What I Thought I Knew

This is one of my favorite older pictures from a time when I began to realize that I knew less than I thought I did


Infancy and toddlerhood are the busiest and most expensive times of parenting –
WRONG. This week alone I have written 3 checks for school picture packages and sent money for 5 different field trips. Eleven year old boys eat A LOT of food and I have been told in no uncertain terms that 15 year old boys never stop eating. Our monthly calendar is now so full that I have had to buy a new weekly calendar in order to fill in everything we need to keep up with. Granted our 4 year old has more appointments than an average kiddo, but he is by no means taking up the majority of the calendar.

You stop worrying about your kids so much when they leave home.
My mom has taught me that the worry and prayers continue even when your 30 and 40 something children are happily married parents, dentists, and CFO’s.

Parenting books, doctors and other parents will have all of the answers to my questions
For every book I read or every parent that I talk to, there is yet another opinion. It's amazing how diverse the opinions are on how to get your baby to sleep, potty train, attach, discipline, etc. With more information comes more questions.

If I make every effort to “parent well,” my children will be near perfect. Those children who aren’t near perfect must have parents who don’t parent well.
I don’t really need to say much about this other than I was pretty clueless and proud for the first couple years of parenting an easy going first child. Of course, this drive to parent well at all times also made me much harder on my first child than I needed to be.

Children who are picky eaters when they are young will always be picky eaters. If you make sure to not allow your child to be picky when they are young, they will never develop picky habits.
You can definitely do better than I did in feeding your children a variety of foods at a young age. I thought too often that a food might make Micah choke or might be too spicy. This made him a fairly picky toddler, but as I mentioned earlier, that child can eat now! Elise who I made sure to not allow to be picky as a toddler is now a picky 8 year old.

Middle school will be the absolutely worst time of parenting.
I told Tony for years that while I didn’t really believe boarding school was a good option for children, I might change my mind once Micah hit middle school. I know we have two years and ten months left of middle school parenting for Micah and another three years for Elise and Isaiah, but the first two months have been better than expected. Micah is really fun to be with right now. We can play games that interest both of us and he shares a lot of common interests with his dad(read: sports).

Elementary school will be one of the easiest times of parenting.
This 8 year old thing is harder than I would have ever guessed.


I had enough compassion for parents of children with special needs.
Obviously, you can never really have “enough” compassion for someone, but I thought I could understand how hard it must be at times. I have learned that you really never have a clue until you walk in someone else’s shoes. I certainly didn't realize the joys that could come with it as well.

What did you think you knew?