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I'm with you.
We have ten, the youngest is 2, and a total of three preschoolers. We sit together through the 90 minute sermon easily. Libraries and restaurants are a breeze. I don't think we have ever gone out to eat, in toto, without someone coming up and remarking on the behavior of our children.

Ok, So some observations.
First child training...we have three simple rules for the uninitiated:
1. Obedience should be first time obedience. You'll never yell at your kids.
2. Obedience should be sweet and cheerful.
3. Delayed obedience is disobedience.

Other observations:
If you read at HSLDA's website (www. hslda.org) you will realize that the great frontier of family terrorism is the dreaded new Gestapo- Child Protective Services. Horror stories abound. Liberals consider spanking to be child abuse. Now I don't know how you are going to have authoirty with no real consequences, but the restaurant/ public places stories recounted by my fellow freepers all attest to the folly of this permissive parenting.

We actually enjoy our children immensely- all of them. the best part of all is that the teen years so far ( we have 5 who are 14 tears old and up) have not been what we feared- tug-of-wars, rebellion, youthful alienation. Instead, they are our best friends.

One last thing. We ask successful families as we meet them, what they consider to be key ingredients for the homes they have so wonderfully built. We all expect to hear about making your children mind, giving chores,etc. But one recurrent theme is, we have FUN with our kids. Camping, joking, playing...we make it a point to HAVE LOTS of Fun.

And I second that!

Thank you for your post. It's easy to disregard my comments, since I have only one child, because people can say "oh well you just got a calm one in the gene roulette." But when a parent with several kids says it, it carries more weight. Here is the simple yet shunned truth from your post:

First child training...we have three simple rules for the uninitiated:

1. Obedience should be first time obedience. You'll never yell at your kids.

2. Obedience should be sweet and cheerful.

3. Delayed obedience is disobedience.

That's great! I tell my wife every time you yell, you ARE LOSING.

Now you can either not yell because you have no discipline, or you can not yell because you have discipline.

I'll only add that the trauma associated with this is less the earlier it is started. Some people read this sort of thing and say "that would never work with my 4 year old..."

Well, they are right. If you have waited until the age of 4 to expect full obediance you are going to have a major struggle.

Also, the political observation: most disciplinarian parents are Republicans. I'll leave it at that.

The fun is as important as the discipline. The mistake is to let them be at all similar to each other. The fun should rollicking good times; correction should be hell.

A child with constant correction but no fun will be an adult who is incapable of happiness (he can't believe it is possible). A child with no correction will be an adult who is incapable of happiness (he believes it is possible but can never find it).

We actually enjoy our children immensely- all of them. the best part of all is that the teen years so far ( we have 5 who are 14 tears old and up) have not been what we feared- tug-of-wars, rebellion, youthful alienation. Instead, they are our best friends.

Could it be that the "natural" stage of teenage rebellion is a myth built of experience; that it is not natural or inevitable at all, but simply the bill coming due for all the permissiveness of childhood?

Someone will answer that teens still rebel, or even more so, in strict religious households. My response it that we are NOT talking here about just being strict. Sometimes, parents can be "strict" because they are lazy, and don't want the effort of forming their individual child by loving discipline. Of course an adoloescent will chafe at that.

But we are talking about child development. If you have to pull tight reins on a 16 year old, again, you may be strict, but you lost 10 ten years ago and just don't know it.