Enriching Your Child's Conscience

Children are living with curiosity. They learn lots of things in life, gifted naturally with intuition, and open toward everything they find. Everything seems to be interesting to them. That’s why they want to know about many things. It’s indeed a sign of good development.

Parents need to help children develop their conscience, which will be a great means of getting spiritual experiences. Through these, they’ll learn about self-esteem and moral values. Of course parents want children have and familiar with good values in life. As parents, what can you do then? Here are 5 ways you can do to enrich their conscience:

• Give good examples. What you say and do everyday reflect what you think about the world. If you say good stuff, your children will do the same. Children are great imitators. It’s important for you to say and do nice things anytime anywhere.
• Listen when they talk. Sometimes your children ask questions that sound silly to adults, like “Mom, where does the sun sleep when the night comes?” Listen to them and answer seriously, “The sun doesn't sleep. It shines in other places in the world.” By listening, children will feel that they get respect from their parents.
• Show happiness. Show and share all the happiness and positive energy and thoughts with the children. If you’re happy, they’re happy too. By doing this, the children will learn that life is enjoyable.
• Introduce them to nature. Tell them that all things happen in the world are connected to each other and that there’s a reason for it. For example, water is needed to irrigate plants and plants are food source for other living creatures.
• Be flexible with your rules. Children should be informed about what they should do. However, always take notice on their development. There will be time when they can decide what they want to do. By being flexible with your rules, children will stay cheerful and expressive.

Those 5 tips are actually easy to carry out. Just place yourself as your children’s parents and friends as well.
Again, remember that children are good imitators. Once you do or say something bad, there’s a great chance that they will do or say the same.

Cooking With Your Kids Helps Develop Motor Skills for Preschoolers

Did you know that cooking with your kids is a natural way for them to develop motor skills? If you've never looked at cooking that way before, think again. There's a reason why kids have a universal love for cooking - just like for stacking blocks and banging!

Cooking is especially good for preschoolers and here's how:

1.  Two year olds are developing large muscles in their arms:  They will enjoy stirring and stirring and stirring :-).  My two year old is always asking to stir; and her subconscious knows why! At 2 years old, a child naturally imitates circular strokes as part of their normal physical development. So, let them stir at every opportunity.

Here are some ways to encourage arm muscle development through cooking:

• stirring: flour, eggs, pancake batter, gelatin making, etc. 
• scrubbing potatoes and vegetables 
• cleaning the cutting board:  Give them a washcloth and some lukewarm water with the cutting board in the sink. They'll have a blast rubbing the wet washcloth up and down the cutting board to clean it. 
• pouring from large measuring cups into a bowl 

2.  Two year olds are developing the ability to turn pages:  Another motor skill developed during the preschool age is the ability to turn pages. So - just pondering here...is it the story they love so much or just turning the pages of the book? Well, actually both. They need the motor development of turning the pages; and the pictures and vocabulary improve their intellectual development.

3.  Two year olds love "patting" and "pressing":  From being fascinated with "patty-cake" chants at an early age, preschooler's still love to pat and press. I'm sure you'll recognize your preschooler doing this at the park:  scooping up rocks or sand, piling them up, and patting the top into different shapes.

Well, here's some suggestions to bring the "patting" inside:

• packing down brown sugar in the measuring cup 
• gently pressing a fork on top of peanut butter cookie dough on the cookie sheet 
• patting to level off the top of a cup of sugar 
• patting and pressing on pizza dough 
• pressing down with a cookie cutter on rolled sugar cookie dough 

4.  Two year olds love to dip - and this develops arm muscles skills too!:  it takes a lot of coordination to dip! Getting the food in the dip, then moving the arm and somehow getting it into your mouth.  If it wasn't difficult, they wouldn't get food all over their face! :-)

So, unless your 2 year old always has a clean face when he or she is done eating, here's some dipping opportunities:

• carrots in salad dressing 
• french fries in catsup 
• dipping a spoon in the emptied batter bowl to clean out the goodies :-) 
• dipping fruit in a fruit dip or chocolate (like frozen bananas or strawberries) 
• dipping chicken or fish in a batter for you to cook 
• dipping the bread in French toast mix 

So, instead of "shooing" your preschoolers and 2 year olds out of the kitchen, let them dive in with these simple tasks that not only give them great pleasure, but help them develop their age appropriate motor skills.

article by Laura Bankston

Nap Time Cues & Solving Bedtime Fights

This advice actually saved us a lot of headaches when our daughter was younger. In fact, following just this piece of advice got her sleeping two hours each morning and afternoon, plus twelve full hours every night at just five months old. Now almost four, she has no trouble saying that she's tired and needs a nap. As counter-intuitive as it may seem, there are three very common mistakes parents make:

1. They assume more naps will make it harder for the child to fall asleep at night. This is flat out, 100% UNTRUE. In fact, most bedtime fights occur because the child is overtired. Even when they do manage to fall asleep, they can't get that deep restful sleep they need. Think about it: when you're overtired, how often do you crash hard, only to find yourself wide awake at 2 a.m.? It's no different for the little ones.

2. They assume that babies need to be fed every two hours, regardless of any other schedules. This is also generally untrue. Granted, for very new babies this is a precaution that should be taken into consideration, and breastfeeding moms will need some relief as well. But our family doctor made a very good point: if a baby is sound asleep, it means they're not being woken up by nagging hunger...so stop waking them up to feed them! With my own daughter, once she learned that she wasn't going to be fed every couple of hours she opted to just stay asleep and eat a bigger breakfast.

Remember, this was when she was just five months old. It took only three days to train her this way, and to this day she sleeps well right through the night.

3. They assume a later bedtime will create a later wake-up time. This is also completely untrue. Children are creatures of nature and instinct, and they will tend to wake up at the same time every morning. Yet surprisingly, parents extend their kids' bedtimes as late as possible to try and get them to sleep in a little later. What this does is it actually forces the kid to become overtired, resulting in more and more bedtime arguments and restless sleep. The kid gets up throughout the night, and they still wake up early. It becomes a cycle. The way out of this is to go for an earlier bedtime, and be consistent with it. That consistency will pay off.

Oh, and admit to yourself that 6 a.m. actually isn't a terrible time to get up. You can go to sleep before midnight too, you know.

A new baby needs a lot of sleep and when they’re not sleeping, they can be hungry or need a diaper change. It’s a little hard to know in the beginning what’s making your baby cry or if they're tired. But as you both begin to settle into your routines, you’ll begin to notice the cues that your baby needs to nap. You want to make sure they get in good naps during the day and at appropriate times so that you won’t have as much trouble getting them to sleep at night.

Even a very small baby will rub their eyes when they get tired. They'll yawn; perhaps get fussy. As children get a little older, their activity levels may pick up as they get tired and try to avoid sleep.

Try to keep to regular nap times during the day. If you’re baby is napping 3 times a day, then a mid-morning, early afternoon and late-afternoon nap is appropriate for a baby with a 7:30 or 8 PM bedtime.

Often babies get tired towards dinner time, and then parents are faced with a dilemma. Do you let the baby sleep and risk not getting to sleep at bedtime? Or you do you try to keep them awake through dinner and perhaps put them to bed a little bit earlier?

Most parents will opt for trying to keep the baby awake a little longer in favour of keeping to a regular bedtime. But if it's been a busy day for the little one, let them have a very short nap and then wake them up gently for dinner or a feeding and some light play before putting them to bed for the night.

Remember to make rituals for naps as well as bed time so your baby gets used to sleeping at regular times.

8 Tips to Save Money on Groceries

Hey hey...we're coming up to the weekend, and you know what that means!

Nope. Not fun in the sun or a restful mini-vacation between grinds at work. For the working parent, there are no mini-vacations. What we do get is a little extra work, not least of which is hitting the grocery store!

The average family’s grocery bill is usually one of the higher numbers on the family budget. There can be an enormous difference in what each family spends on their groceries, depending on many factors, such as whether they buy name brand, more meat, etc.

The good news is that this allows for a large amount of savings if we decide to be frugal with our shopping. Following a few simple tips will have you well on your way to saving a few bucks.

1.) Make a meal plan. You’ll know exactly what you need from the store before you go.

2.) Watch for specials and coupons in store newsletters, and plan your meals around them.

3.) Make a list and stick to it. If it’s not on the list, don’t buy it.

4.) Don’t shop when you’re hungry. That way you won’t be tempted to buy things that you don’t need.

5.) Shop alone. Count on your bill being higher when you bring your spouse or children.

6.) Only buy things you know you’ll use. For example, if your family doesn’t like broccoli, don’t buy broccoli in the hopes that they’ll eat healthier this week.

7.) Keep your eyes on the items on the bottom shelf where the prices are lower.

8.) Buy store brands when the quality is the same. Most of the time, it actually is the same product in a different package.

It’s pretty easy to be frugal once you realize how much money you’re actually saving with these simple steps. Keep a log of your grocery bills, so you can see how much of a difference you are making.