Basics | Mommy Points

April 2, 2009

Table Manners

Filed under: Basics, Children, parenting — Chris @ 8:37 am

Have good table manners become a thing of the past? I personally don’t think so, but as I look around at the hectic lives that most of us are living these days, I have to wonder if anyone has the time to teach them anymore. More andmore of us are eating at staggered times, eating on the go, or are just so busy and frazzled we are happy the kids are getting anything nutritous into their bodies at all, we aren’t about to start a war over how they are shoveling it in.

But then a holiday happens. Or maybe you take your children out to a restaurant. Suddenly you find yourself cringing. Did my child really just spear his meat with a knife, hold it up in the air and bite hunks off of it… like a caveman. Is my preschooler blowing bubbles in his glass? Did that child just wipe his face with the neck of his shirt?

And you realize it is time for an intervention before great aunt martha tells all the relatives what wile helions you are raising.

Where to begin:

Start with the basics, if your children don’t already know them.

Napkin in lap.

Butt in chair.

Feet under table.

Utensils to eat.

Use your napkin, and only your napkin, to wipe your face.

Chew with your mouth closed.

Don’t talk with your mouth full.

Say please and thank-you.

If you don’t have anything nice to say about the food, don’t say anything at all.

Ask for something to be passed to you that is outof your reach, i.e. no climbing on the table.

Teach your children how to properly set the table. It drives me batty when I ask one of my kids to do this and they throw the silverware into a pile.

After you have mastered these you can fine tune your attention and teach your children what to do with all those extra spoons and forks at the table! Many times I am not even sure.

Comments (2)

June 4, 2008

We All Need Reminders

Filed under: Basics, Chores, Keeping It Real, using handipoints — Chris @ 9:12 am

This morning in my email I received the following email:

Dear chris,

Oops, [Your child] hasn’t been doing chores! This is a weekly reminder to ask your kids to login to Handipoints to mark their chores off and claim their points! Kids earn special prizes in HandiLand for marking off their chores throughout the week.

Keeping up with a routine is hard. That’s why we’ve created easy tools for your kids to track their chores online. Login now with your kids to update your chore charts: http://www.handipoints.com/reminder.

Regards,
Handipoints Support

I love this feature! Because honestly it isn’t my children not doing their chores, it is me not finding the time to log in and check everything off. The weather here has just turned beautiful which means my children are not asking to use the computer. They want to be outside playing, soaking up the sunshine, hitting balls with sticks wearing uniforms I have to wash constantly. Oh wait, this isn’t about me, ahem.

Routine is difficult. When other things change, sometimes everything else seems to fall apart along with it. I am not sure why this happens. But yesterday afternoon when I was surrounded by basket after basket of laundry that needed washing, as well as several sets of sheets and comforters, so much so that I could barely walk through my laundry room, I realized that it is not just my children who are afflicted with this.

The job of doing the laundry looked so huge and overwhelming, that I really didn’t know where to begin. I was half tempted to just walk out of the room and leave it for another day. Instead I threw a load into the washer, and slowly plugged away all day long.

As soon as each load came out of the dryer I folded it and called the owners of the clothing to put it away. That way I didn’t have piles of clean clothing folded and co-mingling with the dirty clothes. Because we all know what happens, the clean clothing jumps into the dirty clothing bins and gets washed over and over again.

Last night all the sheets were folded and put away. There were plenty of towels already in the bathroom for everyone to use for their baths and showers. (Of course I had to wash those AGAIN, because the laundry never stops) But this morning when I woke up the laundry room was as empty as it could ever be. I folded the last load out of the dryer, made the kids put their stuff away, hopefully in their drawers and not their hampers.

If there were a handipoints for grownups, I’d be cashing in those points right now. Hmmmm, now that I think about it I might just treat myself to a coffee later on today.

Comments (5)

May 31, 2008

Math Skills

Filed under: Basics, parenting — Chris @ 9:43 am

Today I volunteered to work at the snack bar at the baseball field where my children play. I will get to show off my math skills. Or not.

One of the mothers who was there said something that I have been mulling over all afternoon. When I showed up at the snackbar she said, “You know, it is always the same people are here. The same parents who volunteer.” I looked around and realized that she was right. I see the same parents over and over again, many I know by name, almost all I know well enough to wave and say, “Hello.” However, they represent probably one-fourth of all the children who participate in the sport.

And then there are a handful of parents who do everything. A handful who coach, volunteer their time and efforts, who lead the league. I am not among that handful, my husband is but I am not. I have too many children involved in too many things for both of us to devote that amount of time and energy. But I feel guilty about it.

Today, showing off my stellar math skills and handing out bottles of gatorade, I felt like I was contributing.

Comments (14)

February 27, 2008

Do Smoke Alarms Wake Children?

Filed under: Basics, On The Web, parenting — Chris @ 10:01 am

This morning on the Today show I watched a segment about smoke alarms and their efficacy in waking children. They showed a family with young elementary school aged children and set off a smoke alarm after they went to sleep for the night. The results were shocking. The parents were sure that their children would wake up and continue on with the fire escape plan that they had discussed and practiced as a family.

The children slept right through the alarm. They let the alarm go on for 20 minutes. Toward the end of that time the oldest child woke up and stumbled downstairs to see what was going on, but he did not seem to know what was going on or that he should be evacuating or perhaps waking his sibling that shared his bedroom. Two of the children woke up in their beds, pulled the covers over their heads, and promptly went back to sleep.

I can say with a fair degree of certainty that the smoke alarms would not wake up most of my children. They sleep so soundly. I know I would have to go and wake them up should the need to evacuate arise.

According to the USFA, the U.S. Fire Association:

What is imperative at the moment is for our citizens to understand the need not to rely solely on smoke alarms as the entire answer to escaping from fire. These recent news events serve to reinforce the need for home escape planning. Smoke alarms are a tool in the planning process. Parents need to clearly understand their supporting roles in the escape plan. After going over the plan with your family, you should conduct a walkthrough of the plan. When you feel comfortable with your plan, hold a fire drill at night (activate your alarm) while your children are sleeping so that you and they can determine the appropriate response to a smoke alarm.

I think this is something we will be trying at our house soon.

Comments (10)

February 13, 2008

What Age Should Allowance Start?

Filed under: Allowance, Basics, Children, answering your questions — Chris @ 11:02 am

At what age did you start allowance? Mine are 4 and 2. In your universe I’d give $ to my 4 yo, what about the 2 yo? What happens when 4 yo wants to spend his money and 2 yo doesn’t have any? Argh, the complications … right now no one gets anything

Well, my 3 and 4 year old children do get an allowance, but mostly it is because they have older siblings and we didn’t want them to feel left out. When my oldest children were that age they didn’t get an allowance. I really didn’t even consider it.

Having said that, since we do not give cash, but rather put the money into a bank account, I don’t see any reason not to start. We also put any birthday or holiday money they get from friends and relatives into their accounts. My kids have loved seeing the balance grow.

I encourage long term saving. We do not run out every week with fists full of dollar bills looking for things on which to spend money. Being able to see that one weeks worth of chores gets them x number of dollars. They are able to figure out how many weeks of chores they will need to do to earn enough money for an item they want. Funny how suddenly having to do chores for a month to get a toy, usually makes the toy less desirable.

Isn’t that one of our goals as parents to raise discerning consumers?

Comments (10)

February 12, 2008

Allowance

Filed under: Allowance, Basics, Children, Chores, answering your questions — Chris @ 3:19 pm

Oh there are so many differing schools of thought on allowance. Whether or not it should be tied to chores, just given freely, or even if it should be given at all.

I think that having a small amount of money is helpful in teaching them how to budget and save for things.

At my house allowance isn’t directly tied to chores. Each child gets half of their age in dollars each week. So my 13 year old get $6.50 while my 4 year old gets $2. It is their money free and clear, to do (mostly) whatever they desire with it. I do sometimes say no, but that is mostly with the littler kids who would like to spend every cent they have on candy. My older children have been very good about saving their money for things that they really want.

If I ask them to do special chores that are above and beyond the scope of their normal activity I will sometimes offer a monetary incentive. In the fall when we were doing the endless leave cleaning up, I offered $5 for anyone who would help. I was out there doing it with them.

My oldest two sons will also do small amounts of babysitting for me. I never pay them for this, but will bring them home an occasional treat, like a couple tins of Altoids or a special coffee or hot chocolate from Dunkin’ Donuts. Just a little something that shows them that I appreciate them. I think when all is said and done that is what most of us want, children or adults, is to be recognized and appreciated.

Comments (7)

January 23, 2008

Another Question From The Comments

Filed under: Basics, answering your questions, using handipoints — Chris @ 1:41 pm

In the comment section of the previous post, Viva, the owner of the Handipoints site, asked:

Curious to hear what parents think about the idea of adding the feature of restricting time spent in HandiLand by deducting points automatically? For example, in order to enter HandiLand or play a game in HandiLand, kids would have to spend some of their purple Bonus Points.

I thought this was important to bring out as a post all its own.

So, what do you think? Would you want some sort of imposed time restriction on the Handiland site?

Can I say what I think?

I don’t like this idea. I prefer to be the one who decides how long my child can or can not play a computer game. Some days I allow them to play longer, if it is a rainy day, or one of those reallllllllllllly long evenings that we have in the middle of winter, or as a special priviledge.

I would wonder if the points would be good for a certain length of time? What if your child had to get up in the middle to go to the bathroom, or they didn’t use all of the time… would it be saved for the next time they logged in? What if they were in the middle of a game and the time ran out?

I don’t know, to me it seems like needlessly complicating things.

But, the site owners would love to know what you think as the users of the site. Would this be a feature that you would utilize or even be interested in? Leave a comment and let them know.

Comments (15)

November 27, 2007

Positive Reinforcement

Filed under: Basics, Children, Chores, Instilling Values, Kindness Of Spirit, Work Ethic, parenting — Chris @ 12:33 am

Have you ever noticed that it is really easy to ignore your children when they are being good? And then as soon as they act up, or do something naughty you come right down on them? I know this can’t just be me.

But some days it seems like an impossible task “catching” them being good. Other times I am too focused on the negativity that swirls around like a virus.

Tonight my oldest son was cleaning up the kitchen area, like he does every night. Generally he sweeps, cleans off the table, fights with his siblings while he is doing it because he doesn’t understand why they are so messy and clearly they are doing it just to torment him. Clearly.

So he was cleaning up and I was dealing with younger children having baths and co-ordinating showers. And searching the house for discarded bath towels, because apparently no one can ever bring them downstairs to the laundry room after using them. Even though I ask them every. single. time.

He called to me that he was done cleaning up. I called back to him thanking him for doing it. And really thought nothing of it again.

Right before he went up to bed we were talking in the kitchen . I happened to glance around the kitchen and notice that all the pots and pans were gone. He had hand washed all of them, dried them, and put them all away. He had wiped down the stove and counter tops, and had put all of the dishes in the dishwasher. This is completely unprecedented.

I interrupted our conversation right then to tell him how proud of him I was. How impressed I was at the amount of effort he had put forth unasked. I hugged him tight, though it embarrassed him slightly, and told him how proud I was.

He was beaming.

It was a good reminder for me to work on praising the positives. Turns out you catch more than just flies with honey.

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November 6, 2007

It’s that time of year…

Filed under: Basics, Children, parenting — Chris @ 3:34 pm

when children fall in love with every single toy that they see in the catalogs.

Today I went to the post office and there was our very first holiday toy catalog. The children have been pouring over through its pages. The younger ones pointing to every single thing on the page and saying, “Will you buy me this? And this? And this, too?”

The older ones who are wise to the deeper meaning behind me saying, “We’ll see,” just make out lists. Lists that go on and on. I encourage the list writing because a) I think it is much needed handwriting practice, and b) I don’t have to say “Maybe,” every three minutes.

It is also the time of year for the holiday card photos. An exercise in futility that I continue to practice every year, even though it ages me and makes me want to reach for a large glass of spiked eggnog.

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October 17, 2007

Toys, toys, toys

Filed under: Basics, Making It Work, answering your questions, parenting — Chris @ 11:12 pm

When it comes to toys, I fully embrace the less is more philosophy.

A couple of months ago a friend of mine stopped by my house with her husband in tow. Funny thing about my friends’ husbands, in the world I live in husbands are sort of like unicorns, you believe they exist, yet you never really see them.

All of my friends are SAHM or WAHM, and all of the husbands work at offices away from the house. So while I might know all the details of my friends’ spouses, their hobbies, their likes and dislikes, maybe even their choice of underwear (yes I have had this conversation, more than once, and I can only think it came up because of a shopping expedition), I would be hard pressed to pick any of them out of a line up.

So when my friend stopped over, her husband had not been to my house in over 4 years. he was interested to see all the work that we had done to the house in the intervening time. And after walking around, he said, “But where are all of your toys?”

I had laughed and he said, “No. I am being serious. Where are all of your toys?”

The truth is we don’t have a lot of toys. I despise toys that “do” things and offer no opportunity for open ended play. This includes most toddler toys that require batteries. Therefore there is not a ton of colorful plastic stuff lying around my house.

So what do we have?

Wooden blocks, lots of them. You can not fully use your imagination and build with a 30 block set. 300 blocks? that can build anything your imagination desires. And they stack neatly on the lower shelf of a bookcase.

Lincoln Logs and Tinker Toys. Same thing, lots of them. These don’t get as much play as other building toys that we have. I store these in a huge rubbermaid bin and pull them out once in awhile. The allure of a “new” toy occupies them for a few days to a week, before I pack it back up and put it away again. Not every toy has to be readily available at all times.

K’nex (great for older children who like to follow directions and build complicated things) I recommend buying a large set that comes with an instruction book to build many different things from a single set. Much like the Tinker Toys and Lincoln Logs these are not sitting out in the open waiting to be scattered or have valuable pieces lost. I bring them out when requested.

Brio Builder. This is a hands down favorite with my preschool and young elementary school aged children. Unfortunately you cannot buy them in the US any longer. Why? I have no idea. You can still but them on ebay sometimes or make an impromptu trip to Europe and pick some up. No?

Legos. I don’t even need to mention these do I?

But the thing with all of our toys is that they can all be stored neatly and efficiently in baskets and bins. Those baskets and bins can be placed on bookshelves. Everything has a place, and that place is not lining the walls of my family room, or scattered on my floor. You’d be surprised how much better children can play when there are less choices and less clutter surrounding them.

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