Great Moments in Parenting

Recent family surf trips have caused me to reflect on my life with children. Ryleigh is 10, well on her way to becoming a teenager, and Zoe will be 7 in September and I'm slowly losing my influence on them. However, as you'll see below, some things stick a little more than others. For the most part, I think the kids are growing up well. They're active, involved, and doing great academically -- all this in spite of frequent and stupid mistakes on my part.

Here's a partial list of corruption, terror, bad ideas and outright lies I've inflicted upon my precious little ones:

• Ever using the words "butt" and "poop" in a sentence -- ever
• Teaching Zoe how to make armpit farts
• Forcing Ryleigh to go on Disney's Pirates of the Carribean
• Forcing Zoe to go through Disney's Haunted Mansion (some people never learn)
• Teaching the kids the "diarrhea song"
• Guess what? Chicken butt!
• Letting Zoe drive my truck
• Hanging Ryleigh off the side of the balcony so my fans can adore her (wait, that was Michael Jackson)
• Telling a 2 year old Ryleigh there were monkeys in the Badlands of South Dakota
• Telling Zoe the new leaf blower was for her
• It's OK to chase the geese out of the yard with a hockey stick
• Calling Legoland, "Lame-O-Land"
• Go flush the toilet while Mom is in the shower (it's not so funny when I'm the one in the shower)
• Pull my finger
• Making up funny new words for old songs (see bullet #1)

OK, so I'm not a perfect parent.