I saw the most inspiring example of EXCELLENT parenting just before. How did she get to BE like that? Could she teach others to be such excellent parents? Will I ever see them again??

The first thing I noticed was that she said to her children as they entered the corner shop seating area: ‘be respectful please. there are other other people here’.

Then when her son spilt his orange juice on the table, his clothes, and his chair, she did not freak out, , , (even slightly!). She said in the calmest voice ‘It is okay, mummy can clean this up. This is no problem.’

She also said to her son that he should use ‘two hands’ on his cup. And she repeated this a number of times. He was successful in his attempts to drink from the cup. He wanted to do it himself. She was more than happy to let him – with the constraint of the two hands thing.

She set boundaries. She said ‘no’ to her daughter’s requests for more orange juice. Even when her daughter tried to emotionally bargain with her. She still said ‘no.’

It has left me wondering if these sorts of skills can be learned!! Intuitively, it feels like it would require a strong sense of self. A strong core knowledge that she is okay, that everything is okay!