A Fine Parent

A Life Skills Blog Exclusively For Parents

About Ashley Trexler

Ashley Trexler is a passionate parent, dedicated to debunking popular parenting advice that doesn’t work, and raising healthier, happier kids. If you're sick of the same trite parenting advice everyone is spouting, she warmly invites you to visit her at Lies About Parenting.

How To Be a Good Parent Through Dedicated “Lazy Parenting”

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(This article is part of the Simplify Life series. Get free article updates here.)

How to be a good parent through dedicated lazy parenting - main posterLet’s face it, parenting today takes work.

Something’s gotta give. We’re trying to do too much with our kids, too soon, too often.

By today’s impossible standards of how to be a good parent, I’m a complete failure. I love my daughter, and enjoy our time together, but at heart, I’m a lazy parent. Which is why you’ll never catch me:

  • following my toddler around on the playground
  • trying to cajole her into eating dinner
  • spending every waking minute fixated on her

I accept, and embrace, that she’s an individual. As an individual, she deserves the opportunity to make her own choices, solve problems for herself, and build awareness of her unique interests.

Which is why I’ve dedicated myself to be as lazy as possible, as often as possible, when it comes to parenting my child. I’ve embraced “lazy parenting” with all my heart.

Don’t misunderstand — I’m not negligent, or uncaring. My daughter’s not walking through broken glass barefoot or watching seven hours of SpongeBob a day.

We just try to avoid extremes. There’s no lengthy list of activities we participate in, no major demands we feel the obligation to meet. If we’re interested in something, we explore it; if not, we move on.

Rarely experiencing a #parentingfail feels great!

So, what does lazy parenting look like?

[Read more…]

How to Make Sure Your Kids Don’t Grow Up to Be Judgmental People

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(This article is part of the Building Character series. Get free article updates here.)

Judgemental People Main PosterDoes it bother you when somebody judges you?

I am an unmarried mom.

No, not a single mom, but an intentionally unmarried mom. In a committed relationship with the father of my 2.5 year old daughter for the past 11 years.

While many of my friends are happy for my happiness and have accepted my choice (whether they agree with it or not), every so often, I stumble into people who just cannot mask their disbelief (and often disdain) at the path we’ve chosen.

While I don’t easily get fazed by judgemental people, when someone assumes a moral high ground, it makes me wonder. Am I missing something? Is a traditionally married mother better than an unmarried one?

We have come a long way from branding the letter “A” on an unwed mother’s forehead, and yet, the only socially “acceptable” way to bear children is with a ring on mom’s finger.

Discrimination against unmarried mothers is just one example of why it’s time for a tune-up of our moral compasses. Whether it’s race, religion, sex, money, or education, our beliefs are often out-of-touch with today’s world.

If we’re to raise kind, compassionate kids into moral, empathetic adults, we need to separate judgement from morality.

There’s right and wrong, of course. The basic ten commandments, in whatever dish you prefer them served. Thou shalt not lie, cheat, steal, or harm (well, that’s the condensed version).

But judgement is often hidden under a veil of morality.

The unmarried mom, the breastfeeding preschooler, the attachment parent, the unschooler. In today’s world of 24-hour news channels and instant status updates from friends around the world, is it really our place to judge anymore?

We see lifestyles and events we never would have been exposed to before technology took over, and when the ideas go against our beliefs, attack is too often the first line of the defense.

Technology has brought judgement to the forefront of our collective conscience, in the form of social media shaming, internet trolls, and opinion-based journalism. Judgement is our instinctive response to anything that is different from what we’re used to.

Of course, it’s natural to judge people. It’s instinctive, ingrained in the human species to be wary of people who don’t look the same. Even babies prefer similar looking company.

Let’s explore the grey area between right and wrong, where morals often become judgement, and conformity is our “safe place.”

[Read more…]