OK have been meaning to start this one for a while - what are you insouciant about re yr kids?

[Clary]

Sorry for silly long word in the title. I really mean, what do you let go and think is OK that others might not. I am convinced we all have sthg.

For example, a pal is a lovely mum and really caring but once carried more children in her car than there were eseast for. I would never do this.

Another really really lovely caring mumsnet type mum who makes her own bread and loves her lovely kids to bits and does all kinds of imaginative stuff with them but passes on shoes.

Another is lovely too, shoes always nicely shined, house is clean and tidy, children very polite, ride bikes, read well etc, but are fed total crap - and refuse any brown bread, salad, fruit etc (at least that's all the kids were ever given at playdates there).

So what's your thing you just don't think matters? I'm not after judging (tho no doubt this will go that way) but interested.

Tp show I mean it, here are mine (I have 2); 1) I let my kids lick out the cake mix bowl (the car friend thinks this is unacceptable). Raw eggs, schmaw eggs. Am I putting their lives at risk?

2. I am a bit casual about illness. If DD is sick (she often is) but not really ill, ie she throws up then asks what's for lunch and goes and runs round in the garden afterwards, I don't wait 48 hrs to send her back to school.

See, I told you I was a bad mother!

I don't worry about TV (in my "perfect parenting" fantasies I was going to be really tough on it ), falling over, dirt or climbing (most) things. And we virtually never iron anything of DS's. It had never occured to me to worry about licking out the bowl, but I have no intention of starting now.

Clary, oh, I'm going to probably wind you up now. I am PISSED OFF about the new car seat law. I am car free and would be totally insouciant about letting DS sit on my lap in someone's car - indeed, have done so when out in the country with no car seat and the alternative being 8 mile walk. Because car seats don't make that much difference and car accidents are not that common. Yet there's all this pissy paranoisa about obligatory car seats, not taking into account at all the fact that some people are carfree and don't want or need to lug a big car seat around al the time- particularly given that car seats don't , percentage-wise, make that much difference in an accident.

madamez.

Your ds would be a lot safer (AFAIK) sitting in a car with no car seat than sitting on your lap.

Car accidnets a lot more common than paedophiles or other things people worry about

btw the new car seat law you are p-d off about mainly affects children over 6 or so who previous to it would have been sitting in car without a booster. How old is yr DS?

Not bothered about

occasional fruit shoot or Mcdees, we watch TV and DVDs including Dr Who and Harry Potter, chocolate spread sandwiches for breakfast (at weekends only), suasage rolls or chips, dirt, ironed clothes or co-ordianted clothes - in fact they choose their own rather odd combinations - as long as they are appropriate for weather,

I am fussy about

correctly fitting shoes for daily use, car seats, being polite, being kind and thougthful, really detest rudeness of any sort,

I am sure I could go on

I lick the cake bowl sod the kids.
Mine have too much stuff, have been known to eat minced feet (aka mcdonalds) and oh shoot me now they know what fruit shoot is.
They have missed bedtimes on holidays and I have let them stay off school to go on holidays.
Bad mother award to me please.

Oh and on Christmas day and Easter day chocolate IS a staple food

Clary: EVERYONE'S dcs would be safer if private car owneship was banned. Statistcally anyway. Mine is 2 - just at the age where there is no such thing as a portable , fits in everyone's car, car seat. There is an actual gap in the market (for the paranoid) for a car seat that's easy to carry and uinverally applicablbe..

Everyones DC would be safer if we hung paedophiles but hay that's not going to happen is it.

we do use car seats but twice i have taken ds in a car without one. the first time he was strapped to me in a baby sling, the second he seat next to me squished up in the corner so nobody could see!

we didn't go very far. the first time just a couple of minutes, the second probably about 5.

my excuse is not a great one. had arranged to go out with friends only to discover someone had taken off with the car and the car seat still in it.

also once when we weren't travelling far and it was pitch black i didn't strap the car seat in properly, just put it on the back seat.

we have a very awkward car seat that in 2 peoples cars does not strap in properly. i just make sure the front seat is right against it so it can't go anywhere.

our car seat is one of those that lies flat when on the pushchair, so in the car is meant to be in the most upright position. at 3 months old this didn't look very comfortable but did it anyway as i couldnt get the car seat in my friends car if i didn't. cue gasps from this woman saying oooh he shouldn't be upright like that. cue her saying oh my dd got her ds one of those door bouncers - you should get him one. nowe to me they look dangerous!

oh and weight limits and warnings on baby products. ds has been sitting up unaided ages and is well over the 20lb weight limit but i still let him sit in his bouncer.

the only thing i mind about on here is drawing on walls i think and car safety, even though it wouldn't seem it lol.

oh and i am very insouciant about seatbelt use on myself. as in i rarely wear them, although do in other people's cars.

not at this stage yet, but my mum used to sometimes let me have the day off school just because and i will probably let ds occasionally have a day off. for me it was usually because i hadn't done some homework that was due in.

Mine swear, and we secretly think it's funny.

3 year old: " When I'm grown up I'm going to work in your office a be a fuck arse boss like you"

DH: " You mean a kick arse boss"

I am a really good parent in every other way.

DS2 age six has started to spell swear words!!!
Example i'm not allowed to say F.U.C.K. . DS1 has Tourettes and NEVER swears

DS1 will be missing a days school for a trip to spain with my sister

Message withdrawn

get ths my kids have had chocolate FOR breakfast again today

when they drop something in the car and can't reach it, I say "oh for goodness sake, quickly un-do your seatbelt and pick it up, you won't die if you do". I was always leaving irons around my children

i can not believe that someone would ever actually do this stuff never mind comeout and admit it!!! i am in disbelief about a lot on this thread but this takes the biscuit.

i think i am laid back about a lot of things, will always choose playing with the kids over doing housework but i could not cope with a dirty messy house so i make sure it all gets done at night, my kids clothes are all brand new, why would you dress kids in something that someone else has worn???

this really annoys me, you need to go through so many checks etc just to work with kids and yet any idiot on the streets can have a child and treat it anyway they want!!!

'why would you dress your kids in something that someone else has worn?'

Let me count the ways

I have 3 kids and can't afford brand new for all of them

Its good for the environment

They are perfectly good clothes, some hardly worn.

I hate waste

Why the hell not I say. My line is drawn at second hand undies I think though.

totally shocked, I am also in total disbelief about this thread - I can't believe that people find all this stuff shocking!

oh my god if you cant even afford to buy them new clothes how are you ever going to afford to feed them proper and take them nice places i.e days out, holidays, school trips, never mind just treating them to some thing they really want just because you think they deserve it, mines are not spoilt but i would hate to think i could not afford to buy them something as basic as new clothes

totally shocked, you are too easily shocked.

days out etc are TREATS not rights. New clothes are luxuries.

Well each to their own. I would go as far as to say I prefer second hand clothes, especially for me. Much more originality at half the price. High street stores are for sheep imo.

And er, I've got enough money to feed them thanks. Just prefer to spend me money on other things.

I would be ashamed if my children wore nothing but new clothes - wasteful, and how many friends would we have if we didnt receive and give hand-downs?

niceglasses are none of the 2nd hand clothes you get from high street shops then!!! are they 2nd hand and homemade???

[shocked]

Oh well, one born every minute

i'd rather spend my money on treats for them than on overpriced new clothes

and what do you do with the old one? dump them? lovely planet you'll be leaving your precious angels piled high with landfills!

2nd hand from charity shops mainly, but at least I'm doing me bit. Listen, hun, you buy what you want - but don't make sweeping generalisations like ' why would you want to dress kids in second hand clothes' and not expect some come back. Many pple rely on second hand. And the bloody hell not. New doesn't mean better in my book, but then its my book.