News You Can Use - Out of Stock Products, Free Shipping, and Advent Wreath Kits

We are slowly but surely getting in some of the out of stock products.  We have just recently received a new shipment of the Mom’s Plan It Engagement calendars, Fridge GRID Pads, and Family Budget Organizers.  We hope to have the momAgenda Kitchen Folio’s in by the end of this week or early next week.

Our Free Shipping offer ended today, but will probably be coming back in time for the the Christmas holiday.  Join our monthly newsletter or subscribe to our blog feed to be updated when the free shipping offer comes back.

We have added a new product variation of the Advent Wreath Kits.  Now you can purchase the Advent Wreath Kit along with the choice of one family activity book or calendar, In the Presence of the Lord, What Color is Christmas, or the hide and seek Advent Calendar.  The Advent Wreath Kits are perfect for church groups looking for fun ways to celebrate the Advent season.

How to Keep Track Of and Organize Family Activity Ideas

Family activity files are a great way to keep track of all those clipped magazine articles, brochures, and websites, you have collected over the years in the hopes of having them readily available when planning your family outings and activities or when looking for some new family night ideas.  Similar to a family travel file, a family activity file can make planning a family outing or finding a new idea a lot easier by organizing the ideas by category and keeping them stored in one central location.    Here are some suggestions on how to make your own.

Determine What Kind of System You Need

Any organizing system you design should be created so that it meets your needs and isn’t complicated to use or keep updated.  So when creating a system to organize your family activity ideas it is important to start first with understanding how and how often you collect information.

If you tend to be a big collector of paper such as magazine articles, event brochures, newspaper clippings, etc then you will most likely need a multi folder system for storing your information.  If you tend to only collect and save only a few pieces of information and keep a small amount of notes, then you are probably best trying to incorporate your family activity file into your current system for organizing papers or just starting with a single file folder.

Also, if you tend to bookmark a lot of family activity idea websites on your computer then your online organizing system should also be a little more in depth with multiple folders for different topics.  If you tend to bookmark or save very little information on line, a single bookmark folder will do or simply a printout or written note will be enough.

Creating a Paper Based Multi Folder System

Things You Will Need

3 Ring Binder

Tab Dividers

3 Hole Punched File Folders

If you decide to go with a multi folder system, then begin by deciding how best to sort the information you save.  Here are a couple of options to get you started.  You can use these topics or create your own.  Just make sure you use topics that make sense to you and that will make it easy to find things when you need them.

Family Night Ideas

Family Outing Ideas

Holiday Traditions

Craft Ideas

Science Ideas

Boredom Busters

Online Resources and Notes

Another option is to sort your information and ideas by holiday if you tend to do most of your family outings and activities during specific holidays.  Here is a list to get you started: New Year’s, Valentine’s Day, St. Patrick’s Day, Easter, Passover, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, July 4^th/Memorial Day, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Hanukkah

Once you decide how to sort the ideas you save, then you will know how many file folders to buy and how big a 3 ring binder to use.  Keep in mind that you may find topics you want to add in the future, so be sure to buy a few extra file folders so that you have a place to store the new information.

Also, be sure to have an extra file folder or notepad in your binder to keep hand written notes on any ideas, suggestions, or websites you want to remember. 

Creating an Online Multi Folder System

If you tend to spend a lot of time on the internet bookmarking favorite ideas for family outings then you also may want to set up an online version of the paper based system.  To do this, create a folder in your favorites file and name it Family Activity Ideas.  Once you have the main folder set up you can go ahead and create sub-folders within the Family Activity Idea folder using the same labeling system you designed for your paper based system.  After you have all your folders set up, go through your exisiting bookmarks and move them to the appropriate sub-folder. 

If you tend to bookmark only a few sites in your favorites then the multi folder approach may be a little more than what you need.  In this case, here are some other options for you to try:

Create just one Family Activity Idea folder in your Favorites folder and just store everything in that one main folder. You can always subdivide the folder at a later time if the contents begin to grow and you are having a hard time finding anything.

Write down the web address and website name of an online idea you have found in the notes/online section of your paper based system. 

Print off a copy of the idea or website and store it in the online resource section of your paper based system. Just be sure to read through the websites copyright rules to be sure that printing off copies is allowed.

 How to Use a Family Activity File

Once you have your family activity file set up it is just a matter of remembering to use it and maintain it.  Here are some tips to help do this:

Have your file handy during family meetings or while discussing weekend plans.

Keep notes of your activities stored in your file to make planning the following year simpler. In regards to day outings, things you may want to take note of are, when you went, the weather, the crowd level, things you should do differently, and any coupons or discounts you used. In regards to any crafts or home family activities, be sure to keep notes on problems you had, how fun or engaged the kids were in the activity, where you bought the supplies, changes you would make, and the things that worked well.

Go through both your paper and online file every year to toss out things you no longer need.

Good luck!

Cider Mills, Corn Mazes, and Haunted Houses

Here are some great sites to help you find cider mills, corn mazes, and haunted houses in your community.  Also be sure to visit our local area family activity page for links to family activities near you.

Apple Orchards and Cider Mills - All About Apples has a great listing of apple orchards and cider mills in each state as well as apple guides and recipes.

Corn Mazes - If you are up to trying a corn maze this year, visit The Maize to find one in your local community as well as tips and suggestions.

Haunted Houses - If scary things are more your style then visit HauntedHouses.com to find something spooky near you.

 

Planning Your Next Family Outing

It never fails, we will be happily driving along for a family outing to enjoy some of the traditional fall family fun like a cider mill, corn maze, or just a drive to enjoy the fall foliage and one of us will inevitably ask “Did You Bring the Camera?“  It should never be like this, but unfortunately there are times when we are less than prepared and either have to do without something we forgot or need to turn around and go back to get it .  So this year in an effort to make things easier and the transition out the door and on our way smoother we have created a free family activity planner to help us and you get organized.  Here are some tips and suggestions to make the most of this free printable.

Some common things you may need for your trip are a camera, video camera, sunscreen, maps, cell phones, discount coupons, snacks and/or lunches, car activities, and first aid kit

Save yourself some money by visiting the website of the place you are visiting to see if they have any discount coupons to print off and bring.   Also, to save money and avoid standing in long lines, try packing rather than buying your lunch.

Try and get as much of the prep work and packing done the day or night before to make the transition smoother the next day.  Things you can do the day before are fill the car with gas, check or replace the camera batteries, charge your cell phones, print off maps, pack your family backpack with supplies, go to the bank, set out clothes, check the weather, make lunches or snacks, and check your first aid kit. 

Print off a few copies of the family activity planner and keep them in your family activity file so they are easy to find when you need them.

Save your completed family activity planner sheet along with the map and any other documentation or information about your day trip in a family activity file so that you can reference it next year and save yourself time reinventing the wheel so to speak.

Good luck!

2008 Edition of 8 Weeks to a Frazzle Free Christmas

Make your Christmas preparations easy this year with the 2008 edition of 8 Weeks to a Frazzle Free Christmas, a completely free e-book walking busy parents through the holiday rush and preparations one week at a time.  The e-book is completely free and also offers a sign-up for optional daily and weekly reminders.  The new 8 week session begins October 20th and ends on December 14th.

How To Avoid the Competitive Parent Trap

Ah, the beginning of a new school year, marking the end of the summer boredom blues and the return of structure to our days. A time when parents rejoice, teachers cry, and the sport of competitive parenting begins.  Competitive parenting for those of you unfamiliar or new to parenting is the terrible sport started by parents to give their children an upper hand, while making themselves feel successful as parents and other parents insecure and guilty.   Every school and neighborhood has them, the parents who make it their job to ensure their children are the best at everything.  They sign them up for every enrichment activity available, hire math tutors and French teachers, and make it their business to keep tabs on the achievements and failures of every child in the class.  They are constantly measuring the achievements of their children to other children and seemingly will stop short of nothing to make them the best or at least keep up.  And leaving in their dust, parents who really don’t want to compete, but not sure how to avoid it. 

So to help every parent who is ready to stand up to the competitive parenting pressure here are some tips to help you survive the new school year.

Stop Measuring Your Success as a Parent by the Achievements of Your Child 

Believe it or not, but your success as a parent has NOTHING to do with the achievements of your children and has EVERYTHING to do with how emotionally strong and prepared your children are to lead their own lives.    Your job as a parent isn’t to make sure they get into Harvard or become the next Bill Gates, but rather your job as a parent is to nurture, inspire, and teach your children to define their own success and happiness while giving them the skills and tools necessary to make it happen.

Surround Yourself with Supportive Likeminded Friends

Nothing will make a parent more insecure and nervous than having a friend who lives in the competitive parenting trap.  So to make sure you don’t fall prey to the trap and all the drama that comes with it, distance yourself from others who are living in it.  Instead, surround yourself with parents and friends with similar goals and parenting techniques so that you are uplifted and supported. 

Believe in Your Child

Children are born with an innate realization of who they are as individuals.  It isn’t until parents start getting involved that their natural instincts get over shadowed and this understanding loses focus.  So to protect them from forgetting who they are, teach them from an early age to trust their instincts and pursue their passions.  Children can and will do amazing things with their lives if we give them the space and tools to help them.

Do yourself and your children a favor this new school year and stop competing.  Believe in yourself as a parent, stop measuring your success through your children, surround yourself with supportive friends, and most importantly let your children dream their own dreams.

Good luck!

How to Help Your Child Get Great Grades

When parents ask me to coach their teenagers they inevitably want their child’s school grades to improve and seem a little shocked when I say, “Yes, that’s easy.”

Like Susan, who sent her 13-year-old to me, Grace was doing OK at school however her parents wanted to get her into a better school and to do that her grades needed to improve. Grace was enrolled in one of my coaching programmes and by the end of the programme her predicted C grades had become A and B, with a 100% pass rate in science a previously disliked subject.

How did we do it? The answer is to know your child’s learning style. When you do, you can help them to help themselves. Coupled with understanding what motivates them, what drives them and their perspective of the world you can motivate any teenager to improve their schoolwork.

So this week I thought I would share with you my guide to learning styles:

Learning style is the way in which you learn most easily, knowing this can make studying much easier. People learn in four ways, through reading, listening, doing or graphics and we will discuss each one.

Reading — these people learn mostly by reading and writing; this is predominately the style taught at school. When studying, they read and make lots of notes. This style is known as verbal memory.

Listening — These people learn most by hearing something spoken to them. In class they are likely to enjoy discussion where people are talking and get bored when there is writing to be done. When studying they may read and talk out loud or tape themselves and listen at a later date. They will also ask others to question them so they can speak their answers. This style is knows as tonal memory.

Doing — these people learn by movement in some way. These will be the students constantly fidgeting at school, they cannot sit still. In studying they are likely to walk around and make up rhythmic songs and poems. These students may benefit from studying with either the TV or radio on and also may hum or sing while they are studying. This style is known as rhythm memory.

Graphics — these people learn by seeing pictures, tables or graphs. When studying, they are likely to draw pictures and put information into tables and boxes, they also will enjoy using mind maps. This style is known as design memory.

Action

Think of a time that your child was studying recently and the methods they used. Which one of these four do you think they are and why? Ask your teen and see if you are right.

Write a list of 5 ways you can support your teenager’s learning style now you have discovered what it is. For example, telling your child to switch off the TV while studying may not be the right thing to do, depending on their learning style.

So, if we go back to Grace, she was typical in that her Mum made her do her homework in a room all by herself with no noise. Grace found this very hard and as we worked together we found that she was very high in rhythm memory. So we began to do things like introduce a radio into the room where she was studying, studying while walking around the room and making up songs and poems. The results were incredible. As for the science exam, she made up a song about the valence table while playing the guitar at the same time — it worked a treat and is just what someone with high rhythm memory needs. I should know, as this is my greatest learning style. When I was in the police force, I learned every piece of legislation to a song and I can tell you, it took me all my might not to sing the charges to someone as I was arresting them! In fact if you asked me now, I could still sing the Theft Act to you. You play it, I’ll sing it!

Sarah Newton is one of the world’s leading teen coaches. She enjoys a high profile and is one of the only Teen Coaches to have hosted her own eight part TV series ‘My Teen’s a nightmare - I’m Moving Out’. Her first book ” Help! My Teenager is an Alien - the everyday situation guide for parents” was launched in March 2007 by Penguin and rarely drops out of the top ten parenting teenager books. Sarah believes that parents can have great relationships with their teenagers and still get all the boring things done and to this end she offers everyday practical advice. To get Free access to Sarah’s “3 easy proven techniques to instantly reduce stress in your home and dramatically improve the relationship with your teen” go to http://www.sarahnewton.com

Conquering the Chaos Part I – Taking an Inventory of Your Life

With the start of a new school year we thought it fitting to take some time to talk about how to create a family schedule and routine.  Most families start out with good intentions to create a more harmonious family life by vowing to cut back on the running, stress, and general chaos of everyday life, and for a variety of reasons abandon the commitment and plan shortly into the new school year partly out of exhaustion and partly out of an inability to overcome the hiccups along the way. 

With this in mind we are beginning a three part series on Conquering the Chaos.  Over the next three monthly newsletters we will tackle three aspects of creating a sound family schedule - Taking an Inventory of Your Current Family Life, Organizing Your Family Life into Buckets, and Creating a Family Schedule that Works.  By dividing the topic up into three segments we hope families will have a chance to take some time working on each aspect and be ready to move on to the next topic the following month.  So let’s get started!

Taking an Inventory of Your Current Family Life

The secret to any good family schedule is to understand in detail the current situation and being honest about what your family needs and wants to change.  This is the hardest part for many families because it takes the most time and often forces parents and kids to face some of the reasons behind the current craziness of their lives.  Without this step though, you run the risk of not addressing the root causes of your chaotic lives and eventually “fixing” the wrong things. 

Understanding Where You Spend Your Time

Have you ever gotten to the end of a long day and asked yourself, “What did I do all day?”  This happens to many families who have become overwhelmed with the general craziness of life.  Parents know they did something, but their accomplishments and efforts have become overshadowed by the chaos of the day and for the life of them, they can’t remember anything they did throughout the day.  To get a true handle on your schedule and the current state of your family life, you first need to take an inventory of where you spend your time and how long everything takes.  In essence you are doing a mini time study of your family’s habits, schedules, and time so you can better understand where your time goes, the bottlenecks, poor habits, and patterns of your family life. 

To get this step started you will need a copy of the Family Life Time Inventory for both parents, one week of your time, and a little dedication and persistence.  Begin by printing off the family life time inventory for yourself and spouse.  You also may want to print off additional copies to post on your refrigerator or keep in your briefcase or desk at work. 

The time inventory has sections for each day of the week and is further divided by morning, afternoon, and evening sections.   Begin by choosing a week that is fairly typical of your everyday life and then begin making notes each day about the things you do during the morning, afternoon, and evening.  Be sure to keep enough detail so you can actually pinpoint the specific tasks you did as well as how long they took, but not so much detail that it becomes burdensome to keep up.  Also be sure to keep any notes regarding bottlenecks, habits, or patterns you have noticed.  Feel free to expand any notes or thoughts you have on the back of the paper. 

If you work outside the home, it will be your choice as to whether or not to include details on your work activities.  If you just want to keep notes on your family life activities during the day while at work, be sure to have one handy at work.  Some examples of things you may do while at the office are, making doctor’s appointments, picking up birthday presents on your lunch hour, or updating your work calendar with the kids’ activity schedule. 

Understanding the Bottlenecks, Habits, and Patterns

After a week of doing the time inventory you should begin to notice bottlenecks, habits, and patterns to your family life.  For example, are the mornings crazy because too many people are using the bathroom at once?  Is the TV distracting you and the kids in the evening?  Is your toddler having meltdowns every time you try and leave the house?  It is important to understand these because these things are often the culprit of a disruptive family routine and sometimes can easily be changed or fixed with minor tweaks.  So take some time to make notes on these things and experimenting with making some changes.  We will discuss them further in Step III - Creating a Schedule that Works.

Evaluating What You Want to Change and What Works Well

Your last assignment is to sit down as a family and discuss the things you want to change and the things that are working well.  For example, some parents may want to make it possible to get more sleep for themselves and their children.  Another example may be to sit down more often as a family for dinner.  Just as important as noting the things you want to change is making note of the things that are working well.  For example, Friday night family nights may be something that are currently working well and shouldn’t be changed.  Another example may be parents taking time every evening to read to their children.  If it is something you enjoy and something that isn’t causing any current stress to the family then it is probably something you are doing well and shouldn’t be changed.  Use our printable, a notepad, or better yet a table top flip chart (kids LOVE these) to make your notes and document your conversation.  Save everything for use in Parts II and III.

If your kids are old enough it is important to do this step as a family.  Put one of your kids in charge of making the notes and be sure to give everyone a chance to voice their opinions and concerns. 

Good luck!

Whose Dream Is This Anyway?

What I Think I Know - A monthly tongue in cheek commentary of things I’ve learned (or so I think)….

I’m a little worried I’m cheating my children.  Cheating them because unlike many other parents in our school district, I don’t make my kids take extra math classes, join competitive sports teams, and participate in performance orchestras.  My style tends to be a little more laid back in that I make sure my children work hard in school, get good grades, have plenty of opportunities to participate in extra-curricular activities of their choice, form many friendships and social networks, and always give 110%

And as I stand back watching these other kids grow and their parents dedicate endless hours and dollars to their children’s lives, I often wonder whose dream are they chasing?  Do these kids actually dream of becoming the doctors, scientists, and lawyers they are being groomed to be or do they dream of something different?  Or worse yet, do they dream at all?

Call me crazy, but I actually think it is a good idea to let my kids dream their own dreams and help them along the way by providing them the opportunities and resources to achieve their dreams.  Mimi Doe said it best in her book, 10 Principles for Spiritual Parenting: Nurturing Your Child’s Soul, “When we nourish our children’s dreams we help them strengthen their courage to stay true to who they really are - we allow them to weave their spirits into everything they do.”  I couldn’t agree more.

Don’t get me wrong, I know the parents who choose a more structured managed life for their kids, are doing so out of love and a desire to give their children a better life.  But in the end, the straight A’s and perfect ACT scores will mean little if their children’s spirits are sad and unfulfilled and they end up being something other than what they were meant to be.

New Products - Lunch Box Notes, Mom’s Plan It Memo Pads, and Pet.doc

We have a lot of new products just in time for the busy back to school days.

Lunch Box Notes - Leaving lunch box notes for your kids has never gotten cooler than with these fun one of a kind lunch box notes.  Simply fill in th blank side with a special note to your child and slip it into their lunch box for lots of laughs.  Your kids will be the hit of the lunch room!

Mom’s Plan It Memo Pads and Reminder Notes - From the popular Mom’s Plan It product line comes even more ways of making life easier and organized.  There is now a complete line of magnetic memo pads including phone, grocery, babysitter, honey do, to do, and school pads as well as kitchen and kid reminder notes.

Pet.doc - This is the perfect insert to the popular Life.doc product for any family with pets and looking for ways of keeping the pet information organized.