Parenting Skills 101

Jill and my parenting skills have been attacked over the past two weeks over a variety of things from kissing, to "allowing" my oldest to have a "boyfriend," to allowing her to watch, of all things, wait for it ....... "High School Musical." (Have I used enough quotes?) Unfortunately, the people attacking us won't come and speak with us directly about their concerns, but do feel comfortable talking to others about it thinking we won't hear about it later. Don't worry -- they don't read this blog so I am not using this time to respond or "attack back."

But, in response :), I would like to point out to parents of other kids that do read this that it is normal for preschool kids to have "boyfriends" and "girlfriends." It is normal for them to kiss because (hopefully) they see kissing at home. I am glad that my kids know I love their mother. I am not ashamed to give my wife a kiss in front of my kids (we are just talking about a peck kiss). If I am a bad parent for that, I don't want to be a good parent (that sounds like a country song I should write). Anyways, I have done some researching and found this on a child psychology website:

Preschool "boyfriends" and "girlfriends." Some parents of preschoolers are alarmed when they hear their kids talk about a boyfriend or girlfriend. If your youngster says this, remember that kids don't attach the same meanings to the word that adults do. Most experts agree that it's best to react to this kind of news in a neutral way — don't encourage the behavior, but don't express concern either.

Just something to think about for the weekend.

Changes

I have made the changes necessary to my account here so I won't be deleting this page after all and starting over. The bottom line is that some people were looking at the page that I did not want looking at the page (i.e. certain people that pay me to do certain things) after searching for me on Google. So, I have taken my full name off, my location is gone, and all references to my occupation are gone.