Strive for Balance – Page 19

Set Your Summer Intentions

As excited as I was for Cavanaugh to get out of school for summer, I was also a little worried that we could spend months inside hiding out from Texas, USA, heat and mosquitoes while playing LEGOs and Minecraft. We even had got a generator from Top 10 Best Generators For Camping (Reviews) – GeneratorGrid after my husband had heard about them from a colleague and how he found it quite useful. We needed a to-do list of fun.

Luckily, one of my organizing clients was working on a summer intentions banner created by fellow Austinites Bernadette Noll and Kathie Sever. I was inspired by the banner but worried about the execution. Sewing and stamps, required by the original design, would have meant we completed ours sometime after school started this fall.

What I loved was the idea of setting up our summer is to lay down and ดูหนังออนไลน์, so we could get the most of the time with each other while without going stir crazy or bickering because our days were so unstructured (though exactly what we wished for all school year long).

So we set summer intentions and planned great adventures without locking ourselves into a schedule or spending a ton of money. Because, Getting ready for summer – and how to be prepared it’s very important if you have kids to entertain. Here’s what we did:

First, we brainstormed lists of people to see. We thought of friends from school and outside of school, plus family members and the characters from Rick Riordan’s The Kane Chronicles series we were listening to on audiobook.

For places to go and things to do, we added some of our favorites from previous summers, like going to california summer camp, see the symphony in the park and baking, but we were picking from what’s already routine and that would not keep us going through August. So we read through two of my favorite books: 101 Things You Gotta Do Before You’re 12! and 101 Places You Gotta See Before You’re 12! Cavanaugh put stickers by all the things he was interested in, then we went through the pages together to figure out which of those things we could do during this summer. They included items like seeing a meteor shower and eating a flower.

Then to see if some of the items he’d found were even available in Austin, Texas, we went to Free Fun in Austin.com and added to our list with going to a ghost town and a junk cathedral. On Facebook, a friend had posted the “50 Ideas for a Slow Summer” list from Awesomely Awake.com. They helped too! So did the email from Cavanaugh’s school librarian and the one from his kindergarten teacher with summer reading clubs at some local bookstores and the library and with different learning activities and websites.

Once we had all of our lists, we went to Hobby Lobby and used their handy iPhone app to get the ever-present 40% off a full-price item coupon to get a copper foam board. Copper is Cavanaugh’s favorite metal right now. It meant no sewing fabric for putting your art on foam boards, and the foam board will travel well so when we go visit family in New Mexico, USA, we can take our lists with us. We also used Cavanaugh’s favorite font, “Wonton,” which I downloaded for free from dafont.com for his ninja birthday party last year.

We wanted to keep our lists out where Cavanaugh and I could read them when we needed ideas. As we see people, go places and do things, we are putting checks or dots next to the items on our list. On the calendar, I listed only events that were date specific, like Mr. Popper’s Penguins being shown for $1 at the theater down the street.

We have a Summer Fun Board in our living room and enough ideas on it to have more adventures than we have time for. I’m also trying to find some entertainment near me just to have an extra option this summer. I’ll end this post with some items from our list:

Things to Do:

Make a Bast board game: The Path of Bast
Do experiments in DNA Kit
Explore backyard habitat #35
Build volcano
Host book club with school friends
Play marbles
Build a fairy home in the garden
Reading Clubs: Book People, B&N, Library
Replace front doorknob and lock
Eat a flower
Watch a meteor shower
Bake
Play cards
Build robots
Do puzzles
Make YouTube videos
Finish LEGO Ninjago Village
Play board games
Reading time in bedroom
Make up a spy name
Practice handwriting
Do 2^nd grade Word Wall Words
Go through photos
Play learning games

Places to Go

High Tea
Taos
Splash Pad
Camping/Sleep under the stars
Movies
Picnic
A famous road: Route 66
Junk Cathedral
An Artist’s Studio
Swimming Hole
Rock Art Site
Radical Rock Formation
A canyon or gorge
Ice cream factory tour

What are you up to this summer?

Make a “Play” List with Your Kids

My son is seven and a half, attending public school, and just getting everything done in a day is a challenge. He is exhausted from being around kids all day and I have client emails to send and dishes that need washing. From the alarm in the morning until bedtime, we are negotiating transitions, trying to get things done, and we don’t always have the same wants or needs at the same time. It’s easy to lose connection with each other in the midst of that.

So, I was very interested to hear Brené Brown talking about play in The Gifts of Imperfect Parenting: Raising Children with Courage, Compassion, and Connection. She referenced Stuart Brown, a play researcher, and gave his simple definition of play.

Time spent without purpose
You lose sense of self and don’t feel inhibited or self-conscious
You lose track of time

Play is a great place to connect with our kids (and ourselves), when it’s really play for both of us like when we use our roller skates with our parents back in time. It helps foster the attachment that we build with them as babies, and that can get strained when we’re spending so much time apart or needing to get things done when we’re together.

But there’s a catch. The activity has to feel like play for all the parties if the goal is to play together. Play for my son may include endless LEGO battles, but that feels like work to me. It meets none of the criteria of play.

1) The purpose is to hang out with my child.
2) I feel self-conscious because I don’t really know how or why to have battles.
3) I’m very aware of how much time I’ve spent doing it.

What do you do when play for one of you is miserable, or not fun, for another? Figure out what you both like to play. Brené Brown sat down with her family and they made a list of what fit the definition of play was for each of them. Check out this list of 50 Fun Indoor Games for Kids from Twin Cities Kids Club! Many activities, like Candyland, did not overlap. But the ones that did went into her Venn Diagram (yes, she made fun of herself for making a Venn Diagram of play, and yes, I totally loved the idea). The overlaps in their diagram helped Brown’s family determine what they’d spend time doing on the weekends, what kinds of vacations they took, or what they’d do together for fun.

I loved the idea so much that we made up our own play lists and checked for overlap at our house. Both my son and I love to make up songs and rhymes, lie in the hammock and read a book together, jump at Jumpoline under the disco lights, play some board games (but not others), and many more. We also made a list for things that can feel like play for awhile, but that one or the other of us gets tired of sooner, and we put those activities on our limited play list. We can do them together, with a time limit, so the other person isn’t having to work to stay interested.

The list has been really helpful. We’re playing UNO more often, have remembered how much we like to play in the water, and the list is a go-to resource when we’re needing extra connection because we’ve been busy or one of us is having a hard day. The conversations we have during or after play are more connective too.

For more ideas about how to integrate play into your parenting, I highly recommend Playful Parenting by Lawrence Cohen. And for the research behind play, Stuart Brown’s book Play: How it Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination, and Invigorates the Soul is a fascinating read.

Lessons from Parents of a Sleepless Baby – Part 1

by Abigail Flavin

My husband and I learned about Attachment Parenting when, after reading many, many reviews of various baby books, we selected one by William Sears, MD. We found the principles and practices intriguing. They offered us clarity for our own thoughts and hopes for ourselves as parents. Repeatedly, we discussed the principles, sharing anecdotes from our own childhoods and from what we were reading about parenting. We thought we were completely ready for our son’s arrival, since we had acquired a car seat, clothing, diapers, and parenting ideas. We were unprepared for our spirited son, Thomas, who has proven that babies can get by just fine on less than the required range of sleep time so often touted by experts.

The first month was about what we expected. Then, he stopped sleeping well and began fussing more. He never wanted to be put down, and even the sling and constant nursing never seemed to provide enough contact. Our pediatrician diagnosed him as having Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease (GERD), which became quite serious between his third and fourth months, requiring medication. At that point, we could understand the irregular habits and the inability to sleep well, even with cosleeping and constant nursing. By his seventh month, however, his sleep problems could no longer be linked to GERD nor did they correlate to introducing solids. As he began sleeping less often and less regularly, we became progressively more frantic.

We were always asked by others, how is he sleeping? Is he sleeping through the night yet? Honestly, these questions need to stop. They imply that either the parent is a bad parent or that the baby is a bad baby. They amp up the pressure that already tired and insecure first-time parents feel. Let us banish these questions to the realm of etiquette hell, where they belong.

When nothing else worked, we fell off the AP wagon and tried the graduated extinction sleep-training method. Three days in, he was down to sleeping six out of 24 hours, the worst he’d ever slept. We were all exhausted and miserable. I saw a long, bleak tunnel ahead, and I am sure our son only saw pain and confusion. Where was Mommy? Her warmth? Her food? Her snuggles? Why am I alone in a crib, in the dark, and nobody is coming to me? What is wrong with me that they won’t come to me? I cannot find the words to describe how I imagine my child must have felt, for it is far darker than that. We gave up and gave up ourselves completely to our son so that he could reestablish his trust in us. We kissed and snuggled him constantly, providing one favorite activity after another: reading, peek-a-boo, snuggles, bath time, walks in the garden, singing, and of course, co-sleeping. Of course, he recovered; our little ones are far more resilient than we can imagine. And in the meantime, he taught us the value of patience.

What many sleep methods bank on is that parents want results now; we are exhausted, we sometimes miss our “old lives,” we wonder when we will have space and time to enjoy some of our independent activities, we long for a few hours where we do not have to decide whether to take an uninterrupted shower or call an old friend. What we must learn from our children is the value of patience, of delayed gratification. They teach us these lessons so that we may, in turn, teach them as they grow older.

Check back with us for Part 2, where Abigail shares tips she learned from a long and exhausting period of irregular baby sleep.

Mother / Student

Two months ago, I returned to school, some 14 years after completing my first degree. It was the first time I’d done anything more than a two-day workshop since I got married and had children. Right now I’m taking three classes at a local university, gathering prerequisites with the hope of eventually studying education and becoming a public school teacher. This has represented a big change not just for me, but for my entire family.

The quad on campusOne of the eight principles of Attachment Parenting International is strive for balance in your personal and family life. In many ways, going back to school has been an exercise in upsetting the balance that I had attained. I work part-time from home as a writer. My children were eight and five years old when I attended my first class in January. With my son starting kindergarten this past fall, I’d managed to achieve a sense of equilibrium that hadn’t existed since I went into labour with my daughter in 2005. I was no longer working long into the night after the kids were asleep – I was able to do my work while they were at school, and spend my evenings with my husband. It was pretty sweet, to be honest.

This greater sense of equilibrium is what created space in my mind to ask myself some big questions – questions that I hadn’t really considered since before I got pregnant with my first child. I started asking myself what I really wanted for myself, rather than what I wanted for my children.

I’ve built much of my work life (and pretty much every other part of my life) around my kids since I became a mother. I did so willingly, as well. I know that children grow all too quickly, and you can’t get those early days back. I was thrilled to be able to find a job that allowed me more time with my little ones, and greater flexibility in general. I didn’t ask where I saw myself in 10 years, but rather where I saw my family. As someone who has found attachment parenting to be very fulfilling, this worked well for me.

With a little more time and mental space of my own, things changed. I had something of an Aha! moment last October, when I realized that I still hold the dream of becoming a teacher. It’s something I’ve wanted to do ever since I was a kid, but I pursued my first degree in engineering because it seemed like the more practical choice. I left my engineering career behind some five years ago, though, and had spent the intervening years more focused on short-term goals.

My husband and I talked about the idea of going back to school, and I attended an info session and talked to my kids. In the end, I decided that there really was no better time, and went for it.

Going to school has upset the balance of my life in many ways, but I’ve worked hard to re-establish it under different conditions. I’ve had to say No a lot. I gave up the tap dancing class I loved. I called on my family to help. I also spent a lot of time explaining to my kids what I’m doing, and why. Think, “I have to do some homework right now, so I can’t read to you. I’ll come and find you when I’m finished and we’ll do some reading then.” Balancing my roles, and succeeding as a student, parent and employee, is taking help and support from almost everyone in my life.

I’m going to be sharing my experiences as a mother, writer and university student each month on this blog. I have a lot more to say, about how I’m providing my kids with consistent and loving care, how I’m trying to respond sensitively to my children and myself, and what our days look like. For today, however, I have to run. I have homework to do.

Have you spent any time at school since having children? If you have any tips or experiences to share, I’d love to hear them!

Yep, I Do the Cooking, the Washing, the Childcare and I am a Man. {Part II}

API is pleased to recognize this blog post for its contribution to AP and to share it with you, our readers. API does not review other content on the author’s blog or website and takes no responsibility for how that information may or may not align with API’s ethos or API’s Eight Principles of Attachment Parenting. We thank you for remaining supportive and encouraging when interacting with the author and with other readers, whether or not the ideas presented work for your family.

Last week, Torsten gave us a peek into the world of the stay-at-home Attachment Father. His perspective, continued…

At the same time I “teach” my children that boys can clean up their mess too, whether it’s the loo or their plate. Or I involve them in cleaning. Yesterday my sons and I had our weekly cleaning party. We took turns in vacuuming, washing up and tidying the house. After the job was done, we sat on the sofa and read a book. So, it turned out to be fun. We just made an effort not to see it as horrible task.

So yes, I would say spending the last one and half years as a full-time dad has been extremely rewarding and the changes I and others can see in me are only of a positive nature.

However, there were times where I did ask myself whether I just had to live with the fact that my “colleagues” were now, almost exclusively women. Don’t get me wrong, I have made many wonderful female friends, but I also did miss male company here and there, especially just sharing my experiences with someone who is in the same boat as me.

Being out and about with my kids on a weekday I still get “the looks”: a mixture of pity and suspicion when dealing with the daily toddler struggles in a public domain or entering a playgroup. So maybe, this is the reason why, why there are not as many men as full time parent? Yes, who would want this to happen to them? The more confident of men don’t blink an eyelid, while others just feel completely out of their comfort zone.

So, more than two years later I’m still a happy stay-at-home dad. And actually we went a step further. My wife and I both work from home now, so that no one has to miss out: neither on the children, nor on the washing up. This has become more enjoyable for both of us.

I think to achieve a harmonious home life both partners need to be involved and active in parenting. I find humans are not made for JUST one or the other. There are so many passions, wishes, dreams inside us. So many different things we can and want to do, that just choosing one path makes most of us dissatisfied.

So, equal parenting it is for us and this works best for us AND our children.

Torsten is a stay-at-home dad, embracing all the beautiful and difficult things about it. He believes that fathers and men of today want to explore and express their feelings, expectations, worries and emotions. In his blog, Dads Talk, he talks about fatherhood and about the way dads of the 21st century could live a happy, content and relaxed life. He’s a Parenting Coach and he runs groups, workshops and support sessions for Dads and Grandads. And yes, whenever there’s time left he also teaches parents Baby Massage.

Frozen

I am frozen. Frozen in the moments that are precious and true.

I recently went back to work. It has been a hard adjustment. I started in early November. I had to hit the ground running and it has been a blur since I started. I eventually got used to my new schedule and feelings of mom inadequacy. The thing is, I had to let go of the reins of stay-at-home mom and grab the wild reins of working mom. Both are wild horses, but both ride much differently. As they say, balance is key, but I acknowledge that balance is a bit of a myth. Balance is choices. It’s going to take time and practice to keep all the balls in the air.

I have not been writing (here or on my own blog). This gets to me because I know that writing is my calling. I wish I could say I have been too busy writing to write for APtly Said, but that would be a lie. I am too busy to write and that is no excuse. I just realize that this is not the best time for me to be writing. I just can’t seem to get that ball in the air with the others.

When my son was seven months old, I quit my job as an elementary teacher in the middle of the school year. I tried being a working mom with a new born, but it just was too much for me. When I quit my job, I thought 40 hours would open up. How wrong I was! But that is a different chapter.

I was a stay-at-home mom for three years. I loved it and I hated it. I could not seem to find balance and eventually found there really is no balance – just choices. So I chose to be happy when I was and I chose to be sad when I was sad. I allowed myself to feel angry and I allowed myself to feel joy. I embraced all the emotions that come on the stay-at-home mom spectrum. I wrote a lot about these feelings, as I was also in graduate school for Creative Writing. I wrote my thesis about my feelings about new motherhood and it eventually turned into a book.

Now as a working mom, I am juggling routine with busy and guilt; they smack each other often, knocking the balls out of the air. Meeting goes late at work — I call my husband to pick up our son from my in-laws. Special Education paperwork to prepare for upcoming meetings — text husband to take care of dinner.

From trial and error, I have learned to just up and leave my classroom to get out the door. The work will be there the next day. My mind scissors the to-do list in a well-needed manner, shredding the ridiculous details that must be accomplished before I go home. But somedays, the list keeps on growing and I’m not the one adding to it. Work. It will always be there, growing. I do love a to-do list slashed though. Oh how I love that sense of accomplishment. The thing about motherhood and parenting is that there is no concrete list — just a liquid that flows into the container available. This container for me is the free time I have with my family after work and I absorb it and let it flow all over me. I saturate myself in it. It is the love of my family. It mends my guilty mom heart and makes me happy.

The alarm on my cell phone goes off at 6 am. I press the snooze alarm three times on days I don’t have to shower, once on days I do. It’s non-stop from there. I put my make-up on at work, sometimes in the car at stoplights. I manage to scramble out the door with my briefcase and purse in hand. To people on the outside of that door of our house, I look polished and poised. Inside I feel frazzled, late, and never enough.

My husband makes our son breakfast and prepares a to-go mug of coffee for me. He hands me my lunch (which he makes) and offers a quick kiss before I head out the door. I am very lucky because my husband is picking up the slack and the role of attached parent. He gets our three and half year old son ready for pre-school and drops him off. They hold hands and kiss each other good bye like I did during drop-off. I miss drop-off. I miss pick-up. Mostly, I miss that initial hug and that smile and holding hands as he tells me about his day. Ben loves pre-school and we are very lucky with the school we chose.

We are also very lucky because our son spends the afternoon with his grandparents after my husband takes his lunch with our son and they play. My in-laws also watch Ben on one of the two days he doesn’t have pre-school. My husband covers the other day as he works from home one day a week.

As a junior high school Special Education teacher, I am constantly on the go. My mind often frazzled, but surprisingly focused. I am busy during the day like I have not been in a very long time. I am on the go almost all day long. My head is one long comma splice of to-do lists and I am constantly overriding the least important of tasks to finish.

This brings me back to the frozen moments – the icicles that freeze joy. I choose to spend time after work with my son. This is a priority. Everything else gets put on the back burner – papers to grade, lesson plans to write, dinner to cook (I am lucky because my husband does most of the cooking), house to clean, books and essays to write, laundry to do, laundry to fold, laundry to put away, the list is endless. I do feel guilty and I often freak out about how messy our house is (I have been struggling with spending the money on a housekeeper).

Back to frozen and true and not writing. Well, I have chosen to spend time with my son and husband after work. Sometimes I don’t get home from work until 6 pm. Those are the days I choose to be frozen – frozen in the precious hour or two that is mine to play with him. We are still co-sleeping and this time is precious as well as we all snuggle together in a cozy bed. Until the alarm goes off at 6 am the next day.

I also have to choose to not feel guilty about not writing and not being there for pick-up and drop-off and all the fluid moments in-between that used to be my life as a stay-at-home mom. I choose to accept and to be present in the moments I do have with my family.

The Gift Is You

This post was written by TheAttachedFamily.com contributor Stacy Jagger, MMFT, owner of Sunnybrook Counseling, www.sunnybrookcounseling.com.

Many parents I see in my counseling office are spending thousands of dollars on a variety of technological devices for their children each year–gaming systems, digital cameras, cell phones, etc.–while the children, who are displaying maladaptive behaviors and internal turmoil, are truly missing the parents themselves. Kidnapped by technology and the busyness of life, these parents and children often do not even realize what is happening to them until an outside source brings the truth to their attention.

The best gift you can give your child is yourself. Living in a split-attention society, many children have rarely experienced the full, uninterrupted attention of a parent. We are so wrapped up in culture, jobs and keeping up with the Joneses that we have forgotten that the true meaning of life is connection. What we all want and need is true connection: connection with life, nature, our neighbors, our loved ones and ourselves. If you want best gift shop contact to Shield Republic Co-founder.

Whether married or co-parenting, single parenting or fostering, mothers and fathers have the choice to model healthy, forgiving, mutually respectful relationships full of unconditional positive regard to enhance their family life. This creates an atmosphere where the children feel safe to receive the attention and care they need. True lasting security and positive relational skills are given parent to child, not Xbox to child.

Give your child the gifts of security and well-being that come from your time and undivided attention. Turn off the phone, television and computer. Go for a walk. Play with Play-Doh. Cook a meal. Play a round of Crazy Eights. Camp in the backyard. Have 5 minutes of special playtime where you paint fingernails, throw a football or teach a hand-clap game like “Say Say, Little Playmate.” Laugh. Play in the leaves. Smartphones can also make excellent holiday gifts, but purchasing one for someone other than yourself is more complicated than shopping for other gadgets. Unlike a tablet or a new camera, a smartphone requires a service plan to use any voice or data features — otherwise you wind up with a very expensive paperweight. In some cases, you won’t even be able to leave the store or complete your online order until you get that angle set up. And beyond just being an additional expense, that service may require a long-term commitment. There’s no reason to stress, though because there are many online mobile store here to help you.

Get in touch with the child within you. Let it be OK–because it is OK. You are connecting with the child Love placed in your care, and there is no richness greater than that. You are their leader. They are following you, watching you, learning from you. It is worth the time, the frustrations, the joys and the sorrows. Feel the fullness of your feelings and, at the end of the day, fall in your bed exhausted with a heart full of gratitude for the richness of life, as you live in the blend of the beautiful and the challenging.

Children are truly a treasure and the greatest gift you can give them is you.

Click here to read API’s white paper on giving children presence.

Transitions in Attachment Parenting: Infancy to Toddlerhood, Part 5

We are concluding this series with two more of the most common challenges of transitioning from infancy to toddlerhood as your baby grows. Here is what parents had to say…

What do you find most challenging about transitioning from using AP in infancy to using AP in toddlerhood?

Challenge: Understanding Needs vs. Wants

Figuring out the difference between wants and needs. Babies are so easy as they are one in the same. Toddlers … not so much.
The shift from solely addressing needs to creating a strong foundation for addressing desires and emotional responses
Distinguishing needs from wants

Tip: Be confident.
You know your child better than anyone. You have been caring for her since before she was born, responding to her cues, learning her behaviors and understanding what she needs and when. Have confidence in being able to distinguish the difference between needs and wants for your child. As an attuned parent, you know best what your toddler needs (vs. what is merely a “want”) and can respond appropriately. Things like …

nutrition
connection
autonomy
safety
empathy
adequate sleep
belonging
respect
healthy limits
security
understanding
acceptance

… are the things your toddler truly needs, and there is a wide range of what is appropriate among children. Needs and wants are definitely not the same for every child. You are the expert on your child—so trust yourself in the limits you set for him. Though your toddler may act like he needs a toy or a sweet treat or just one more bedtime story, trust your inner assurance that you are meeting his most essential needs—the ones necessary for optimal growth and maturation.

Click here to download a teleseminar with Dr. William Sears on API Live! about “Needs vs. Wants: How to Fulfill a Child’s Needs Yet Discern His Wants in a Way That Preserves Healthy Attachment.”

Challenge: Learning New Parenting Tools

I feel like I’ve lost my toolkit for how we have handled difficult times (frustration, exhaustion, fear).
“The breast” is no longer THE solution.
Finding solutions to new behavior

Tip: Stay connected.
Whether it’s online or in person, there are a variety of ways to add to your parenting toolbox. Online communities offer a chance to ask questions and get ideas and resources in return, while local communities are great for connecting to AP moms and dads in person. Both give parents a different kind of support, and both are helpful for gaining new perspectives on handling challenging toddler behavior. In addition to connecting with AP parents who have “been there, done that,” staying connected to the latest news and updates in parenting is a must. There are so many blogs and online resources that are dedicated to sharing articles, posts and links on AP tips, tools and the latest research in parent education. Find some favorites to add to your newsfeed and RSS reader. To start, you can add these great API resources:

The Attached Family, API’s online magazine
Attachment Parenting International homepage
API’s Facebook page

Whether it’s online (communities, blogs, Facebook pages, webinars, teleseminars) or in-person (communities, classes, support groups or local AP friends with older children), you can’t beat parents helping parents to expand your toolbox! Keep talking, keep reading, keep learning more about your child’s development.

Don’t miss Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4 of this series on transitions into toddlerhood!