Are YOU a holiday hypocrite too? :)

As parents we spend our time trying to teach our children the difference between right and wrong. We sneak vegetables in their food and we make sure they drink plenty of milk. We give them fresh fruit as an alternative to sugary sweets. As parents we tuck our kids into bed each night with a story, song, prayer and a kiss. We make sure they are wearing warm jammies in the winter and cool jammies in the summer. We give them vitamins. We teach them to lace up their shoes so they don't trip and fall. 

We teach them "A clean house is a happy house. So clean up your room to make it happy!" (They have yet to make the connection that both "room" & "house" are code for "mom.") We search through their Halloween candy vigorously--hoping to find any tainted candy--after all we only want our children to be safe.  That reason & that reason alone explain the Halloween Candy Tax we impose on Halloween. ;) wink wink. We teach our children to think for themselves because "If all your friends jumped off a bridge, would you?" We teach them lessons in humility and altruism. We, of course, want our children turning out better than we did. We want to learn from the mistakes our parents made. We genuinely want what is best for them! One of the most important things we do as parents is teach our children about strangers. Don't talk to strangers. Never go anywhere with a stranger. Don't accept candy from a stranger. If a stranger has a kitty or puppy or hamster or ferret--do not go see it! It's most definantely a trap. We love our children--that's why we do these things

However, come Halloween through Christmastime, many of these rules go out the window. After dressing our kids up with way to much makeup, we drag them around for the neighborhood to admire; we let them accept candy from pretty much anybody who offers it to them--aka strangers. And then we get frustrated the next day when our children are literally bouncing from wall to wall! Next comes Thanksgiving where the motto is "It only comes once a year--why not enjoy it"--thus destroying the effort to make them eat enough fruits and veggies that we have worked so hard to instill! Instead, we accept things like, "I finished my 3 helpings of dinner and my first helping of pie! Can I have some pumpkin roll?" as acceptable Thanksgiving etiquette. :)

Finally my favorite--Christmas time! Here we drag our already hyper children to malls and parties and force them to sit on the lap of a strange fat man wearing a bright red suit and curly, shaggy, white hair so they can ask him for free toys. And then, we laugh & take pictures when they scream. Then, as we snuggle our hysterical children, we are secretly laughing on the inside at the jolliness that surrounds the Santa tradition.; however, not all kids are afraid to see Jolly Old Saint Nick. Those kids hop up on the stranger's lap and rattle off a list of toys & games they want--for free-- that would provide entertainment for a small third world country. :)

For us, it wouldn't be the holidays without turning our back on a few traditional parenting practices! How about you...are you guilty as charged?

Finally, I should want to condemn this practice, but alas, like most of you reading this...I find humor & holiday spirit in the backfiring of the values we have tried to instill in our children. If you don't believe me, then hopefully you will enjoy the pictures below as proof! ;)

 If you are reading this, copy this post onto your blog and add pictures similar to mine & share! Also,  be sure to leave a comment so I can come take a peek! (These pics are from several years ago...I thought it would be fun to show off my beauties when they were younger as well as pre-diabetes days for Syd.)

Its all worth it once you get your bag of goodies though!