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How To Cope With Teen Mood Swings Now
Teen mood swings and hormones can be hard to handle. That might be the understatement of the year. Of all the ages and stages of child development the teenage years can be the hardest. One moment your teen is engaging and strong willed and they have clearcut ideas and opinions and they can carry on great conversations with you on topics like social justice and politics. And then the very next day they are slamming doors, shrugging at every thing you say, seemingly incapable of more than one word answers. Parenting teens is a Jekyll and Hyde experience. You never know which one will show up at breakfast or after…
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11 Survival Tips For Raising Teenage Daughters
Raising teenage daughters is not a walk in the park. Your sweet little girl, that adorable baby you used to dress up in cute pink dresses, who insisted on reading Robert Munsch bedtime stories all snuggled up in her toddler bed for years, is now a teenager. Oh yeah, it happened fast too, didn’t it? Overnight, she’s a surly teenager with attitude, and you wonder how your relationship will survive this. Relax, the good news is you’ll both be fine…eventually. There are just some things that you need to remember. Chief among those is DO not take it personally. You were a teenager once. Try to think like your teenage…
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Fun Canada Day Matching Game Printable
This month have some fun with this Canada Day matching game. It’s a great way for kids to spend a few moments when you are getting dinner ready or doing something that needs to be done. Canada Day is one of my favourite summer events. First of all, it heralds the start of summer and second of all, it is close to my daughter’s birthday. She was a July 2nd baby. So, that makes her birthday so easy to remember. But, it means many people are always away that time of year and party throwing is tricky. Don’t miss the Canada Day Fill Ins page I have available here too…
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Special Challenges With a Special Child – Angelman Syndrome
THIS IS A GUEST POST about Angelman Syndrome and part of what I hope will be a series here for parents of children with disabilities and special needs. Have an idea for a guest post that might help another parent? Please email inkscrblr7@gmail.com I used to think my family was among the less-than-lucky few gifted with big challenges. We have Anna, a 17-year-old toddler with Angelman Syndrome, who was “disruptive” long before the term became popular. Special Challenges With a Special Child and How We Survive Them However, as I listen carefully to everyone around me I find that the semi-perfect families, the normal ones, are the true exceptions to…
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What are the Best Ways to Celebrate the Last Day of School?
What are the best ways to celebrate that last day of school? There are many ways to mark the accomplishment of finishing another year of school. This school year has flown by. June is almost here! There is nothing quite like the excitement of a child who is climbing off the bus after the last day of school. It truly is a landmark day for both kids and parents! They have completed another grade and you have survived an entire school year – hopefully unscathed. It’s the great time for both of you to celebrate. So what are some ideas for an end of year party? 5 Best Ways…
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What Happened One Crazy Weekend with Robot Baby
On Friday I became a grandma. My oldest daughter became a Mom and Ainsley an aunt. Which by default then made my husband a grandpa. Robot Baby Lucas joined our family this weekend. And it was nostalgic, fun, comical and a little bit crazy bringing a pretend baby home. But it was also a whole lot more than that too. The road to toy robot baby Lucas began last year when Payton, then 15, told me she wanted to take a parenting course at school. She was giddy over the prospect of having Robot Baby for a weekend in grade 11. Initially I balked. How does a parenting course prepare you for a…
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9 Reasons Why Life Needs a Yoast SEO Plugin
This week I was resting in Savasana relaxation pose after my fitness class at the YMCA and my mind was wandering. It’s been a busy, emotional season getting Ainsley registered for high school, and then there was the near concussion mishap for Payton. Too much time at the emergency room of a local hospital. Breathing and doing my corpse pose, my mind wandered. Had I done the right thing signing her up for high school nearby? Will she miss her friends too much? Will her older sister resent having her younger sister at the same school? Then too many clients owe me money right now. Why has my one client…
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Teach Your Child How to Be a Friend
This morning I have already connected with 3 of the parents I know who have kids with special needs. I am beyond grateful for their support. My kids are both having a rough week. Some part of that is life as a teenage girl. Another part of that is special needs. And yet a final piece of that is other people’s kids. Can’t control how other people parent, even though I wish I could. But I can reach out to my support network. And I can write. Sometimes that’s my therapy. Girl friendships are hard. I get it. I was a girl. In fact I am a person who survived…
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Exclusive Printable Find The Letter ABC Book
It’s time to start thinking about school! As in, your little people born in 2014 are now ready in the province of Ontario to register for school. That’s exciting. I can still remember my daughter’s first day of school. I was so cool, and my daughter marched right in to kindergarten and never looked back. Then, all of a sudden one of my closest friends whose son was in grade 2 already looked at me and said: “OH MY GOODNESS I can’t believe it’s her first day of school.” Well, if that didn’t open the floodgates and I cried my eyes out standing there. Her sympathy at that time sent…
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Giving Back This Holiday Season with Red Cross Canada
“I’d rather have empathy than sympathy,” my younger daughter, 13, out of the blue stated the other day when I was driving her to her therapy riding session. That got me wondering if she knew the difference between the two. So I asked her why she felt that way and what she considered empathy. “Sympathy is just feeling sorry for someone, like pity, for someone else. Empathy is being able to feel their feelings, put yourself in their shoes and do something about it.” There are many challenging moments parenting teens. But there are also times when they say or do something unexpected and you recognize that they might be…
