My Son's First Book

My oldest boy just wrote his first book; a proud day for daddy. I didn't even know he had it in him.

Maybe he takes after me after all. I've written two books; Daddyhood and Stress Relief 101 and I am proud of both of them.

My son's book is a seven page book about his little puppy called Pepper. He wrote it all by himself. Wow, that kid is creative. Others play football or soccer. My kids writes. I like that.

And I hope he continues to write. Who knows, he may become the next Mark Twain or Edgar Allan Poe or even Stephen King.

But right now, he's just my son and I am a proud daddy.

Bring back old-fashioned play

Psychologists urged to help parents reverse the commercialization of childhood.
By Christopher Munsey

Years ago, if you gave a kid a lump of Play-Doh, she might roll it around in her hands and shape it into a ball, a lion or some other figment of her imagination.

These days, kids are more likely to look at that lump, scratch their heads and say, "What does it do?" said Diane Levin, PhD, at a session on the effects of electronic media on childhood.

Levin said examples of what she terms "problem-solving deficit disorder" can be seen in children who are so used to staring at a screen while playing electronic games that they don't know how to play creatively. Making things worse are the messages that children get from these overly structured and directed activities, she said.

"What we have is a huge clash of cultures between what parents, families and society want to teach children about what it means to be a person with good values and the messages given by popular culture," said Levin, co-author of "So Sexy, So Soon" (Ballantine Books, 2008).

The intense marketing toward children started in the early 1980s when the government relaxed regulations on the advertising of toys and products to children. Now, toys are even being used to market other toys, with cell phones and electronic games, Levin said.

The convergence of sophisticated technology and unfettered commercialism is a "disaster" for American children, added Susan Linn, EdD, author of "The Case for Make Believe'' (New Press, 2008). Linn, who also spoke at the session, co-founded the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood with Levin and serves as its director. Before deregulation, she said, corporations spent about $100 million a year advertising products to kids. That spending has now mushroomed to $17 billion annually. Such practices, she said, are linked to childhood obesity, eating disorders, youth violence and early sexualization.

Not knowing how to play creatively and playing electronic games in isolation also means that children are losing the traditional lessons of play, which help them make sense of the world and learn how to interact with peers, Linn said.

Psychologists can help parents push back against the trends, Linn says. One example of success came last year, when in response to a letter-writing campaign, Hasbro shelved a plan to market dolls to young girls based on the Pussycat Dolls — a pop group known for their scanty dress.
"They will not be coming to a toy store near you," she said.

When You Thought I Wasn't Looking

When you thought I wasn't looking I saw you hang my first painting on the refrigerator, and I immediately wanted to paint another one.

When you thought I wasn't looking I saw you feed a stray cat, and I learned that it was good to be kind to animals.

When you thought I wasn't looking I saw you make my favorite cake for me, and I learned that the little things can be the special things in life.

When you thought I wasn't looking I heard you say a prayer, and I knew that there is a God I could always talk to, and I learned to trust in Him.

When you thought I wasn't looking I saw you make a meal and take it to a friend who was sick, and I learned that we all have to help take care of each other.

When you thought I wasn't looking, I saw you give of your time and money to help people who had nothing, and I learned that those who have something should give to those who don't.

When you thought I wasn't looking I saw you take care of our house and everyone in it, and I learned we have to take care of what we are given.

When you thought I wasn't looking I saw how you handled your responsibilities, even when you didn't feel good, and I learned that I would have to be responsible when I grow up.

When you thought I wasn't looking I saw tears come from your eyes, and I learned that sometimes things hurt, but it's all right to cry.

When you thought I wasn't looking I saw that you cared, and I wanted to be everything that I could be.

When you thought I wasn't looking I learned most of life's lessons that I need to know to be a good and productive person when I grow up.

When you thought I wasn't looking I looked at you and wanted to say, 'Thanks for all the things I saw when you thought I wasn't looking.'

Each of us (parent, grandparent, aunt, uncle, teacher, friend) influences the life of a child. How will you touch the life of someone today? Just by sending this to someone else, you will probably make them at least think about their influence on others.

9 Ways To Make Your Child Smarter

Make music: Listening to your child play the trombone isn't always a pleasurable experience, but music lessons can be a fun way to engage in right-brain learning. According to a study by University of Toronto researchers, organized music lessons appear to benefit children's IQ and academic performance—and the more years the student takes lessons, the greater the effect. The study found that taking music lessons in childhood was a clear predictor of better grades in high school and a higher IQ in adulthood. So help your children release their inner Mozart, sign them up for the school band or private lessons.

Breast feed: Mother's milk is elemental brain food. Research consistently has shown that breast-feeding has multiple benefits for growing infants. It prevents dangerous infections and provides essential nourishment. Danish researchers have discovered that breast-feeding can make babies both healthier and smarter. The study found that infants who breast-fed for nine months grew up to be significantly more intelligent than those who breast-fed for one month or less. The bottom line: If breast-feeding works for you make an early investment in your child's health. Breast-feeding your infant can deliver long-term dividends.

Foster fitness: Studies by University of Illinois researchers have shown a strong relationship between fitness scores and academic achievement among primary school children. Participation in organized sports fosters confidence, teamwork and leadership, according to research by the Oppenheimer Funds. This study also found that 81 percent of women business executives played team sports as girls. So instead of retiring to the TV after dinner, consider throwing a ball around or going for a walk. Even better: Encourage your child to get involved in an organized physical activity or school sport.

Surprise! Play video games: Video games get a bad rap. Yes, many are violent, solitary and mindless, but stick to the ones that develop children's strategic thinking and planning skills and the ones that promote teamwork or creativity. Educational toy companies like Leapfrog are now creating motor- skill and memory enhancing games for small children—even toddlers. A recent study conducted at the University of Rochester found that participants who played video games recognized and learned visual cues much faster than their non-video-game-playing counterparts. British teachers have begun using some video games in the classroom.

Junk the junk food: Cutting out sugar, trans fats and other junk food from your child's diet and replacing them with high-nutrient alternatives can do wonders for early childhood mental and motor development—especially in the first two years of life. For example, kids need iron for healthy brain tissue development, as nerve impulses move more slowly when children are iron-deficient. And studies show that poorly nourished children have trouble fighting infections, which causes them to miss school and fall behind their peers. Pay attention to what your kids are eating, and the grades may follow.

Nurture curiosity: Experts say parents who show curiosity and encourage their children to explore new ideas teach them a valuable lesson: Seeking knowledge is important. Support your kids’ hobbies and interests by asking them questions, teaching them new skills and taking them on educational outings to develop intellectual curiosity.

Read!: This tried-and-true method sometimes gets overlooked in the rush to adopt the latest IQ-boosting technology, but reading is a sure-fire, low-tech way to improve learning and cognitive developing in children of all ages. Read to your children from an early age, sign your child up for a library card and keep the house stocked with books.

Breakfast breeds champions: A strong body of research dating back to the 1970s shows that eating breakfast improves memory, concentration and learning. And children who don't eat breakfast tend to tire easier, be more irritable and react less quickly than those who begin the day with a solid meal. With today's hectic schedules, a full sit-down breakfast isn't always possible. But even an energy bar and a glass of milk can go a long way towards helping your kids stay focused and engaged during school hours.

Play mind games: Chess, crosswords, cryptograms, riddles—they all train the brain to perform mental gymnastics. Games like Sudoku can be fun while promoting strategic thinking, problem-solving and complex decision-making. Keep brainteasers around the house and challenge your children to help you solve the trickier problems.

"I Hate My Newborn Baby!"

I found the following ob MSN Online:

"I Hate My Newborn Baby!"
A new dad confesses: They're not always bundles of joy
Add this page to favoritesBy Steve Belanger, Men’s Health

Week 1
The first few days are a blur of exhilaration and exhaustion. I sit holding that little ball of flesh--all 6 pounds of him--and I can't believe how lucky I am.

On the third day, we take Matthew home. My wife and I are looking forward to spending the next 3 months together, raising our boy. After that, she'll go back to work and I'll stay home.
The parenting books say the average newborn sleeps about 19 hours a day. That's how long our boy cries. He never naps, and at night he sleeps for just 20 minutes at a time, and only when he's being held. This makes it tough to follow the first rule of having a newborn: Sleep when the baby sleeps.

Week 2
Clearly something is wrong. We take Matthew to the doctor. "It's just a little intestinal distress," he tells us. "It's fairly common and nothing to worry about."

Meanwhile, my wife, Kelly, and I start sleeping in shifts. She goes to bed at 7 p.m. while I sit in the basement with Matthew for, inevitably, 5 hours of crying. Then at midnight, we switch for 5 hours.

Before, the basement had been my sanctuary. Comfy couches, big-screen TV, every man's dream. Now it's my prison. I lose my temper 50 times a night. Sitting there alone in the dark, exhausted, I'm overwhelmed. "Why are you doing this!" I scream at him. "What do you want me to do?"

Week 3
I hate my newborn baby. There, I said it. Nobody ever says it. But if what Matthew is going through is fairly common, then I'm sure more than a few men have thought it. It's always "Coochie-coochie-coo!" and "Oh, he's a handful, but he's worth it." Yeah, right. Am I missing something here?

I'd waited 42 years to meet this kid. Now I want to return him. Or ask for an exchange. "Do you have any quiet babies that I could take instead? No? Would you mind looking in the back?"
I feel like the worst dad ever.

Week 4
Two more doctor visits and no improvement. We switch to formula, replace Matthew's bed linens, and start using a humidifier in his room. We're desperate for something, anything, to click. Friends say things like, "Just wait. One of these days he'll start sleeping, and your life will change." Every time he dozes for more than 15 minutes we think we've turned a corner. But then he wakes up crying, as if someone has just poured a bucket of ice water on him.

Week 5
The doctor thinks maybe Matthew has a milk allergy, so he wants us to switch to a soy-based formula. We start him on a Saturday.

The next day, my mother-in-law comes over to give us some relief. Kelly and I each go our separate ways. She takes care of some stuff around the house, and I lock myself in front of a day's worth of NFL games. By dinnertime, my mother-in-law is deeply concerned. "He's getting worse," she says.

I call the doctor, who advises us to allow the new formula a few more hours to work through his system. At 10 p.m., Matthew is as miserable as we've ever seen him. We decide to take him to the ER.

Then, as we're getting ready, something crazy happens. He falls asleep in my wife's arms. We don't get our hopes up--we've fallen for this trick before. Fifteen minutes later, we take a chance and lay him down. Still out cold. Then we dare to crawl into our own bed.

That night, he sleeps 6 hours straight. It's the breakthrough we've been hoping for.

Today
As I write this, Matthew is sitting in his bouncy seat looking at me with a smirk on his face. He's 6 months old, and he's already my best friend. Every night he listens to my troubles, cooing his understanding or praising me with an encouraging fart. But for his first few weeks on this planet, we did not get along. Not at all.

Looking back, I feel incredible guilt--not just for having had so much hatred and anger, but for how selfish I'd been. Many new parents are facing real problems. Their kids are sick. They're having trouble affording basic necessities. They're doing it alone. My wife and I were together 24-7 and parenting knocked us on our asses.

To those struggling parents, I say best of luck.

To my wife, who's now back at work, I say thank you for giving me such a wonderful son.
And to my boy, well, I'm sorry about the things I said to you during your first few weeks. I promise to make it up to you for the rest of your life. I love you, buddy.

Hang in there. It will get better. They’re your future. Treat them with respect. Give them love.

Why Get Stressed Out?

Why do parents get stressed out over their children? Don't you realize that they won't be young forever? They're going to be grown up and they're going to move away and you will look back over the years that your children were home and you will see all the times you wasted by being stressed out over nothing. yelling at your children, sending them to their room, spanking them.

Times you could have spent laughing with your children. Times your could have spent having fun with your children. Times you could have spent being the parent that your children think you are.

Children are precious and they don't have a say in the matter. They don't mean to stress you out. They're just being children. They're doing what they're supposed to do - play and have fun. The problem isn't with the children, it's with your attitude.

You need to change your attitude. See the humor in your children, not the stress. Change the way you look at things and your life and your children's lives will change for the better. Children learn by watching you. If they see a stressed out parent who snaps over nothing, they're going to grow up an be the same way.

I don't know about you, but I don't want my children to grow up being stressed out. I want them to grow up and enjoy life. I want them to enjoy their children. I want them to be just like me. When you think about that, you'll start to see things differently and you will start to make better choices. Remember, be the parent that your children think you are.

BC is a professional speaker, Christian comedian and author. His current book is Daddyhood, a humorous and thought provoking book about life with his two boys. BC became a dad for the first time at 52 and the second time at 55. His life has been wonderful ever since.

The Karate Kid

My oldest son, Austin is in Karate Camp this summer. He's actually getting pretty good at it. He's learning a lot. For example, just yesterday he learned that if you karate kick a metal chair it will hurt your foot. He has also learned that if he kicks his brother, his brother kicks back. Austin has quite a ways to go before he becomes a black belt, but at least right now he's hanging in there. And next month the two of us are doing a magic show for the kids at Karate Camp. That will be fun.

he looks pretty cool in his karate outfit. In fact he hasn't taken it off in four days. He sleeps in it. It was white. It's the color of dirt now.

Town Meeting

I went to my first town meeting tonight since the topic of discussion was the school budget. It seems that the commissioners want to cut the budget by about half and they want to raise taxes.

Since about half of my hometown is out of work because one industry (the biggest employer in town) went bankrupt trying to keep up with foreign prices and the other industry, a textile mill moved overseas (thank you government), and gas is now $4.00 a gallon, we don't need a tax increase.

And why are they cutting the school budget. Every one of the commissioners' big thing when they were running for office was, "I'm going to push for better education. I going to fight for better funding for teachers and schools." Now I clearly see that was just a bunch of crap to get them elected. And two of the commissioners I voted for just for that reason.

Our children are our greatest resource and they have no say in this. We can either keep spending more and more and more on law enforcement or spend more on education so our children won't grow up and become criminals.

I've already lost faith in our national government thanks to Bush and Cheney and I've lost faith in our state government here in NC thanks to Jim Black and now I'm losing faith in our local government. Every one of the commissioners tonight sat up there like they could care less what we thought. Their minds are made up. They're in office and they don't care what we think. And I think that none of them will be elected next term.

I have two children in school and I want them to get the best education possible. The U.S. isn't number one in education, Finland is. The U.S. isn't even in the top ten. I think that's reason enough to get the government out of our schools.

Where does it stop. what do we as citizens have to do to claim our government back?

Red Smiley

the school where my son goes has different color smiley faces to determine their behavior. A Blue smiley means great behavior, a green smiley is good behavior, a yellow smiley is okay and a red one is bad behavior. Fortunately, my son gets mostly blue and green smileys but every once in a while he gets a red one. Like last week. He got a red smiley for jumping in mud puddles. It had rained heavily the night before and there were puddles of water all over the play ground, and Austin had to jump in every one of them. That's what little boys do, it's their right to jump in mud puddles. It's part of growing up. He told the teacher that mud puddles were from where the rain peed. Rain peeing, I've never heard that one before. If my son is that creative, they ought to give him a blue light and let it be.

What's The Matter With Parents?

Did you read where a man threw his children off a bridge over a fight with his wife? What the hell is the matter with parents these days? I don't know what the fight was over, but I'm sure it wasn't great enough to throw his children off a bridge and kill them.

I've had some knock down drag out fights with my wife, but they were never enough to throw my two boys off a bridge. I could throw her off the bridge before I throw my two children.

I wonder what was going through this man's mind when he did it? I know if I was there there'd be a bullet going through his mind because no one who would do something this stupid deserves to live.

My children have made me so mad I could bite a hole in steel, but I would never do something like this. If you can't handle children, then here's an idea: don't have children.

He will see those children again someday on another plane and I hope they make him pay for what he did. I realize that God is forgiving, but something like this is just unforgivable.

Love your children. Tell them you love them everyday. I do and the love they give back is so satisfying.

Happy Birthday

My youngest son turned three today. We had a party at the pre-school and cake was everywhere except in the childrens mouths. How do they make such a mess? We gave him a scooter just like his big brother's.

They grow up so fast, don't they? I'm going to hold him as much as I can now because before I know it he will be too old to hold and I will miss it.

I will also mis hearing him say, "I love you daddy." It's really going to hurt when he stops saying that. But right now, Happy birthday son. Your daddy loves you very much.

The Mini Vacation

So the family took a mini vacatiion to Myrtle Beach over the weekend. Vacations are a time to relax and get over the stress in your life, right? Wrong. The resort we were going to was advertised at the end of 52nd street. Only thing is, there are like three 52nd streets in Myrtle Beach. Whoever came up with this idea should be fired immediately.

We went around in circles for about two hours looking for the resort. When we found it there were cars all the way around the block waiting to check in. The place was full to capacity. We got our key and then we couldn't find the room because they sent us to the wrong building. When we did finally find the room, the key wouldn't work.

I teach stress management so at this point I'm trying to practice what I preach. It's not working. This is just one of those days where nothing is going to go right.

The resort had an indoor pool and water slide and hot jaccuzzis and all kinds of things for the kids to play on. the only problem is, there were too many kids there. So no one had any fun. Every pool was full, the water slide was full every jaccuzzi was full, ever chair was taken, we couldn't enjoy it.

I was so glad to get back home and relax in front of the TV and watch football. There's no place like home. I don't think I'm going back to Myrtle Beach ever again. It's getting way too big to enjoy anymore.

Maybe I'll go to Atlantic Beach, NC or Carolina Beach. They're still small enough to enjoy and not stress you out.

Oh, thank God for Valium.

My Kids Didn't Get Enough For Christmas

My two boys didn't get nearly enough for Christmas apparently because over the weekend we went to a children's expo in Raleigh and bought them even more stuff.

It was like a giant flea market for kids. Toys everywhere. My oldest boy saw a toy guitar he wanted, so I told him, "Let's walk around awhile and then we will get it when we leave." But when it was time to go, the guitar wasn't there. Someone else had gotten it which reminds me of a saying, "If you see it and can afford it, buy it. It won't be there when you go back."

we got my youngest son a bicycle. We got skates for both of them, and clothes. All together we spent $80. Not bad when you consider that brand new the bicycle alone would have cost $80.

I don't mind buying used stuff. If it looks good and it works, get it.

On the way home we stopped by Goodwill. I found a guitar there and it was better than the one at the expo. My son thought so too.

You find some great deals at Goodwill, the Salvation Army and the Thrift Store and you're helping a great cause when you buy there.