My husband and I are teaching our kidlets to snow ski. A very daunting task, I’m afraid. But we both love skiing, so we are determined to eventually have fun with our children on the slopes–even if it means hating each other first.
We don’t have enough extra cash flow to pay for lessons (though I think that would be a wise route), so we figured we can teach them on our own. We taught them to sleep through the night, walk, and use the potty, why can’t teach them ski?
This past weekend we took our family on a little winter vacation for a few days of skiing and fun together. Sounds simple, but it wasn’t. And I decided that like teaching them to sleep through the night and use the potty, teaching our kidlets to ski has tested our parenting skills to the limits.
So here is what I learned (and re-learned):
1. Children can cry and scream a lot. They can do it unexpectedly at any age, in front of anyone.
2. They do not always listen to you, even when you’ve told them how to do it a million times.
3. Patience in parenting can be futile.
4. Sometimes you just have to let them try on their own, even though you know they are going to crash.
5. They hate you when they are learning, BUT they love you when they’ve mastered it.
6. Sometimes their favorite part of the trip is the Cap’n Crunch you let them have for breakfast, and not the expensive skiing experience.
7. Sometimes your favorite part of the trip is the Cap’n Crunch you let yourself have for breakfast, and not the expensive skiing experience after all.
8. You still love them. They still love you. And you’ll probably go through it all over again, very soon.
