.When it comes time for traveling, the proper kids’ luggage for traveling makes parent’s jobs tons easier and therefore the trip more fun for the youngsters . That’s because if the youngsters like their Fake Louis Vuitton Bags they’ll be more likely to hold them, which suggests you do not need to keep track of it for them. Since everyone is keeping track of their own bags, it makes even the foremost arduous holiday traveling much easier, and with tons less hassle and stress, that in and of itself makes the trip tons more memorable and fun. You can also check here for memorable travel reviews.
Mom and pop will probably have space in their bags for baby clothes and in fact , the ever present diaper bag, but small kids need their own piece of bags for his or her clothes, toys, toothbrushes and other stuff they’ll need while traveling. once they grow old and need to ride within the car for long trips to go to relatives during the vacations , they’ll need a place to place their favorite toys and books. kids luggage for traveling satisfies all of your kids’ travel needs and keeps them happy and peaceful during what are often a stressful time of year.
If you’re in need of bags for your kids to travel this Christmas, you ought to consider totes, messenger bags, lunch bags and backpacks of varied designs, colors and sizes. If you are not organized, holiday travel are often particularly stressful. With all the good shapes and sizes of kids’ luggage, being more organized may be a snap since great luggage makes it easy to pack smarter and more efficiently. With luggage styles like pilot cases, backpacks and duffel bags, every child within the family will surely find something he or she likes.
A Tip for Your Kids’ Luggage
Since this is often their luggage, meaning they’ll respect it and lookout of it better which suggests it’ll last an extended time. a method to offer them more ownership of their luggage, having it personalized with their name for an additional special touch which pays off in supplying you with more value for your dollar since they’ll treat it better. Not only do kids feel more “grown-up” with their own luggage, but personalized bags are easier to seek out within the luggage areas of airports. having the ability to seek out your luggage faster and easier in an airport makes your holiday traveling tons more enjoyable and stress-free.
When traveling anytime, but especially during the vacations , your older kids will want to pack and carry their own luggage and personalized totes, duffel bags, backpacks and pilot cases will make that tons easier. Kids’ luggage comes altogether shapes and sizes and can help make your holiday travel experience far more pleasant this year!
Attachment Parenting International (API) as a whole and are not necessarily connected to API’s Eight Principles of Parenting.
“Have no fear of perfection, you’ll never reach it.” – Salvador Dali
Children do not have this fear. I think it spills over to being a parent, too. I have learned by trial and error to not be afraid. I am not a perfect parent, nor will I ever be.
When my son paints, he does it so organically and naturally. I usually let him have his way with the water colors, crayons, and water mixing cups. It gets messy — real messy.
He knows what colors he wants to use and how to curve the crayon to meet his own needs. He bends and turns, creating his own masterpieces. I will admit, I often am not supervising him directly when he is painting. He has a table in the art room/office. When I am writing, he is creating. We are in the same room. I set up his materials in the respect of leaving brushes out, often uncleaned. He figures it out. He’ll ask me when he needs some help or fresh water. Most of the time, he says, “I’ll do it all myself.” He is three.
I am often amazed at his creations. I like to think he is a natural, but all children are natural artists.
“Every child is an artist, the problem is staying an artist when you grow up.” – Pablo Picasso
I am trying to think of ways art and creativity can translate into parenting. I believe Attachment Parenting has been a natural process for my family. We had the tools, and the art was created. We have used the Eight Principles in our life and have selected the “colors” which are our favorites. You do not have to practice all eight Principles to get certified as an AP parent. There is no certification. Some parents only use a couple principles, some use all eight of them.
My husband and I are practicing gentle discipline. At times, it is frustrating. At times, I wonder how fear would be more effective. But we guide and teach and teach and guide. Sometimes we are left with bite marks and exhausted sighs, but we know we are creating our own masterpiece. Our son is a blank canvas and the colors we choose will have an effect on him. We choose each color from the parent palette carefully.
So, I leave you with an art show of some of my son’s artwork.
Principle 1: Prepare for Pregnancy, Birth, and Parenting
Become emotionally and physically prepared for pregnancy and birth. Research available options for healthcare providers and birthing environments, and become informed about routine newborn care. Continuously educate yourself about developmental stages of childhood, setting realistic expectations and remaining flexible.
Principle 2: Feed with Love and Respect
Breastfeeding is the optimal way to satisfy an infant’s nutritional and emotional needs. “Bottle Nursing” adapts breastfeeding behaviors to bottle-feeding to help initiate a secure attachment. Follow the feeding cues for both infants and children, encouraging them to eat when they are hungry and stop when they are full. Offer healthy food choices and model healthy eating behavior.
Principle 3: Respond with Sensitivity
Build the foundation of trust and empathy beginning in infancy. Tune in to what your child is communicating to you, then respond consistently and appropriately. Babies cannot be expected to self-soothe; they need calm, loving, empathetic parents to help them learn to regulate their emotions. Respond sensitively to a child who is hurting or expressing strong emotion, and share in their joy.
Principle 4: Use Nurturing Touch
Touch meets a baby’s needs for physical contact, affection, security, stimulation, and movement. Skin-to-skin contact is especially effective, such as during breastfeeding, bathing, or massage. Carrying or babywearing also meets this need while on the go. Hugs, snuggling, back rubs, massage, and physical play help meet this need in older children.
Principle 5: Ensure Safe Sleep, Physically and Emotionally
Babies and children have needs at night just as they do during the day — from hunger, loneliness, and fear, to feeling too hot or too cold. They rely on parents to soothe them and help them regulate their intense emotions. Sleep training techniques can have detrimental physiological and psychological effects. Safe co-sleeping has benefits to both babies and parents.
Principle 6: Provide Consistent and Loving Care
Babies and young children have an intense need for the physical presence of a consistent, loving, responsive caregiver: ideally a parent. If it becomes necessary, choose an alternate caregiver who has formed a bond with the child and who cares for him in a way that strengthens the attachment relationship. Keep schedules flexible, and minimize stress and fear during short separations.
Principle 7: Practice Positive Discipline
Positive discipline helps a child develop a conscience guided by his own internal discipline and compassion for others. Discipline that is empathetic, loving, and respectful strengthens the connection between parent and child. Rather than reacting to behavior, discover the needs leading to the behavior. Communicate and craft solutions together while keeping everyone’s dignity intact.
I drew this when I was a kid. My mom saved all my art. Principle 8: Strive for Balance in Personal and Family Life
It is easier to be emotionally responsive when you feel in balance. Create a support network, set realistic goals, put people before things, and don’t be afraid to say “no.” Recognize individual needs within the family and meet them to the greatest extent possible without compromising your physical and emotional health. Be creative, have fun with parenting, and take time to care for yourself.
“Creativity is more than just being different. Anybody can plan weird; that’s easy. What’s hard is to be as simple as Bach. Making the simple, awesomely simple, that’s creativity.” – Charles Mingus
API Reads is more than club for people who love to read books. It’s a place to share concerns and ideas to strengthen the connection to our children and families. For example, one reader posted the question, “Has the book inspired you to make any changes?” This is one of the responses:
“I’m also trying to take better care of myself. I have my first session with a personal trainer today! I’d like to start meditating, but with a baby who hates naps it’s hard to find time when I know I’ll be able to sit quietly, so I’ve been trying to make my showers meditative. We’ve also started having daily outdoor play time, and I’ve been trying to make sure we have some relaxed family time on the weekend.”
What else have we been discussing? How much technology can affect your family life, whether it is your friend or foe, and how can you help find a balance with it. Also how nature can play a role in balance.
“Yes, like you and Lex, it is harder for my husband to unplug. He loves video games and drawing, which he does on a tablet. During this, he usually has a movie or TV show in the background. There is nothing inherently wrong with these things; it’s how he enjoys himself. And he does take breaks to play with our one year old. We also have dinner together — tech free — and are making an effort to do the same with breakfast. At the same time, when we go on vacation and don’t have our machines, I do feel so much more connected.
I’m not sure how to deal with this imbalance in media use. I don’t find it ideal, but at the same time, my husband is at home, kind and attentive when he needs to be. It doesn’t seem worth a struggle. Thoughts?”
This post is written by Stephanie Petters, coordinator of the API Reads program
If there’s one thing many Attachment Parenting families share, it’s a love of reading.
“Cultivating a sense of curiosity is so healthy, beautiful and eye-opening for me as a parent.” ~From the API Reads discussion of Nurturing the Soul of Your Family
Join AP parents through July and August as we discuss Nurturing the Soul of Your Family by Renée Peterson Trudeau through Attachment Parenting International’s online book club, API Reads (on Goodreads).
“…this book guides you in exploring the most powerful, essential things you can do right now to bring more peace and harmony to your family, or what I consider the 10 paths to peace,” shares Renée. “I hope this book will help you realize you do have the answers you need. You just have to become quiet enough—and create the space—to hear them.”
In just the first couple weeks, we’ve started learning about shifting our perspective, where disequilibrium comes from, challenging the beliefs we’ve inherited from our families, how self-care supports us in being more present with our partner and children as well as how self-care translates into owning our personal power and that it’s about more than massages and pedicures, and that our families are our opportunities to heal and grow as a person.
~From the API Reads discussion of Nurturing the Soul of Your Family:
“Imagine exploring how to truly nurture our soul and the soul of our family in order to awaken to a deeper level of connection—to ourselves and others? THIS is the area I really want to ‘get.’ Nurturing my soul seems to take a back seat, and I tend to focus on what is happening in the moment that needs my immediate attention. I feel like I am in some survival mode mentality that I need to break from…”
“Agreed! I think it’s hard to make time for oneself as a parent. If I’m not with my daughter, I feel I should take that time to nurture other relationships. It’s easy to forget to spend time alone.”
What more can we expect from this book? With the remaining chapters, we can expect to cover:
Making time for spiritual renewal
Loving the ones you’re with—spending time together (like you mean it!)
Defining, celebrating, and honoring your family culture—learning what you stand for?
Slowing down—doing less to experience more
Exploring a new way of being—making hard choices, breaking free, and doing it different
Building your tribe—asking for and embracing help as you create your support network
“From page 187 on my IPad, ‘Everything you want to experience with your family, you already possess. There’s no need to create, craft, cook, farm, buy, or become something new in order to experience what’s available to you in the now, in everyday moments.’ Frankly, I have the time, it is just how I spend my time that I see as a problem. I am not always choosing to spend my time where my priorities actually are. My choices are often not made from a heartfelt place of being present. I allow the ‘urgent’ things to take precedent over the important. Add to that, when I picture what I see as a ‘perfect’ moment or day, it also often includes a ‘doing’ rather than a ‘being,’ such as baking, creating, buying, etc. The passage I quoted really struck me, because those things also involve a ‘doing’ that often takes time and focus off of the important. This focus on doing does not give me what I want and often takes from what I want. It struck me that if I come from a place of already being where I want to be with my family, then perhaps these activities could at times add to the joyful experience, but if my focus is on the activities, then I often do not get what I am looking for with my family.” ~From the API Reads discussion of Nurturing the Soul of Your Family
Getting ready for September, API Reads will be featuring a book for couples, Getting the Love You Want by Harville Hendrix
I wish I had known how much I would love being a mother.
How could I have anticipated the depth of this love?
My heart opens with wonder when I watch my 18-month-old son lift his arms, snap his fingers, and gently sway to music. Any music. We could be in the check out line at Walgreens and if he hears music, he lifts his arms in praise.
Oh, the world is good to him. Despite the little, blue bruise on his forehead from a sad encounter with the edge of an antique bureau, it’s a loving world overall. I am forever grateful for the opportunity to be a gentle and consistent source of kindness as he learns to walk, speak, and jump. May he internalize this love and bring it forth as an inner light in days to come, days when I am no longer by his side to wipe away the tears of sad encounters.
A foundation for trust is being built. I am his “secure base” and he then sets off to explore this magical world full of rocks, leaves, sunshine, and scrumptious raisins. We co-sleep. He nurses on demand. His organic rhythms are honored.
I love being a stay-at-home mom.
I didn’t anticipate this.
Because of my blindness, I scramble to make up for the financial mistakes of the past. If I only had known to save so staying-at-home would unfold with greater ease.
Today, I acknowledge choices made and make new ones. I find creative and wonderful ways of bringing in money whiles nurturing my son. And that’s including the fact that we already have sought the best iva company to repay our mortgages. We teach Mommy and Me Yoga together. We stretch, sing, dance, and play with other mamas and little ones. It’s delightful.
And when my son sleeps, I write.
I write and weave together story, philosophy, and gratitude. I knit the love I feel into the words appearing on my computer screen. I smile, marvel, and sigh as tears and syntax flow.
Being a mother awakens a fierce and gentle strength. I know I’m not alone in staying up late at night while my son sleeps to bring in extra money for the family. A “gap” exists between what my husband makes and what we “need”. It’s all about priorities. I won’t capitulate to pressure to return full time to paid work. Instead, I navigate as skillfully as possible, as fearlessly as possible, as boldly as possible, a way to give my heart , and my best, to our son.
These precious early years are priceless. They are worth more than all of the world’s gold. I’m investing in the future emotional health of this little one. I’m investing in the health of all of those who will one day cross his path.
I’ve never worked harder to stay-at-home. On good days, I smile at the irony of it.
I didn’t anticipate this and yet, I embrace it with determination and grace.
Successful relationships require humility, that is, the ability to view our own wants and needs on a larger scale, which includes the wants and needs of others. As attachment parents, many of us know the importance of balancing our wants and needs with those of our child.
In marriage, this balance can be a bit more difficult, especially if our co-parent is not necessarily on the same page as us when it comes to parenting decisions. “They should know better” we argue, and too often lose our humility in dealing with adults. But, nobody is perfect.
When I first became an attachment parent, my husband didn’t immediately hop on board with all of the principles (and the resulting methods) that I was proposing we practice. And I must admit, the principles of attachment parenting and nonviolent communication didn’t quite carry over in the practice of my marriage.
Many times, I would tell my husband outright that his way of parenting was wrong, and that I was opposed to the way he was choosing to parent – the same way I had parented just months before. I pitted his actions against my philosophy.
What I failed to realize was this: While my parenting philosophy had changed, a change in my everyday parenting practices and reactions had yet to catch up. I had years of parenting beliefs and vices I needed to unlearn, and my husband was no different.
My arguing with him didn’t make him want to cooperate, but instead put him in a defensive mode. I wasn’t winning him over with this approach, that’s for sure!
What I was doing was the opposite of what I would want someone to do if I made a parenting mistake. I know I wouldn’t respond well if someone pointed out my every mistake in the heat of the moment. It almost always makes things worse.
I had my own parenting struggles, and he didn’t seem to respond to mine in the same manner. I realized what a hypocrite I was being.
Opening Communication
I decided to start showing some humility. Knowing that I still had my own parenting difficulties, I would share something I was struggling with, and ask for his advice.
It went something like this: “I really want to stop raising my voice at the kids, but it just seems to happen automatically when I’m frustrated. What do you think I should do?”
By humbling myself, they became “our” struggles, and we truly became partners on this parenting journey. Over time, once it became clear to him that I would no longer be singling out his behavior, he began to feel comfortable enough to open up to me about his own personal struggles.
Yes, it’s possible to feel connected to your partner even if you don’t share exactly the same views on parenting, and even if one of you has less visible struggles than the other. Some marriages require a bit more humility (read: balance) than others.
If you’re looking to open the lines of communication in your home, pick behaviors and issues that you both struggle with. Don’t single out something that only your spouse struggles with. Don’t use this as an opportunity to pick apart your spouse’s parenting. Be real. Be humble.
When we are humble, we can see that we are not “better” than other parents. We all have our hangups. We are all still learning and growing.
Tip: This also works with other family members and friends. And our kids!
I’ve swept up the Art Room. This room is my writing room and has also become my son’s chaos room. He paints here, plays here, and learns here. It is a womb of flashcards, water color trays, brushes, paper, stuffed animals, clothes, crayons, play kitchen items, toy trains, race cars, and other toddler toys. There has been plenty of times when I had to use power washing dublin to clean my carpets full of paint and dirt from the backyard. Carpets shouldn’t stay damp for too long. Carpets and rugs are lovely, comfy and comfy . Used and maintained correctly, they’re ready to last several years, and become an origin of wonderful pride and happiness. But when not taken care of, unattractive damage could cause numerous problems. The key to any carpet treatment — vacuum-cleaning — must be consistent and complete. Some research has shown an honest vacuum-cleaning can eliminate up to 80% of soil inside a textured plush carpeting. supported use and placement, carpets must be cleaned by professionals carpet cleaning Ann Arbor annually , and spot cleaned as required within the meantime. Drymaster Carpet Cleaning has been operating in the Newcastle since 1990 and has the experience, equipment and procedures to service your premises.There are many varied methods of steam cleaning your carpets. The most common form of steam cleaning is a 1 stage process, where a cleaner will bring to your home a portable machine, similar to the machine that you can rent from the local supermarket or hardware store. This steam cleaning machine is filled with water and detergent and your carpet is cleaned without any pre spray or agitation. This method cleans your carpet without a rinse process and unfortunately leaves detergent residue in your carpet which will promote rapid re soiling. This steam cleaning method is over 20 years old and is not the preferred method by most carpet cleaners today, but unfortunately is still being used by a lot of budget type cleaning companies. Carpet cleaning experts in Newcastle also offers our customers the carpet Dry Cleaning method. Carpets are indeed one of the most important things that we can find in our homes. These can make or break the look the whole room. This is why most people always make it a point to have carpets in their homes so that their homes will look as elegant and as nice as they should be. This is true only under one condition. carpet cleaning usually look their best especially when they are still clean and new. A newly bought or installed carpet would always pull the look of the simplest room there is. Most carpet owners do make it a point to maintain the cleanliness of their carpets. We all know how carpets attract dirt so much. Even if we try to take care and keep our carpets clean, there will always be a stain that will begin to pop out of it. Once a carpet looks very dirty, this can now destroy the look of the whole room. This can now leave the room very untidy and not well cleaned. This is the primary reason why you should always maintain the cleanliness of your carpets all the time. Whether you do this on your own or you hire carpet removal service to do so, you need to make sure that your carpets look as new as they should. One equipment that has really made carpet cleaning such an easier but effective cleaning job is a vacuum cleaner. These are tools or equipment which are used to suck out dirt which are trapped within the fibers of the carpet. This is very effective when you want to remove the solid particles, allergens and the dust which have stayed in the carpet. Although cleaning the carpet thoroughly, removing the stains do need extensive cleaning procedures in order to remove them in the best way possible.
Ten minutes before I swept, it looked like a bomb of paper based material exploded. Add crayons, spoons, plastic play food, children’s books, stickers, paper, paint, M & M’s, and one toddler. Chaos.
My son painting in the Art Room. You can see the toddler debris on the floor.
The pile I’m looking at could be swept into a dustpan quickly. And then it would be gone.
But I have to sort out the debris. What is recyclable — at least the paper and plastic.
I’m tempted though to do one clean sweep then I could attempt to floor mop the wood floors. This is my favorite room in the house. It has twelve foot ceilings and pine wood floors with amazing detail that I got thanks to the work of the professional from Epoxy Flooring Bellevue. It has a south facing window which centers the room — one large window nine feet high by three feet. Visit website for more details about DIAMOND COATING EPOXY FLOORING OTTAWA.
A rare treat this past Saturday — a snowstorm with big chunky snowflakes. You can see the window to my art room in this photo.
This room is never organized completely, only at best, neatened up. My husband has recently installed a shelf system in the closet to organize my on-going writing and art projects. Confession: I am a pack rat and have kept every paper based memory and scrap of paper. I have all my art projects from elementary school (thanks to my mom). I have the first note a boy gave me in sixth grade asking me out. Check yes, no, maybe.
I have kept every letter and card I received as an enthusiastic pen pal writer in the 80’s, including letters from my pen pal from Japan and Costa Rica.
Check out that postmark — 1987, complete with a bubble gum scratch & sniff stickerPen pal letter from Japan
***
My feet stick to the wood floor. Invisible toddler tape perhaps. As Ben calls it, sticky gooey. Everyone is asleep as I pull it together to do the impossible — clean this room. My goal is to see the floor. I start with baby steps picking up loose paper. I recycle what I can. I take a deep breath and recycle the toddler art I don’t want to keep. Should I keep them all? For Pete’s sake — I have over ninety-nine. Throw them out. He will paint more. Trust.
My son’s art gallery in the Art Room
I pick up the books my son loves to dump from the toddler height bookshelf. The rest is a blur. A complicated system in my head of mathematical and analytic order takes over. I put things where I think they may belong. Piles. Lots of piles. They are off the floor for now.
What remains is still covering the floor: a pool of colored collage.
A blue plastic spoon with three vertical grooves lays angled across a scribbled toddler art paper. A crumbled napkin dyed with faded water color paints rests on top. A fluorescent pink index card with pen and ink scribbles hangs to the far right of the pile. The outfielder of the pile — catching loose grounders — about an inch away is a brown dog bone sticker the length of a penny.
A receipt for a failed fertility treatment from August 8, 2008 sits on top of the crayon stew. $244 reminding me of our desperation to be with child. Forever ago.
How did Ben find this bill? I know — he opened the file cabinet. The poor thing is shoulder height to Ben — completely accessible to his exploratory curiosity. (Yes, file cabinets have feelings; they like order — toddlers must make them nervous).
A black teaspoon lays across another fluorescent pink index card. A cardboard white cake mix box next to an empty ink cartridge. Crayons: thick canary yellow, yellow green, navy blue — all visible. Too much. I’m overwhelmed. I’m just going to sort out the paper, crusted in sticky toddler chaos boogers — subtract from the pile.
A black sock bundled. A page from Ben’s favorite book, Wacky Wednesday torn out. I can’t throw this away; it’s the eleven wild wacky things park scene. Ben loves to point them out. The page with the purple limo with the old lady in purple, pushing the yellow buggy on top of the limo.
A wild eyed yellow giraffe sticks his head out of a pothole.
Wacky Wednesday book
The pile is lessened: progress.
A copper penny: head’s up, 2002.
A crayon crumb collage, fit for 80’s wax paper iron art projects, on the back of a glossy 8 x 10. I scoop it up and use it as a dustpan, moved enough by the bright colors to take a photo. Too lazy to find my camera, I toss the debris in the garbage.
Flipping the photo over, I see my fourth grade class from 2008. I was so hungry to be a mom in that photo: infertile. I put the photo on top of the printer paper atop my scanner.
The pile still there on the floor.
Next, fetch the plastic Ziploc bag for the crayons: thick purple broken tip still sharp; navy blue — the triangle grip; a plastic crinkle cut French fry (I hate these tiny outliers too tiny for toy bins). I’ve been throwing them away one by one, even though they fit neatly into the red McDonald’s fry holder, which I hate and soon it will get the cut. I’ll recycle it though.
The plastic corn ear goes into the keep pile. Place white play cake mix with it. My son thinks he is Chef Ramsey. All play kitchen items are keepers.
My therapist’s card (currently going to grief therapy) — I need to call her and make an appointment. This goes on top of my desk.
Blue M & M — throw it away. Maybe eat it.
A scribbled passage for a book I am working on — into the closet.
Yellow green, verde Amarillo, verte-jaune goes into the bag. An orange colored pencil soon behind it.
Turquoise thick Sharpie — no cap, dry as the desert.
Recycle?
Red crayon, red colored pencil. Cheap Rose Art red crayon, orange stub, green stub, thick blue, thin black, thick brown, thick blue — the other half. Royal blue plastic spoon — pile with black teaspoon.
More crayons: purple, navy blue, thick orange, thick red — sticky vegetable potato chip crumbs rolled around it like a Yule log.
Joan Miro eraser
Joan Miro 97 eraser from the Denver Art Museum — bought single, bought solo — a lifetime ago.
A persuasive journal prompt, a rogue teaching resource unearthed and liberated by my son from it’s tidy box.
Art Blast washable water colors packaging — not a good idea unsupervised. At least I can recycle the packaging: cardboard.
My son, Ben painting his masterpieces
Another persuasive writing prompt card.
I think a piece of dried poop was on the white index card.
A pastel purple index card.
I smell poop. Affirmative on the poop crumb.
Wow, I keep everything (not the poop); I should have just swept all this stuff up.
A brown twig.
My friend’s self-published poetry book makes the cut, only because it is inscribed and has “Congrats on the baby” on the inside cover — a reminder of graduate school and my miracle pregnancy.
I’m tired and sleepy. The rest of the pile is going into the dustpan, which actually is just non-recyclable garbage.
I walk by the window, curtains open and turn off the light sneaking a peek at the beauty of this room — the chaos of this room and marvel at the chaos tidied up (for now).
Stained glass fleur de lis my husband made sitting in Art Room window
What are the things you hold onto and what are the things you throw away? How do you keep your child’s playroom tidy?
By the time my daughter was 2 years old, I had completed treatment for cancer. Still very ill, I was on a quest to find health. I understood cancer to be an environmental disease, and while I could not say I knew what had caused the disease, I thought if I made enough changes, I could remove the underlying cause.
I took up yoga, among other practices to cultivate health. I gained so many healing benefits from the practice, especially working with sound and breath, and before long, I found myself engaging in a daily meditation practice.
At first, I would meditate after Kaylee would go to sleep. It started with a few minutes a day. After a few months, it was over an hour.
In every other aspect of my life, I was more calm and perceptive. The benefits of the practice were clearly evident and had a positive impact in my relationships and my ability to parent.
But, it was really hard to do. How do you meditate with a little one by your side?
If I got out of bed in the morning, she would wake up. Upset and overtired, it would make a difficult day for us both. When I waited for her to go to sleep, I was often too tired to stay awake.
The more serious I became about the practice. The more annoyed I was if Kaylee woke up. If I heard a noise come from the bed, my heard would jump as I feared an end to my blissful retreat.
By the time she was 3, I had many incidents of being irritated and having an overtired child who woke up alone and upset.
I also went to a plant medicine retreat to do my meditation and that was life changing for me.
At some point, I was at a dinner party and heard a story about a little girl who sat cross legged with her hands in gyan mudra (thumb and index finger tips touching) resting on her knees. The little girl then grimaced and yelled “MOMMYS MEDITATING!” Everyone laughed at the irony while I completely connected with the situation.
While the practice had helped me be a better mother at every other moment, I was not responding with Love and patience during practice.
It was clear, something needed to change.
And then, I got it.
This practice of meditation. Of being in the moment. Of activating the healing side of myself. Of taking it breath by breath, moment by moment. It was very similar to the experience of loving my daughter. Loving her without the judgements or fears. Those moments where its just her and me and it doesn’t matter what else is around or what needs to be done.
Moments of unconditional Love.
I decided that instead of trying to fight my daughter, I would work her into the practice. Instead of leaving bed to meditate, I would simply sit up in bed. Instead of trying to meditate after she fell asleep, when I was too tired, I would put her to sleep in my lap while I meditated (this was and continues to be great method of getting her to fall asleep!). If she woke up during my practice, I would invite her to join me and give her a hug. If that meant I didn’t get more than 3 minute intervals of concentration or my eyes were open the entire time or I really didn’t meditate at all, that was okay.
My intention was on Love. Once I opened myself to how I experienced that Love, the practice became more deep and the experience of my daughter transformed. I also found that if I took breaks while meditating to interact with her, she would happily play around me and give me some space.
Some days she even sits next to me, cross legged, hands in gyan mudra and tells me, “I’m meditating.”
While it isn’t easy to meditate with a toddler or preschooler climbing all over you, it is possible. The key is in remembering that meditation is not about being calm during a moment of peace. Its about cultivating the ability to have peace during a storm, whether that storm lives in experiences in our days or the expectations in our minds.
And what easier way to prepare then to practice in a storm everyday?
