parenting

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ew things are as important as the food we eat. It’s our body’s fuel to grow, heal and get stronger. While a nutritionally balanced diet is always important, it’s even more so for a pregnant or nursing woman. After all, those same nutrients are now helping you grow and feed a developing baby. Talk about work.

If you have found yourself overwhelmed on keeping up with what foods you should or should not be eating, don’t worry you’re not alone. The good news is that no matter your dietary restrictions, whether they be from personal choices (vegan, vegetarian, etc.), food allergies (peanuts, soy, dairy, etc.) or illnesses like Crohn’s Disease or Diabetes, these five simple tips will help you get on the right path.

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elp your little ones understand the meaning behind Thanksgiving with this fun and super easy craft project. Your kids will create a Thankful Turkey and be able to list the things they are thankful for. Before your family digs into your Thanksgiving feast, pass the Thankful Turkey or Turkeys (if there are multiple) around the table and ask everyone to share at least one thing they are thankful for. This is a great activity to bring your family together and share the meaning of Thanksgiving.

Supplies needed for each Thankful Turkey:

• 1 large pinecone
• 3 sheets of different colored construction paper (1 yellow and any other colors)
• 2 large googly eyes
• 1 red pipe cleaner
• Different colored markers
• Scissors (child proof)
• Tacky glue

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ne of the things I’ve learned in my years of working at a preschool and having my own as well as clients’ kids go to preschools is that many children do not sleep well in a daycare or preschool.  The last thing you want is to be away from your child for hours and then have to pick up a cranky overtired kid. Plus, if they do not sleep well during the day, they are more likely to sleep poorly at night. There are several ways to help your child sleep better and to help your child care provider help your child sleep better so you can pick up a happy, well-rested camper!

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aycare and preschool are great learning environments for children, not only to learn hard skills like math, reading and writing, but also soft skills like patience, communication, and teamwork. While socializing and interacting with others is critical for young children, being surrounded by other kids also means that your little one may pick up a bad habit or two. Nose picking, biting, and loud ear-splitting shrieking is not something you hope they’d learn, but it could happen. So be prepared and learn how to help your child break these bad habits.

1. Nose Picking. EWWW!
Nose picking is embarrassing but resist the urge to say anything negative. Most children pick their nose because they are bored, curious, or trying to relieve stress. Often times it is an unconscious habit. Children may also pick their nose because they have an excess of mucus and it “feels like something is stuck up there.”

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he first time I dropped my son off at day care, I was split between two distinct emotions. 1) the guilt/sadness that surrounds handing your beautiful baby over to another for the first time and 2) the unabashed giddiness that came on like a rush of free-time to the brain.  What was I going to do with all these baby-free hours?  I had work and errands naturally but all of those had previously been juggled with a baby on the hip, in the car, in the shopping cart.  I smelt freedom!

Fast-forward two weeks and somebody had clearly been up to something sneaky with the time-space continuum.  What had previously seemed like a huge block of free time had become mere minutes.  Nine to five had compressed itself into the space of one read through the email, a load of laundry and a conference call.  Maybe I ate a granola bar for lunch in there somewhere.  How could it be so!

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e recently wrote a post about questions you should ask your daycare to decrease your child’s chance of catching a bug this season. We got a lot of positive feedback from parents so we decided to come up with a list of things you can do at home to protect yourself and your family. After all, kids don’t just get sick at daycare, they can also catch a bug at home! Also, the 5 steps listed below not only apply to your children, but to parents as well, so make sure you implement these too 🙂

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We’ve had a pretty warm fall, but as the temperature drops, it’s time to prepare for the start of the cold and flu season. For parents with children enrolled in a child care facility, the big question is: are my kids safe with all the germs in daycare?

Here’s the truth:

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s a home-based day care provider, I am often asked for my best advice to help ease the “goodbye drama” that sometimes happens when a parent leaves his or her child at day care. For new parents, this is a big concern. Will my child cry? Will my child suffer? Will my child understand?

My answer is always the same, “It depends on your child’s age and it may actually be harder on you than on them.” Of course, this doesn’t mean your child won’t cry or cling onto you or sometimes even melt down for a moment, but it does mean that this transition from parent to child care provider or teacher is usually fleeting and absolutely dramatized.

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his weekend as I cleared out the basement in hope of making some room, I found a box full of baby clothes. I was too attached to give it all away, but didn’t really want to continue to have it sit in the basement collecting dust. A brilliant idea came to mind: I decided to give my daughters, Eva (4) and Maya (2), some of the newborn clothes to play with and dress up their dolls. Seeing those sweet items around the house once again reminded me of when they were oh so tiny! It turned out to be a big success, the newborn onesies fit their Ikea dolls perfectly and were the highlight of the day!

What your child will learn:
– Fine motor skills: practicing to put on shoes, tying laces, buttoning onesies, buckling overalls, etc.
– Pretend play, which builds skills in many essential developmental areas.

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When I needed to find a daycare and a preschool for my girls, I spent days on Google, on the phone, and then visiting child care providers. I visited 16 centers before settling for the one that felt right for us. In this post I will share 10 tips that I hope will help you in your search for finding great and affordable child care.

1. Start your child care search early, as far as a year in advance, especially if you live in a concentrated urban area like Washington D.C. or San Francisco. This is even more important if you will be looking for an infant. It’s usually more difficult to find space for an infant than for a 3 or 4 year old because of the teacher-to-child ratio: for infants, you must have 1 teacher for 3-4 infants (depending on the State) but for a 4 year olds, it’s around 10.

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