The Mom Crowd

We have all been there before – you have done everything you can possibly think of and your baby is still crying. They have a clean diaper, they have been fed, burped, they aren’t sleepy, have clean clothes, temperature is right, they don’t have a fever, they aren’t constipated, the room is quiet, being held in their favorite position, they are healthy as far you know, and yet they are still crying. I would like to suggest another tool for your tool belt – prayer.

In the 5 months of my son’s life there have been times when Roman will cry uncontrollably. I can tell it is a different cry than when he is hungry or sleepy. It’s heartbreaking and nerve racking at the same time. So when my son is in this mood all I can think to do is pray. I also feel like he picks up on my stress level. If I am calm, then he will be more likely to calm down. So first I calm myself. Then I hold him in a quiet room in a comfortable position and I pray to God.

Here are some of the things I have prayed.

• I pray against any fear that he may have. Sometimes I think he becomes afraid and that is why he is crying. I don’t know why this prayer works, but it does.  I actually say out loud, “I pray against a spirit of fear.” And then reassure my son that he has nothing to fear, that we aren’t going to leave him and I will always be with him.

• I pray for peace. I pray that his little body will have peace. I say the words, “peace and relax” in a soothing voice over and over. Even saying the words to myself, gives me peace.

• I pray for healing. Sometimes I think he may not be feeling well and I have no way of knowing what is bothering him. So I pray a general prayer asking God to heal whatever is ailing my son.

• I ask the Holy Spirit to comfort my son. In the Bible the Holy Spirit is called the Great Comforter. I believe that the Holy Spirit can comfort my baby in a way that I can not spiritually, so I ask for his help.

• I pray that my son would know how much he is loved. His father and I love him a lot, so do family and friends, and his Creator. I believe that babies find great comfort and peace when they feel loved and when they are told they are loved.

These five ideas for prayer aren’t new, but they are a good reminder to pray when your baby is flipping out.  Now what to pray when a toddler is flipping out and throwing a tantrum is a whole other set of prayers! LOL.

Do you pray for your baby when he or she is crying? What do you pray for?

Earlier this week, Christy shared ideas for helping our little ones and their constipation.  I thought I’d follow that up with my child’s polar-opposite issue: plentiful poop and the yearning to play with it!

My son is two, and the discovery of his feces is nothing out of the ordinary for a child his age.  About 3 months ago, it happened for the first time: I’d go into his room to get him up from his afternoon nap only to find him sitting there, somewhat happily, in the middle of a poop-smeared crib.  Poop everywhere: on the sheets, the pillows, the stuffed animals, the railings, his hands, feet, legs, and fingernails.  Mm, mmm, and it smelled good, too.

My daughter had gone through this fecal-phase briefly as well; hers lasted for two or three days.  I expected my son’s fascination to pass just as quickly (no pun intended).  However, it soon became a routine for him.  There was one week wherein I had to disinfect every inch of his room three consecutive days.  Don’t forget the baths and scrubbing of the tub each time as well.

Our solution then was to put pajama pants on our boy every time he goes to bed, even when it’s hot.  (The a/c has to be turned down a little more every afternoon at naptime as a result.)  We still do this on a daily basis.  The pants deter him from digging.  Occasionally, I forget to put the pants on, or I think he might not need them anymore.   And those are the same occasions when I realize PANTS ARE NECESSARY.  FOR THE LOVE OF LYSOL, PUT THE BOY’S PANTS ON!!  Will I never learn? 

What To Expect the Toddler Years was my first stop for information.  Many of their suggestions were things we’d already instituted, including

• fastening diapers securely so access to the goods is limited or impossible
• recognizing patterns in bowel movements in order to predict and circumvent future occurrences
• providing the child with healthy and better-smelling tactile play activities (like dough, finger paint, sand, etc.)

Out of curiosity, I Googled this topic, and started with the words “kids who play…”  All kinds of responses were listed in the drop-down window, and I was amused to find that “kids who play with poop” is just sixth on the list.  The search led me to Babycenter.com’s Q & A on toddler poop-playing, and the solution with the highest success rate is to give the toddler a brief cold shower after the poop-cident.  Although it seems a bit extreme, I can see how a desperate parent would want to find an effective consequence for a child who is passionate about playing with his or her BM’s.

What do you think, Mom Crowd?  Have you faced this issue?  What worked for you and your child?  And do any of you have coupons for Febreeze?  I sure go through a lot of it!

photo courtesy mrsmecomber

Every kid goes through the rite of passage of losing their baby teeth and growing into their adult teeth.  They also go through that awkward phase of having big and little teeth cluttering their mouths.  My oldest discovered his first loose tooth today and I find myself thinking back on my own childhood.  

My mom made a tooth fairy pillow for me.  I remember her doing all the needlepoint and sewing the pillow together.  She kept it all these years and gave it to me last year anticipating that I may want to use it for my own children as they go through this particular rite of passage.  Seeing the pillow brought back memories of falling asleep excited that I would wake up with the tooth gone from the pocket in the pillow and that it would be replaced with some money.  I don’t remember exactly how much money I got back then but I do remember pulling out a few quarters from the pocket.   I remember that I tried as hard as possible to will myself to wake up and wait for the tooth fairy to come.   I thought she might be as pretty as tinkerbell and I wanted to get a glimpse. 

I know that some parents pretend that the tooth fairy is real and make the tooth fairy exchange a lot of fun for the kids.  We’ve never gone down this road before so I am currently figuring out how I want to approach the tooth fairy mystery.  I’ve read that some parents forego giving money to their kids and instead give crayons, pencils, or some other treat.  

Possible Choices:

• Money
• Special Coins (Like a dollar coin, half-dollar, Sacagawea)
• Crayons
• Stickers
• Pencils
• Candy–sort of ironic since you really have to start paying attention to teeth cleaning!
• Dentil Floss–although I doubt that would be as appreciated as money

After doing some research, I found that there are several websites where you can buy a special tooth fairy boxes, banks, books, pillows, and baby tooth memory albums. (You have to check out that last link!!) I had no idea there were so many products that parents can purchase!  I even found a website that has sample letters you can leave your child from the tooth fairy that encourages him/her to keep doing such a great job brushing his/her teeth because she loves collecting nice shiny teeth.  

What fun memories do you have of the tooth fairy as you grew up? What traditions do you have with your children?  Are you going to pass on the tooth fairy tradition?  Tell me what you thought about that baby tooth memory album!

**photo courtesy of sappymoosetree

What do you do if your child comes to you and wants _____ that you think are too expensive?

In our case that is shoes.  Our 5 year old saw a commercial for a brand of shoes and was convinced that the shoes would help him run faster.  He has recently grown out of his old shoes and does need new ones.  When I looked up how much the shoes he wants are I thought, “No way am I paying for those!”  At first I wanted to tell him that we were not getting those shoes because they are too expensive.  I knew that answer wouldn’t really make a lot of sense to him and would probably make him angry.   My husband reminded me that it could be a good life lesson and that we should think about approaching it from a different angle.

My husband asked me how much I would normally spend on shoes for the boys.  I told him and we came up with a strategy to help the 5 year old learn about managing money.  We also wanted to guide him and help him make a decision that he could be happy with.

We looked online with the 5 year old at the shoes he wants.  We did tell him that the shoes cost more than we want to spend on the shoes but that he did have some options. We told him that we would pay for a certain amount of the shoes and that he would have to come up with the rest of the money. We asked him if he would like to know what other kids do when they want something that costs more than they have.  He said, “Sure!”

We said that some kids:

• save up their birthday money and use it to buy something they want
• ask their parents, grandparents, neighbors if they have extra jobs they can pay him for
• choose to buy something less expensive that is within their budget
• wait for it to go on sale

He thought about it and he either wants to save some of his birthday money or do extra jobs to make up the difference.  As soon as he can pay up then we will happily take him out shopping.  We feel good that he is learning about how to live within a budget and work hard for the extra things he wants.  We shared that we have to make those same decisions when we want to buy things that are cost more than we have in our budget.  We feel like it is a real world learning opportunity for him–he’ll have to make lots of similar decisions about money as he grows up.

We look forward to using this strategy more as these situations come up more often in the future. I think he’ll feel good about participating in buying something that he wants.  If he figures out that those shoes won’t actually make him run faster then he’ll also learn another good life lesson.

How do you handle it when your kids want something that you think is too expensive?  What do you tell your kids?

**photo courtesy of   flickr’s plasticrevolver

My family  just moved from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to Dallas, Tx (for the summer) in a car and moving truck. That’s right,  21 hours of actual driving time.  In two days.  That made for long days  with pit stops.

To be fair, I have to admit that I did not make this trip with them.  I flew to Dallas with the 21 month old the same morning everyone else left Pittsburgh.  We thought that maybe it would be better for the toddler to not have to endure such a greuling road trip in a short amount of time.  My in-laws came up to help a few days before the big move day.  My husband planned on driving the moving truck while  my in-laws planned on driving the car with the kids in it.

My mother-in-law came up with a FABULOUS idea that I wanted to pass onto everyone.  She showed up with some plans in her road trip arsenol.  She bought some plastic gold coins and told the boys that they could earn the coins by doing special jobs around the house.  They each had a bag to put their collected coins in.  She told them that when they were on their big road trip they could spend their “money” at “Mimi’s store”.  Since we were still packing up for the move there were plenty of jobs to do around the house–especially since I’d been having some complications from the miscarriage and hadn’t been able to get as much done as I needed to.  The boys were excited to earn gold coins and were even more excited about being able to buy special treats from her store.

She also came with a DVD player, a borrowed Leapster, and Nintendo DS.  We let the boys pack their backpacks with toys and brought a basket of books to help with entertainment.

We were worried that the boys woulde be upset because they weren’t going to be riding in the moving truck with daddy.  Thankfully, Mimi’s Store was a HUGE hit.  What did Mimi have at her “store”?  She had some inexpensive toys like slinkys, stickers, and spray foam.  She had lots of food items like goldfish, cheese crackers, and cookies.  She also had pixie sticks, fruit rolls, and fruit chews.  It was an indulgence for sure–they don’t normally get a lot of those kind of snacks at home but we figured that being stuck in a car for 12+ hours a day for two days was a good reason to let them have some extra fun.

Her idea was genius because it helped on the front end with all the jobs and packing that needed to be done AND it helped to pass some of the long hours in the car.  Doing the extra jobs around the house also kept them occupied as more and more of their toys were packed on the truck and the house was being cleaned.

If you are planning a road trip (or even a plane trip) I think this is a great strategy to help pass the time.  So I pass it on to all you moms who are planning summer travels in hopes that you can use this to make your road trips more enjoyable!

Happy Travels!

*photo courtesy of spader