Mustachian parenting techniques

[jengod]

http://www.brainchildmag.com/2015/06/unsolicited-child-training-tip-1-benign-neglect/

We have met so many kids like this throughout the years that, in comparison, my children appeared to be neglected slackers, since I purposefully did not book too many scheduled activities for them...We are the trailer trash of our solidly middle class, suburban neighborhood. I cut my family’s hair. We drive used cars and repair them in the driveway. We light firecrackers in the backyard just for fun. We do rocketry — sometimes with real rockets and sometimes with Diet Coke and Skittles. We do our own house repairs. We buy used everything except socks and shoes and underwear. We take clippings of other peoples’ plants and plant them in our own yard.  If everyone who lives on our block donated one of their luxury car payments to, say, Angola, there would be enough money to feed and deworm every child in that country for a quarter of a year, and as such, I am sure some of our actions are viewed as “low-rent” by our neighbors, but we don’t care. Our kids have grown up grubby, active, usually happy, occasionally busy, and sometimes bored.
Some of the best learning, thinking and creativity come from bored kids. Here’s how you train bored kids to become people who can amuse themselves while stretching their creativity:

[MDM]

Very nice - thanks for sharing this.  Many good ideas there.

[golden1]

I cut my daughters hair, but that isn't necessarily mustachian.  She has very curly hair and it really looks the same no matter who cuts it so I figure I might as well do it.  She just keeps it long anyway so I just trim an inch off the ends every once in awhile.  I don't cut my son's hair, but I do let it grow really long between cuttings then cut it very short.  He might get 3 cuts a year.   We hardly do any structured activities either.  My kids just aren't into sports so they don't do them.  They did do band for a few years in elementary and now my dd does chorus and photography club, but that is all school sponsored.  I am really big into letting the kids have unstructured time. 

[PJSparkles360]

I really like this article. This is much how I grew up, we did our chores and then we had fun. Sometimes that meant sweeping the barn with really loud music, other times collecting caterpillars and experimenting with what they might eat (apparently not salami by our conclusive research). Some days it was riding our bikes on homemade ramps, others were mixing up all the shampoos in the bathroom until we got one to make Mom's hair 'extra curly'. Once my sister (then about 10) even designed a whole play barn on paper and asked our Dad to build it. It was just awesome, right down to the lights and running (via a hand pump) water! Now-a-days you see children with schedules so full that they don't even have the time to socialize outside or even think outside of a structured activity or TV. It is sad to see, but also a sign of the times with less SAHP, kids are thrown into school/ daycare or camp or some other type of structured play in the summer. Everyone parent has their kid literally building a resume for the rounded student by the start of elementary school. No parent wants to be the one that didn't give their child 'that opportunity'. Yet, the reality is that type of schedule isn't necessary until they reach high school and are really needed to prepare for the moment when they are expected to be their own entity in society. What kids need is the chance to figure out who they are and follow their creative intuition just like this article says. Otherwise, kids are going to be burnt out before they reach high-school graduation. For us, we don't have kids yet, but one day we hope to scale back our lives/ FIRE and be there to let them play however they want, support them in whatever crazy adventure they want to build in the backyard and just enjoy watching what they will do with all the toys my engineer husband is going to leave handy for them.