I am pleased to introduce you to this week’s guest blogger. Elyse is a wife, mother of two, chocolate loving, gin drinking, trained butcher, and former resident of the UK who now lives in Canada and blogs over at Life Without Lemons. Elyse’s blog is about food, family, and lots of gin but contains bad grammar and spelling mistakes (kindly pointed out by her husband).
White lies are paramount to parenting. I never would have believed such a statement but then I became a parent and realized those little fibs are just about as important as feeding the little darlings. I am not talking huge, whopping lies, but important stuff like telling the little angels that the ice cream man only plays music when he has run out of ice cream and that if you get out of bed at bedtime the monster that lives under the bed will bite off your legs.
Perhaps non-parents reading this are judging me right now and feel my deception may somehow be harming my children’s development. I see this side of the argument and—before I had children—I would have agreed that an open and honest approach to the lessons of life was the way to go. So in my defence of the white lie and its vital role in parenting I will give you a real life situation in action so you can make up your own mind…
It’s a Saturday. It’s a lazy pyjama morning with the kids being entertained by cartoons and us grownups taking in some much needed coffee and relaxation. A wild suggestion of Tim Horton’s for breakfast (I may be British at heart but we go to Tim Horton’s so we surely must be “nearly Canadian” already!) is mentioned and with the kids excited at the prospect of a Boston Cream donut instead of a well-balanced breakfast, they are sent upstairs to put on some clothes.
I hear the pitter patter of feet on the stairs and turn around to a shiny vision of madness beaming back at me from the bottom of the stairs. The white lie part of my brain is tingling (just like Spiderman’s spidey senses, I imagine).
I smile at Harry and say:
With no questions asked, Harry shrugs his shoulders, retreats back up the stairs and comes back five minutes later, slightly more normal and acceptable.
So you see white lies and parenting go together like gin and tonic. It’s just a shame I can’t stop him dressing like a wally every time we head out of the door.
It’s a good job I can save all these photos in a folder on my computer called “Embarrassing images to show any future dates you bring home in revenge for waking me up at 5am for the first two years of your life.”
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Your turn:
Do you care how your child dresses in public?
Did you parents care how you were dressed?
Elyse,
I definitely tend toward telling kids the truth, whole truth and nothing but.
I have no children that I know of, so obviously that is worth what it is worth.
I don’t know if you’ve seen international sporting events of late, especially to my regret, Cricket, adult male fans are dressed in all manner of weird and bizarre outfits.
The lad should have been allowed to go as, “silverman.” He had covered all the naughty bits and is perfectly acceptable to the world.
brendan
Those adult males at the cricket usually contain my brother and in his defence he was very drunk and thought that he looked rather good as Wonder Woman.
Hilarious!
My mom always dressed up my sister and I to go out and sometimes in matching outfits that she made. When my children were little, I found a really cute kids clothing store that sold hats vests dresses skirts, all really cute! I did recently find a photo where I went a little overboard… They looked like ragamuffin gypsy children…Not sure where we went that day!
Never did fib to them though… 🙂
My Mum did dress me up to go out too but far worse she let her friend perm my hair once! I smelled like bad perm solution for weeks and looked like a poodle!
Another blogger who loves gin and tonics? Did we just become best friends? *Whistles casually to cover up creepy comment* Anywho, my twins are three, and, while I can get my son to wear perfectly picked out outfits, my daughter has to wear whatever she wants. She can’t go out in her underwear and flip flops, but I might’ve taken her to the store yesterday in a sparkly Cinderella dress, sweat jacket, and winter boots.
I think that clothing combo sounds rather fetching! I have checked out your blog too and will be following along- us gin and tonic folk should stick together!
Super! And so true! I can only aspire to your white lie level, but have been known to claim such falsehoods as “don’t know where your craft went” or “sometimes coffee breath smells like chocolate”. Loved this!
I have used the missing craft line a few times and have no shame in addmiting that the kids think the dogs eats them!
I loved to wear my pants over a million times even when they were ripped and dragging on the cement. My mother on the other hand disliked the way I dressed because dressing like that made her look like we could not afford clothes, and the best ones were always ripped. I do understand now as a mother of a 6 year old boy, who would love to walk around in his gas mask. I completely understand that sometimes it is necessary to make your children change into something else and on other days I love to just let him show the world his personality and the way he would like to dress. I would have done the same thing with the knight outfit
Ripped jeans are just the coolest thing when you are a kid- I loved mine! Luckily for me the -20 temps here in the winter have lead my son to dislike cold knees at recess- result!
I feel the need to defend myself …… Curly permed hair was very fashionable in the 80s….. Your hair did look a bit funny …. That fringe !! …Sorry
No need to apologise Mum, I feel it has helped shaped my character into the well rounded person I am today- Or lead me to drink way too much gin- could be either! xx
The last paragraph was pretty hilarious! I laughed a lot. I think white lies (not the serious ones) help put the “fun” in parenting–just like what you did here. Instead of saying a straight “NO” and letting your child feel down for the rest of the day, this is a much better thing to say.
Thank you- I always go for the fun option! I am sure it wont take them too long to work out my little fibs! One day I promise I will tell them that the hazard light button in my car is not an ejector seat button too…..
I can’t count the number of times my sons wore a cape somewhere. But that was it. No full costumes in McDonald’s, please, unless it’s Halloween.
Funny thing about heroes and clothing white lies: I was once asked by my young son why Wonder Woman was wearing her underwear. I had to think quickly since telling the truth (she was the brain-child of adult men living out a mild S&M fantasy that involved a corset and a golden lasso) didn’t seem advisable. Thankfully, my watching the 1970s series made me a master of the White Lie: “That’s her swimsuit,” I said. “Diana was raised on an island, so she went swimming a lot, and that became her costume.” *Whew, he bought it.*
I think you need a medal for the quick thinking on the Wonder Woman cover up- fantastic!
I used to be very matching conscious, until I gave birth to my own Punky Brewster.
(see ‘Punky Brewster Phase post http://imandreaandyourenot.wordpress.com/2013/03/04/715/)
I think the knight in shining armor would be a bit much, might have to pull the white lie.
I think you have a case against Timmies…
I used to care when I had kid 1, but by the time I had kid 3, I am just glad they are dressed! They have to be empowered to pick their own lovely fashion choices!! 😉
“Like gin and tonic…” As a mom of two, I can relate. Thanks for your wit!