Our Family Culture

I recently read an article about an influencer mom who posted on Instagram about her and her husband’s parenting style, which she likened to being “European.” According to the post, a “European” type of parenting involves less emphasis on kid activities and more on adult lifestyle. Some examples are having your kids eat the same foods as you, taking them to restaurants so they learn dining manners, and traveling with them to cultural locales. This is basically how my husband, Anthony, and I are raising our kids, too. But we don’t call it “European.” We’re not following a prescribed parenting style or label. It’s just similar to how I was raised as a kid with an immigrant parent. True, it’s also along the lines of what I witnessed when I lived in Europe, but to me this is about what Anthony and I want out of a family, and what we want for our kids. Every parent gets to make the call that’s right for them.

My parents were not the kind of parents to do a ton of “kid” stuff. I don’t really remember them playing with me on the floor. We never went to Disney World. Honestly I don’t remember visiting playgrounds too often, though we did have a swing set in the backyard which we were free to monkey around on from sun up to well past sundown. I think it was the fact that my parents were hard at work as a nurse and a machinist, both of whom at times worked overnight shifts. They were just too tired to play. I do have memories of them taking us to Brookfield Zoo, ShowBiz Pizza (what a blast from the past!) for birthday parties, and Six Flags Great America. Every year my mom would take us to meet up with a friend and her kids at Santa’s Village for a day. When we’d go to Thailand, they’d take us to the waterparks. So they definitely did kid-oriented stuff with us, but those were special occasions.

We play with our kids. They have a playroom; there’s a swing set out back, and we’re within walking distance of playgrounds. Yesterday it was nice outside so our daughter suggested we all play a freeze game on the front lawn. We like board game nights. But I’ll admit I’m not the most hands-on mom. I have to remind myself that the mess they make when playing is worth it. A day off means a chance to go to a museum, not those bouncy warehouse places. They get to do that stuff, too, but it’s not exactly in my wheelhouse. I’m more of a let’s-sit-and cuddle-and-read kind of mom. A let’s-have-an-age-appropriate-conversation-about-important-issues kind of mom. We go to the library a lot, which is exactly what my mom did with us.

My parents mostly cooked at home. Both my parents are excellent cooks. Because my dad is Chinese/Thai, we ate a lot of Asian foods, but we also ate things like sauerbraten from my mom’s German heritage. She of course also made typically American dishes like tuna casserole, pizza, and burgers. We ate what they gave us; there was no question about that. When we were in Thailand, I dutifully ate what my aunt made, though sometimes if I was lucky at a roadside stand they’d order me my favorite noodles and I didn’t have to eat every type of weird (to me) seafood the grownups would order. Honestly, I am glad for it, because now I pride myself on my foodie sensibilities. Food brings me joy!

Anthony, on the other hand, admittedly did not eat as broadly growing up. His parents are from Irish and Italian backgrounds, so he remembers homemade ravioli and soda bread, but the vaster world was not at his disposal. The first time I made him jasmine rice, he scrunched up his nose at the floral scent. His eyes would widen at some dishes I’d make. But to his credit, he tries it all. He eats spicy food like a pro now. He’s not afraid of something new. He’s even eaten chicken feet with my father at dim sum. He didn’t like it, but hey, he tried!

So naturally, we do the same with the kids. I enjoy cooking all kinds of food from around the world. Yes, we’ll make mac and cheese for their lunch on the weekends, but at dinnertime, we sit and eat the same thing all together. The kids eat Sicilian eggplant patties and Thai chilies and French onion soup. When they get to adulthood, it would be great if they continue to explore their palates through culinary means. I want them to be able to meet people from around the world, sit at their tables, and eat indiscriminately. Food brings people together.

My husband’s family didn’t go out to eat much. His dad would say they “didn’t have two nickels to rub together.” My parents would take us to Barnaby’s Pizza and order fried mushrooms, sausage pizza, and pitchers of root beer. We’d go to Chicago’s Chinatown (R.I.P. King Wah) on the weekends, and we tried every Thai restaurant around. My brother and I were expected to sit and behave ourselves. There were no tablets or phones back then, so we had no choice! It’s important to me to take the kids out to eat, because it’s one of my biggest pleasures. I limit my spending on other things so that we can experience dining out as a family. The kids are welcome to bring a book, but we leave devices off the table, that is until recently, when our eldest daughter got a phone. Now we have to tell her to put it down. But because we’ve been dining out ever since they were born, there are no major issues; they’re used to it. That’s not to say it’s all roses–on Valentine’s Day we took them out to a fancy place and younger one was whiny. We didn’t know it at the time, but she was starting to come down with a cold. It was too late to cancel our order, but we got through it and managed some nice moments. In the end, though, the ups outweigh the downs.

Lastly, we’ve never shied away from traveling with the kids, even as infants. Car trips, plane rides. There were definitely frazzled moments, like when we had to pull the car over somewhere between Michigan and Chicago so I could nurse the baby so she’d stop crying at the top of her lungs. But we never for a second regretted taking them places. They were 5 and not yet 2 when we traveled to Spain and Sicily as part of a multigenerational trip of a lifetime. Anthony knows how important traveling is to me, and before we were parents we talked about how we’d take the kids as many places as we could. He didn’t travel much in his childhood, except for returning to Illinois to see relatives when his family lived in North Carolina. Of course, my father took us back to Thailand several times, but they also made cross-country trips all over the U.S. as well as Mexico and Canada, and my mother always made sure there was an educational component. We try to do the same. On vacation, we plan for the kids to have fun things to do, especially swimming, but we also don’t hesitate to take them to galleries and historical sites. I’d love to do more international trips, because I want them to know what a big beautiful world this is, with all kinds of wonderful people and places, but they’re learning that about America, their home country, which is equally meaningful.

And that’s what it comes down to. Every family has different desires for the present, priorities, and hopes for the future. These are some of mine. It’s not “European,” per se, but a reflection of who we are and what we want for our family. More than anything, I hope someday our kids value our family culture we built and savor happy memories.