Three Things

My good friend Ellen, over at Thrift Store Mama tagged me in a meme. It's my first "outside of Facebook" tag, and I am such a dork I didn't groan at all when she included me in her game, instead I was all - Dude, choose me! Choose me! And she did, so now I'm continuing the game.

And, if you did not click on the link above, the game is this. Name three "ways that I think I'm good at being a mom".

It struck me that this will always be an evolving set of issues. For starters, children are constantly changing, and along with those changes come changes in their needs. Likewise, things that I think make me a good mom are not always practiced. Sometimes I just don't find the patience or energy I need.

Ellen's number one was that she was willing to take her "giant butt" and put it through tunnels at the playground, and I have to admit that long ago I told Connor my giant butt was too big to fit down tunnel slides because I do.not.like.them. Seriously. I used to be Ms. Danger when it came to playgrounds and amusement parks, but now I'm Ms. Prissy. But, as Ellen noted in her initial post, things vary from mom to mom. And, whatever I think makes me a good mom may horrify another mom, and the opposite may be true as well. So parent as you will, my fellow moms, but here are my three.

1. I trust my kids. I believe in the parenting philosophy that if you give children responsibility, they will behave responsibly. My kids have a long leash.

2. I make / bake things. I am queen of the craft room in this house, and I bake great tasting cakes. I remember my mom had a stint as a candy maker and she used to send treats to my classes every holiday - including Kansas Day. It was awesome. In high school, I made a few sunflower chocolates and brought them to school. I think every one of my friends that went to elementary school with me exclaimed "I remember when your mom used to make these for us" or "I remember when we got to make these in girl scouts when your mom was the troop leader". So, I'm stealing a page out of my mom's playbook here.

3. I'm not passing on my many irrational or semi-rational fears. I decided quite some time ago, that when I had kids, I was not going to pass along my fear of snakes, cats, spiders...And so far, it's working. When we went camping, I spotted a five foot long black snake. Instead of my gut reaction which would be to scream, I fairly calmly called out "Ed, you might want to bring the kids over. There is a very large snake here". And then I carried Helen for quite some time as we watched the snake slither away. Both of my kids love all of the things I am terrified of.

Oh, and I'm fully willing to accept that it's nothing I do that makes me a good mom, it's that every day I wake up, take a moment to be thankful for the good health of my kids, and cross my fingers that everything goes OK. Maybe there's just some big force looking out for me and it's not me at all.

Elaine