A MESSAGE TO OUR CHILDREN

I really thought we parents had got past all that. Past that whole "Martha Stewart" thing of tryin' to run a business while raising perfect genius children, decorating perfect homes, making perfect cupcakes and party favors, raising chickens which give us perfectly dyed eggs, and growing our own perfect vegetables. I thought we'd finally figured it out -- that we can have it all, just not all at the same time. I thought we'd got over comparing ourselves to all the other parents we knew, and always finding ourselves lacking. I guess I thought wrong.

'Cause that's sure not what I'm seeing and hearing, now that my kids and all their friends are finally coming up on their 30s. Instead of learning from our mistakes, I fear they have simply replaced our Martha Stewart Complex with a Mommy Blogger/Pinterest Complex, and that facebook has just made it 100 times easier to compare themselves, not just to the other young parents in their neighborhood, but to every young parent in the entire blogosphere! And of course, they are bound to come up short somewhere, since no one person could ever have enough time to do all those amazing things they have pinned to their Pinterest boards, right? Who wouldn't feel inadequate?

If I could teach my kids just one simple thing, it would be this. Wanna go down in history as a great parent? Here's all you have to do. Turn off the TV. Turn off the stove. Turn off the computer. Most importantly, turn off that dang phone! Now get down on the floor and play with your kids. Give them your undivided attention, for at least thirty minutes. That's all it takes. Thirty minutes a day. Every day.

The glee on their little faces is all the affirmation you will ever need.