Posted in Parenting

A Child Bumps Her Head. What Happens Next Depends on Race?

Posted on by Tim Connolly

When a child experiences a mild head injury and a parent seeks medical attention, what happens next in New York City seems to depend on the ZIP code and the color of the parent’s skin.

In April, the actress Jenny Mollen, wife of the actor Jason Biggs and resident of Manhattan’s affluent West Village, announced on social media that she had accidentally dropped her 5-year-old son, causing a skull fracture and requiring treatment in the intensive care unit of a private Manhattan hospital’s I.C.U.

Three months earlier and several miles north in the Bronx, my client, a Latina mom, was folding laundry in her apartment when she saw her 9-month-old daughter and 7-year-old son bump heads while playing on the bed. The following day she noticed that her daughter had a bump on her head. She took the baby to her pediatrician, and a follow-up at the hospital showed two minor skull fractures with a small underlying bleed.

This is where Ms. Mollen’s and my client’s stories diverge. According to Ms. Mollen’s social media account of the incident, she and Mr. Biggs were met with compassion and sympathy by the hospital. Ms. Mollen publicly thanked the staff, saying she was “forever grateful.”

Get the big debates, distilled. This comprehensive guide will put in context what people are saying about the pressing issues of the week.

At the Bronx hospital, though, my client was met with suspicion, interrogation and accusations of child abuse, even after explaining her daughter’s accidental head bump with her brother to the hospital staff. Emergency room staff members called the New York City Administration for Children’s Services to report possible child abuse. A.C.S. workers and the New York City police interrogated her, as well as her husband and their 14-year-old daughter. At no time was this distraught mother told she could or should contact a lawyer. Nonetheless, when the baby was ready for discharge without requiring any medical treatment, A.C.S. told her parents that they could not take her home and that they must identify family members to care for her and her siblings. Otherwise, the children would be placed in the foster system with strangers. Though she was still regularly nursing the baby and no judge had reviewed this decision, my client had no choice but to comply. She left the hospital without her daughter.

Two days later, as a family defense lawyer who represents parents against abuse charges in family court, I met her. She was terrified and shaking during our first conversation, and told me she had not seen her children in two days. The first thing she wanted to know was when they could come home. That day, without any evidence of wrongdoing, A.C.S. filed a petition in Bronx Family Court accusing her and her husband of child abuse by intentionally causing their daughter’s skull fractures. A.C.S. asked the judge to issue an order to keep the children out of their parents’ home and asked that they remain with a relative.

To be clear, there’s nothing to suggest that Ms. Mollen and Mr. Biggs abused their child or that they should have been investigated or charged with abuse. The outrage is not that they were treated with compassion and understanding — it’s that low-income black and Latino parents in the Bronx are not.

Though the words “skull fracture” are enough to bring chills to any parent of a young child, in reality mild skull fractures in young, mobile children commonly result from accidents and generally do not require treatment other than observation. And though parents can usually describe the event or provide information about how they believe a skull fracture was caused, it is not uncommon for a parent to notice increasing head swelling or a bump hours or days after something happened, when the child’s activities and movements are long forgotten.

In my experience representing parents against abuse charges in the Bronx, I have repeatedly seen the mere existence of a skull fracture in a young black or Latino child brought to the hospital trigger a call to a state child abuse hotline, an investigation, a child abuse accusation in family court and the removal of children from parents. This is especially the case when a parent cannot tell the hospital exactly how the injury was caused because it may have occurred days before the symptoms arose or were noticed.

In the past 18 months alone, we at Bronx Defenders have represented at least six parents charged with abuse based on a child’s minor head injury.

Research shows that black and Hispanic pediatric emergency room patients with minor head trauma are two to four times more likely to be evaluated and then reported (as suspected abusive head trauma) when compared with white, non-Hispanic patients. Once there are suspicions of abuse, black children are more likely to receive invasive testing like full body X-rays.

We have challenged child abuse allegations in the courtroom on several occasions, and it almost always turned out that A.C.S. had little medical evidence to support its contention that an isolated and mild skull fracture was from abuse rather than an unfortunate accident — even when the parent could not say how the fracture occurred. For family defense attorneys, the process of litigating hearings to exculpate parents and reunite families can last weeks or months, during which time the family is traumatically separated. Even short stays in foster care have proven harmful to children, who can be placed with strangers and separated from siblings, family and other support systems. To address this harm, which is experienced disparately by low-income parents of color, A.C.S. needs to change its practice of presumptively separating children from their parents without adequate evidence that the child was harmed by a parent.

In the case of my client, for example, I immediately consulted a New York City-based pediatric neurosurgeon to confirm that the baby’s skull fracture was minor, plausibly accidental, and that her mom’s story was consistent with the injury. It was then quickly exposed during my client’s arraignment that A.C.S. had no firm medical evidence to support its charge of child abuse. In fact, A.C.S. admitted that though it had separated her from her children and filed abuse charges, it had not spoken to a neurologist, neurosurgeon or child abuse specialist, nor had it spoken to any doctor who provided conclusive evidence that the baby’s skull fracture was anything other than an unfortunate accident. That day, over A.C.S.’s objections, the judge ordered that the children be returned home, and three months later, A.C.S. withdrew its charges and the case was dismissed.

But none of this should have happened. All families deserve the sort of support and compassion that the Biggs/Mollen family received in a time of need.

While a better-safe-than-sorry approach that accelerates child removals may sound like a responsible way to protect children, it ignores the harm and trauma children can experience when they are separated from their families and placed into foster care.

New York City must grapple with how and why it has permitted a system to hurt children by believing some parents but not others.

Rain or shine, there are plenty of outdoor learning opportunities for your children- both in childcare and at home. So go outside, get dirty, and have fun! and learn new things at Dad blogs about parenting and kids.

Posted in Kids

Urban-Farming Camps Have Kids Asking, Where’s the Healthy Food?

Posted on by Tim Connolly

At summer programs in Harlem and the Bronx, children grow crops and talk about the limited sources of good nutrition in their neighborhoods.

Standing between two buildings on 127th Street, a group of campers on the cusp of adolescence mulled over a change in schedule. Normally, they would spend the morning planting and gardening as part of Harlem Grown, a youth development nonprofit that uses gardening and cooking to teach and empower children in Harlem.

But on this Friday, they would become amateur cartographers, mapping their local food landscape.

The 15 campers walked through their neighborhood, paper and pencils in hand. How many delis? (By some counts, 17, by others, 14.) Supermarkets? (Three.) Fast-food restaurants? (Twenty-two, they estimated, but lost count.)

As he looked for places offering affordable vegetables, Myles Bradumn, a 13-year-old camper, grew frustrated. “What about the delis?” he asked.

“Can you get vegetables at the deli?” said his counselor, Jarielle Isaac, 22.

“Sort of,” Myles replied.

“Can you get a lot of produce at the deli? Is there fresh food there?” she asked, pressing him.

“No,” Myles snapped. “But where are we supposed to get our food from, then?”

For years, summer programs like the Fresh Air Fund have transported low-income New York City children into the suburbs and countryside for outdoor activities. More recently, urban-farming initiatives have offered similar experiences within city limits.

But programs like Harlem Grown and Culinary Arts and Agriculture Training, which began in July at four New York City Housing Authority buildings around the city, are taking the local experience one step further, helping children explore bigger questions in their neighborhoods: what the food choices are, and why healthy options are often hard to find or afford.

You can help your children to learn different things from the children’s book series and they can learn about financial freedom and life lessons.


Posted in Kids

5 Toys and Games to Pack for the Trip for the kids

Posted on by Tim Connolly

These are the toys and games that Wirecutter parents pack to keep their children entertained while traveling.

Next time you fly — or take a long road or train trip — with your children, consider stocking your carry-on with toys and games that will not only entertain them but maybe even teach them a little something. Here are a few suggestions, aimed mostly at younger children, but often fun for older ones and adults, too.

Pro tip: Whatever your go-to travel toys end up being, reserve them for trips so that they retain their special-occasion allure.

These coloring pads’ water-filled pens and reusable pages — they turn bright hues when wet — let preschoolers “paint” without mess on the plane or in the car.

In this learning app, children explore and shape an imaginary land, watching the flora and fauna change — which helps them become more observant travelers, too.

This analog game offers delightfully tough logic puzzles. Translation: It’ll help keep your grade-schooler occupied through the inevitable real-life traffic jams and travel delays.

An upgrade from the old Magna Doodle, this LCD drawing board is more colorful, more accurate, and easier to erase — and just as self-contained and mess-free.

This quick-paced “pick and pass” card game is simple enough for children as young as 5 to master, but tricky enough for older players to enjoy.

Everyone has to maintain a financial budget and how much money should you save before having a baby, it’s difficult thing but you can learn about it just drop your comments in the comment section.

Posted in Parenting

Parenting Is Bad for Your Face

Posted on by Tim Connolly

Acne and other skin conditions can flare up during pregnancy and postpartum. Here’s what you can do about them.

“You either have the best skin of your life during pregnancy, or the worst.” That’s something my dermatologist told me when I came to him with what I thought was a rash but turned out to be a face full of acne. I was about five months pregnant with my first kid, and in shock. I never had acne as a teenager — a pimple was a once-a-year occurrence. I thought when you were pregnant you were supposed to glow, not have your face burst into flames.

Turns out that for a good portion of the pregnant population, glowing is a lie! While the research on this isn’t great, studies show that about 40 percent of pregnant women have acne, and while the majority of those women had acne before pregnancy, more than 13 percent of them didn’t. The folks with no history of acne who flare up as adults are the “most angry patients of the day,” said Dr. Jenny Murase, M.D., an associate clinical professor of dermatology at U.C.S.F. Medical Center.

To add insult to injury for all of us with our first acne during pregnancy — it may be because we’re getting older, not just because we’re pregnant. Dr. Murase said an onset of acne in your early 30s is very well-described in the medical literature. Because I had my first child at 30, “With the timing, it was your age and you were coincidentally pregnant,” she said.

But that’s not the only skin condition that may crop up during pregnancy, postpartum and beyond — in fact, there are so many things that might happen to your skin and hair (skin tags! hair loss!), but I’m focusing just on a few major areas in this newsletter. I talked to three dermatologists about some skin conditions to look out for, and how to deal with them.

Acne: The bad news first. “There are very few ways to treat acne during pregnancy,” said Dr. Hilary Baldwin, M.D., medical director of the Acne Treatment and Research Center in New Jersey and New York. There aren’t good studies about the use of acne medication on pregnant women. (This is an issue that crops up with all medications during pregnancy: Most studies on pregnant women and medication are observational, which are not the highest quality studies.)

But there are a few medications that have no data indicating adverse effects, Dr. Baldwin said, including metronidazole, clindamycin and azelaic acid. All three come in topical form, and metronidazole and clindamycin, which are antibiotics, are also available as oral medications (though the oral forms of these medications are not recommended during pregnancy). Over-the-counter treatments that work and are appropriate for use in pregnant women are limited.

Pretty much all topical treatments are safe to use while you’re nursing, Dr. Baldwin said. “The absorption is extremely low,” so the chances of anything ending up in your breast milk are tiny. Any oral medication that’s safe for a baby to take is safe for a nursing parent to take, Dr. Baldwin said. If you have an acne flare up during pregnancy or postpartum, it might not resolve immediately, she added. You may need ongoing treatment even after you stop nursing, but at that point you will have more options for medication.

Pigmentation problems: During pregnancy, your nipples may get darker; you may develop a line down the middle of your belly called the linea nigra, which can take many months after your baby’s birth to go away; and you may also get melasma, otherwise known as the mask of pregnancy. Melasma is “characterized by tan or brown patches on the cheek, the forehead, the upper lip and portions of the face,” said Dr. Andrew Alexis, M.D., chairman of the department of dermatology at Mount Sinai St. Luke’s and Mount Sinai West.

Melasma can happen in anyone but is more prevalent among women of color, said Dr. Alexis, who is also the director of the Skin of Color Center at Mount Sinai. During pregnancy, Dr. Alexis recommends preventative measures, like staying out of the sun, to avoid melasma. Once the mask of pregnancy appears, azelaic acid can be used to treat the condition in pregnant and nursing women, and it can be used later on. If you’re not nursing, you can also use creams containing hydroquinone, or topical retinoids like Retin-A, to treat melasma after you give birth, Dr. Alexis said.

Stretch marks: “There’s very little evidence of any therapy that can prevent them,” Dr. Alexis said. Extremely moisturizing lotions like shea butter might help reduce stretch marks, Dr. Alexis has found anecdotally, though there’s no evidence to support it. There’s not much to be done treatment-wise during pregnancy and lactation for stretch marks, he said. But when you’re no longer nursing, you can try retinoids to reduce their appearance. You can also try laser resurfacing, “but it requires multiple sessions to get the results, and there are some nuances to treating women of color,” because with darker skin there’s a higher risk of skin-color changes, Dr. Alexis said. So if you are a woman of color, it’s paramount to find a provider who has expertise in doing laser treatments on women with darker skin.

One last thing: You may think that being concerned with skin changes during your child-rearing years is mere vanity, but there are real psychological consequences to untreated severe conditions, Dr. Baldwin said. Studies have shown that acne can lead to negative body image, lower self-esteem, depression and even workplace discrimination. Which is all to say: It’s not frivolous or shallow to care about the way you look when you’re also caring for a baby.

Everyone has to maintain a financial budget and how much money should you save before having a baby, it’s difficult thing but you can learn about it just drop your comments in the comment section.

Posted in Parenting

Finding Myself in My Mother’s Calendars

Posted on by Tim Connolly

We tend to think they are about keeping track of time. They are about much more.

Among my mother’s legacies are four decades of yearly calendars. At the beginning of this year — a decade after her death — I resolved to read all 40. Could these appointment calendars, which she kept from 1965 through 2003, offer a window through which to glimpse my mother in the midst of living her life? Curious, I hoped that something as ordinary as her datebook might surprise me.

In the calendars, she is young again and on the go — this meeting or that, this child to the doctor and that one to the speech therapist, and all of them to the dentist.

An early entry in the first surviving calendar, Jan. 29, 1965, settles an ongoing sibling disagreement: “Carol sets [the table], Jane wash [the dishes], Nancy clears.” There we all are — her three daughters in the kitchen, our duties delineated. But it’s also the last year that all three of her daughters lived under her roof. As we headed off to college, the calendar kept track of our goings and comings.

Who owed her money from advances on their allowance? Well, that would be me (in debt for much of 1965 and 1966), and Nancy (complicated borrowing throughout the spring of 1965). Only my sister Jane — who went on to be deputy chief accountant of the Securities and Exchange Commission under President Bill Clinton — never borrowed money from my mother as a teenager.

My inauspicious appearance as a 14-year-old in debt is succeeded by a self-centered adolescent falling in love in 1967. The kitchen phone tethered us to the spot by its immobility; there the calendar received my scribbles. “Ken, Ken, Ken,” I wrote monotonously one Sunday, filling in dates that had already passed. Sometimes, I wrote my name as I talked with Ken, Ken, Ken. When I ventured forward in the calendar instead of backward, with a single “Carol” on Oct. 14, 1967, my mother pounced; she appended “is spoiled!” Teenage self-absorption lanced with a pen stroke. Her exclamation point reassures me that she wrote this in fun.

My mother’s calendars reveal her entangled world — daughters and their appointments, the friendships and responsibilities as the wife of a lawyer who later became a judge, and her own political concerns and activism. Born before women achieved the vote, she always voted, noting in her calendars every local and national election.

We lived in a village 40 miles west of Buffalo with no public transportation. When we needed to be somewhere, she got us there. The calendars do not expose the tension of fulfilling those duties: rebellion by children against attending an event or asserting they were, in fact, the one meant to set the table, not clear it. The most frequent reason for an event’s cancellation was “blizzard,” “snowstorm,” “some snow.”

We tend to think that calendars are about time, but I see now they are about much more — relationships (for whom will I set aside time?) and responsibilities (what events matter most and what is my role in them?). My mother was relentless, for instance, in fighting for people’s rights. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s her calendars show her advocating birth control, taking women to Buffalo for abortions (after 1973) and advocating housing solutions for migrant workers.

On the earliest calendars these causes weave like counterpoint with her family obligations. At other times, the calendar takes its turn as a diary, though the art calendars she used apportioned an entire week to one page. The stark capital letters across the date of April 4, 1968, shouting: “DR. KING ASSASSINATED!” reveal her shock and grief. They now appear as a scar.

My mother didn’t outsource her life. Her calendars for 1969, 1978 and 1991 track her duties as wedding planner for her daughters, each reception held at our family’s magnificent Victorian house. Weeks before “The Big Day,” as she called one wedding, she records her tasks: order linen and cake, call the caterer, see florist.

Through that large house also traipsed 40 years of pets: “Cyrano [a dog] bit by a rat;” “take Cassie [the cat] to the vet — if you can find her;” “Demeter [another dog] to Happy Tails.” Out in the barn, Rosie (the pony) needed a tetanus shot.

Each reference to me speaks of our relationship, but the one on May 24, 1989, “Carol in labor, 4:10,” causes a catch in my throat. I am becoming a mother for the second time, but we were 1,300 miles away, and so her calendar received her excitement.

Over time, the calendars began to reproach me. Throughout the 1990s, why wasn’t I visiting more? Her earlier calendars reassure me; my life in the 1990s was her life of the 1960s: balancing children’s appointments and activism. In those years, she recorded so many health appointments for others that when she made an appointment for herself she wrote in parentheses “me.” It reminds me that sometimes mothers are the afterthought in care.

As my calendar-reading project unfolded, I sprained my ankle. Feeling frailer than usual, I became haunted by the record I encountered of my mother’s aging body in the last years of the calendars, when medical appointments vied for primacy with social engagements. Jan. 3, 1990, “hurt knee in tub;” a broken hip, heart arrhythmia, stress tests, cataract surgery, blood tests, bone density scans, varicose veins, heart medication, ambulances to the ER, EKGs. I knew the end, too: the empty calendar of 2004 as Alzheimer’s lacerated her mind, and 2009, her death.

Each morning my parents came to life as another year unspooled before me. At night, my dreaming self became an unmoored time traveler as I encountered my parents of the 1960s and 1970s — my father in his favorite casual jacket, my mother in her kitchen, pets from those decades romping by. Should I tell these dream parents they will be dying soon? Recently I reached for the phone to call them — dead for a decade — and tell them of my day.

Time is like that coiled spring binding each calendar. Daughters’ weddings spiral into anniversaries, five years, then 25 years. The calendars function in reverse now, not a record of what is to come but of what was.

My mother’s calendars remind me this is how life is lived: from commitment to commitment, with interruptions from injury or weather. They tell me: Keep notes for tax purposes, take care of your pets, see the dentist, vote, include culture in your life, use your privilege to be an advocate, laugh at yourself, keep learning, remember the birthdays of your loved ones.

When my mother was dying, my sisters and I headed home. They arrived before I did. As I flew into Buffalo, they sat down for dinner with my parents. “Carol is coming,” my sisters told her. Though she lived several more days, that night she spoke her last words. My sisters repeated, “Carol is coming!” and Mom asked, “When’s the wedding?” My mother, our calendar keeper till the end.

At the time of pregnancy, managing your wife’s emotions is a difficult thing because she needs more care and attention, if you want to learn more about it then please drop your comments in the comment section.

Posted in Parenting

What Am I Doing to My Kid When I Yell?

Posted on by Tim Connolly

Short answer: You’re setting yourself up for a lifetime of shouting matches.

Yelling at kids is incredibly easy to do, and many parents find themselves yelling on autopilot when behavior gets dicey. But yelling at kids isn’t effective. Still, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t feel effective. After all, yelling often feels like the best technique for getting a kid’s attention, punishing them, or simply expressing big parental feelings of anger. But all of the shouting, screaming, and yelling at kids is deeply unhelpful.

According to Dr. Laura Markham, yelling is clearly a parenting “technique” we can do without. The good news is that the psychological and emotional damage to a kid is minimal when parents yell (assuming it’s not true verbal abuse). The bad news is that those who are doing it constantly are setting up more shouting matches later in life.

Yelling at Kids Is Never Communicating

Nobody (except for a small percentage of sadists) enjoys being yelled at. So, why would kids? “When parents yell, kids acquiesce on the outside, but the child isn’t more open to your influence, they’re less so,” says Dr. Markham. Younger kids may bawl; older kids will get a glazed-over look — but both are shutting down instead of listening. That’s not communication.

Grown-Ups Are Scary When They Yell

The power parents hold over young kids is absolute. To them, their folks are humans twice their size who provide things they need to live: Food, shelter, love — Nick Jr. When the person they trust most frightens them, it rocks their sense of security. And yes, it’s truly frightening for a child. “They’ve done studies where people were filmed yelling. When it was played back to the subjects, they couldn’t believe how twisted their faces got,” says Dr. Markham. A 3-year-old may appear to push buttons and give off an attitude like an adult, but they still don’t have the emotional maturity to be treated like one.

Yelling Makes Kids Fight, Flight, or Freeze

Dr. Markham says that while parents who shout aren’t ruining their kids’ brains, per se, they are changing them. “Let’s say during a soothing experience [the brain’s] neurotransmitters respond by sending out soothing biochemicals that we’re safe. That’s when a child is building neural pathways to calm down.”

When a toddler with underdeveloped prefrontal cortex and not much in the way of the executive function gets screamed at, the opposite happens. “The kid releases biochemicals that say fight, flight, or freeze. They may hit you. They may run away. Or they freeze and look like a deer in headlights. None of those are good for brain formation,” she says. If that action happens repeatedly, the behavior becomes ingrained.

Yelling Makes Kids Fight, Flight, or Freeze

Dr. Markham says that while parents who shout aren’t ruining their kids’ brains, per se, they are changing them. “Let’s say during a soothing experience [the brain’s] neurotransmitters respond by sending out soothing biochemicals that we’re safe. That’s when a child is building neural pathways to calm down.”

When a toddler with an underdeveloped prefrontal cortex and not much in the way of the executive function gets screamed at, the opposite happens. “The kid releases biochemicals that say fight, flight, or freeze. They may hit you. They may run away. Or they freeze and look like a deer in headlights. None of those are good for brain formation,” she says. If that action happens repeatedly, the behavior becomes ingrained.

Parents Who Yell Train Kids to Yell

“Normalize” is a word that gets thrown about a lot these days in politics, but it’s also applicable to a child’s environment. Parents who constantly yell in the house make that behavior normal for a kid, and they’ll adapt to it. Dr. Markham notes that if a child doesn’t bat an eye when they’re being scolded, there’s too much scolding going on. Instead, parents need to first and foremost be models of self-regulation. In essence, to really get a kid to behave, grown-ups have to first.

It’s Not About “Letting Them Off Easy”

A parent may feel like they’re putting their foot down and establishing some discipline when they yell. What they’re really doing is exacerbating the problem. Scaring a kid at the moment may get them to knock off what they’re doing, but it’s also eroding trust in the relationship.

There is an alternative method that’s more effective and not as hard-line: humor. “If the parent responds with a sense of humor, you still maintain your authority and keep them connected to you,” says Dr. Markham. Laughter seems like a more welcomed outcome than cowering.

When It’s Okay to Yell

While the majority of the time yelling isn’t prescriptive, “there are times it’s great to raise your voice,” says Dr. Markham. “When you have kids hitting each other, like siblings, or there’s real danger.” These are instances when shocking them works, but she points out that once you get a kid’s attention, modulate your voice. Basically, yell to warn, but speak to explain.

Nobody is going to stifle themselves around their kids all the time, and nor should they. That’s not what it’s like to be a person. But it’s a harmful long-term parenting strategy. Rain or shine, there are plenty of outdoor learning opportunities for your children- both in childcare and at home. So go outside, get dirty, and have fun! and learn new things at Dad blogs about parenting and kids.

Posted in Parenting

What sport should my child play? Choosing The Right Sport For Your Child – Infographic

Posted on by Tim Connolly

Everything from better sleep to a clearer mind can be found from physical activity. As my grandmother used to say, “You’ve got to move the body!” With that in mind I share this infographic to help you choose a sport for your child.

Choosing the Right Sport for Your Child

If there’s one word that can be used to describe any child, it’s “potential.” Kids are bundles of raw potential. Finding the right outlet for your children, or helping them find it, can influence who they become and help shape the rest of their lives.

An obvious example of that potential is the near-limitless physical energy kids usually exert all day. Active kids are happy kids and sports are a physical activity that can give direction to that energy as well as help build positive character traits like resilience and teamwork. With the right combination of encouragement and enthusiasm, your kids can channel their boundless energy into a lifelong love of a sport that can add to their mental and physical health.

That love of sports can give children something they’ll enjoy doing for most of their lives — possibly giving them an opportunity to excel at the highest levels of competition. Yet for kids to become champions or even just lifelong enthusiasts, they have to begin by choosing the right sport. A child’s natural excitement for sports can be crushed quickly if he or she chooses to participate in a sport that isn’t suited for him or her.

You may want your daughter to experience the same fun you had playing with your friends on the basketball court, but she may prefer the individual focus of karate or gymnastics. Choosing the right sport for your kids may make a difference in whether or not they stick with it for other reasons, as well.

For example, your kids may love hockey, but if your family’s budget can’t keep up with the equipment costs, it’s likely your children won’t be able to stay on the ice. You also want to make sure that the sport your children choose gives them the best chance to succeed and continues to challenge them. For example, if your son is stronger than he is swift on his feet, he might have a better time participating in wrestling or football than cross-country or track.

All parents want to help their kids reach their fullest potential. That means helping to guide them toward making the best decisions as to where they want to direct that potential. Choosing the right sport for your kids can mean the difference between finding their passion and staying rooted to the couch. You can help your children to learn different things from the Point-system for kids and they can learn about financial freedom and life lessons.

Posted in Parenting

My child gets on my nerves!! 5 Strategies to Help You Take Your Kid’s Behavior Less Personally

Posted on by Tim Connolly

Maybe it’s an innocent comment like, “Ewww, Mama,your breath stinks, don’t kiss me!” or maybe it’s an angry outburst – name calling and slammed doors. Some things are hard not to take personally.

Do you ever find yourself thinking or saying any of the following?

You are making me so angry right now!

Why are you doing this to me?

Can’t he see he’s hurting me?

I can’t believe he’s treating me this way! He’s so ungrateful!

If those thoughts are coming up, you’ve got a pretty good indication you’re taking your child’s behavior personally. This means you wind up feeling hurt and angry. The next thing you know you’re in a power struggle with your child, or you’re saying things you swore you’d never say to them – trying to use guilt or shame to get them to behave the way you want them to.

Taking behavior personally makes it much harder to stay calm, much less think of solutions and be a leader.

How can we stay calm and not take things so personally?

First off – give yourself a bit of a break. You are certainly not the first person whose child has gotten on their nerves.

Getting on their parents nerves shows kids they have the power to make you react, and even if you’re reacting negatively, power is a huge motivator. This means kids have a knack for finding just what buttons to push to get the strongest reactions from their parents.

So – what can you do about it?

5 Strategies for Not Taking Your Child’s Behavior Personally:

1) It helps to remember that behavior is communication. Kid are young. They don’t have your years of experience dealing with frustration, fear or anger and they generally have far fewer resources for handling these big emotions. This means sometimes they express them inappropriately through their behavior.

2) Become familiar with your anger triggers. What actions, words or external circumstances are likely to get under your skin fast? Become familiar with your main anger triggers. As you notice these triggers you may be able to take steps to prevent them, or make plans for how to deal with them in the future.

3) Pause. There are VERY FEW behaviors that require immediate action. I love the way Rachel states this in her own post on not taking behavior personally. Her recommendation is: Stop, Pivot, Breathe. Sometimes you can’t leave the room for your own personal time out, but you can probably turn away or at least close your eyes as you take a deep breath.

It’s important to note that sometimes, if you’re very angry, it’s helpful to pause, catch yourself before exploding, and then simply state: “I’m too angry to talk about this right now.” You can wait out the immediate storm and work on problem solving and teaching once you’re more calm. Kids will not only remember your example of handling anger, they’ll also be more receptive to learning from you when they’re not afraid of your rage.

4) Ask yourself: What am I feeling? Where is this coming from for me? When you notice you’re taking your child’s behavior personally, it’s a great time to be a bit of a detective: What nerve did they touch? When have you felt like this before? What story are you hearing in your head about this behavior or these words? You might not know the answers right away, but investigating can help you understand why you feel so deeply in these moments, and lets you write a new script for yourself.

Recommended Book: Mindsight by Daniel Siegel. We don’t have to stay trapped by our past experiences and traumas. This book tells us how to use mindsight to unravel these traps and resolve recurring conflict in our lives.

5) Change your inner script – when you notice a thought like, “Why is he doing this to me!?” try changing it to: “I wonder what he needs from me right now?” In her book Confident Parents, Remarkable Kids, Bonnie Harris explains:

To affect our child’s behavior, his internal state must first be understood, then accepted, then addressed.

Kids who are “misbehaving” are stressed because of an unmet need set some rule and Get your kids to follow rules . By thinking about what they might need, we move away from taking their behavior personally and move back into being their loving parent and guide.

Posted in Kids

Garden Toys for 4 Year Olds – Super Fun Diggin’ in the Dirt!

Posted on by Tim Connolly

At four years old most kids are happiest outdoors. One of the most peaceful and easy ways we’ve played together as a family is in the garden – sometimes growing things, sometimes just digging in the dirt, looking at worms and finding special rocks.

Here’s a list of our favorites for having fun in our garden

Best Garden Toys for the 4 Year Old in Your Life!

Radio Flyer Wheel Barrow

An uncle gave our son one of these wheel barrows when he could barely toddle behind it. It’s actually a little awkward for toddlers to push with the one wheel, but at 4 it was perfect. It lasted for years of dirt and mud moving, toy moving and joy-of-pushing-around use. All three kids loved it and we only got rid of it when they all got too tall for it to be a good fit.

Garden Hand Tools

Naturally kids want to copy the grown ups in the garden, and this is easiest if they have their own set of kid-sized garden tools. We’ve liked the ones that have metal heads because they’re easier to use for digging.

  • Metal Garden Tools for Kids with Wooden Handles – This set by Toysmith served us well, though the wooden handles eventually got lose as they got older and dried out.
  • Garden Tools for Kids with Tote – If you want one that comes with a convenient tote, this set by Gardenline gets good reviews and comes with a tote and a kid sized watering can too.
  • Garden Toys Set with Wagon – This set of garden tools comes with a wagon to cart everything around. The downside is these are all plastic, and thus may not have the durability. However, they are lightweight and can double as beach toys too.

Kid Sized Rakes and Shovels

Having tools around that little kids can use to do yardwork makes it fun to rake leaves, dig a hole or move compost. We were able to find a shovel and rake at our local hardware store, but if you want to order online, Toysmith makes this set of kid-sized tools (about 28 inches in length). It includes two rakes a shovel and hoe. Sometimes we as grown ups like having the small shovel around for scooping out compost from the compost bin.

Kids Sized Garden Gloves

It’s hard to find smaller garden gloves to fit little kid hands. Here are a couple options:

  • Melissa & Doug Giddy Buggy Good Gripping Gardening Gloves With Easy-Grip Rubber on Palms – Reviews state these are too big for a 2 year old, but may fit a 4-7 year old nicely. 
  • JustForKids Kids Genuine Leather Work Gloves, Kids Garden Gloves, 4-6 Years Old – If you prefer a leather glove, this pair is made in kid sizes and has a ton of positive reviews.

See Through Compost Bin

Compost can be fascinating when kids get to see the process happening in this see-through compost bin. Kids can compare how fast different materials decompose.

Garden Seed Kits

Seeds of Adventure makes gardening kits and games for kids. You can get a Flower or Herb Vegetable Garden in a Box. They also make a memory game and a go-fish game, both of which feature gardening information and come with seed packs as well.

A Tent for the Garden

Give kids a space to play outside with a simple pop up tent. The Homfu Kids Tent Playhouse can be used indoors or out and gets positive reviews for being large and having windows. However, if you prefer not to have separate poles for set-up, you may like something like these twist and fold pop up tents from GreEco.

Have fun in the garden! Rain or shine, there are plenty of outdoor learning opportunities for your children- both in childcare and at home. So go outside, get dirty, and have fun! and learn new things at Dad blogs about parenting and kids.

Posted in Kids

20 Essential & Must Have Healthy Habits for Kids

Posted on by Tim Connolly

Inculcating good habits in kids is very important for every parent. Doing things on daily or regular basis turn into habits, these habits help in building the character of your child. Children are very observant of their environment. They pay heed to everything that is happening around them. Therefore, it is important that as a parent you imbibe healthy habits in your kids. Here, we shall discuss some of the healthy habits that you may help your kid practice on a regular basis and become a better human being.

Healthy Habits For Children To Learn

A child is a great imitator, that is whatever your child sees and observes, he/she is bound to practice it. Therefore, teaching kids healthy habits will help them acquire skills for a better life ahead.

Following are some of the healthy habits list for kids that you may start early in life and give your child a great start for a healthier and better tomorrow:

  1. Eating Healthy And Well: Good healthy eating habits for kids are of utmost importance in the formative years. Though sometimes it may become quite challenging for you, the key is, to make the food look appealing to your child. Refrain from feeding junk and sugary food your child. Make them aware of the ill-effects of eating unhealthy food and help them in making right choices in food.
  2. Outdoor Activities: Along with a good diet, it is very important for a kid to be physically active. Prompt your kid to spend more time in outdoor activities, such as running, cycling, playing in the park with the friends etc. Physical activities energize the child and keep them happy and motivated.
  3. Sleeping On Time: Adequate amount of sleep and rest is important to regain and replenish the energy levels in a child’s body. Good sleep helps the child feel rejuvenated and fresh for the day. Set up a sleeping routine for your child and adhere to it. Irregular sleeping hours can make your child irritable and erratic.
  4. Washing Hands Before And After Meals: Getting rid of germs holds priority, and you should teach your kid the importance of washing hands before and after meals. Teach your kid to use soap and the correct technique of washing hands. Washing hands keeps the germs and infections at bay.
  5. Breakfast-The Most Important Meal Of The Day: Never let your kid skip breakfast as it will give them the energy for the day. Fuelling up on energy in the morning helps in keeping the blood sugar levels in check and keeps your child active and energized.
  6. Inculcate Good Reading Habits: Reading habit is very good for every child. Reading not only helps in grasping a language better but a child learns to become more imaginative and creative. You may set up a regular reading schedule or even read together at bedtime.
  7. Bathing: Where some children are water babies others despise water to a great extent. You must inculcate the habit of personal hygiene in your child. It is important to encourage them to bathe on a daily basis and also after an active session of outdoor activities.
  8. Spending Time With The Family: Spending time with the family is very important for a growing child. They not only learn to bond with the family members, but also the importance of spending quality family time together. Dinner time is the ideal time for a family to bond together.
  9. No Aerated Or Carbonated Drinks: Kids can easily become addicted to aerated or carbonated drinks which are extremely harmful in the growing years. The high levels of sugar and caffeine may have adverse effects on your child. Refrain from giving such drinks to young children and introduce them to healthy drinking options such as fresh fruit juices, milkshakes or smoothies. Inculcating healthy food habits for kids is a prime responsibility of the parents.
  10. Brushing Teeth Twice A Day: You should strictly help your child follow the habit of brushing twice a day. Good oral hygiene cannot be overstated as teeth are vulnerable to cavities. Kids usually dislike brushing, but if you educate your children about the importance of brushing, it will help them adopt this habit with ease.
  11. Tidying Up Their Room: Kids love to be messy and love to litter, which is absolutely normal. But it is very important that as a parent you inculcate the importance of cleanliness to your child. Train your kid to put their toys and other belongings back in their place and help learn to be organized from the beginning.
  12. Using Tissue Or Handkerchief: It is important to teach your kid how to use the handkerchief while coughing or sneezing. Teaching them to dispose of used tissues in the dustbin is equally important. Letting your child know the about germs will keep them informed about preventing infections.
  13. Following The Vaccination Schedule: Vaccinations are very important to prevent your child from deadly diseases. Keep yourself braced with the vaccination schedule of your kid. Giving right vaccine at the right time will save your child against many serious ailments. It is also recommended to keep the vaccination record handy and carry it along for all the visits to the doctor.
  14. Restricting The Screen Time: Children love to sit in front of a television and watch their favourite shows. It is good to watch a cartoon or a movie, but it is very important to make a note of the time your child is spending in front of a T.V. Watching too much television can not only affect the vision of a child, but they will become lazy and restless. Make a schedule and stick to it, though occasional binging may be allowed.
  15. Taking Care Of Your Kid’s Mental Health: It is often seen that most parents pay more heed to the physical well-being of their kids than the mental well being. It is very important to pay heed to the mental health of your kid. It is more important in cases where single parenting is involved.
  16. Teaching Them The Importance Of Money: Teach your child the value and importance of money. Start by giving them a piggy bank and a weekly or monthly allowance. Teach them how they can effectively spend and save their money. Making your child learn about the importance money at an earlier stage in a good idea.
  17. Importance Of Sharing: Most children find it very difficult to share their toys and other belongings with their siblings or friends. It is very important to teach sharing and caring for your child. Apart from tangible things it is also important to learn to share intangible things such as feelings and emotions.
  18. Respecting Others: Using negative or harsh words can affect anyone in more ways than one. It helps to teach your child to be respectful, not only towards elders but towards same age and younger kids too. You need to teach your kid that hateful and spiteful words could destroy relationships.
  19. Teaching Equality: Teaching the virtue of equality is very important for a child. Whether a friend or a foe, rich or poor everyone should be treated equally and without any bias. No discrimination of any kind should be encouraged. Your kid should learn to treat people fairly.
  20. Learning To Accept Defeat: We all love to excel in whatever we do but what takes more effort and courage than winning, is to accept defeat in a dignified manner. Explain to your child that it is absolutely fine to lose. There is no need to feel depressed or dejected, but what is important is to get up and start again.

These are some of the essential healthy habits that you may start early in childhood and help your kid follow a healthy lifestyle. These simple habits will help your child take a healthy start into adulthood.

You can help your children to learn good habits and manners from the children’s book series and it helps you to make your kids healthy and sincere.