Remember when you had a little baby snug in your arms and were all "How often do I feed him?" or "When will she sleep through the night?"

This was followed by "How do I stop my kid from throwing a major meltdown" and "Why won't they eat vegetables!"

In your innocence, each time you got through a stage you'd think it would be all downhill from there, easy peasy slice o' cheesy.

Not to burst your bubble or anything but I'm here to tell you you're DELUSIONAL. There is no easy peasy slice o' cheesy. The only slice o' cheesy you're getting is the one you snarf down while running out the door to take your kids to hockey/swimming/skating practice.

Lets take allowances for example.

There seems to be about 50 kajillion opinions on how it should be done. Sarah DeVeau implemented a system of earning money based on chores.  Maureen's kids have chores but they can also earn extra money by doing extra work...and lose money with penalties.  Last year Caroline refused to give her kids an allowance but this year in a moment of desperation she gave out some manipulation money.

And what about how much allowance your child should be given?  One dollar for every year?  A certain amount per chore? And if we tie money to chores are we sending our kids the message that they only need to help out when they want to get paid?

It seems procuring a house mortgage is easier than navigating the murky waters of allowances. 

Here's the thing. There's no right or wrong way. Could we be messing up our kids by giving them allowances based on work they do around the house? Possibly. Could we be messing them up by just giving them money all willy nilly?  Yep, that too.  Could we teach them from a very young age that Loonies are actually called vaginas and Toonies, boobies and watch the mayhem ensue?  Oh yes we could. Because parenting gives us great power.  But we won't teach them vaginas and boobies as coin names because with great power comes great responsibility.  NO MATTER HOW FUN THE ALTERNATIVE MAY BE.

The truth is we're all messing up our kids in our own special way. Allowances are not the exception to the rule.

Here's what we do at our house (and I based it on the advice of Alyson Schafer who has yet to steer me wrong with any parenting advice she's given me).  At the beginning of each month we give Son No. 1-$20 and Son No. 2-$15. This is their money for the month. They can choose to spend it all at once, little bits at a time or save it. Once the money is passed over it is theirs to do as they wish.  We have watched them blow it all on crap and have stood by in awe as Son No. 2 did the unfathomable and saved his allowance for three whole months to buy a camera.  If they make bad choices, we don't admonish—they are learning and sometimes those lessons come from spending all your money in a dollar store while your mother stands by biting her lip until it's bloody so she doesn't blurt out THERE'S STILL 29 DAYS LEFT IN THE MONTH.

We don't tie this money to any chores. We don't even have any chores in this house, we have expectations. That means there's a certain level of responsibility that comes with living in a family like removing your dishes from the table, putting any uneaten food in the green bin and placing your dishes in the dishwasher. It means if I ask you to help me clean up the living room, you don't have to do so enthusiastically but there better not be any eye rolls either. The cat doesn't feed himself and the day I taught you how to properly clean your hamster cages was the day you learned what it's like to be a pet owner. Jackets are hung up, shoes are put away.

But not always. Sometimes jackets are left on the floor and there needs to be reminders....because it is a learning process. Just like how they learned 29 days is a long time to go with no money and a couple of cheap broken toys and a ring pop to tide them over. The upside is I have kids who see me cleaning and now sometimes offer to help. Not because I will give them a quarter to wash a toilet but because we are a family and that's what you do when you live in a family, you help. This works for us, just like your system probably works for you.

I don't know if it's going to work in the long run but I do know that if it's not the allowances it's going to be something else that I do that screws them up and when I do it's going to be really really special.