Parents: Do not feel bad about participating in your child’s extracurricular activities

Last week, I got a call reminding me that my son’s Pinewood Derby car was due at weigh the very next day!

Yes, I totally forgot about it and it soon became a race against the clock.

I had to pull an all-nighter to complete the project — and it was awesome! I got to recreate Luke Skywalker’s X-34 LandSpeeder in a wooden Derby. How cool is that?

But shortly after, I started to get some grief about doing it on my own and not having my son create the car on his own.

(Oh, wait…What do you mean this is supposed to be for the kids? Since when has the Pinewood Derby EVER been for the kids?)

There is a reason why there are sections of home improvement stores such as Lowe’s and Home Depot dedicated to Pinewood car building, complete with high-quality Dremel tools — because this is a big boy project.

We all remember our dads in the garage, hammering, cutting, and sanding away like a Pinewood mad scientist.

And now its our turn.

I can hear the moms out there, rolling their eyes at the thought of a parent completing a project for their kids.

Hey, moms: How many Girl Scout cookies have you sold to your friends or at work? I’m sure you sure aren’t earning those badges for your own sash!

You see, it’s what we do as parents.

This has been happening for generations. Remember those candy bars that we all had to sell at school? We never sold those things, our parents took them to work and hawked them to their co-workers!

So lighten up. Stop the guilt and stop feeling guilty.

Go ahead, build that super cool Pinewood Derby car, sell the heck out of some Girl Scout cookies.

And if anyone gives you grief about getting it done for your kids, just tell them it’s a family tradition.

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