SOMETIMES I don’t recognise my kids; they are so unlike me or my husband that we both wonder where they really came from.

For one thing they are very sporty. They are both figure skaters and acrobats. They spin, jump, cartwheel and tumble with ease and apparently limitless energy. They are graceful, quite unlike their parents who, at their age, demonstrated a complete absence of poise or indeed any co-ordination at all.

With constant activity they are always ravenously hungry. However, apart from my son’s great love of hot dogs, they have little time for junk food. My daughter is most likely to ask for a turkey salad roll for lunch, maybe with some tabouli. Next week it will probably be cold chipolata sausages and a salad with cucumber and green olives. She absolutely loves sushi.

Many of their friends seem the same. They almost all play sport every weekend if not several nights a week. They do dance or drama.

Like us, their parents are constantly driving them from one venue to another. As far as I can see, they eat vastly more healthy things than I did as a kid.

Kids are also much more worldly wise than I was at their age. Many of them already have travelled widely. They are often very socially aware, very funny and of course total whizzes with technology. Computers, tablets and the wonders of the internet they take for granted. Many are very knowledgeable. They talk about the universities they want to go to even at age eight or 11. They have high expectations for themselves, and they work really hard.

I know that I may not be dealing with a nationally representative group, and many kids don’t enjoy the advantages of many families in Canberra, but many of my kids’ friends really are a credit to themselves and their parents.

We live in a world in which families are constantly bombarded with messages about how parenting is tough, how parents are failing their kids and how we all need to do better – whether it’s giving our kids a perfect diet or ensuring that they excel at everything.

Most parents work, are time poor and struggle to keep up with everything. But a lot of us do devote every waking moment, directly or indirectly, to our kids, to their commitments, their friendships, education, health and happiness.

In my case, in the past couple of weeks, it’s involved everyone in our house getting up before 6 on bitter, cold Canberra mornings to get the kids to, of all places, the ice rink as they practice for performances at this year’s Skate in the City.

Sometimes it’s hard going, and we can always do better. But every now and again we ought to stop worrying, take a moment to enjoy our children’s achievements, successes and simple pleasures, and give ourselves a modest pat on the back for getting them there.