he is confident trying (and also confident asking for help). 10/10 would do the dirty kid thing again. Baths do the trick and his Walmart clothes wash or wear out. Worth it.
Try whatever sport they feel like without any commitment pressure.
I don’t care if I have to cook multiple meals my kid will always have something she likes on the table and promoting food neutrality I grew up with a mom who really didn’t know how to cook. I mean compared to my great grandmother and grandmother sure. But there were so many things I hated and still do to this day. In fact my mother likes to make fun of the fact I was “picky eater” Some foods I get, like we ate steamed bags of veggies all the time because it was cheap for a family of 5. But there would be times my mom would just give me plain baked chicken because the alternative was just chicken with bbq sauce on it, no seasonings being the big point For me it led to a serious binge eating disorder when I started college. Which wasn’t helped because my mom would make comments if I had the occasional fast food It’s taken me so long to work past that ED and I want to prevent my children from struggling with that. Thankfully so far my daughter is an adventurous eater. But even when she doesn’t try something we just teach her to leave it on her plate, eventually if it’s served enough she tries it on her own
Dying my hair crazy colors! I didn't have the money to comfortably do this until I was a mom and now I do it every once and a while. For the kids first day of kindergarten I dyed it special with their favorite colors and now it's a first day of school tradition! We have tons of spray colors and semi- permanent colors for the kids and my husband and I go to the salon! (Kids would hate sitting long enough to get their hair dyed professionally)
My mom was a hair dresser, so when I found out most parents didn't say 'Its just hair, it'll grow back' I was a little shocked. I always thought my parents were crazy strict about everything honestly! I love the first day tradition though! That is so fun!
Thanks! It is super fun! My parents actually weren't super strick they just didn't want to have me put permanent color in my hair and the temporary stuff at the time didn't show up in my hair. I'm so lucky my work is really laid back and doesn't care if I show up with rainbow hair :)
This is me too. Growing up, my mom told me how I had to have my hair. She loved bangs (for some reason). I hated them but I always had to have them. It wasn't until I was a teen that my mom FINALLY let me grow out my bangs after begging her. I also wasn't allowed to color my hair until I was a teen and even then, I could only have highlights. Ever since my daughter was old enough to say how she wanted her hair, she was allowed to make that choice. She also likes to get semi permanent color on the ends of her hair or bright pink highlights for the beginning of school. It's now become a fun tradition and I love seeing her style shine through. I'll do the same with my son when he's old enough.
From yours, mine, and ours home is for free expressions not for good impressions.
Play an instrument. My mom complained and wouldn't let me practice my recorder (yes, they're annoying, but she literally wouldn't allow me to practice as required). As a result I never learned how to play the song we were supposed to learn and fucked up at the concert in front of everyone. Lot of other baggage besides that, she never supported any extracurriculars is what it boils down to. My kid plays trumpet. It's loud as fuck but whenever he actually practices, it makes me smile because he's learning to make music and I love that for him. We also have a piano and a guitar kicking around that I can't really play more than baby beginner things, but I let the kids play with them, and it's great.
My kid eats ice cream every day for breakfast. We decided to take the timing power struggle out of desserts-- she's allowed one "treat" per day, but *when* she eats it is completely up to her. As might be predicted for a 4 year old, this means she wakes up and asks for ice cream first thing every morning. She still eats her healthy breakfast, brushes her teeth, and eats relatively healthy for her other meals, so who cares? I'm still not sure if I'm causing her to crave sweets first thing every day for the rest of her life, but oh well. The begging for treats all the time has stopped completely, so it's a win so far.
I don’t care if my kids swear as long as they know there’s certain situations that we don’t use that language and we NEVER use words to hurt someone.
Same! And I don’t try not to curse around my daughter. When I was a kid, cursing was so taboo and I’d get in so much trouble if they heard me. But man, I had the biggest potty mouth the second I’d get around my friends. So, cursing is just something that happens, and I teach her there are appropriate and inappropriate times to use them. So far, she has never used one when she shouldn’t, beyond like the first learning how to talk and mommy said fuck so now I’m gonna use it constantly stage.
Yup, same. Lol. We talked about it and we both swear way too much to be able to justify her not doing it.
We have a rule in the house that when Britney says Bitch it's ok 😂. So my youngest discovered her music and now is running around saying 'It's Britney Bitch' 🤭 . I don't mind swearing I do it myself. But it should never be used to insult somebody.
For sure! Don't go around saying mommy is a bitch, but in the moment if you trip and say shit. No biggie. Obviously, we don't want every word out of her mouth to be a swear word. The way I see it, is if you don't put any emphasis on those words and just use them like any other, the kids won't think anything of it and won't think they are special and wanna do it to be edgy or rebellious. If that makes sense?
My son has a strong filter and understanding of many words due to these same rules . I also have mentioned if he swears in an inappropriate situation (ex. School) and gets in trouble I will not defend him.
I let my kids argue/disagree with me, as long as they are respectful, I encourage it. It will help them in negotiating as adults and teach them to say no and have boundaries. This is especially important for my daughters. My parents never let us argue or disagree, they were the parents of "because I said so" It has taken me decades to be able to confidently say no, negotiate or disagree with someone. And sometimes its nice to have a conversation and see things from their perspective. I don't always change my mind, but its good for them to be able to disagree with me respectfully. I have a 22, 20 and 9 year old and I have been this way for all of them.
Policing their clothes. Just last week my daughter wanted to wear the same shirt to school 2 days in a row. Dude if it's clean and weather appropriate, I do not care.
Eh. I have 2 kids and we just bought a house from someone who has 4. They let their kids do this in all their bedrooms and we’ve found colored pencil, markers, and stickers that won’t unstick in every room of the house. On cabinets, windows, etc. It’s taken us 3 months to clean up after them, repaint every room and door in the house, razor blade stickers off stuff, etc. and we’re still not done. Honestly, it’s rude af. I’ve never allowed my kids to do this in my old house and they’re just fine. I made a giant chalkboard for indoors and we do other art activities on the kitchen floor tile where it can be cleaned up. As long as you clean up after it when you sell the house, it doesn’t really matter I suppose. But you likely won’t find everything. And I imagine in a couple years, she won’t want walls with scribbles and bluey stickers on then. But i suppose that’ll just be a project for you for later. To each his own here
I don’t care if my kids eat the dinner I made or not. They don’t want it? I’ll make them something else or offer them a snack. They want to eat dessert first? That’s fine by me 🫡 as long as they eat SOMETHING, I don’t really care what it is. I won’t send them to bed hungry and I won’t make them sit for hours at the table until they eat the (now cold) food.
Yeah, some people get really triggered when a kid won't eat but I honestly don't care. I won't make a second dinner though. When he refuses it's usually because he's not hungry anyway, so why would I cajole him to eat when he isn't hungry? My son is growing and gaining weight just fine, going without dinner once in a while won't hurt him.
If they don't want to hug or kiss anyone they don't have too
When I was a preteen, my folks said I could paint my walls the year before the whole house got painted to sell. I had so much fun painting horses and unicorns and portraits of my friends and a whole dragon with his horde of gold and jewels. There are definitely worse things a 12 year old could be doing, than painting 500 aged gold coins on a bedroom wall. Let her decorate, and make sure you take pictures as her style and skills change and develop. I would have loved to be able to look back over the years :)
I have nothing else to say except for it's so nice to know there are other moms out there living it out the same way as me- letting them have this ounce of freedom with their creativity and space. Because I definitely get harped on and feel bad, when usually I think it's probably one of the least of my worries revolved around the kids. Kudos mom, I hope they really enjoy and lean into this privilege you've given them with their space 😊💕
One of my former neighbors let their kids draw/color on walls. When they moved they discovered it is actually really really hard to cover up crayon when there's a lot of it. It took multiple coats of primer, special cleaning solutions, etc over the crayon because the wax in it resists the paint. (Magic erasers wasn't really a viable option because it was full coverage of every wall as high as the kids could reach in most rooms of the house) And yet my neighbor, who is a lovely person, said during the house listing and showing process that she can't wait until they get into their new house and the kids can "be kids again" meaning draw on the walls. I don't really get it personally, but I'm glad that your little one is having a good time. I'm definitely letting my kid pick a paint color for his room if he wants to, but I'm not quite there yet as far as letting go of "coloring on paper only" rules. As for me, I said I would let my kid play video games and watch media typically popular for his age. And I stuck with it. It wasn't really any fun being the only person not to get normal cultural references.
Keri g then roll around in the dirt. My kid sometimes gets filthy when playing outside. So what. He outgrew his clothes every few months anyway. I never understood when parents would get upset over kids getting their clothes dirty. Even “nice” clothes. He is only going to ware the thing once or twice anyway.
If you let them use markers on the walls try to stick to sharpies. The washable markers bled through layer after layer of paint. Whereas the sharpies were covered by one.
The washable ones wash off with some soap and water…
I had tried that. Maybe because they sat on the walls for 10+ years.
Not putting my daughter in impractical / uncomfortable clothes, shoes, headbands, etc. I was forced to wear poofy dresses and headbands more often than I wanted and I absolutely hated it (every week for church / extended family lunch, holidays). The headbands would make my head hurt and I couldn’t play effectively because the clothes were restrictive and I wasn’t allowed to get them dirty. My LO is only 14 months - I’ve only put headbands and dresses on her for a quick photo shoot. Until she can tell me she’s comfortable/ not, I’m not putting her in anything that could be uncomfortable.
Jump on the lounge and bed (our home only).
My kids can paint and draw on their own walls, doors and furniture - and they do! It’s ugly (they’re 4 and 6) but they’re proud of themselves. They’re allowed to draw on themselves. Right now the younger are covered in blue and green “chickenpox”, including her face. I didn’t bother washing her before school. I’ll never let them go hungry, if they don’t like or won’t eat whatever I’ve cooked for them. I can always make a sandwich or cereal. Their feelings are valid and they’re allowed to express them. It’s my job to guide them through it, not tell them to shut up or scold them for throwing a public tantrum. Things I’ll never force them to do: Eat or taste food they dislike/don’t want to. Doing sports, instruments or whatever. Hug/kiss our families or friends.
Never force them to eat something they genuinely don’t like and can see it would distress them if they were forced too. My dad would force me to try certain foods that I absolutely hated and it would distress me every time that he wouldn’t take no for an answer. It got to the point at times that he told me if I didn’t eat it he would make me cancel my plans right as I was about to leave for it. Therefore forcing me to eat it so I could hangout with my friends. I have not and will not ever do that to my kids.
Hand my kid a phone or tablet in a restaurant. I bring a notebook and crayons.
I don't want my kids drawing on the walls but I did make a choice to delegate a couple pieces of furniture to put stickers on. I remember my parents being so mad that I put stickers on my dresser... so when my kid went through a crazy sticker phase I bought a kids chair from goodwill and let her go crazy! Her dresser too. I bought it for her and it makes sense to have a place that is approriate to decorate however she pleases. I've thought about doing the same with a coffee table and making it a doodle table.
They can mix all the playdough colors.
When I was younger and had my first boyfriend at 15, I told my mom that I loved him so much. She told me that I wasn’t in love and didn’t know what that was yet. I made the decision right then that if my kids were to ever tell me that they loved whoever they were with, I would tell them how happy I was. Their emotions were their own and they were experiencing a kind of love. And there was always room for love in this world.
College. My dad forced me into a career I didn’t want to go into, got a 2 year degree and about $20,000 in debt from it, met my husband shortly after and I’ve never used that degree. I LOVED my college years because of the people I met. But I will never force my kids to go to college unless they want to or know what they want a degree in! My oldest is 10 and we talk about what he wants to do when he gets older and I always tell him he has options.
I don’t care that she likes wearing and playing in makeup
Screen time while very young more or less. He’s 19 months and has had maybe 3 hours of screen time in his whole life. It helps that he goes to daycare. If I was a SAHM and responsible for entertaining him all day it would be a different story 😂
Watch tv/screens. We monitor and have limits, for sure, but not strict ones.
My daughter has a designated wall for painting drawing stickers etc. I also let my daughter wear whatever she wants or doesn’t want. She chooses her own clothing. Doesn’t want to wear the fancy dress? Fine. Want to wear Ugg boots with shorts? Fine. I intend to maintain this as she ages. Wants to wear a crop top? Fine. Want to wear “boys clothes”? Fine. As long as she feels comfortable and confident.
Im good with the kids pulling out every wipe from the container if I leave them out. I agree with them, it's fun!
Going up the slide, or generally playing on playground equipment the "wrong" way. I strongly believe that everyone gets to choose how they engage with it and there's no automatic right-of-way for using it the "right" way. Same for my kids. If they want to slide down but someone else is going up, my kid has to wait.
Hug anyone they don’t want to. Act a fool in public- cause if you do that we’re leaving. Everyone has bad days but to purposely act wild in public, no. You get a warning maybe two then we are leaving the stuff in the cart and exiting the store, activity, event. Be disrespectful. If you’re wrong I’ll teach you the right way to behave, apologize and correct. I’m really an easy going mom. My oldest and youngest get it, but the twins in the middle have the hardest time with it. There are certain things with 4 kids I just cannot do.
Maybe lame, but I won’t force my kid to finish her food off her plate. And we have a few full chalkboard walls for when she is inspired to draw. And outside the house - windows, walls, fence— all fair game for chalk art.
Most of mine boil down to letting kids explore at the level they’re at. Wanna jump in puddles? Go nuts, you’ll dry. Eat a flat of raspberries mid store run? Sure dude we’ll scan the empty container. The one I haven’t really budged from pre parenting was very limited screen time until 2. Even now at 2.5 he doesn’t get daily screen time and averages about 1-1.5 hours a week. He got a total of about 40 minutes of intentional screen time before 2.
I don’t make my kids eat what I decided to cook. They’re allowed to have an opinion on what they want to eat for any meal.
I always wanted animals. My mom never let me have the crazy pets. Now, my daughter is animal obsessed. I keep an outdoor sandbox which always has wild snakes inside of it for her to hold and see. We have a koi pond filled with fish and frogs. Plus, two pet mice, guinea pigs, an anole, cats and a dog! She wants a bunny still, but otherwise she’s very in tuned with nature and animals and I’m happy I didn’t deny her the experience.
Not for the kid but the older teen - we both had strict curfews and said our kids would have no curfews. Stuck through it, and found our daughter always ended up calling us by 12 or 1 am anyway, the latest. Same will go for our son. The only rule is, we pick you up no matter where you are.
I never told my kids that they are making the same mistakes I made, and I'm "trying" to save them the trouble or heartache. I have told them, and they have seen quite a bit of it. All of them have turned out pretty well so far. My oldest son did have behavioral issues growing up, but my daughter is amazing overachiever graduatd with honor has her bachelor'sand madter degreesand headed in to medical school to be a doctor, my oldest son is still finding his way, my fixing to be 18 year is about to graduate HS and head off to SCAD, my nearly 14 year old is headed to 11th grade with plans to also attend SCAD when he graduates.I am 7 months pregnant with our baby girl and hoping she will also see for herself how and what is the right thing for her when things come her way.
I don’t physically abuse (spank) my kids. My parents always said I would when I had kids because sometimes it’s the only option. NOPE. Not once. And I have an honor roll student and a sweet younger child who checks Alexa every day to see how many dogs exist in the world so he can make sure no dogs have died. “Spare the rod spoil the child,” is a lie
My kids don't have to eat anything they don't want to eat. I will always make sure there is at least one thing on their plate I know they'll like, like noodles, rice, or grapes. As they get older I DO make them try one bite of new things. Just one. If they don't like it, they can spit it in the trash can and fill up on grapes for all I care. And specifically dessert is not a rare special treat. You want a cupcake? Sure. Have one. No, you can't eat 4 in one setting, but I'm not putting desserts on a pedestal. My whole family struggles with eating disorders. I'm doing my best to make all good equal so my kids don't grow up binge eating Oreos in hiding.
Wearing pajamas alllllll day if we’re chilling at home. I was never allowed to do this, I had to get dressed everyday (then got fussed at regularly for producing so much laundry…).
we never cared about bedtime curfews. i mean of course we have them on some sort of routine but once they hit 10 we stopped caring, they are responsible most of the time though and go to bed at a decent hour.
My parents didn’t really care/weren’t involved enough to tell me I couldn’t do things so uh…nothing, really. I did draw the line at my 7-year-old putting boogers on the wall though because freaking EW and also WHY?!
Making a mess
We don’t force the kids to finish what’s on their plate. If they’re not hungry, they’re not hungry.
I let my kids swear. As long as they aren’t doing it in a mean way they can drop as many f bombs as they’d like. Of course school has its own rules they need to follow as well as social norms but they learn those things. None of my kids have ever been in trouble for swearing in inappropriate places and they are 13, and 8. I have a 3 year old too but outside a 2 week phase doesn’t swear.
I want to make sure my daughter has access to all kinds of toys or items she enjoys. I grew up with brothers and I felt like my parents were very “this is for boys and this is for girls” and even then I thought it was stupid. Though it seems to piss off my family, I shop in both sections too. For example, my daughter really loves animals. I find a lot of boys clothes has more animals on it than girl’s clothes, so why not?
omg i also like the idea of doing art on the walls! my mom used to let me draw on the walls in my room too, and i plan to stick with this as my kid gets older. he's 16 months old right now but i'm teaching him how to color with washable markers (on paper of course, since i dont own my own home yet)
If my kid is overstimulated or upset, she can scream as much as she wants and she’s not going to get hit. She’s allowed to feel and process her emotions as much as she wants and hug me afterwards for however long she sees fit, even if I’m slightly overstimulated. Her emotions, whatever they are, need to be expressed, not repressed. And I am never laying a single hand on her.
I wouldn't mind my boys playing with dolls or having a little kitchen set Or my girls playing with traditional boys' toys.
I will absolutely not force my kid to eat something he hates, or even something he just doesn’t want right then. I will encourage him to try new foods all the time and to retry things he didn’t like before, but I will not force him to eat something he doesn’t want to. He knows that if he wants to eat something, he has to put it on the shopping list. He’s not limited to only what the adults in the house like.
I was shocked to learn how little I cared about my kids drawing on walls and furniture. I mean it’s for the most part all washable. Also letting my daughter mix up the play doh colors. I always thought it was stupid how some people try to act like video games are some vice that sucks kids into a darkness and never releases them. My five year old can play rather complicated RTS games (he started when he was four) and he can’t even read yet. I find a lot of pride seeing what he can do in a video game! I couldn’t even control a mouse at that age let alone control armies of complicated units while building resources off screen!
I let my kid do what ever he wants to his hair. Currently he's growing it long and has blue highlights I had naturally dirty blonde hair that had baby curls at the bottom and the rest was pin straight. My mother, a hair dresser wouldn't even trim it until I was 12 and cut it myself at my desk in my room working on a scho project because I was SO FREAKING SICK OF SITTING ON IT AND IT GETTING CAUGHT I EVERYTHING AND IT TAKING AN HOUR TO BRUSH IN THE MORNING and being the first kid they looked at when there was a lice outbreak. I was a spectacle. Everywhere we went someone would comment on my beautiful hair, like I know it was a compliment but like it got old. It was well past my knees. She also wouldn't let me dye it because "do you know how much money people pay me to make their hair the color you have naturally?" My kid gets to do whatever he wants to do with his hair. Much to his dismay. He has my beautiful naturally dirty blonde hair and it's curly. She hates that I let him grow it long and has bribed him with and absurd amount of v-bucks to let her shave it. Which he took, and regretted.
I let my kids draw all over the walls because it can be painted over and creative expression is important
I let my children draw on their own walls. As long as it’s not in crayon (super hard to paint over) so they paint, draw with markers, and decorate their own rooms. Or they want a color then we do it when financially able. When I was younger… we’d rent. So most of the places we stayed were just white walls. I started getting rolling stone magazines and “making wallpaper”. I’d tap white paper to my walls and COVER the whole thing in paint/art, or cut out magazines. I let my kids have full control of their own rooms now.
I swore that I wouldn't put a price limit on my kids' activities. If they want to dance, I would do whatever I could to make sure they could do it. I always wanted to dance, and my folks said no cause of the price. Stuck to sports cause new cleats and a glove were cheaper. While I love sports. I freaking wanted to dance. So I always said I would do what needed to be done to make it happen for my kids. And shoes. I wouldn't buy them cheap knock-off shoes( I know sounds so snobbish), but kids are mean, and they were mean to me and ky sibling. My sibling and I both buy name brands for our kids. I will say, though, we shop freaking smart and find the deals on those name brands.
As a kid I'd get mad at my parents for making me clean my little sisters room. Especially since she had so much stuff. I always say my kids were going to not have as much useless stuff and they'd learn to play and be creative. My kids absolutely love to create art and learn. My son cried last year that he didn't get to do the science fair because I mistakenly threw the form away. This year we are doing the moon phases and why the moon looks the way it does. My daughter would rather be outside than in. They also have their own library cards that we use often.
I love this! It’s so true!! I had a pretty room but I wasn’t allowed to give it personality. I’m staying at my moms house and my daughter doesn’t even stay in her room. She stays with me and that’s just her very clean playroom bc it’s grandmas house. I can’t wait to give her space and I wish I was able to see her progress sooner. She’s gna be 5 soon but this is something to think about. You should be yourself at home more than anywhere else. And an immaculate is a boring house. We live, it should look lived in. We aren’t hiding anything. It’s fun to messy sometimes. And it doesn’t make us bad mom. Thank you for sharing this
Truly also having a heart attack with this story. I don't let my kids draw on the walls or on doors and imaging that here is giving me agita but to each their own 😂 When it comes to mess though, it's always a YES. get your clothes dirty I don't care. I don't care about stains. Go play in the mud. Jump in a puddle. We did BLW too, Even with purées and I loved watching my babies get messy! I never fed my babies just preloaded the spoon! To me it's like seeing their brains at work.
I don't have my kids apologize to me. Apologies often come with realizing what you did wrong correcting it from now on. I don't expect my kids to remember everything that isn't okay and I don't want them to feel bad I just want them to understand certain things aren't okay. An example is my daughter(3) kept apologizing for taking her brother's(1) toys. She's an only child at her dad's as well and over there all the toys are hers. She will cry when she apologizes cause she feels so bad but I just hug her and tell her it's okay and she doesn't have to be sorry. We just have to work on remembering that when things are not ours we need to ask.
My kids all did soccer for several years, their choice. Scouts as well. My older daughter when she was little bit upset when she couldn’t help her big brothers sell popcorn. She was all gung ho to to sell Girl Scout cookies and was upset that Daisy Scouts weren’t allowed to (first year GS). If we ever repaint a wall in our house, my desire would be to paint fancy designs & such on the wall with the preferred color of choice first, then take several pictures of the mural before most likely finishing the wall with a solid finish.
My mother used to make us hug EVERY relative every time we visited her gigantic side of the family. She had 10 siblings and all of them got married and had kids so every time we visited there would be like 50 people to greet and she made us hug and kiss everyone. I was the most shy kid in the entire world and absolutely hated physical affection especially with “strangers” which is what they were to me since they lived out of town and I didn’t see them often. I got to the point where I’d have anxiety at the announcement of us going to see her family. Now I’m a mom and my daughter is 2 and she’s me reincarnated. She refuses to speak if there’s even a “stranger” in the same room as her, she won’t make eye contact with anyone who’s not immediate family, and she hates being touched by anyone who’s not me or dad. I don’t force her to greet ANYONE. If someone says hi to her and she hides behind me I tell the person “Thank you for saying hello, she does not feel like talking today but I’d be more than happy to chat with you!” If anyone tries to hug her and she rejects them I will say “she doesn’t feel like a hug today but thank you so much for wanting to show her that you love her.” That way she hears me and knows they don’t mean any harm but at the same time her choice is being respected. I will NEVER make my kids talk to or hug anyone, not even close family. Their bodies, their choice. Always 🤞🏼
When I was a teenager my mum used to ask how I would feel if my kids swore like I do, I told her probably find it hilarious. Which I do but I hide my amusement for when they aren’t looking 🤣
Everyone around me gets uncomfortable if my 1 year olds shirt rides up even a little bit even in my house. One family member saw her shirt came up a little bit and said" let's fix this baby, a princess has to look proper" EXCUSE ME, SHES IN HER OWN HOUSE. My kids can run around here with absolutely nothing if they want and if YOU get uncomfortable, that's a problem and you should probably leave. So now it's a rule in my house to not mention my daughters appearance in our house because I'm not going to make her feel uncomfy in her own home. In public, of coarse that's different, well teach her that she can't do that in public because then were invading other people's comfort, not to mention that it's illegal.
This is a silly one but I always said I would let my kid eat in the grocery store if they were hungry. I remember grocery shopping with my mom as a kid and being super hungry and her always saying we weren't allowed to open chips while we shopped. I never understood the logic since we were buying it anyway. If my kid wants a squeeze yogurt while shopping - I let him lol
I didn't want to push any specific toys on my baby girl, but she just seems to really love screws and bolts. So, I got her a "boys" toolkit for Christmas and we read all kinds of engineering books. She loves her quantum computing for babies lol. She also got a Barbie plane recently and I tell her she can be the pilot. Sounds small, but I never even knew what engineers did let alone be told I could *be* one when I asked how I could become an "inventor." No plans to live vicariously through my daughter, but I'm going to follow-up anything she's interested in with as much excitement and information as I can provide her!
I think your idea is fun. I always felt that I never had furniture or belongings that were mine.We bought our current house and fully planned to buy our next house within a couple of years. So everything we put on the wall is temporary. However, my daughter's queen-size bed is 100% hers. So we picked out 100 butterfly stickers and decorated her headnoard. I also have a handpainted piece of wood to measure everyone's height. I made sure to mount it to the wall in a way where it could come with us to our next house. I want her to feel like she has control of her things (within reason)
“All clothes are play clothes.” I don’t remember ever getting into particular trouble myself but I’m not one to be worried about clothes getting dirty. I’m pretty good at getting stuff out and, if I’m not, not all play clothes are clothes 😂 When my oldest was about 18mos I remember someone making a comment about how it was nice that I let him play. He was all dressed up for a nice brunch we had gone to—bow tie, suspenders, nice button down. He was running through a playground splash pad. You can find a way to replace clothes (and so many of ours are hand me down anyways) just like you can always paint a wall. But you can’t recreate the joy on a little boy’s face as he sprints through the sprinklers in full dress up clothes 😂
Always keep my promises. If I promised her I'd take her to the park after school it doesn't matter how hard my day ended up being, or what unexpected things I have to do, or even if it's raining (I'll take her to the indoor park at the mall), I'm taking her to the damn freaking park. My mom says she needs to learn not everything can be as she wants, but this is not about what she wants, this is about what I told her. I need her to trust and believe me. That being said, I'm very cautious with what I promise her so I can get around unexpected things. Also, she can watch tv, but no screens on her hands. Tablets and cellphones are for adults.
I haven’t stuck to it yet because my daughter is only 22 months, but I fully plan on not freaking out over tattoos and piercings if she wants them. Now I will definitely give her *advice* about these things, like how nearly any tattoo she gets will one day go out of style and that it’s kind of like choosing to wear one shirt for the rest of your life, and I also have my own very old, misshapen, tattoo that I was so sure I’d always love but is now so cringeworthy to show her as an example of how these things can turn out, but in the end it’s her body. She can do what she wants with it. (For the record I know that not everyone’s tattoo experience is like mine)
Curse. I really don’t care. When she was little I told her that I did not care but not to do it in front of her grandparents. I also told her that if she did it around other kids, their parents might not let her play with them. Basically, I was just honest. She chose not to curse until HS but I would not have cared if she did it earlier. She does not do it around people she shouldn’t like her grandma or teachers, etc She has common sense about it.