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[quote=Anonymous]I'm the originator of the default parent list a few posts ago, and I just thought I'd clarify a few things.

First, I never said that everything was **mandatory.**  I even noted that some things like swimming lessons are optional.  Birthday party attendance and hosting is obviously optional as well; I just personally can't imagine not letting my kid go to birthday parties.

Second, I sincerely hope that you never wake up to text messages from your mom asking for a picture of your toddler in the shirt she just sent, or an email from your mother-in-law complaining that the dropbox link you sent her "doesn't work," and she needs access to the photos so she can make a photo book.  If you either don't get these messages or can ignore them, fantastic.  They just happen to take a fair amount of bandwidth for me and my husband.  (Fortunately, he deals with his mom's tech issues!!)

Third, there are definitely childcare options that don't require as much backup coverage as daycare does!  Hiring a nanny probably gets more days covered overall.  We've done both daycare and nanny, and I found that nanny had its own set of costs.  You have to find, hire, and socialize this person.  She might leave and only give you two weeks notice, and then you find yourself scrambling and probably covering some days in between nannies.  And you have to be someone's "manager," which I found I just didn't have any patience for in my personal life.  So, although daycare has a lot of closures, I like that they are mostly more predictable than a nanny's absences.

The daycare coverage issue is also mitigated if you have local grandparents or other family who can help in a pinch.  That just doesn't happen to be our situation.

Anyway, you can argue with my list.  Those are all things that have come up in my family recently, but some of them probably are not mandatory.  And goodness knows we do a craptastic job with a lot of them--hair cuts and nail clipping in particular.

Except going to the dentist.  I'm not arguing about that one, and I'm not waiting until my kid is FIVE to go to the dentist.[/quote]

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