Parenting at it's finest

I came up with the idea for this blog post a few months ago when I was cleaning. It's ironic because my last blog post was all about how I don't clean.

At this moment in time... I was going through my daughter's room. I was astonished at how much crap she had accumulated since the last time I was in there. 

As the cleaning lady comes pretty regularly, I run in there to wake her up or to tell her to clean her own room - seldomly actually taking a solid look around to take it all in. 

That kid is a bag lady. She loves bags. Everything is in a bag!

The future I need to save her from

Inside an old book bag, was a purse with a ziplock bag inside the purse. What was in the ziplock bag you ask? 

It was a rock.  

I asked, there wasn't a good reason - incase you were wondering. 

Forget about the sneaky drawing that happens on all of her furniture. Like, what was she thinking? Did it cross her mind that I wouldn't mind if she wrote all over the furniture?

Does she think it's cool to "tag" her dresser? She must have been claiming it as her own incase a dresser thief came in the middle of the night ... "Oh, I can't steal this dresser - it already has someone else's name on it." 

This is only after I BANNED food and drink in the room. No food, no drink - not even water. When you find crusty string cheese under your daughter's pillow - you would ban the food and drink too. 

Anyway, back to the day I came up with the blog post... I was in her room - and she has bunk beds. she's only one person - so she doesn't really sleep on the top bunk. That's reserved for the cat. 

So, as I decided against taking the comforter and putting in the wash - only to pull out the vacuum and strategically vacuum the comforter that was on the top bunk.. I though to myself.. 

Wow - I'm not really good at this parenting thing. 

I figured I wasn't alone, so I asked my friends what makes them a good parent, and what makes them a shitty parent. I also opened it up to speaking of their own good and shitty parents. 

The good parts included a lot of loving them, teaching them  and showing them stuff... 

The bad parts included losing them, leaving them places and hiding food from them...  

I did get one of these though... Again, in response to - "Tell me the best thing and the worst thing you've ever done as a parent" 

"Teach my son the correct way to light a bottle rocket.

Shot my son with a bottle rocket"

That was my brother. Gotta love him. 

Here's my list. Now watch this inappropriate mommy blog make you feel pretty good about yourself. 

My daughter still doesn't know how to ride a bike, partly because we live an apartment and she doesn't have one, and partly because I'm afraid of bikes and it makes me cringe. 

 I spend most evenings doing homework and ignoring her. She has to schedule play dates with me (this makes me sad). 

She's had a TV in her room since she was an infant - her imaginary friends were Steve and Joe from Blues Clues.  

She eats Lucky Charms and drinks soda. 

She's late to school at least once every two weeks because I can't seem to get that - wake up when the alarm clock goes off - thing down. 

Some days I wonder when the last time she took a shower was... 

We took her to see American Sniper (in my defense, she ended up watching Netflix inside her hoodie after about 4 minutes) 

We reward her with Skittles. 

When she wants to go somewhere and we don't feel like it - we tell her it's closed. (Beach, Park, Pool, Chuck E Cheese ... etc) 

And to all of you perfect parents out there, that stuff is pretty unforgiving, I know. 

But... And this is a BIG but... (Not like Kim Kardashian big, but big nonetheless)

She is amazing. And contrary to popular belief,  it didn't happen by accident. 

We weren't blessed with a child who magically could over-come all odds. 

We must be doing something right. 

When we spend time with her - we spend quality - no frills - time with her. She knows that we love her. She knows that we protect her. She trusts us. She believes in us. She banks on us.

If we, as parents, spend all of our time focusing on what we're doing wrong... that's all we will see. 

BUT - if we try to just do the right thing, right at that moment - and we pay attention to what we are doing RIGHT.

We will see what we are doing right. Then we can roll with that... 

Author of this inappropriate mommy blog and her inappropriate daughter.