Balance

It is all about balance. That's one of the problems that my family and I have. We don't see eye to eye on the topic of balance. They think I am too strict with kids. I think I am only strict because no one else is. After all, kids need balance. You can't have everyone being really strict or no one being strict. You need to have the correct balance of strictness and _______ (whatever the opposite of strictness is). So, when everyone is mad at me for telling the kids they can't have two ice cream cones in one day, I should get to be the one who is mad. Mad at them for making me be the strict one. Who said I wanted to play bad cop all my life? Not me.

And the worst part is that this is a recent development, one that is driving me into too many fights with the family. Fights about what the kids each, fights about if they should get a time out, fights, fights, fights. When I had my first nephew, I was the fun one. His parents were there to be the 'bad cops', the ones who said 'no'. It was my job to be the fun one, to fill his belly with ice cream, to play with, to spoil and then to send home. This worked great for awhile. Then, a few nieces and nephews later, I was suddenly the bad cop. I think the more kids that showed up, the more I tried to make organization out of chaos. This is also when the others seemed to have lost the energy or will to raise the kids to be the best they can (by enforcing some rules and having BALANCE in their lives).

Yup, balance, it's all about balance.