Tips from the Trenches: A Guide to Practical Parenting

OK, I'm finally going to ask....where do you draw the line? Sometimes (ok, a lot of the time) I wonder if other people's kids get away with some of the stuff I overlook on a daily basis.

Today, for example, I was playing on Facebook while my kids were running around the house in chase. They were having an excellent time and had established a "game" in which they would take a lap of the place ending at the water cooler where they drank water (here's the bad part) STRAIGHT FROM THE NOZZLE like over-grown hamsters in a cage.

While I didn't egg them on, I also didn't make any effort to stop them. They were having fun. I was having a little obsessive-compulsive peace. So overall it seems ok to me.

Then I started to wonder if this is the beginning of the drinking out of the milk carton behavior for which I have no mercy when my husband does it. Am I opening a can of worms for social norms in the future? Or, perhaps, I'm just giving my kids some good fodder for therapy.

So instead of asking "What would Jesus do?" (which frankly wouldn't help me here). I'm asking you. What would you do? Where do you draw the line? What other behaviors should I look out for and nip in the bud? Please, I'm afraid I'm might be seriously off-base on this one!