Archive for the ‘Parenting’ Category

Jewel had the New Testament books of the Bible in her AWANA memory work for last year, and we fumbled through that somehow.

But this year she needs to memorize the Old Testament (as well as re-reciting the New Testament), and can also earn a badge from Keepers at Home for that work.

After hearing several folks talk about various songs and jingles they used to help memorize the books, I went on a search.

There are many, many YouTube videos that have the “Books of the Bible” to music. To a lot of different kinds of music, I might add.

I listened to a lot of them. A LOT.

Many of them didn’t seem like they would really help the memorization, since they sounded more like someone took a tune and fitted the books of the Bible into it (often somewhat awkwardly).

I was delighted when I found this video, from the Bigsby Show:

Catchy. Easy to understand. The kids and I both like it (this was a point of considerable discrepancy on many of the videos). And?

It sounds like they wrote a song to fit the books (rather than the other way around)! Yay!

We started out listening to the YouTube video frequently, but it wasn’t long before I hopped over to The Bigsby Show website and purchased a copy of the CD so we could listen in the car. (This is not a sponsored post, in case you were wondering!)

Parenthetical note: Could I have burned a CD from the YouTube thing? Probably so. But I appreciate what they do, and they need financial support to continue their work. Artists deserve to be rewarded for the fruits of their labors just like anyone else. {off soapbox}

Jewel is now totally comfortable with her New Testament, and just ironing out a few minor prophets in the Old Testament.

And much to my delight… R.T. is almost there, too! Pretty impressive, for three.

Anyhow, learning the books of the Bible is a daunting (but important!) task for people of any age, so I wanted to share this resource that we have found to be invaluable.

And… The other songs on the CD are really neat! Catchy, cute songs with interesting views of Moses, Noah, Jonah, plus other fun (Christian) messages. Definately a CD we will continue to listen to even when we have all 66 books down pat.

Very cute way to share a great message!

I’m sure everyone has read articles about kids lives being “too busy” – since even the popular media from time to time decides to point out that no six year-old needs to go to school, ballet, cheerleading, History Day club, practice for the play, sing in the choir, and volunteer at the senior center – and do her chores.

But that’s not what I’m talking about.

I’m talking about the overwhelming sensory inputs that our kids are bombarded with. All the time.

Since we’ve changed out lifestyle over the last dozen years or so, I’ve begun to notice it myself. Of the rare occasion we go out to a movie, it seems too big and flashy, and far too loud. I wouldn’t even consider going to a music concert that involves amplifiers. Heck, even dinner at most restaurants is unpleasantly loud.

And that’s for my “mature” (in the developmental sense only, folks), adult brain. What about little people?

Well, guess what? The Canadian publication The Globe and Mail would like to tell you Why SpongeBob is a bad influence — and they’re not talking about potty humor or disrespectful attitudes. It’s over-stimulating in a sensory, well, sense.

Interestingly, I read this article on Monday morning, after having been utterly blown away by this point on Sunday evening at AWANA.

Let me be clear: We like the AWANA program. We like the church where we take our kids for AWANA. We like the AWANA teachers. This is not a criticism of any of those things.

Here, in fact, is Jewel at the awards night after her first year as an AWANA Cubby, back at First Baptist Church in Homestead, Florida. (as it turned out, she missed her second Cubby year because of moving and logistics. She rejoined for Sparks last year, though, and just started her second Sparks book!)

Jewel was eagerly anticipating the start of the new years’ Sparks classes, and a chance to see all her friends again. (This is a nice tie-in for her, since we no longer attend there and she doesn’t get to see those folks weekly in Sunday School).

Earlier, R.T. had said he was not interested in joining AWANA this year. As the time drew closer, though, he decided that he would like to give it a try, provided that Wolf or I remained with him. Being us, that was an easy condition to meet.

I filled out the registration paperwork, and we went into the designated classroom. When all was said and done there were THIRTY Cubbies in the room, along with some ten or so teachers (a couple of whom, at any given time, were taking attendance, processing registrations, etc.).

So the child to teacher ratio was not at all bad. And the children were about as well-behaved and calm as I think a group of thirty three- and four-year-olds is likely to be. It was not at all the case that they were “running wild”…

But somehow, still, it was madness.

It was loud. Especially when they were playing before things got started; but it was never what you might call “quiet.”

And there was activity, and movement, and, and, and…

R.T. clung to my leg and would not even consider going to play. The fact that he, too, was visiting with former Sunday School chums didn’t matter at all.

He wouldn’t sing along, clap along, or venture and answer to a question. He was totally withdrawn.

For most of the evening, the children were split into three groups of ten. This reduced the noise level in each separate room to a dull roar.

For the first rotation, game time, R.T. remained stuck to me like a limpet, and cried at the leader’s suggestion that he might want to run around with them.

Second rotation was snack time. R.T. enjoyed his snack (with me sitting beside him), enjoyed the break (it was quieter with everyone eating!), and surprised the leader who came by to check his “memory verse” (which they were doing as “repeat after me”) by saying the complete verse and citation by memory from the teacher’s introduction at the beginning of class. He’s a good memorizer, my R.T., and has been practicing for quite a while now.

He remained calmer during craft time, happily coloring in his Cubby puppet. And when we regrouped in the main classroom for closing, he was willing to stand up and sing (as long as I was right there).

Now, I don’t think it’s all a bad thing. And I do think there’s good in learning to cope in different (even if somewhat unpleasant) circumstances. But… He’s THREE.

I guess with so many people sending their kids off to Day Care from birth on up, our society has lost site of just how young, immature (in every sense of the word), and needy these little people are.

The Lord made the world for us, knowing what was best… Gradual sunrise, birdsong…

Maybe we all need to slow down, back up, turn it off.

A young filmmaker made a movie based on just that question, and it’s called (surprise) Divided.

His question is why our Christian young people are leaving the church at an alarming rate. Why are the much touted – oh yeah, and expensive – “youth ministries” failing?

Through interviews with youth, with youth pastors, and other Christian scholars, he explores what’s going wrong, what the Bible has to say, and what we need to do.

This is something that we talk about often, and feel very strongly about. God calls Fathers to disciple their children, and calls believers (all of them) to gather together in worship.

Get a cup of tea, take an hour, and watch this important movie.

It’s available free online until September 15th – just click the graphic below. (The DVD is also for sale).

Well, this has not been what one would call a raging success. And an expensive “learning experience”, to be sure.

I’ve been reading a lot lately about the advantages of Fermented Cod Liver Oil (FCLO) and Butter Oil for overall health, and specifically for dental health.

If you want to know what the heck I’m talking about, the Healthy Home Economist blog is a great place to start. You can read How I Healed My Child’s Cavity, then check out How to Get Your Child to Take Cod Liver Oil. The comments have treasure troves of great information, too!

It’s all based on the work of the late Dr. Weston Price (I’m reading his book Nutrition and Physical Degeneration right now). You can find lots of resources on the Weston A. Price Foundation website, including “Cod Liver Oil Basics and Recommendations“.

So I clicked on over to the Green Pasture website, and ordered a bottle of Butter Oil, as well as a bottle of this:

**NEW**BLUE ICE™ Emulsified Fermented Cod Liver Oil – Peppermint**KID TESTED**

Sounds good, right?

Not so much.

With shipping, nearly $100. And the verdict?

I mixed the Butter Oil and the Cod Liver Oil together in a little medicine cup.

Nick, Wolf and I can slug it down, shudder, take a drink of milk, and go on with our lives. Jewel and R.T. have alternated doing okay with it, and gagging and spitting.

I tried mixing it in a little yogurt. To me it tasted pretty good, adding mostly a minty tinge to the yogurt flavor. R.T. said he didn’t like it much, but drank it down. Let’s just say Jewel was quite opposed.

The best solution on which we eventually settled? Slug the supplements out of the cup, take a drink of nice cold milk, then the Littles each have a little bit of Nutella on a spoon.

Am I excited about that junk food addition? No. But I think the supplements are important enough to outweigh that little bit, plus I hope they will grow more accustomed to it over time.

We ran into an additional bit of a challenge as we got to the last third of the bottle or so of the FCLO. Apparently I had not shaken it up well enough at each use, and it had separated. According to Green Pasture, this is normal, and the remaining product is still good quality. But that remainder is much more solid than what we had been using, and the texture was not appreciated by my crew.

I decided I could try to do better…

Foe my next order I selected the blend of Butter Oil and Cod Liver Oil, in two different formulations – capsules, and Chocolate Creme flavored gel. This order (with shipping), was over $100. Ack!

This is where I start getting really frustrated with their dosing information, but I’ll get to that in a moment.

The capsules are obviously the most palatable choice – but only for the adults. The poor kids are just learning to swallow pills, and these babies are pretty big – and you’d have to take a lot of them.

Speaking of having to take a lot of them, there’s the price factor. Wow, they charge a lot for putting the stuff in capsules!

• The blend gel costs about $0.51 per serving (based on their serving size, the one bottle price, and not counting shipping).
• The capsules? Over $0.78 per serving based on the same factors. Half again as much — AND their serving size is mysteriously not the same as the gel!
• Increasing from two to three+ capsules to get to that same dosage raises the cost to a whopping $1.17+ per serving. (And read on to see why you probably need to take eight capsules, costing $5.75!)

But I digress…

The kids can’t take the capsules.

So, chocolate sounds yummy, right?

No.

Remember that TV commercial for air freshener?

A wet dog walks in. The actress wrinkles up her nose and announces that it smells like a wet dog.

Then she sprays “the leading air freshener”, sniffs, and wrinkles up her nose again.

She announces that now it smells like a wet dog in a pine forest, since that band only tries to cover up odors (rather than actually removing them).

This is kind of like that…

This used to taste like nasty fish.

Now it tastes like a nasty fish dipped in chocolate.

Yeah. Eeeew.

So now I have some leftover Peppermint FCLO that is separated and unpalatable. And I have essentially the whole bottle of Chocolate CLO/Butter Oil Blend that’s just disgusting.

But the stuff is way too expensive to throw away. And I have come to believe it’s way too important to our health (especially given our kids’ dental issues) to give up.

Now what?

Luckily, Nick came up with a way to get the Chocolate blend down, although it does involve more junk:

Chocolate chips, chewed up, then spoon the supplement in on top, and swallow quickly before the supplement gets a chance to touch your tongue. Munch on a few more chocolate chips for good measure.

Just be careful not to smell the stuff, as that will definitely ruin your whole day. (Wolf says it reminds him of catfish food).

And let’s talk about dosing.

The Green Pasture products’ dosing recommendations don’t line up exactly with the ones from the Weston A. Price foundation, which is not too surprising.

What troubles me is that the Green Pasture doses aren’t consistent among themselves.

• The FCLO suggests a dose of 3/4 teaspoon.
• The Butter Oil suggests a dose of 1/2 teaspoon.
• The blend (which is 2/3 FCLO and and 1/3 Butter Oil), suggests a dose of 1/2 teaspoon! So 3/4 + 1/2 + gel = 1/2?
• And the capsules, even more inexplicably, contain that same blend, and list the suggested dose as “2 capsules (750 mg each)”. First of all, mg is weight, and tsp is volume, so there’s no direct conversion. But the FCLO lists an equivalency of 3.5g (3500 mg), and the Butter Oil 2.5g (2500 mg) – so based on those you would need 3 1/3 capsules just to reach the 1/2 tsp. blend dosage (as noted in my cost analysis above), and 8 capsules to get the full doses of each product by their individual listings.

Hmm.

I guess we’ll try some of the other options… The non-emulsified FCLO has a smaller dose, so that might be easier, for instance.

I’m just scared to try other flavors, now. It’s such a big investment in something with the potential to be so… so…

As a lefty, I grew up learning things a mixture of ways.

Some things I learned to do left-handed, and some even had special equipment.

Others I learned to do right-handed – often because that was the way someone (right-handed) showed me, and it never occurred to them, or to me, to do it differently.

In my experience of real life since then, these are the ways I have thought about teaching things left-handed or right-handed — a relevant topic in a house of mixed handedness.

You really simply MUST learn to use right-handed scissors. That is all.

Sports and music have grey areas. If someone wants to paly guitar, I advocate learning to play it “righty” rather than having your own guitar with “upside-down” strings, as half the fun of guitar is being able to pick up any guitar and play it. With other sports, the child may learn to throw, catch, etc. with their right hand, simply because this is the way things are modeled. But there may be other times when they may not be able to master it that way, and need to learn left-handed.

We have some illuminating stories in this regard from Jewel’s life, our little Lefty.

When she was about two, we were camping, and Wolf and Nick were throwing pine cones (into a lake, or ditch, or some such). Jewel, watching them, picked one up, and cocked her arm back… And then she stood there, as if paralyzed. All the coaxing and explaining in the world couldn’t get her to swing her arm forward and throw. It was bizarre. Then inspiration struck. I switched the pinecone from her right hand to her left… And she promptly made a lovely throw into the target area.

Similarly, even after restringing the bow for her, two grown men who bow hunt could not teach my lefty daughter to shoot an arrow… But I walked up, had them show ME, then showed her (left handed), and she immediately hit two arrows into the target!

As we approach more formal handwriting training in our schooling this year, we will no doubt continue to explore the subtleties of this issue.

And that’s without even getting into the question of whether lefties and righties really are “wired” differently. I’m sure you’ve heard the joke – “only left handed people are in their right mind!”

My latest gift from the fine folks at Franklin Springs Family Media was the new family worship DVD, Gather the Family.

We eagerly sat down to watch the program together as a family, and we were not disappointed.

R.C. Sproul, Jr. was featured as the “subject matter expert”, outlining the Biblical truths of the call to family worship, as well as some of the struggles we face with it in the modern world.

The production of the program had a very nice flow to it. There was background and narration provided from a single set, providing a “home base” effect as we jumped back and forth around the country to visit with various families.

Says Franklin Springs,

Modern busy lifestyles conspire against families taking the time to gather together. But Gather the Family visits families across the country who are enjoying the benefits that abound when families take even a few minutes to worship God together during the week.

Far from a burden or drudgery, this film reveals the joy that emerges when family worship becomes a priority in the home.

Family worship holds the lasting value of building biblical truths in the foundation of a family. The experience also forges family unity in a uniquely rewarding way.

Often we were distracted (in a good way) from the content of the program (which we then backed up to catch) by noticing the lifestyle of the families being profiled.

Look, all the women and girls are wearing skirts! Even working in the dairy barn! Even climbing trees!

Look, they all have (or are working on) more than 1.14 children (the last average number I’ve seen for the U.S.).

So, we’re NOT the only people, after all… Whew!

But back to the program.

Wolf and I both really enjoyed the program, the ideas, and the perspectives of the various families.

There was one issue that rubbed us the wrong way, though, and is one of Wolf’s particular “hot button” issues. Oddly enough, it came from R.C. Sproul during his opening remarks.

I am not going to try and transcribe word-for-word from the DVD, but I believe a faithful rendering of the essence of the comment is as follows:

…that’s why I like the language of “family worship” better than “devotions.”

“Devotions” sounds like some duty you have to do, to show God that you like him a lot.

“Worship” is entering into His glory…

Here’s the thing, though:

He’s the Almighty, All-Powerful G O D.

Not only does He deserve our Worship, but He deserves our Devotion, too! (Remember that whole “bondservant” thing?)

This seems like a cop out. Like those people who want to “soften” the Gospel, and make their church more “seeker-friendly”. You wouldn’t want anyone in our modern society to feel “put off” by what you have to say, right?

Bah!

But please don’t get the wrong idea. Although he says this disagreeable thing early on, it is not an idea that pervades the program. And many of the families themselves do, in fact, call their time “devotions”.

I would still whole-heartedly recommend this DVD… The wonderful overall message of family worship, the ideas and inspiration provided by the families who are interviewed – it’s a wonderful blessing!

Introductory Offer!

For a limited time (not specified), Franklin Springs is offering a discount of “up to 25% off the MSRP” when you purchase the DVD from their website [HERE], and enter the following coupon code at checkout: GTF-NEWDISCOUNT.

What a great gift for your whole family!

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I hardly expected to find an article saying the same things as my recent rant about immodest clothes for little girls on CNN.com.

Yep, you read that right.

LZ Granderson wrote a very strongly worded article called, Parents, don’t dress your girls like tramps. YES!!

There was even a piece on this issue that aired on Good Morning America, complete with pop psychology about why little girls shouldn’t dress that way.

And to all those who lament that they buy it because, “that’s what’s out there in the stores”?

You’ve all heard my thoughts on that, but LZ has another very pointed declaration:

Why are the retailers selling that stuff?

Because we’re buying it!

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, there is still such a thing as “voting with your wallet”.

Stores keep selling it because consumers keep buying it, so those of us who don’t like it assume that we are in a small minority.

But LZ’s column gives me hope that this is not the case. Perhaps this is another case of the silent majority.

• There are, no doubt, some people who like those things for their little girl, as puzzling as that seems.
• Then there are some people who are totally indifferent, and buy it because it’s there.
• And some who feel peer pressure, and some who give in to their children’s peer pressure, who buy it because it is what some celebrity is wearing.
• Of course then comes the potentially huge group of people who don’t necessarily like these clothes for their child, but allow them to wear it because it is “all that’s out there”, and they haven’t bothered to take the next step and find an alternative. (As I mentioned in my post linked above, this includes an alarming number of Christian families, including those in positions of leadership).
• Combined with the admittedly smaller group of us who are already actively avoiding these items

If people really would just speak up, we could change the world…

Okay, it should really be for Children, but that loses the lovely alliteration…

After some comments on my review of Near Mama’s Heart, I thought I should give you a rundown of some other books about nursing that we’ve read.

I believe in reading to kids of all ages, and I am absolutely convinced that they absorb a lot of things we may never think about… In this case, I hope you will think about normalizing nursing for your littles, even though they may never see it out in society today.

A lot of our books are in storage, but I’m going to try and get as many listed as I can think of. Here’s a few to start the ball rolling:

This is a board book with a mirror at the end so your child can see just how cute breastfed babies are. To my adult eye, it looks a little dated, but the kids adore it.

Very cute board book, including illustrations of a wide range of ages and positions – even tandem nursing. Another favorite in our house.

This is a slightly longer book (ours is softcover). It’s a very cute series of plays on words, as a new big brother struggles with the meaning of the word “nurse.”

Of course, there are any number of other breastfeeding books for children out there – and just because I haven’t read them doesn’t mean I think there’s anything wrong with them! Even a cursory search on Amazon breings us a great list of Children’s Breastfeeding Books.

What are your favorites?

Train up a child in the way he should go, And when he is old he will not depart from it.
Proverbs 22:6

In addition to the usual application of this verse, I believe very strongly that this is something we ought to bear in mind as we dress our little girls.

Too often I hear from parents that they don’t necessarily think that what their daughters wear is ideal, but that they don’t have any choice since those styles are all that’s available at WalMart, at the mall, or wherever they usually shop.

That makes me angry, and sad, and frustrated… Poor Jesus, sitting up there looking down on us.

We should be willing to give our lives for our convictions, but in the end we’re not even willing to shop a little longer, spend a little more, or learn sew a little, if that’s what it takes to guard our daughters’ purity.

There are clothes today being marketed to little girls that not that long ago would only have been considered appropriate for grown women.

And there are clothes today being marketed to little girls that not that long ago would have been considered inappropriate for anyone outside of “the world’s oldest profession.”

(I’m not even going to get into the issue of bathing suits here, as that is another topic in its own right, and a deserves a post all its own.)

What do we think our little girls are learning, when we dress them, or allow them to dress, in clothes that reveal or emphasize parts of their body that are “private”?

What about this top, which I recently received in a box of swapped clothes for Jewel:

Sure, the sleeved sweater top layer covers the shoulders, solving the tank-top immodesty problem… But why does a six year-old need to have something tied across, emphasizing her breasts? Again, remember that although she doesn’t have any mass there yet, we’re training her about how ladies dress.

Would you wear that?

Yes, I realize that this top would not be looked at twice by most folks in our society today, whether worn by a female age 35, age 15, or age 5.

But, like the old Hebrew National hot dog commercial, we’re supposed to be answering to a Higher Authority.

If we don’t train our daughters in modest dress from the beginning, but rather dress them in the same clothes as the rest of the world buys at WalMart, why are surprised when our teenage daughters want to dress in clothes that are designed to be seductive – the same ones the rest of the world buys at WalMart?

Nothing warms my heart like hearing my five year-old daughter lean over and whisper in my ear that the lady who we just passed in the grocery store isn’t dressed modestly!