It started with a torn up ankle and my husband in grad school 4 nights a week.  I was home alone with my 1 1/2 year old son and I couldn’t walk.  We made friends with You Tube and  watched Fiest sing 1234 on a Sesame Street clip.  We watched Bobby McFerrin sing “Hush Little Baby” with YoYo Ma.

Then I got pregnant and had to be on progesterone supplements that turned me into a vomiting zombie.  So we watched Cars.

The baby was born and we became Dora obsessed.

My son now loves all vehicles.  So we watch ridiculous slide shows of toy monster trucks driving over toy cars.

“My child will never wear disposable diapers.”

“I’ll never snap at my child.”

“No sugar, EVER.”

“I’ll keep up my appearance when I become a mom.”

“We won’t turn into those couples who forget to make time for each other.”

“MY child will not watch TV until he’s 2 and then it will only be 1 minute a week.”

At some point, the lines became blurred on many parenting rules my husband and I had made for ourselves.  We broke our rules.

Which is why I try to ignore the typos in someone’s post.  Why I have patience with the mom who uses Twitter to vent on something personal…occasionally.  Understanding for the couple who sits in silence at the restaurant.  Compassion for the mom in the too tight yoga pants and stained shirt at the mall.  Respect for the dad who makes an 11 minute video of staged monster truck scenes and posts it online.

We all stray from our original path and bend our rules.

The rules I’ve broken and the lessons I’ve learned are the reason for my silence when I hear soon-to-be parents or very new parents pontificate on all their supposedly unwavering rules.  We have to start there, don’t we?

Our kids are going to be just fine.  Despite the fact that my son can recite the lines to entire movies by heart, he can also divide and count the syllables in any word you give him.  My daughter was introduced to cheaply made toys when she was 8 hours old (because she had to be introduced to Chick Hicks ASAP) but was strong enough to roll over at 3 weeks.

My kids will grow up to be happy, healthy adults.

They’ll be just fine and if we keep temperance in mind when evaluating our parenting, we’ll be just fine too.