Fall For Life

One of the most dangerous obstacles that a child will undertake while growing up, is FALLING. Whether it be falling from a chair, or simply toppling over while learning to walk.
As dangerous as it may seem, this falling over stuff is one of the most important lessons that they will learn, not just as a baby, learning to sit upright, but right through to the end of toddlerhood. It is also very important for the adult for a number of reasons, one of which is freeing up time, not being beside a child for every second and ready to catch him/her as they are about to fall.
There are a number of reasons why falling is such an important part of learning and of life in general.

1. When a baby sits for the first time, neurons in the child's brain make new connections to each other, developing the brain to greater heights (this is a process that starts happening from birth, neurons are connected to each other every time something new is learnt, literally millions of neurons are connected). When a baby falls, you guessed it, neurons are connected. If a child is held back from falling, neurons will not be connected, and may be delayed for some time.
2. When babies fall, they are learning that it hurts, and with this new found feeling of pain they will eventually learn to put their hands out the either stop from falling or to cushion the fall. Developing reflexes and their co-ordination (balance).
3. Catching a child before they fall, may lead to becoming dependent on the parent to always be their. As hard as it is, watching a child fall, then encouraging them to get up by themselves is far more beneficial to both the child and parent, for the parent it's not having to worry so much that their child might fall, it is replaced with "I hate seeing my little one fall, but I'm confident that she/he has learnt to fall and can pick her/him self up without a great deal of fuss".

Haircut Havoc

Today at 2 years and 1 month old, Skye (my daughter has had her 10th haircut, yep that's not a misprint. 10 haircuts and the age of a little over 2.
I have heard so many horror stories about a child getting a haircut, and Tracy and I did have our fair share of yelling and screaming from Skye in the early stages of hair cutting.
Her first Haircut was at four months, and what an insane job that was. If she could of, she would have torn down the whole salon.
I don't think there's any magic cure for this, I think it would be something like, being tied up and for me to made to eat liver or something like that.
One thing we had tried while getting a haircut was with a bottle of milk, it worked for most of the time, and for those times that it didn't work, distracting her with one of the hairdressers hair clips, worked very well ( for about 3 or 4 minutes).
One thing I have noticed, is that the last two times her hair had been cut (the last cut was today), she just sat there for the entire 15 to 20 minutes.
Skye isn't the super child that is totally behaved in every situation, she's just a regular everyday kid (the most beautiful though).
I think the reason why she sat for so long, was the regular visits there, now every six weeks. It has also been different hair stylists too, so this isn't a factor.
I think most kids that only have a small amount of hair don't get use to it quite so quickly, as they may go to the hairdressers, only 2 or 3 times by the age of 2.
It looks as though patience and time is the best fix for this little problem of getting a haircut.

King For A Day

Have you ever seen a parent yell at their child, well, ummmmmmmmm, just because they can, just because there the parent and the child has little choice but to be yelled at. And the majority of yelling is usually so miniscule of importance, that the yelling did not achieve anything except upset the child. By miniscule I mean, being yelled at because the child had turned the TV to another channel or something as simple as yelling with joy ( that something the child had pleased him/her self with) while the parent was trying ever so hard to watch the news.
I have been told by many parents that no matter how good your parenting skills are, and all the other things to raise a child, you will eventually need to yell at your child, even if it's for your own sanity, you will need to yell.
Before Having a child of my own, I didn't really want to believe that I would be a parent who needed to yell occassionly. Well I do a little bit of raising my voice, but I'm very lucky, in the sense that each time that I'm about to yell at my daughter, for running towards the road or going near the hot oven, or even drawing on the wall with a felt tip pen, I have the ability to stop and think what I'm about to say, before I say it. I still yell but it's very controlled and the after response of clarifying why (I was yelling) is very positive and very fast. Positive ! Because if I show her (what ever the problem is), in a calm voice, and tell her that it's ok, she may learn from it.
The reason why I can act the way I do is something that I've imbeded very deep within me, and that is, that I will ALWAYS love and respect my daughter for every second of every day for as long as I live.
Sure I've heard alot of parents say that they feel the same way, but then they go and say something like "I hate you, I wish you were never born". Yeah that's extreme, but believe me, there's a hell of alot of parents that say that exact phrase.
If you, as a parent, at any time yell at your kids for what ever reason, smack them (to hard), swear at them, embarrass them, abuse them or tragically the most common of all, neglect them. Please take a moment to think for awhile about what is written below. This is how I think everyday, which is why I can never ever harm my wonderful daughter.


You have a son and you have just found out that (for what ever reason) your son has only 24 hours to live.
For the next 24 hours how would you treat your son. I'm betting that you would treat your son like a KING. I would imagine that you would shower him with all the hugs, kisses and "I love you's" that you could ever possibly give.
The love and respect of your son would reach immeasurable heights and absolutely nothing that he did was wrong, or could be seen as wrong in your eyes. I'm guessing that everything that he ever wanted was miraculously before him, to make him laugh and cry with joy.
All the while, you've forgotten all about the vase that he broke last month, which was dealt with, with a searing smack on his bum, one of which actually hurt your own hand. You have also forgotten all about the pain and agony of giving birth, that you so kindly remind your son, how much it hurt when you brought him into your life, time and time again.
Nothing else matters for at least the next 24 hours. It's all about a your little boy, just him, your son, the one thing in your life that you treasure so very much.

With all this in mind, this is how you should feel about your child, EVERY, SINGLE, MINUTE, of every single day, for the rest of his/her life.

The Power Of "NO"

The word "no" is an immensely powerful word, but just who has the power, the parents or the kids.
I have seen many a parent tell their children "no" from the moment they could move about, the reason for this is to stop a child from climbing on a cabinet that may fall on them, or from stopping a child touching the hot oven, basically to stop the child from coming to any harm. What ever the word no is used for, the child has learnt the word no from a very very early age. The first three words that alot of children say is mum, dad, and no. Why is this, well it's quite obvious, those three words are repeated to them more than any other word.
Many of the parents, that I have mentioned above, have a strange response to a child that says no to them, for instance, "put your toys away please", the child responds with, a very firm "NO", the parents reaction is usually, "don't you dare say no to me" or something similar.
The anger from the parent is very obvious, and to the child may be thinking a number of different things.
What ever the child is thinking from this reaction, could be anger, sadness, or even fear. The one thing that the child wont be thinking is "but you taught me how to say NO", a child's logic doesn't work in the same manner as an adults logic does.
When it comes down to it, the child has been taught to say no by the parents themselves, so why does a parent get angry about something that they have taught the child to say. Answer, very simple, the parent does not want to lose the power of being in charge, and also has forgotten where the child has picked up the word no from.
I was talking to a friend of mine who had just had a baby, I was talking to her about how I thought about the word no, her reply was, "I will be teaching my child the word "NO" from the very start, I replied "what if your child one day says no to you", She said my child would never dare to say "no" to me.
That pretty much ended the discussion, as I left it right where it was, THE NEED TO BE DOMINANT.
There is a few problems with this state of mind, I will just speak about just one of the main issues.
If a child grows and would never dare to say "NO" to his/her parents through the fear of what may happen as a consequence. That same child may never be able to talk to his/her parents about an issue of the utmost importance, such as falling pregnant or putting a dent in the family car. Why ? FEAR.

Please and Thankyou

Please and thankyou seem to be one of the most repeated phrases that a child will hear from their parents.
In order to teach manners to a child, a parent responds to child that has asked for a drink of water of something of that kind, with "please". This is said to encourage the child to use manners.
While there is nothing wrong with this theory of teaching manners to children, consider this for just a moment.
Kids have a habit of copying everything they hear, especially from their parents, as a child sees and hears more from them than any other person. Now think about how often an adult says please or thankyou. I have watched so many parents ask their children to politely do something, but many times, the request was asked without a please, and when it was done, no thankyou either (most of the time of course there was a please and a thankyou).
Considering a child copies nearly everything parents do, a child not hearing a please and thankyou all the time, will of course copy what they have heard, this is nothing like how an adult would think, in the sense of "they didn't say it so why should I", this is just purely and simply copying.
How can we avoid this from happening, well one thing I did, was to stop asking my daughter for a please or a thankyou for nearly everything, with just the occasional mention of it.
The reason why I thought of trying this was quite simple. It was obvious to me that when she had learnt a word such as cat, more, again or car, she had retained those words for ever, so I figured that if she had learnt those words and said them without prompting, then please and thankyou are no different.
Turns out that the theory has worked and she now (at the age of 2 years 1 month) says please and thankyou, not all the time though, but she does say it without any prompting.
Another way to get a child to use these words would to be mindful of how often you use the words yourself, if possible use them every single time.
Or possibly, don't expect a please or thankyou from your child with every request that they make, if they do use please or thankyou without prompting, make the biggest deal about it possible, just to show how well the child has done. You will find that the encouragement will improve the use of these words.