Nine years ago I had no job, a baby on the way, and a degree (or two) that I couldn’t use. So naturally I did the most logical thing I could think of: I opened a business.

Ever since then I’ve been running a family child care program out of my home (and I haven’t gone crazy yet! Not once!). I have made every mistake and learned every lesson the hard way. Being a child care provider has made me a better mother, and I’m so grateful for it every day. If the lessons from my screwups can help someone who’s struggling with their kids, then I’m happy.

I have also found myself in the role of advocate when it comes to provider issues. I’ve come to learn what a complicated, undervalued, difficult, and essential job this is. In some ways I’m trying to give people a look at what this job is really like, and to show how important it is for our culture to treat its child care workers with respect (before we all burn out and run away screaming).

And I speak for children, who, I’ve come to learn, are highly misunderstood beings.

I thank my family every day for putting up with this social experiment and for sharing their wife/mommy with all these other people (nine, at the moment).

I thank the parents in my program who let me ponder life lessons while working with their children. I would never publish anything here that I wouldn’t tell them.

In case you’re wondering, the title of this blog was inspired by an actual list of rules that we had to create when we had a little sibling rivalry happening.