Joanna Gaines Has 3 Genius Parenting Rules Every Family Can Follow
Any Fixer Upper fan would be thrilled to accept decorating advice from Joanna Gaines. Over the past few years, the HGTV alum has firmly proven herself as an expert renovator with a practiced eye for what looks good. And she doesn’t even have an interior design degree.
What Fixer Upper viewers may not realize is that Joanna is just as good at parenting as she is at staging a bookshelf. The mother of five shares so many tips for raising children from infancy to teen years, and just like her innate talent for decorating, she’s cultivated some pro-level parenting tips.
Chip and Joanna Gaines lay out clear rules for their kids
Many celebrity parents like Will and Jada Pinkett Smith treat their children more like peers, allowing them to make their own rules instead of laying down the law. But the Gaineses are comparatively strict when it comes to their offspring. This tactic seems to be working.
Their most famous rule for home at the farmhouse is no television. It’s a curious approach for TV stars, but the Gaines family insists it makes them all closer — and forces them to spend more time outside on their 40-acre Waco homestead.
Chip even admitted sometimes he’s stricter than he’d like to be. “When I got to be a parent, I don’t know what it is about it … I feel a little bit like a drill sergeant sometimes. Some elements of my personality, as a parent, I’m not real crazy about,” he told Fatherly.
The ‘Fixer Upper’ stars have a clever rule for screen time
They don’t have a television at home, but the Gaineses do allow other screens, including phones and tablets. However, that doesn’t mean their five kids can just spend the whole day using them.
During a recent appearance on Today, Joanna explained her genius advice for limiting how much time her teens spend on their phones.
“We have this little station where everyone charges their phones,” the HGTV star explained. “It just became a house rule, when you’re at home, that all the phones go in one spot, so if you want to check a text, if you want to check an email, you go to that spot, but it’s not on your (body).”
This technique naturally curtails the tendency we all have to check notifications whenever they make a sound. It’s helpful for the Gaines children and for Chip and Joanna when they’re trying to enjoy family time together.
Every Gaines family member has chores to do
Living on a working farm with multiple animals means no shortage of chores. But it’s not just Chip and Joanna shouldering the burden of running the home. They also dole out age-appropriate chores to all their kids, from collecting chicken eggs to watering the many plants and collecting fresh grown fruit and veggies.
And those chores come with some positive rewards. “Our rule for the iPad is that the kids can use it a certain amount of time every other day,” Joanna told Southern Living. “It’s contingent on them doing their chores and homework. I try hard to make it not the thing they look forward to every day. I don’t want them focusing on that.”
“It’s funny when I say, ‘No iPad games,’ and then see the things they create and invent on their own,” she continued. “I’m like: ‘That! That’s the stuff right there, kids.’ “
It sounds like screen time isn’t even missed in the Gaines house.
