"So, letting our kids be free, wild, and messy also helps alleviate our frustration if we just let it go," said the woman.
Parents always find it a big task to arrange activities for their kids to do in their free time. When @jessi.meeks faced a similar situation, she came up with a brilliant idea. She calls it "whatever makes you happy hour." The TikTok video posted by Jessi Meeks is captioned, "The only rule - no TV" and has about 290k views. The children can be seen playing with a bucket of ice cubes filled with water using their paintbrushes. The voiceover explains, “Whatever makes you happy hour is the time of the day where my husband and I sit back, relax, and let our kids be wild, free, and chaotic.”
Jessi continues, "Today, we started with an ice cube painting activity that progressively got messier and messier. However, this is typically the witching hour, so letting our kids be free, wild, and messy also helps alleviate our frustration if we just let it go, and we let them do whatever makes them happy." By the end of the video, it can be seen the bucket is filled with colors and the palette doesn't have many colors left. Moreover, the kids' hands are full of colors.
Many parents on social media loved the idea. @sydepp3 commented, "I love this except my kids wouldn’t leave it to only the boxes they would have gotten that ALL over that white couch, and the fence and everything." @marketingmamasamantha wrote, "I love this idea! Toddlers love to be in control. Such a good way to let them." @sheofthemag expressed, "And they will thank you for it! The sensory experiences and input does wonders… they are just doing them while you do you… love this!" @emmygarcia2 said, "Thank you, I will be picking up a bag of ice on the way home now. Cause mama (is) tired."
In another video, the mother shows what else the kids usually do post 4 pm. The voiceover says, "Every day, around 4 o'clock we call it 'whatever makes you make happy hour' and it's the time of the day when our kids literally can do whatever they want we have lost all control of our household it is loud, it is chaotic." The voiceover adds: "There are children carrying children there is parkour ish, there are walks, playing in construction sites, going down sketchy paths to see if they can find cows, making dad the rock bitch and hold on to other rocks, they're wrestling, she's chugging juice boxes left and right, there are women on the floor, it is absolute madness."
The video is captioned, "Are we lazy? Yes. Are our kids happy? Also yes." It went viral with more than 788k views. @laurengreffe commented, "90% of my parenting is me just checking to make sure whatever it is my kids are doing is relatively safe and won't hurt, maim, or worse themselves." @kelseafrench expressed, "I have never thought to embrace this as a positive. You are amazing! Thanks for the perspective! We have a pack of toddlers as well!"
View this post on Instagram
"Honestly, I’ve done this a few times when I just can’t function anymore and the stuff my daughter comes up with is freaking amazing," shared @kay.dee77.