These brief notes include fifteen simple rules which cover a large part of the principles of parenting. They are distilled from the past one and a half decades which have been unlike anything I have experienced before. No doubt, more could be invented, but these seem to capture the essence of what I have learned. They are most likely to be helpful to prospective fathers who find themselves in the state I was in. Prospective mothers are more likely to pick such ideas up anyway, but perhaps they will be some help to some mothers too.