Parenting | 100 Words

What Is A Normal Christmas?

November 29th, 2025
Mollie T. Cox

One Advent evening, while my family sat in our living room singing Christmas Carols, we were interrupted by a knock on the door. A teenager in the neighborhood, whom we only knew by sight, was collecting donations for a club. We invited him to join our singing. He chose a song from the book we handed him and stayed a bit.

I was surprised. I still debate whether I was more surprised by the quickness of his response or by the lack of self-consciousness on the part of my sons and him. After he left, I decided that our sons saw our activity as normal while I suspected that a family singing Christmas carols in early December was rare.

What about our visitor? Did he think a singing family was normal? It doesn’t matter. What matters is that I remember the seamlessness of that evening because our Christmas tradition was well established. We were the makers of “normal” for our Christmas season.

What else is normal for us? A long breakfast followed by Scriptures and singing before opening presents. No travel. No Santa. Fun gifts. Jelly Bellies anyone?

What is your “normal?”

Decisions, Homeschooling, Parenting

Advice Versus Experience

November 8th, 2025
Mollie T. Cox

I don’t believe in advice. I offer experience and hope.
Tracee Ellis Ross

I don’t believe much in advice either, Tracee. Along the way, I’ve received too much from people who have no knowledge or have never walked in my footsteps. (I remember both the humor and the hurt from those situations.)

I’m also guilty. Long ago and far away, I chose a new homeschool curricula. It was computer based and made my life easier while my family cared for my mother. Within weeks, I was recommending my discovery to other families. By the end of the year, I was pointing out the curricula’s faults and giving different advice. My friends needed my seasoned experience—not my untested advice.

Even seasoned experience has not stopped others or me from giving and receiving bad advice.

What do I wish we all knew before sharing experiences and offering hope? To ask questions first to see our experiences are helpful.

Never miss a good chance to shut up. Will Rogers

Homeschooling, Parenting

Unhappy Happiness

October 25th, 2025
Mollie T. Cox

A parent’s job is never to make their kids happy or smooth every bump in the road… Children learn by messing up, getting frustrated, and not getting their own way.
Becky Kennedy, Mom and Clinical Psychologist

Thank you, Becky Kennedy, for standing up for what I believe—something I understand more after seeing the unhappiness that comes from making children happy.

I’m hurting these days. As I teach and prepare lessons for my eager-to-learn students, I think of certain children I love and wish I could teach. I can’t. Why? Their mothers are absorbed in making sure they are continually happy. Therefore, they are academically behind, socially impaired, and often unpleasant to be around.

Otherwise, they are great kids. or could be if their moms didn’t try to keep them happy at all costs—costs which fall on parents, siblings, neighbors, and the teachers who are required to teach them.

As the mother of adult children and the friend of many mothers of adult children, here is what I’ve learned along the way. Even if you should make children happy, it is impossible. The only path is to do what is best for them—which rarely involves happiness.

Decisions, Homeschooling, Parenting

Following Other Families

September 6th, 2025
Mollie T. Cox

The great illusion of leadership is to think that man can be led out of the desert by someone who has never been there.
Henri Nouwen

I thought the perfect families and homeschoolers showcased in magazines and at conventions could show me the way. It turned out they could only give me a picture of the destination because they had never been in my parenting and homeschooling desert.

I don’t regret what I read and attended. I do regret not realizing the journey presented could not be replicated. There were many reasons. The advice-giving parents were from a different generation. They had different challenges and resources. Others had not finished their journey and so they only thought they knew the way.

As the school year geared up, and the challenges abounded, my peers and I rarely had people who could lead us. We stumbled around together and eventually made it.

Almost twenty years have passed since my sons graduated. The desert has changed during that time. As your school year progresses, may you have people to lead you and the wisdom to know who they are.

Thank you, Marie Hannah, for surviving the desert and returning to guide others.

Parenting

Prayers I Should Have Prayed

July 26th, 2025
Mollie T. Cox

I always prayed my children would stay close to each other when they were adults. I never prayed they would stay close to me. I wrongly assumed it.
A Mother

My friend’s words spoke to me. As estrangement from parents becomes common among millennials, my and my friends’ assumptions about adult relationships with our children are challenged.

My friends and I prayed diligently for our children’s salvation, friends, jobs, health, education, and future spouses, but there were gaps. We prayed for particulars and overlooked larger issues. We prayed for major concerns and overlooked important details.

We looked at the older families around us and said, “We and our children are different.”

These days, when I read Ephesians 6:18, “Keep alert with all perseverance” are the words that stand out to me.

Praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end, keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints.
Ephesians 6:18