On second thought, why don't you just stay away from my towels?

You’ve all seen them. The helpful internet posts about getting children to do chores. The guilt-inducing blogs about moms who have their sons empty the dishwasher every night. The helpful downloads of chore charts that you can post for your children. Recently my own mom shared this Montessori-inspired checklist on my Facebook page:

Thanks for the blog idea, mom! It's such a beautiful scene: Little independent beings toting the firewood and sorting the silverware while simultaneously learning the satisfaction of domestic work and how to do it properly. In real life, though, this quickly becomes messy, unhygienic and just not worth my limited time.

Please don't misunderstand me. I feel the guilt. I don't want to raise kids that don't know how to clean a toilet or disinfect doorknobs (I just learned that I should be disinfecting the doorknobs) but I also don't want my kids walking through my house dripping chemicals. I'm controlling like that. And have you ever seen clothing folded by an eight-year-old?!? My obsessive-compulsive tendencies already activate when my husband folds the towels and they aren't all the same shape.

I am fully aware that an internal debate about kids doing chores falls squarely under the "First World Problems" column heading. But it is a debate. Between our two kids, we currently have after school activities every weeknight. In around these activities we cram reading, math and piano practice, dinner and showers. If there is any time leftover (and sometimes there's not) they get 30 minutes to play together or with neighborhood friends. I have told myself for a long time that I will start asking them to do more on the weekends, but that is when we all want to unwind or are off on other adventures.

Our checklist has a lot fewer chores.

For now, I require our girls to keep their rooms clean and beds made and that is about it. I did get sick of yelling the same mantra five times every morning: "Go upstairs, make your bed, brush your teeth, put clothes in the hamper and turn out the lights." I made them their own checklist and put them in picture frames. That way they could check them off with an dry erase marker. This worked great for a week until the novelty wore off, but here is a PDF of the list if you'd like to give it a try. (I would also like you to know that it took me waaaaay too much time and Googling to figure out how to embed a PDF and you probably won't be able to download it, but best of luck!)

Mom Guilt: Sorry, not sorry.

We need to talk about a very important topic: Mom Guilt.

This topic is important because it is a giant load of garbage.  It is the invention of a modern society with both too much and too little time on its hands.

I want to discuss this topic so we can all NEVER mention it again.

I didn't even know that mom guilt was a thing from which I wasn't, but should, be suffering until I started reading blogs. I heard women bemoaning the fact that they were not spending time playing with their children because they had to work or fold laundry or cook.  Women feel guilty because they choose to tackle housework or job-work or just take time for themselves during daylight hours while they still have a shred of energy left.  They spend all day providing for and caring for their families, but then feel guilty when they occasionally go out with friends or get a manicure. This is madness!

Ladies, let's go back in time to the days of the pioneers.  Do you think Ma Ingalls (Obviously the paragon of pioneer women) even stopped and said "I feel so guilty. I should be playing with Laura and Mary right now instead of peeling these potatoes"?!? Heck no! That woman was busy washing laundry in a stream and fighting off bears. Her kids grew up fine.

Jump ahead more than a few decades to the 1980's.  I remember only a few times when my mother sat down to play with me.  The times I do remember, I was probably 3. By the time I was able to not stick metal into outlets when left unsupervised for 20 minutes, I was playing dollhouse or making up plays by myself in the basement for hours. I was an only child and I still managed to play happily by myself.

Now, I'll agree that from time to time it is nice to play with your kids. but who invented this idea that it is a parent's job to entertain their children? Children are capable of entertaining themselves. They can play with all the junk we buy for them. When they get bored of that, they can play with siblings. I tell my kids "Play with your sister. Why do you think I had two of you?"

Without waxing too prophetic on another topic on which I am not an expert, I will tell you that children need time alone to develop creative thinking skills. Traits like originality and the ability to interact with others don't come from playing with you, they come from being given the space and time to make choices, create and play with other children.

Mom guilt gets also gets me riled up because it is pure sexism. Have you ever heard of Dad guilt? Has any man ever said "Wow, I couldn't even enjoy golf today because I kept thinking that I should be spending the time with my kids."? I won't insult your intelligence by answering my own rhetorical questions. Mom guilt comes to you from the same folks that call assertive women "bitchy" and imply that women do not have the necessary faculties to control their own fertility. We tell women they should do it all, but then make them feel guilty for DOING it all. Garbage.

We are all caring, giving women. We spend hours with our children. They are bathed, clothed, fed, supervised, read-to, worried-about, transported, supported and continually helped by us. They will grow into well-adjusted, self-reliant humans because they have parents who get stuff done and take time for themselves.

I refuse to feel guilty about not feeling guilty. Sorry, not sorry.