What It Is

My wife and I have been blessed beyond all levels of common sense and fairness with three incredible children. They are all adults now (well, the youngest will be 21 in less than a week but I refuse to get into a bout of legalism on my own blog) so the planting, watering and pruning is over and Hope and I are now able to enjoy the fruits of our labor. (Yes, I am equating them to produce but they won't mind, mainly because I have called them a lot worse over the years.) But, if I am honest (and, really, why wouldn't I be?), Hope and I know better than anyone that, without the grace of God, we did way more to screw the kids up than to make them turn out as functional, sane and pleasant as they are.

And that is why we always get a horrified look on our face whenever someone suggests we write a parenting book. Okay, sometimes I just laugh nervously but I am making a horrified face on the inside. I promise. Just to entertain the thought that I have anything concrete to offer someone out there who is genuinely seeking advice on how to raise their spawn makes me feel nauseous. If pushed, I could tell you, “Pray often” but that would be a really short book as well as lacking a shred of originality. (Although a short book might actually get read, and I would only need one bullet point.) So, no, there will not be any how-to books forthcoming from us. But I am willing to work out a compromise. Since trying to tell you what to do with your own children makes me uncomfortable, I am willing to share with you some insight on how to raise William, Laura and Jordan. I know, it has already happened and, odds are, your offspring are nothing like my three are or were—there are no two alike. Like snowflakes. (Heck, sometimes the same kid has more than one person living inside them.) I didn't say this would be a fair compromise, I just offered it as a solution. (You notice how I am acting like you, the person reading this, are one of the people that has asked us to write a parenting book? Pretty clever, huh? I refuse to consider that you didn't even know I was married...)

So, starting tomorrow, I will pepper this blog with stories from the Colle family that may or may not shed some light on what to do with your children. But, I am confident you will walk away thinking less of Hope and I and look at my kids as the miracles they are, crafted and carved by God's grace and saved from the all-to-human ideas and suggestions of their thoroughly confused and clueless parents. Come back and join the fun...