August 31, 2015

Highlights of August 2015

Dominique Parenting and Kids, Wordful Wednesday wordful wednesday

Monkey Boy and me

August was a really happy month for me. R flew down and took time off from work to spend time with me and the kids. We managed to spend quality time as a family and as a couple.

The kids and us in the park cycling

Now that Tiger girl is 4 she is able to ride her own bike and we can go riding as a family when R is in town. She doesn’t need to be excluded from any group activities as everyone can participate in it.

R and me.

We manage to catch up and have some couple time during my birthday week and am working towards a renewed growth for our marriage.

Light purple blooms

I shared photos of the flowers that I took when I visited the Flower Dome a few months back during the last school holidays. I’m hoping that I have time for a trip to the National Orchid garden one of these days so that I can capture the blooms housed there too.

Single yellow/white bloom

I love spotting unusual flowers and was able to capture a few unique single blooms during that outing with the kids.

Gift wrapping Workshop with Jane Means

August was also a month of many firsts for me. It was the first time that I attended a Gift wrapping class. I’ve always been curious on how to package a gift properly and it was really fun to learn how to do the simple designs that Jane taught in the lesson.

What’s is your mindset?

I had an eye opening talk about NLP and both R and I learned quite a bit about how one’s mindset can affect one’s outlook on life. Everything starts from the mind – If you think you can do it you will find ways to do it.

Attending the Make Me Beautiful Workshop

August was also the month I attended my first beauty workshop by Mas a Makeup Guru who is with Mary Kay. She too started off with not much knowledge about Make up 5 years ago and look where she is today. She has her own Makeup Artist school and does beauty and other makeup for others using our Mary Kay products.

R and the kids when they were younger

Planning for the future is very important. R and I have been considering about our finances a lot this year and it was really interesting to know that nowadays they have plans like the Family Advantage by AXA which makes financial planning easier for young families.

My Purple Winged Fairy

I’ve cut back further on my blogging and online commitments to spend more time with the kids as they will be having the SA2 exams soon. I’m also doing more homeschooling with Tiger girl to prepare her for K2 next year.

How was your month of August like?

August 30, 2015

The Parent Child Dance

Dominique Book Review, Parenting and Kids Parenting

The Parent- Child Dance

The Parent-Child Dance: Strategies and Techniques for Staying One Step Ahead by Ronald A. Kotkin and Aubrey H. Fine is a 10 Chapter book which helps parents understand how to relate to their children better.

In her book she mentions about the spectrum of different parenting styles and how kids react to the different styles. What comes easily for us may seem to be different for the child who is trying it for the first time.

Each chapter revolves around problems that parents and children face and suggestions on how they can solve them. Various scenario are raised and solutions given on how to address them.

For example it can be frustrating to get kids to listen and carry out your instruction. Their attention span is very limited and sometimes they do not intentionally want to forget about what you have instructed them. A good way is to produce a pictorial chart for the child so that they can refer to what they have to do. Sometimes it is not that the child is not compliant but the fact that there was poor communication between the child and parents.

Children will always challenge us one way or another. We need to have a plan so that we can take a appropriate path of action if the need arises in different situations.

My thoughts

I enjoyed reading the book as it had clear explanations of why children behave in a certain manner and the rational behind their actions.

Many a times the parenting books do not give a practical alternative to how to handle certain obstacles that most parents face and just quote theory after theory. The summary points at the end of each chapter also makes it easier to focus on and certainly deserve a thumbs up by me.

Ronald and Aubery’s book give tips that are certainly doable and make it easy for the parent to follow through

As parents we need to display a united front and have a clear stance regarding how we would like to bring up our child/children.

It is important to know what works best for your child/children and how you can tweak your parenting style as they grow up. As they move from toddler to teenage we need to guide them every step of the way.

It was interesting to see so many different aspects of how a parent can be fully involved in a child’s life to guide and mentor them. From teaching them the correct way to behave, social skills and also building up their resilience as a young adult.

The authors have some interesting suggestions for dealing with kids misbehaviors which I will be implementing with my boys in the coming weeks. Hopefully they will be able to change for the better.

Do pick up a copy of the book if you are interested to learn more parenting tips from The Parent-Child Dance: Strategies and Techniques for Staying One Step Ahead by Ronald A. Kotkin and Aubrey H. Fine

Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book for review purposes. All opinions are 100% mine. This post has affiliate links.