# Skills you didn't know you would need as a parent **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [October 6, 2016, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skills-you-didnt-know-you-would-need-as-a-parent/767743 "2016-10-06T00:56:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skills-you-didnt-know-you-would-need-as-a-parent/767743/1 "2016-10-06T00:56:16Z")
How to field strip a double light sabre before packing in suitcase, in hopes that won’t set off any alarms with TSA scanners. ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skills-you-didnt-know-you-would-need-as-a-parent/767743/2 "2016-10-06T13:42:42Z")
I thought it was great that my mom could sharpen a pencil with a kitchen paring knife. ---
**Author:** ![Sattua](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sattua/32/11906_2.png) [@Sattua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sattua)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skills-you-didnt-know-you-would-need-as-a-parent/767743/3 "2016-10-06T14:27:16Z")
Unbuckling my belt, undoing my fly, going to the bathroom, then re-doing everything one-handed, while holding my infant daughter. In a public restroom stall. ---
**Author:** ![Jophiel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jophiel/32/66_2.png) [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skills-you-didnt-know-you-would-need-as-a-parent/767743/4 "2016-10-06T14:37:47Z")
Any number of minor toy repairs. From straightening a bent axle on a toy car to shaving down a Lego piece to act as a makeshift hinge in a broken Nintendo DS. ---
**Author:** ![Dinsdale](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/97f17d/32.png) [@Dinsdale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dinsdale)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skills-you-didnt-know-you-would-need-as-a-parent/767743/5 "2016-10-06T14:47:01Z")
> [@Jophiel](#): > > Any number of minor toy repairs. From straightening a bent axle on a toy car to shaving down a Lego piece to act as a makeshift hinge in a broken Nintendo DS. Or toy - un-repairs. Someone gave my kids a small electric keyboard. If you pushed one button, it played an annoying song which still resonates decades later. Despite my lack of electronics knowledge, I figured out how to take the thing apart, remove the contact from that button alone, and reassemble it so the kids could still use it. For a while they kept pushing that button. I’d just say, “I guess it is broken!” Here’s as skill - puke catcher. When my kid was walking across the carpeted room and started projective vomiting, I rushed to him with my hands cupped, begging him to puke into my hands so as to lessen the eventual clean up. I recall thinking at that moment that that was something I had never dreamt I would need to do, and felt that I obviously was a parent for having done that instinctively. ---
**Author:** ![Sattua](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sattua/32/11906_2.png) [@Sattua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sattua)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skills-you-didnt-know-you-would-need-as-a-parent/767743/6 "2016-10-06T15:25:06Z")
> [@Dinsdale](#): > > Here’s as skill - puke catcher. When my kid was walking across the carpeted room and started projective vomiting, I rushed to him with my hands cupped, begging him to puke into my hands so as to lessen the eventual clean up. I recall thinking at that moment that that was something I had never dreamt I would need to do, and felt that I obviously was a parent for having done that instinctively. Been there done that. Consider it my “yep, truly a parent” moment. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skills-you-didnt-know-you-would-need-as-a-parent/767743/7 "2016-10-06T15:54:23Z")
> [@Sattua](#): > > Unbuckling my belt, undoing my fly, going to the bathroom, then re-doing everything one-handed, while holding my infant daughter. In a public restroom stall. Can’t you hang up the baby on the coathook? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![MissTake](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/misstake/32/3189_2.png) [@MissTake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MissTake)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skills-you-didnt-know-you-would-need-as-a-parent/767743/8 "2016-10-06T16:43:01Z")
Untwisting all the damn ties AND removing the plastic strip sewn through the hair on stupid Barbie dolls. Stepping on LEGOs without flinching. If an adult asked you “Why?” twenty times in a row, you’d either punch them or walk away. ---
**Author:** ![WildBlueYonder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/ce7236/32.png) [@WildBlueYonder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WildBlueYonder)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skills-you-didnt-know-you-would-need-as-a-parent/767743/9 "2016-10-06T17:43:25Z")
skills I should have had… Lock the bedroom door to keep the boy in at night, windows too. Guess that is not a good idea. What about chaining him to the bed? I found out when he became an adult that he snuck out when he was like 13 night after night and rode his bike up town and met some other kids there…hmm:mad::mad: I should have slept lighter! :dubious: Later he snuck girls in…11th 12th grade:eek: I’d go in his room to get him up for school and he’d have the girl under the covers so I could not see.:eek::eek: Hmm. How many more smilies can I add to show my astonishmental anger! ---
**Author:** ![Toxgoddess](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f08c70/32.png) [@Toxgoddess](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Toxgoddess)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2016, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skills-you-didnt-know-you-would-need-as-a-parent/767743/10 "2016-10-06T17:47:51Z")
Along the lines of bathroom skills, able to change a toddler AND an infant in a snuggly-type carrier inside a Japanese women’s toilet stall - which is essentially a tiny room with a hole in the floor. Also, the ability to make an entire Thanksgiving dinner one-handed, while carrying a baby on the other hip. ---
**Author:** ![Baker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bb73d2/32.png) [@Baker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baker)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2016, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skills-you-didnt-know-you-would-need-as-a-parent/767743/11 "2016-10-07T03:53:10Z")
Are there books for those “why?” questions? Like, why is the sky blue, or why shouldn’t I stick my tongue in a light socket?