Guess who’s deathly allergic to EVERYTHING and has immune system problems now?

It’s also supposedly good to have animals. Lord knows that there’s no way my girls are going to have pet allergies!

I still can’t bring myself to let her chew on the shopping cart handle. Madre draws a line.

Isn’t that good for the immune system? (I’m serious, I remember reading somewhere that it is.)

Guns, luckily, don’t need to be in a dumb place.

Other than that, agree whole-heartedly with most… eat dirt, get hurt, have fun. It’s what being a kid is all about.

The other day I was at my nephew’s t-ball game and his sister tossed me an animal cracker, which hit the ground. She freaked out that I picked it up and ate it, as did her mother. Why let good food go to waste? Funny how those kids are always sick, have allergy problems and all that, while I’m almost never ill. Wonder if there is a correlation?

Parents should allow their children to explore the world. The younger they get a few painful lessons out of the way the smarter they will be as teenagers and young adults.

My dad kept an unloaded rifle in the hallway by his bedroom. The ammo for it was on a shelf next to it. By the time I would have been capable of loading and operating it, I knew damn well that I wasn’t allowed to touch it without permission. That’s good parenting, not reliance on locks, bubble wrap, and hiding places to keep your kids safe.

Our kids have nearly electrocuted themselves, nearly drowned, fallen down the stairs, smacked each other and themselves with garden tools, ran out behind a car, used knives to play the drums on pots, and any number of things that should have got them killed. They know how to unlock the doors, take the caps off of medicine bottles, use scissors, and have their own rake and shovel to help out in the garden. Strangely, I never taught them how to do any of these things. Interestingly enough all of the “dangerous” stuff – like guns and cleaning chemicals – we taught them about and didn’t make it mysterious, and they have never had an accident with them. Yes, I even let my 3 year hold the firearms when I am cleaning them (imagine that two super dangerous things at one time chemicals and guns!). I am sure that out in public when my kids are about to pull the shopping cart over onto themselves, others at the store think I am negligent. One person had a horrified look when I said, “Yeah, they might do that, and hopefully they will learn their lesson.” I was dead serious, and the only thing that stopped them was I found what I was looking for on the shelf and moved the cart to the next aisle.

Kids are going to eat dirt, get sick, injure themselves, injure others, and generally cause you to have a heart attack at least once a month. No amount of child proofing is ever going to change that. All it will do is shelter them enough so that they really get in trouble when they are teenagers. To say that kids and guns don’t mix well is ludicrous. My kids have been making their own “shooter guns” out of everything they own (the best was when I was switching stocks on a rifle and let my kids have the old stock, no imagination needed there). Kids want what you don’t let them have. So show them your guns and teach them all about them. When they are old enough show them that the proper use can be really fun (especially with water jugs and large vegetables).

Oh, by the way my much younger self found out that 12 volt light bulbs DO NOT like 120 volt outlets.

Also, my fathers 1920’s vintage motor with a pole switch would send a tingle up my arms if I went around barefoot while using it. Finally threw that damn thing away when he passed. \

Good luck!