Many, including Jewel herself, have dubbed her latest album Picking Up The Pieces as a logical companion, or book-end, to her smash debut Pieces of You (1995). Make the most of your health, relationships, fitness and nutrition with our Live Well newsletter. “Boredom is a really important aspect for kids to experience that’s where they get to build their sense of creativity.” “And it’s OK for kids to be bored,” she adds. It’s quality time with your child that matters, in particular time spent focusing on whatever you’re doing with them rather than multitasking,as opposed to quantity time, she says. “The joke across the table is, ‘Oh mum, there’s only so long that you can play the widow card before everybody’s going to go she’s just not showing up’.”Īnd, for those parents – perhaps single parents or those short on spare time – struggling to play with their children, Tan-Kristanto has some reassurance. “We have this joke in the house, ‘Do you play the widow card, or do you play the single parent card?’ ,” she says. “So we’re having this duality of a conversation about healthy eating, sex education and this lovely, joyful, silly conversation about their dad, who is no longer there, but in the same breath it’s woven in. “He’s just like, ‘No thanks, I don’t want to be on the school email list’.”īut while he is the “fun parent”, and she’s grateful that her children have him to play with, she is the one they often come to for emotional support, when the chips are down. “I’m too focused on trying to remember all the things that they need to do, to sort of get through the day, whereas he doesn’t have any of those responsibilities at all,” my friend, who works at an aid organisation, says of her husband. (One is in high school.) Because while her husband is the one to grab the kids for a last-minute game of UNO before they leave the house in the morning, she’s always been the one to grab their uniforms out of the dryer, pack their lunches, and make a mental note to pick up a chicken for dinner. “I just get the eye rolls,” she says of day-to-day life with her three daughters, two of whom are now in university. “Kids know the parent that keeps their world spinning ,” says Melbourne clinical psychologist Stephanie Tan-Kristanto. It’s the one that helps them to have a steady, stable footing.”
“You can see who they turn to, and it’s not often the fun parent. “When kids come into a session, it can be a bit intimidating and scary and unknown, being in a room with a stranger,” she says. She has seen it in sessions with families. “Kids know the parent that keeps their world spinning – even though they don’t know the day-to-day tasks – because when things start to feel unsteady and off-kilter, they always turn to that parent.” “All of that stuff: the packing, meal prepping, nappy changing, school drop-offs, excursion forms, the dinners that they won’t eat most of the time, teeth-brushing supervision, all of that matters and adds up,” she says. “It’s 100 per cent important,” says Melbourne-based Stephanie Tan-Kristanto, director of the Australian Clinical Psychology Association, of the daily activities that mark the lives of the not-fun parent. “You see your kids looking at what other families are doing and it seems as though it’s not as fun,” says Vashti Whitfield (right) with her late husband, actor Andy Whitfield, in 2008, of single parenting her two teenage children. (You can add British actor Florence Pugh’s parents to that list of recently revered fun parents, too.) There are so many benefits! (More on this soon.)īut what about the not-fun parent? The one whose day-to-day activities aren’t fawned over on Instagram, in person, or on the cover of magazines because they are, frankly, too boring to witness? Making sure that camp forms are filled out and school uniforms still fit isn’t as Instagrammable as munching doughnuts with your kids “as the first pink streaks fill the sky”. We should be waking our “kids in the predawn hours with the promise of doughnuts and adventure” or mimic the “ relaxing and fun” royal parenting style of the eldest granddaughter of the Queen, Zara Tindall, and her husband, Mike. If we’re not embracing “our inner child” and finding parenting “stitch-in-the-side funny”, we’re doing it wrong. Royal parents Mike and Zara Tindall, pictured with their children Mia (with long hair) and Lena Elizabeth (pictured in both photographs), are just the latest parents to be praised for being “fun” parents.