Parenting Tips From The Cabbage Patch

This is our daughter, Sandra Ruby. Sandra Ruby is our Cabbage Patch Kid. Isn’t she a doll?

When we adopted her in December of 1985 she came with a birth certificate showing her name, Sandra Ruby, and paperwork that confirmed she was ours. She’s been in our family for over 40 years. But she hasn’t worked a day and still lives with us.

We’ve been an example to her as hard-working responsible people. Here’s the thing, we’ve not been very good companions to her. We haven’t communicated with her as much as we could have. As far as being teachers, we haven’t taught her a thing. So she’s not much different now from what she was almost 40 years ago.

But you wouldn’t have expected us to do those things, would you? After all, she’s just a Cabbage Patch doll.

Unfortunately, that’s exactly what some parents end up doing to their real children. They may be examples of being hard-working, responsible adults secularly, religiously, and socially.

But when it comes to their children:

1. They may be too busy to be companions — not spending enough time (quality and quantity) with their children.
2. They may be too busy to communicate — really listening to what their children say and how they feel about things, and being prepared to answer hard questions when they arise.
3. They may be too busy to teach — helping their children to learn practical skills that will boost their self-esteem (e.g., laundry, ironing, sewing, cooking, baking, minor repairs, balancing a checkbook, managing money, paying taxes, and don’t forget dancing!), in addition to helping their children to establish beneficial habits that will serve them well in their adult years.

By not only being examples to our children but also being close companions, effective communicators, and compassionate teachers, we just might reap the harvest of a close relationship with our children in our later years. Even after all the effort, it might not turn out the way we hoped it would. But that is how it turned out for my wife and I with our two sons. Were we perfect parents? Hardly. Did we make mistakes? You betcha. But we endeavored to apply the tips outlined above as best we could, and now we enjoy a close relationship with our two sons, who are responsible adults in their own right along with their dear wives, each named Carla. Go figure.