Come to find out I’m Marianne Dashwood, and therefore must re-read Sense and Sensibility to remind myself how cool I am.

Take the Quiz here!

but first I have to finish reading the stack of birth stories (Man! everyone has me on the edge of my seat!) for my upcoming book. And with the crazy schedule around here: camping, dinner-dancing, ren faire-ing, paddleboard racing, and so on and so forth I may never get to it!

Another thing I wish I could get to, but can’t:

If you’re a fan of The Daily Groove, or if you’re wanting to become more creative in your parenting, you’ll want to join us on May 31st in L.A.! Scott Noelle will be facilitating his live workshop - The Seven Powers of Attraction Parenting. Here are the details:

When: May 31, 2008, 10:00am–1:00pm (Saturday)
Where: The Community Room building adjacent to
Holy Nativity Episcopal Church
6700 West 83rd Street
Westchester, CA 90045
(Los Angeles, near LAX)

This workshop will focus on “The Seven Powers of Attraction Parenting” as described in Scott Noelle’s new book, The Daily Groove: A Creative Parents’ Guide to the Art of Attraction Parenting.™

You will learn practical, “inside out” techniques for meeting the challenges of modern parenting, with ease and grace, using…

The Power of Acceptance
The Power of Alignment
The Power of Attunement
The Power of Attraction
The Power of Attachment
The Power of AND
The Power of Appreciation

Registration
Enrollment is limited to 50 adult participants, and pre-registration will begin Friday, May 9th. Your investment is only $45, or $75 for couples. There is no charge for children and non-participating babysitters (see below).

To make sure you get a spot, send a blank email to…

event-info-la at aweber.com
…and then check your email for a confirmation link.

BONUS! Register before Tuesday, May 20th, and get a free month of membership in Scott’s “Total Immersion” coaching program. (A $24 value! New members only.)

A Child-Honoring Event
While this workshop is intended for parents, we also want it to be a child-friendly, attachment-honoring event:

“Attached” children are welcome, but if your children are old enough to be separated from you for a few hours, we recommend you come without them. Near our meeting room there will be both indoor and outdoor spaces where children can be active without disturbing the workshop. Childcare will not be provided, so those who bring active children will need to bring their own babysitter/helper to supervise them. We recommend you also bring along healthy snacks, water, play supplies such as crayons and small toys, etc. If your child is a baby who will nurse and/or sleep on you (or next to you) for most of the time, you may not need a helper person. Please contact us if you have any questions about bringing your attached child.

http://files.enjoyparenting.com/Scott-Noelle-flyer-LA-2008.pdf

I’ll be out of town, boo hoo!

but will be waiting to hear all about it from those of you who are nearby Los Angeles!

xox,
Heather

This comic is related to this musing: Regulating Kids!

child: Stop Mommy! Cry! Cry! No Mommy No!
Mommy: “You’re just a baby! A big giant baby!”
child: No! No! Waaaah! sniff.
Mommy:”I’m going to force the big crybaby into the baby swing!”
child:Waaah! No! Mommy! Waaah! Cry!
Mommy:”I’ve got my camera, I’m taking a big picture of the big baby!”
Hathor: “Excuse me? That’s a very interesting parenting technique, what is it? Oh, wait…let me guess!”
Hathor:”You see, I’m a bit of a parenting technique aficionado. Let me see…Oh! I’ve got it!”
Hathor: “It’s called ‘public shaming’ first developed in the dark ages…”
Hathor: “And the goal is a meek, frightened, cowering child who easily submits to bullying!”
Mommy:”Harumph! We’re leaving!”
Hathor: “Some people have strange goals for their children.”

If you’d like to leave a comment, please scroll down to the next available non-comic blog entry, you know, a word-y one (For a myriad of reasons I turn off the comments on the comics themselves)…and comment away, I love to hear from you!!!!

Order this Cartoon as a 8.5 x 11 print on glossy photo paper and signed for only $10!

Around here we’re having one of those days, there’s more yelling, crying and carrying on than there needs to be, and the kids aren’t exactly playing ‘nice’ either. But we get through those days, take deep breaths, remind ourselves that we’re filled with love and eventually it begins to flow forth again. Usually, at least around here, no one needs to ‘change’ their behaviour- or ourselves, we of course are behaving the best we can given the circumstances (and our particular circumstances is exhaustion from a dinner/dance, and the ren faire this weekend.) We just need to change our mood. Regain our optimism. Have you ever noticed that the mouthy-lip from your 3 year old can be totally endearing at times and infuriating at others? We all would gain if we spent less time trying to change our kids and more time working on ourselves, our own reactions. And then serve as that role model of love and respect and generosity and good spirits, so that our children return it in kind. That’s it in a nutshell, my parenting philosophy. Notice that it doesn’t have anything about perfection, and allows for bad temper (in me and the kids, even darling superhero too.)

Well, just the other day I witnessed a mother shoving her screaming 6 year old into a swing calling her a big baby over and over, I have no idea what her perceived infraction was…I really don’t want to know. I saw a mother completely out of control, okay maybe there’s a bit of us all in there, right? But then the inexplicable happened, the other grown woman in the group took her camera out of her bag and started to snap pictures and say out loud “I’m taking pictures of the big baby, acting like a big baby!” So there you have it, not a mother out of control, but planned; cold, calculating and horrifying. I was too shocked to do anything about it, and really what could I have done? it’s one thing to step in and help a mother at the end of her rope, another to interfere with an insane parenting tactic learned off the today show…

Be the boss! Tips on regulating the kids
Dr. Ruth Peters on stern but creative ways to be a disciplined mom or dad

read it and weep.

Love,
Heather

this musing is related to this comic:Strange Goals!