All five of them.
Last week I drove nearly 500 miles in a day to vacation with the family. The kids were good on the trip.
The oldest is 8.
the youngest is 7 months.
There was very little crying. No fighting. No “are there yet”'s.
They read quietly, looked our their windows, or played quietly.
My van does not have a television.
On vacation (a family reunion) they followed rules. Ate at a table and did not get down and run around until they were done eating. (other kids would run away and come back for more bites.)
I have good kids.
Yes, the oldest power trips and beats up his sibligs, yes, the oldest girl is a demanding princess. Yes, I cannot take them to an event where they must sit quietly like a play movie.
But I just thought I could do them a favor by bragging about them.
So, what’s it like, having aliens take over your kids’ bodies? 
Hey if aliens are controlling my kids, they are doing a good job.
Want I should hiore them out to other parents?
Yeah, you do have good kids. They’re the kind of kids I wouldn’t mind having as guests in my house. They’ll be a credit to themselves and to you as they grow up.
Now, if you can get them to do chores, you’ll have it made!
YAY, you!
When I was little I used to hold a “who can talk in the squeekiest voice” competition in the back of the car on long journeys. I will be mildly upset if my kids dont continue my traditions.
egg
Sometimes when the boys are making noise before 6 in the morning on the one day I can sleep past 6 I want to take all of that nice stuff I said back.
I need to take them all on another road trip.
btw the younger ones love being selected to do little chores like set the table. The 5 year old can’t wait to be able to use a lawn mower. Chores are shaping up well.
So, Roadwalker. Where exactly did you find these strange “kids”?
Man, if you heard the things me, my sis, and my older brothers did when we were little, you’d probably freak. One cool thing (when mom and dad weren’t home, of course), was our brothers (who are a good 13 years older than us) would wrap me or my sis in a blanket, and swing us around (imagine the way girls swing a long jump rope with one girl on each end), and sometimes they would launch us out of the blanket, across the room, onto the couch. One time, they missed, and my sister landed about a foot short of the couch, and hit her head on a wooden part of the couch. Aaah, the good old days.
Good for you, Roadwalker. Just goes to show that it can happen, this Good Kid thing.
My kids are pretty good, too. When my older two were young, I could take them anywhere–to any restaurant, church, funeral, you name it–and they would behave. No Matter What. They are just naturally calm, fairly quiet kids. (Or they were, at least. I don’t know what’s happened to them in the 15 years since then…)
My youngest two (3 and 1) are–note emphasis–pretty good. I can take them MOST places, and they will be okay. Not amazingly good, but under control, unless the baby is overtired, in which case she pulls some bizarre shapeshifting thing and turns into the Monster at the Table.
Much of it is parenting, some of it is genetic, and some of it, I think, is totally unpredictable.
Just remember that trip when they decide to drive some nails into the wall to play connect-the-dots some day…
~k