Lions, Tigers, and Bears!!

It is coming to the end of the summer for my family and school year will be upon us in a couple of weeks.  Hubby took the day off of work so that we could have a family day! We decided to use our free zoo pass and go see the lions, tigers and bears at the Zoo today!

With having the wide range of ages for my kids it is hard to find something that all will enjoy and for the most part it seemed like the Zoo did the trick.  If anything it got my teenage boys out of their rooms and out of the house for a few hours of exercise walking through the Zoo.

Looking for family fun, especially for big families....look into getting a zoo membership or public museum membership.  I have found that getting a membership is lower cost for us rather than a one time admittance.  You can then go as many times as you want within the year and even go to other museums or zoos for no or little cost out of pocket.

Parenting Series--ABCs Christian Parenting--Part 7

I know that it has been quite awhile since this series began but here is the next installment of  my parenting series.

Do you give into the whining and complaining that your child does to get their way/wants?  Do you give in to the "my friend has it so I need it too" mentality that children seem to use with parents to get their wants? Does your child know that your "no" means "no"?  If so, this next thought can be a difficult one for parents.

GIVE your child everything he/she needs instead of everything he/she wants, even if you have to say no.

Before you can say "no"  to your child you need to distinguish between what are needs and what are wants for your child.  So we as parents need to know what your child's needs are so that we can help them understand that certain things in life are just wants.  Needs of your child would be things that we rely on every day to live comfortable lives.  So things like food, water, shelter would fall under the need category.   Wants of your child are things that are not essential to their life.  Is having a television, computer, or some other technology type device essential to their life?  NO!  Do they think it is essential to their life?  YES!

We need to be teaching our children what is realistic to living rather than teaching them what they think they are entitled to in order to live on a daily basis.

Take the time to do an exercise with your children.  Prepare for the exercise in advance by gathering pictures of things that could be needs or wants.  Then have them place each of the pictures in either the need or the want category.  Once they have completed putting the pictures in either category, take the time to discuss with them the reasoning behind why they placed the pictures in each category.  It should help your child to understand the "why" behind why we as parents provide the things that we do for our children on a daily basis.  It should also give them a bit of insight on why their wants might not be fulfilled in a timely fashion.