Facebook 101 (for moms)

We've all seen them, the 10-most-annoying-people-on-Facebook lists, with moms being on the top of the list, beating out even duckface teen girls and vague whiners ("My life is over!").  With the invention of unbaby.me in particular, I found myself feeling rather self-conscious every time I wanted to share something silly my kid did, or post yet another picture of them eating bacon.

I've decided to stop feeling weird about it, though, because I stinkin' love baby pictures.  In fact, that's sort of a general thing across the board, I want to share the things the people I care about love.  Babies, a well-cooked meal, an awesome vacation, any of the stereotypical "annoying" things, if it's someone I genuinely care about, of course I want to see it.  Why wouldn't I?  Thus, I have to assume that the people I care about feel the same way about me and my kids.

I think the problem has less to do with over sharing than over friending.  Do I necessarily care that a person I barely knew in my math class in 2nd grade had a kid?  Not really.  Do I want to see an endless stream of pictures of that baby?  Nope.

My niece, on the other hand?  Post those stinkin' pictures!  I want to see every smeared avocado and walk in the park and haircut.

My friends, I love to read about the funny thing your kid said.  I want to know that they're finally going potty 95% of the time.  I want to know that they love graham crackers.  I want to know that they slept through the night for the first (or second, or third, or fifteenth) time.  I want to know that they came down with the sniffles.  I want to know...if I didn't want to know, I'd be a friendly acquaintance at best, not a friend.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, if you're a mom, don't worry about being annoying.  Share what you love, with the people you love.

Besides, we're moms.  I don't know about you, but I don't have enough energy to make sure everyone eats enough veggies, vacuum the floor, AND play pirate treasure, so why bother wasting energy trying to maintain my "cool?"  It's just not practical.

That's no excuse to wear mom jeans, though.

If you're annoyed with someone's baby's pictures, unfriend them.  If you don't care enough to be joyful in a person's exuberance over the person they created, you don't really like them that much anyway.  I'm not saying that to be mean, it's perfectly okay to realize that you don't value the same things that someone else values.

So, here are my quick rules for Facebook for Moms:

1) Focus on quality, not quantity, in all areas of Facebook.  This includes paring down friends to people you are actually friends with and care about.  You might also think about not posting twenty fuzzy baby pictures that look exactly the same, pick out the best few.  And your description of your kid's poop better be funny enough to justify the gross factor.

That's it.  That's the rule(s).  You're welcome.