Tonight at dinner Ken and I did a little test to see how much we cater to our kids.
As I was preparing our plates for dinner when we came up with the idea to only make our own plates and sit down and start eating. We wondered what the kids would say or do? All four of them were already sitting at the snack bar waiting for their meal. Andrew had poured milk for everyone and that was all that they had in front of them. Ken and I had a hard time not smiling, so we sort of hid our faces as we started taking bites.
Within about 1 minute Andrew got up and started making his own plate. Blake was starring into space. Chase and Karli were giggling and carrying on about who knows what. Another one of their arguments about who is bigger, stronger, or smarter probably. Blake finally said, “What the?!” Which is another bad mark against our parenting skills. We have tried to break him of saying this, since clearly he is implying what the heck or worse.
Of course I got up and made the other plates of food. I mean, its not like I expected Chase and Karli to get up and make their own plates. They would have to drag a chair over to reach into the crock pot and other pans, which would probably result in a fight and more chaos that I don’t need. But Blake could be and should be more self sufficient. Ken will remind me constantly that I need to stop doing things like zipping his coat and making sure everything is in his back pack when he leaves for school in the morning.
I will be honest here and admit that I do way too much for my kids. I started to write out some examples and it was getting a bit too embarrassing. Just assume I do too much. Except for Andrew, he does most everything for himself. Is this really going to harm my kids someday? I mean will no one want to marry my sons because I cut up their meat before meals until they are teenagers? I doubt it. I can recall my husband still living at home when we first started dating. He was 22 years old and his mom would make his bed every morning, hang up his suit when he came home from work, and do his laundry every Friday. He has turned out to be a pretty great husband. He cooks dinner half the time and he helps out quite a bit around the house especially now that we are both working at home. I do more for the kids around the house, where as he is the one that does all the driving around to friend’s houses and handling their sports careers (LOL).
Point is, our kids wait for us to do everything for them. Our test proved exactly what we already knew. We are either ruining their lives or some day they will be awesome parents and spoil their kids rotten just as we are.
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