Category Archives: Parenting

Banner for Rights

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I posted previously about parentalrights.org and their goal to prevent the government from interfering with parental rights. I would like to point out that the phrase “parental rights” is not about putting the rights of the parent above the rights of the child. It is actually about giving parents the rights over the government to train their children in a way beneficial to the child.

I discovered today that parentalrights.org gives you the opportunity to get the word out about  their site and their important truths. They have a banner to post on your blog or website. To me it is a worthy cause that people need to know about. You will see my banner on the top right part of my blog. You can also see an example below.

If you are interested in adding this banner to the sidebar of your blog or site, go to this page and scroll down a bit. You will see four different options for your banner. If you have a WordPress blog, you can copy and paste the html code into a text widget. If you want your banner centered, use this code around the code for parentalrights.com.

<div align="center">
.
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</div>

If you are not quite sure how to do this contact my  husband Luke for help.

Parents Versus Big Brother

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Today I received an email from the parentalrights.org blog about an issue that I had just barely been introduced to in the past. I was introduced to a threat to all parents across America that got my full attention and caused me to be afraid in a way that I have never feared in my life. This fear is caused by the United Nations’ Convention on the Rights of the Child. Please read the article. Please. Here is an excerpt.

Since its adoption by the United Nations in 1989, the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) has become the most widely accepted international agreement in history, ratified by every nation of the world except for the United States and Somalia. All signatories pledge to protect children’s rights, foster their development, and uphold their best interests by re-writing their national laws to conform to the standards set forth in the treaty.

While all this may sound harmless and even commendable, the reality is that the Convention allows and even demands that national governments interfere in the decisions of individual families and parents. By invoking the “best interests of the child ,” policymakers and government agents have the authority to substitute their own decisions for those of the child or parent. In short, parents lose their rights to be parents, and become merely caregivers. The result, as parents across the globe are now discovering, is that the family is being steadily undermined, often with tragic and devastating results for the very children who are supposed to be protected.

Without research and/or understanding of what “The Rights of the Child” refers to, the idea sounds like a great one. Everyone wants their children to have rights. Unfortunately the idea that the United Nations is pushing allows parents to take care of the physical needs of their children but takes away any other influence that the parents may have on their children. The children are expected to learn what the UN approves of and nothing else (including morals)!

Parentalrights.org is taking it upon themselves to keep track of countries who have already accepted this proposal of the United Nations and post about it every 2 weeks. Please go to their site regularly or put their posts in your RSS feed. Also, go to the site of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights site and read the declaration for the Convention for the Rights of the Child. The second statement in Article 2 was most disturbing to me. It states that

States Parties shall take all appropriate measures to ensure that the child is protected against all forms of discrimination or punishment on the basis of the status, activities, expressed opinions, or beliefs of the child’s parents, legal guardians, or family members.

Read that again and think about it. Think hard about it. It says that parents have no influence on the thoughts, activities, opinions or beliefs of their children. Is that what you want for your children? It most definitely is not what I want for mine. According to “Imagine If…” by parental rights.org, the Unites States is only one of two countries that have not accepted this. If you disagree with the things written in “the Rights of the children” please do yourself and everyone around you a favor and do everything you can to discourage America’s agreement to it. You might want to start by signing a petition showing that you are against the interference of government on your right to parent your children. Then you might want to consider getting down on your knees and having a long talk with the Person most able to prevent this intrusion on our parental rights.

Update (1/3/09): I now know that this convention was signed by president Clinton but was stopped by congress. Now president Obama is planning to get it passed.  This is very urgent! Go here to do all you can to help.

Note: Although it was not my original intent when writing this post and it is a bit late, this post has a lot to do with the government. If Robert Hruzek at Middle Zone Musings is willing, please consider this my submission for this month’s “What I Learned From” project.

Wishing Well of Whimsicality

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We have developed a method to our madness! (sorry, I couldn’t resist). Seriously, we have found a way to help motivate our kids to help around the house. We give them money!

No, not real money; we made fake money that we call “wishers!” Whenever the kids do chores around the house, they get wishers. If they do a spectacular job or remember their chores without being reminded, they get even more wishers. If they fight or have a negative attitude while doing their chores, they lose wishers.

Now I am sure you are wondering why it is so exciting to have fake money. Well, they use the fake money to buy stuff! When there is one lone juice box in the refrigerator, they can buy the privilege of being the only kid to get a juice box while everyone else drinks out of a boring old cup! 🙂 When someone wants to sit in a favorite chair, he/she can buy the privilege of sitting in the chair.

So, you can see that wishers also come in handy for settling disagreements! For example, if Peter and Phillip both want to play on the computer, the chance to go first can be auctioned. If Peter wins, he feels good because he gets to play on the computer first and Phillip feels good because he now has more wishers than Peter and can win the “auction” next time (as long as Anna doesn’t have more than Phillip)!

Other examples of times we give wishers are:

  • When potty training kids use the potty.
  • Phillip paid Peter to make his bed once.
  • When school is finished on time.
  • When they go above and beyond what they have to.

Note: We are being very careful not to let our kids think they can “buy” anything they want. We are making it clear to them that wishers are pretend and are not to be used on their friends to persuade them to make a toy trade…unless it is unfairly tipped to their advantage. Teasing……just teasing! 😀

Name That Kid

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Having a large family makes for some interesting conversations sometimes. Here is how the conversation at breakfast this morning went:

Peter: Can I have yogurt?

me: Yes

Bethany: Can I have yogurt in a bowl?

Phillip: Can I have applesauce?

me: No

Bethany: I want yogurt

me: It is already in a cup. You don’t need a bowl.

Phillip: Why can’t I have applesauce?

Bethany: Can I have yogurt?

me: I never said you couldn’t have applesauce.

Phillip: You said ‘no’

Bethany: I want yogurt

me: I didn’t hear you ask

Peter: I’m just getting yogurt for Bethany

me: I was talking to Phillip

Peter: Phillip can have yogurt?!

me: No, he was asking about something else

And on and on it went. And that was with just three of my kids. Anna had not entered the room yet, and Candice was behaving fairly well.

I think a little bit of confusion will be eliminated once I learn to use names before responding to my children. It is conversations like the one above that will eventually push me to remember their names, so I can use them. 😀

Notes: Peter did eventually get thanked for helping out with Bethany, Bethany did eventually get yogurt, and Peter was surprised that Phillip might be getting yogurt because Phillip has a milk allergy.

Disobedient Tears

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Today Luke had a discussion with our boys about being tough. Because Peter was crying over nothing, Luke told them that only some things are worth crying about. Examples would be when you lose a loved one or when you realize you hurt someone else’s feelings. Of course there are other instances, too, but the point was that not being able to play with your favorite toy is not a good reason to cry.

A couple of hours after this conversation, I overheard Peter having this conversation with himself while sitting on his bed:

“I don’t cry because I can’t have candy. I’m trying not to cry but the water keeps coming out.” Then he scolds himself saying, “Stop, me! I don’t like this” and wipes tears from his eyes.

It was so cute! I just wanted to take him in my arms and love on him! Time is going WAY too fast for me!! It won’t be too long before he is taller than me (of course that isn’t really saying much)!! 😀

More Calories for Breastfeeding Mothers?

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As a breastfeeding mom of a 7 week old baby, I have been seeking ways to get back to my pre-pregnancy size. While I know exercise is important and has its place, it also makes sense to watch what you are eating.

I have been told with all my children that I should have an extra 500 calories per day in order to give my body enough energy to make breast milk. While I know that is a great thing to hear and very tempting to do no questions asked, it did not make a lot of sense to me.

This is the most sensible answer I have every heard or read on this topic. It makes so much sense it is almost hard to believe. 🙂

Think about it. Adding 500 calories to a diet of a woman who consumes 2000 calories per day (the amount most food package labels assume you will consume) increases the intake by 25%. Adding 500 calories to the diet of a woman who normally consumes 1200 calories per day increases her calorie intake by 41.6%! So tell me. Wouldn’t it make more sense and be more realistic to say that breastfeeding mothers should increase their caloric intake by 25%?

Breastfeeding a Newborn

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Okay, I know many of my readers aren’t interested in learning about how to be successful at breastfeeding a newborn. I am always forgetting what I did in the early days, and what I did this time (under the advice of nurses and lactation consultants) was very successful. The best way I know to keep track of it is to put it here in my blog for reference. So bear with me as I use my blog as my memory!

The first day or two in the hospital I nursed on demand. She did do a lot of cluster feeding, probably because she had to nurse often to get enough colostrum to satisfy her. After the first 2 days, I fed her every three hours night and day, even if I had to wake her up.

It is also probably useful to mention that you cannot use wet and dirty diapers to determine whether the baby is getting enough to eat during the first few days. They are only expected to have 1 wet diaper for each day in age for the first 3 days.

Once she reached her birth weight, I was able to feed her on demand as long as she wasn’t going more than 4 hours in the day or 6 hours at night without eating. She reached her birth weight very quickly using these guidelines! And she is now a little over the 50th percentile for weight, length and head measurement!

A Great Mommy Resource

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Candice has been having occasional wake-up spells in the evening. During these spells, she nurses about every hour and is awake and fussing in between. This tends to last for 4 hours or so. I think it might have to do with growth spurts, but I’ve never experienced this with my other little ones. I found a great online article that addresses this evening fussy time. Kellymom.com is a great resource for parents regardless of how many kids they have! It gives more details than you could imagine and is very well put together. Check it out!

A Bad Example

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This is an from an email I sent Luke in November of 2005. Anna was five years old and going through a bullying stage.

I just caught AM shaking her fist in front of P’s face. I told her not to ever do it again and that shaking her fist in someone’s face is part of being a bully. Then I asked her if anybody had ever done that to her, wondering where she had learned it. She said “no,” so I asked her where she had seen it. She said she had seen it on a movie and that it was a bad guy doing it. I said, “You saw a bad guy do it, right?” She nodded. I asked her if she wanted to be like a bad guy, and she said “no.” I told her that if she doesn’t want to be like a bad guy, she doesn’t need to do things she sees bad guys do. I think that impacted her more than anything else I could have done.

Discouraged

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I am a little discouraged with Ph’s potty training. He does not care if he is wet!! Both AM and P cried when they wet their underwear, which let me know exactly when they went. This helped me know how often to send them to the potty. Phillip started out great this morning! He made it several hours with no accident. He even woke up dry!! But he has now wet his underwear twice and did not care either time!! He just walks around until I notice that his pants are wet!! He doesn’t go much at a time, so there are not usually puddles to clean up. I am thankful for that!I know what you are thinking. He has not even been training for a week, and he woke up dry and made it several hours without an accident. Be thankful for that! That is probably true! I am so glad you gave me such wonderful advice!! Good thing I can read your mind, huh? 🙂
Seriously, though, if anybody has suggestions other than the one above, I would be glad to hear (or read) it!!