Last week in our local community a man was shot and killed by police right near my boys primary school. By the time I picked them up from after school care they were a mix of worry and questions. I knew we needed to talk about what had happened, not a topic I had pre-picked for Thursday night dinner chat over Chargrill Charlies. I wasn't sure exactly what they needed to know, and was still processing the event myself. 

When events happen both in Australia, and globally it is understandable when parents feel confused about how to talk with our children about them. One instinct is to shield them from it. You know; allow kids to be kids!

This is understandable. After all, from the minute we were handed our first baby we were told when it cries it’s our job to work out what’s wrong and fix it. To stop the sad!

Here’s why I think we should resist that instinct.

Simply put, the world, the media, the internet, even the playground – are too...

One of the hardest parts about being a parent is that the parent we hope to be, want to be, and promise to be for our kids when we sit on the couch at night, often leaves us right when things get tough.

Parenting is not easy; in theory we all know the parent we want to be. But in reality, when one of your children hits a younger more helpless sibling we jump to despair because they keep doing it, and we fear we are getting it wrong. (Or worse there is something wrong with our child.) Or your child has their 17^th meltdown for the day over the way you cut their toast and it’s like some kind of poltergeist takeover happens and next thing you are yelling “GO TO YOUR ROOM.” It’s a bit of a cycle, because we wind up regretting it, and promising to do better but it seems to happen again and again.

It’s like whenever our kids are at their worst - our logic, creativity, and compassion leave the room and we seem to match them.

It’s not a...

It’s 5pm and you are racing the clock to do the dinner / bath / bed dash. Your child asks for something, it might be a biscuit or some TV it might be for you to play with them again. Or its 8pm and maybe they are in bed, they ask for the 10 millionth thing, you both know it’s unreasonable….You say no (for a multitude of reasons from health, to safety, or a need for sleep, or because it doesn’t work for you right now) …and your child starts to get upset.

 In your head you think, ‘not this again’…… You dread the meltdown that might build, you worry they won’t eat their dinner, or it will upset siblings, or it might disrupt the bedtime routine and you collapse.  

 “OK just ONE biscuit” or “Fine ill play for 5 minutes and no more” or “ok you can get up and have a bowl of cereal”

 I can tell this story because I have lived it, many, many times over, and I know I will...

It's instinctive to ask your child at the end of the school day: "How was school?"

You're probably keen to know how it's going, what they've been doing for the past six hours or more, what have they learnt?

But how often do you actually get an answer longer than one word?

Recently Gen Muir was chatting with Christine Layton on ABC Radio Perth all about how to get kids to really talk following a day at daycare or school. 

Read more here

 We all know the saying “sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me”. This is the old school approach to dealing with conflict or ‘friendship fires’ between kids which when you think about it, is pretty emotionally dismissive.

 Because here is the thing: words can, and do hurt.

 So why do we tell our kids to ‘just play with someone else’ or ‘dust it off’? Quite simply, we want to make it better. This can either look like telling our child to play with someone else (sticks and stones), or ringing the parent of the other child / charging into the school and demanding action.  

 None of these options are great for our kids because they don’t empower our kids, they don’t allow them to feel ‘heard’, and this means our kids are left feeling alone with their feelings and less confident about how to handle a similar situation in the future.

 We want to make sure our...

As Featured in Mamamia 

This week, mum-of-four, Genevieve shares her Five Golden Rules for parenting. 

I am a mum of four beautiful boys aged five, seven, 10 and 12. 

I drop more balls than I can count. At any given moment in my house there is a mountain of toast, lots of noise, and Nerf Bullets absolutely everywhere. But also, my life is full of sweet, caring, loving, fumbling, big-hearted boy love.

I haven’t always had golden rules when it comes to parenting. They have developed over time through trial and error. 

I started out as a pretty intense mum, focused on getting it all 'right'. When I just had one baby, I was positive he was perfect. He ate and slept when the books said he should and I was, in hindsight, a tiny bit smug about that. Then I had a second baby, and the cracks began to show.

My perfect firstborn baby became a toddler who was pushing, snatching, and on occasion - biting! My new baby had reflux and wouldn’t stop...

As Featured in Mamamia

"I have four sons. I have had a child at home with me for 12.5 years now. They say the days are long and the years are short. But with four boys born in seven years, there were a few years there that moved slowly.

It feels like a blur of superheroes, in my house, in my car, and often, in my bed.

Next year, my youngest son starts primary school. My boys are now aged five, seven, 10, and 12. 

I am technically in the golden years. Out of the nappies, the toddler stage, and the sleepless nights, and not yet into the peril of teenagers. "

Read more here

 “I don’t want to go to daycare today”

 It is human to struggle with transitions, but no one on earth struggles more than our gorgeous toddlers.

Some days it feels from the minute their chubby feet hit the floor they are crying because you cut their toast in triangles instead of squares and every little thing is a battleground!!!

They don’t want to get into (or out of) the car or the bath and they are definitely not listening when you tell them it’s time to stop playing and put their shoes on for day-care.

So, what’s up with that?

Why is it so hard?

And more importantly, how can we bring more peace to tricky transitions for our toddlers?

 

Firstly, why is it so hard?

Because these little humans, are just making sense of their world. Their emotions and brains are still developing. So, they cling to routine because it helps them feels safe, and they drag and stomp their chubby feet to let us KNOW.

The thing is, I really get...

When my eldest son  was about 14 months he fell in love with a green block he simply called "Green”. The block was a part of a 5-piece puzzle that his family day care educator gave him for Christmas, and he grew very fond of the square green block over the 4 other shapes and proceeded to take it everywhere.

He slept with it, ate with it, he bathed with it and once left it at a beach about 2 hours from our home and you BET we drove back to get that block!!

I remember thinking it was so strange, it wasn’t cuddly or nice to sleep with, he'd never had a special blanket or toy he was attached to and why on earth this green wooden block?? I remember worrying that he may need that green block next to him as he sat for his driver’s licence or when he got his first job he loved it so much.

In hindsight it’s a bit clearer that at that age, he had begun day-care. He was starting to get a sense of himself as a separate being from us. I think that “Green”...

How to let your child know they are the centre of your universe in one hug.

 Despite what the Hallmark cards suggest no child actually permanently occupies the centre of their parent’s universe 24/7. It’s just not possible.

We love our children to bits, they are undoubtedly at the centre of our hearts and our minds and a perpetual priority but, babies aside, no parent can devote their every waking moment to a single child. All parents have competing demands on their time, their energy and their focus. There are jobs parents need to do - paid and unpaid - to provide for their children.

There are relationships to maintain, physical and mental health to take care of, responsibilities to relatives, the never-ending debacle of washing, not to mention the demands of multiple kids. No one child can ever really be the permanent centre of a parent’s universe, because, as a parent, keeping a child’s world ticking means we have to keep ourselves ticking. 

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