Being A More Peaceful Parent.

Monday 31st March 2014

Ever since I had my first child, I have been trying to change my style of parenting.
You give something and go and if it feels right, you keep doing it, if it doesn't you change it.

I found it was really hard at first, because I just automatically did what had been done to me.
My parent's believed in smacking and yelling, because they had been smacked and also because of frustration.
Now we have all been there, being so frustrated we do the first thing that comes to us.
For my parents who were smacked as a child, then that is what they did when they got frustrated.

I didn't like smacking, as it made me feel bad, and I didn't like to make my child cry.
So I went to the library and tried to learn as much as I could about toddler/ child behavior, so I had a better understanding of it all.
But I still found myself at times, out of frustration reverting to the way I had been brought up.

Parenting is always evolving, as we get older, as our children get older, as we have more children.
It's just a natural progression.
I have always been open minded enough to try different approaches, if something doesn't feel right, or doesn't work.

But lately I have been reading a lot on Peaceful Parenting, as I am at a point with my youngest, where the old ways of doing things are no longer working.
It all sounds great in theory, but in the heat of the moment it can be tough.

But I know that if I come from a place of love and compassion instead of the instant reaction of frustration and anger, then there is hope for change.

My daughter love language is cuddles and affection, and I find when she has just said things that have upset me or not what I would like to hear, it is very hard to want to be affectionate with her.
But the more I push her away and want to distant myself from her the worse her behavior gets.

Does anybody else go through this?
How do you deal with it?

I know nobody is perfect, and it's a matter of having a balance of respect and boundaries for each other.
But how do you teach this?

But I also love the way my daughter can just let things go, I wish I could be more like this.
She will get frustrated, have a vent at me, and at this point I have sent her to her room for time out, as she has yelled at me in her venting. Then once she has calmed down and come out, it is like nothing has happened and she is happy to let it go.

I am happy for her to vent, as we all need to do it.
I just want less yelling.
Because when she has vented for everything that I have asked her to do, it wears a little thin and that is when the frustration comes in again.

I have found reading a lot of blogs on posts on peaceful parenting is helping though.
http://www.ahaparenting.com/_blog/parenting_blog
http://www.littleheartsbooks.com/2013/11/29/the-gift-of-a-strong-willed-child/

So it is a work in progress and some days it feels like 3 steps forward and 2 steps back.
But I will never stop trying to be a more peaceful parent.

My Way Is Not The Only Way To Get Things Done.

Monday 31st March 2014

Been trying to encourage Miss Personality to use the analogue wall clock to tell the time. She knows how to do it, but just needs a little bit more practice to fine tune it, if you know what I mean.
But when nearly every device in the house tells her the time in digital, whats the point of reading the wall clock, as far as she is concerned. But then again, does it really matter. I mean she can read the time, she knows what quarter to, and quarter past and half past is. She knows the difference between am and pm.

Our other issue is trying to get Miss Personality motivated to do her personal jobs in the morning, she is really good at distracting herself, and then it's lunch time by the time she has finished them.
I have noticed I get distracted easily too, so maybe that is where she gets it from,lol.

Now I knew she had a fascination with time/ numbers, to a certain extent, as she has her dad's need for having a digital clock next to her bed, so she knows what the time is, at all times.

Now dad has increased this desire by giving her his old watch.
It tells the time in digital, but it also does a whole range of other cool things.

• It tells you what the time would be in different countries.
• It's a thermometer
• A stop watch
• Tells the date
• It's a compass
• It is water resistant
• It has an alarm.
• And makes different kinds of beeps to tell you certain things.

Now in regards to her personal jobs, this watch has lead to some interesting developments.
Miss Personality decided to time herself while she does her jobs, to see how fast she can do them, and then each day she tries to beat this time.

I watched and had to nearly put my feet in my mouth, to stop from commenting and just let her do what she felt the need to do.

She would do the first job on her list, then stop the stop watch and record the time in seconds.
Then she would start stop watch from beginning, and record the time in seconds after she had completed the next job.
At the end of her jobs, she then asked me how many seconds in a minute, then converted each time to minutes and then added them up.
The second day she did this, she was so excited to beat her time from the day before.

Now was it important for me to interrupt her and tell her she wasn't doing it the way I would have done it.
NO!

But after I extracted my foot out of my mouth, I smiled at what she had achieved all on her own and happy to do it.

I am interested to see what other things this watch can inspire her to do :)

We Are Getting A Bus!!!!!!

Saturday 29th March 2014

We have talked about making one of our goals, getting a housebus, when we came back from Australia in September.

We didn't have the cash to buy one outright, so we just did a lot of talking about what we wanted in a house bus, the budget of what we could afford. Researched what things we needed in our future home.

Didn't think it would be happening for a while to be honest.

We don't have the skills to build one and thought it would be a lot easier buying one already set out.

But we also found when looking at ones for sale, that there were not many built for families.

A big majority of them seem built for the retired couple.

But an opportunity has come along to rent to own a house bus, that we couldn't say no to.

So in 5 weeks we say good bye to the four walls of a house and go totally mobile.

Wow! 

It's scary and exciting all in one :)

When we found this one, and it ticked all the right boxes , we just had to go for it.

Features:

1976 305 Mercedes

11m long, 2.4m wide 

200hp rear engine with automatic transmission

Airbag suspension with high ratio diff fitted.

1000 ltrs of fresh water

1100 ltrs of wast

70 ltrs fresh toilet water

80 ltrs of toilet waste

Marine toilet

Gas heater

Califont and full size gas stove

110 ltr 12v/24v.230v fridge

Hi tech absolute 400ah deep cycle house battery with dedicated temperature controlled charging and monitoring system

12m x 4 m awning

With all this, it still leaves plenty of room to still personalise it.

I have been reading blogs on housebus families and how they have things set up in their homes.

We have been reading up on solar panels as this bus does not have them, and how to use an inverter so we can run a washing machine, charge our phones and laptops.

We buy things that we can use that doesn't use electricity, so we conserve what we have as much as possible. Like the hand mixer, whistling kettle to go on the gas stove, wind up lantern/ torches, that kind of thing.

We have been reading up on how to do your washing, camping style.

We have been researching ways to modify this bus so we can be as self sustaining as we can.

I also read up today about super magnets that can be used to put up your curtains instead of using cords and curtain tracks.

It's all so exciting and new.

Do you live in a house bus?

What things did you do to make your life easier?

What gadgets have you found to be, must haves?

We are ideally looking for a bit of land to rent to put our new home on too.

Still need to find this.

How did you find the perfect place to park your house bus?

It's funny this time last year I would never have dreamed that this is what we would be doing :)

But we cross of that days on the calendar, excitedly as we look forward to our new adventure.

Growing Our Own Food

Thursday 27th March 2014

I have been researching about growing plants and fantasizing about the day that I can grow my own food.

Part of that research has been to do with watching DVD's on living off the land.

We found these 2 in the local library about a New Zealand man called Te Radar.

It was great to watch someone doing what we want to be doing, from the country we call home.

Then I had my lightning bolt moment and realised that I can start doing it now.

I don't have to wait till we have our own land to live on.

Yeah our backyard is only very small, but some things can take a long time to grow, especially when you are growing them from seed.

I got Miss Personality involved. I asked her if she would like to help me plant my seeds I bought from the supermarket.

The internet is so great for us beginners that go blindly into new projects with the enthusiasm of an eager child.

We found this idea of planting seeds in old empty toilet rolls, you just stuff newspaper in the end, so the potting mix and seeds don't fall out the other end.

Miss Personality did an awesome job helping me do this, and then put the potting mix in for me too.

Well until she found the cricket hopping about in the bag of potting mix,lol.

Then it became mum's job :)

Any way after placing the seeds into the potting mix in the toilet rolls, and then giving them a good drink of water. We sat back and waited to see what happened.

We also had read that when planting them from seeds, you need to make sure they have a good balance of moist soil and sun, so that the germination can take place.

With in a couple of days, Miss Personality excitedly came and told me we had some sprouts sticking through and over the next few days, we had more and more.

Because it is starting to cool off as we head into winter, we are just moving them around to which ever spot has the sun on it.

I re potted them just recently. We have 2 broccolli, 2 carrots, 2 lettuce, 2 silverbeet (but something seems to be eating them), a tomato and a lemon seedling.

I also went out an bought a feijoa plant, as these are one of my favourite fruits.

Will look at getting an apple tree, a mandarin tree, and would like to grow grapes, and a passionfruit vine at some stage. 

But one thing at a time :)

Eeeekkkk We Have Mice!

Tuesday 25th March 2014

It's ok, they are pets,lol.

It all started with Miss Personality going to work with dad.

Who would have thought something so harmless would have ended up with having some new house guests.

Dad found a mouse at his work. 

Miss Personality asked if she could take it home and look after it.

She found this lovely little container at dad's work and went outside and found grass and put a container in it for water and everything.

But sadly, even though Miss Personality did a really good job giving Mr Mouse everything he could possible need. The next day when we woke up he had died.

Miss Personality was a little sad, but was really keen on having a mouse as a pet.

Miss Personality has been wanting a pet of her own for ages.

We discovered a while ago that she was allergic to cats, so we couldn't do that.
We are not in a position to have a dog, as we are renting and moving around a bit.
I had liked the idea of getting a rabbit or a guinea pig, but again we are moving around a bit.

I asked her to do some research on what we needed to look after a mouse. So she went on the internet and typed it in to the wonderful search engine that is google.

She lost interest in it though, as these websites had so much information on them, that Miss Personality got frustrated as she just wanted an answer.

But google also came up with some great links for YouTube.

So we watched a couple of those.

We found out that mice are afraid of heights, who would of known.

Also they don't like to be on their own, which means we needed to buy 2 mice.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2PXAEoEGlA

So long story short, on the weekend we went to the pet shop and bought some mice.

I was surprised that you had to fill in an adoption paper for mice these days.

But I guess it only makes sense.

Miss Personality got the last 2 female mice from the pet shop.

She named them Elizabeth and Blousey.

Elizabeth she just liked the name and Blousey is off the movie Bugsy Malone, that she has watched, and at Musical Theatre lessons they are learning a routine based on the movie.

They are so captivating to watch, we all can spend hours at night watching them scurry around in their cage.

I tell you it is more entertaining than watching tv :)

Elizabeth is the more adventurous one. From day one, she has been the one, happy to come up and smell your finger through the bars. She is very busy making their nest inside the tiny house.

Blousey is very cautious and is now after a few days, starting to come out more and more.

Every day we get out a empty box, and put Blousey and Elizabeth into the box with various things they can play with. Just so they can get use to Miss Personality and she can get use to them. At first I think Miss Personality was a skittery as they were. Just not use to what it would feel like to have them touch her skin. Now she is a lot better.

The first night we had them, they were allowed to stay in Miss Personality's room.

But she found they were just too noisy at night and kept her awake, as mice a night time animals, so they are more active at night.

So Blousey and Elizabeth now stay out in the lounge area.

Having A Light Bulb Moment.

Wednesday 19th March 2014

Did you ask a lot of questions when you were a kid?

Like Why? When? How?

It's a stage that every child goes through and every parent grows to hate, especially when you don't have all the answers.

When did I stop asking questions like, Why? or How come?

Probably out of that unconditional faith and trust that children have, that everything will work out. That all the grown ups in this world seem to know the right ways to do things, so everything will be ok.

Good things happen to good people right, right?

But then all of a sudden these questions start coming back into your head, especially as you get older.

You get sick of people telling you what you HAVE to do, you feel like you have no choices and life stops being fun. You are not suppose to question things, you are meant to just do what is expected of you.

But my brain can't help being like the inquisitive child, trying to wrap my head around the why?

I can understand that we all have rules to live by.

Life is just like that.

Rules to keep people safe.

Rules so that everyone has money to buy the things they need - food, shelter, medicine.

But when you live by these rules and still struggle to have money, to have safety, to have food, to have shelter, to have medicine.

It is my human right to start asking why?

And how can I change this?

I know it is not just me, as I see many people, from lots of different parts of the world, that struggle with this too.

Why is there so much poverty in the world?

We are told growing up, that it is all about getting an education, to get that well paying job, and everything will be solved.

If this is true, then how come there are so many un employed?

How come there is so much poverty?

How come there are so many un happy people?

A lot of countries have free education.

But is that education really free?

Just because our children go to school, are they actually learning anything?

And if they come out of school and have actually learnt anything, is it helpful?

How do we keep ourselves safe?

We abide by the rules of society and if you don't the justice system will deal with it. Right?

How come there is so much crime?

How come in a lot of countries the only way a person feels safe is to have their own weapon? What ever that weapon is, to feel safe.

Incidents like 911, Daniel Morcombe, and even the earth quakes that hit Christchurch, New Zealand, and so many more, that I can't name them all, make you realise pretty quickly that you are not safe.

Lots of people would look at all those examples and say, those situations are all out of our control. There is nothing we can do to change any of those things from happening.

Another words, not my problem.

But is it?

Is there anything that any of us can do to change how safe we are?

Rules so we can be as healthy as we can be.

Meanwhile people are still dying, of starvation, malnutrition, illness.

Even though we have scientist, engineers, inventors, supposedly doing everything they can, being paid good money, to come up with solutions and cures, so that we can be as healthy as we can be.

If there was a cure or solution to change these things, would it be available to everyone?

Or would it only be available to the wealthy? 

Or would it not be made available at all because some organisation or institution would then, not be able to make money off the sick and starving?

Rules so our food is safe to eat and there is plenty of it.

But if there are so many rules around this, why is there so much food that is sold to us that is un healthy for us?

Who is allowed to grow food?

How you are to grow your food?

What you are allowed to look after your food with?

What can you do with your food?

What food is safe for you and what is not?

With all these rules, how can any food that is being sold to the public be bad for us?

And after all these rules, where does having fun, being with our families and being happy fit in?

Are we not meant to have any of that?

STUFF THAT!

All I have at this stage is questions, but I think it is good to ask questions.

Because by asking questions you can become more clear on what you want out of life.

Because I believe you have choices and these choices can bring you changes so that you can find the fun in your life again and be happy and spend valuable time with your family.

I find myself on a journey with my family, trying to find the answers that suit us.

So we can be safe, have food, shelter and medicine.

And most of all be HAPPY!

My 'Oh Crap' Moment.

Monday 17th March 2014

I had one of those moments on the weekend.

When I looked around me and saw my children, like really saw them and went 'Holy Crap! When Did You Grow UP!'

Sometimes life just gets away from you and you are just going through the motions. 

Day after day goes by, year after year. These days and years seem to fly past even faster when you have children.

But this particular day, I got a surprise.

Little Miss Personality will be 10 in January. It has been 10 years since I have had a baby. She is tall, beautiful and has hair nearly down to her bum. She is adamant she wants to have hair like Rapunzel :) She was wearing these skinny jeans, and I looked at her and said where has my baby gone.

I got to spend time with my step daughter - Miss Blondini on the weekend too. She always likes to stand next to me with a big grin on her face, showing off that she is now taller than me at only 13. She is developing into a young lady now, who has a busy social life with her friends and her competitive gymnastics she does 4 days a week. Her dad and I have talked about who is going to be the lucky contestant to teach her how to drive,lol.

Mr Affectionate is working, races stockcars just like his dad and big brother have done, and on the weekend bought his first car. I remember so fondly this little boy that anxiously clung to his mum when ever something new and scary was about to happen, and now he is out there doing it all.

Mr Confident text me on the weekend. He said "I might ask my girlfriend a very important question :) If you know what I mean". Oh yes I knew what he meant. 

So on saturday he popped the question. He said I didn't know how you are suppose to do it, but I did it my way". I said "There is no proper way to do it, as long as it comes from the heart that is all that matters". 

It was so cute talking to him on the phone and letting him tell me of all their plans for the future.

Now I know they can't stay babies for ever and as parents we look forward to the day that they grow into independent young people. But it feels funny when you can still remember the day they arrived into this world, oh so clearly.

So I just smile to myself with pride at how wonderful they are.

I look forward to seeing all the wonderful things they do with their lives.

Time For Plan B!

Sunday 9th March 2014

Have you ever had one of those days, that starts off like crap and no matter how much you try to change the mood of the day, it just seems to go from bad to worse?

Well I had one of those days last week. Not sure if it was just because it was Monday, but I am pretty sure it was because I had an expectation on how the day/ week was going to go.

I had made all these wonderful montessori inspired resources, and thought by Miss Personalities enthusiasm for them, that we were on to a winner. Errrrrrrrr wrong!

After a day of tantrum and tears (and that was just from me), I was left feeling, what had I done wrong? What could I have done differently? Was I expecting too much? But if I was doing something wrong, how could I change things? Or should I just give up and send her back to school?

I am sure I am not the only home schooling parent who has gone through these thoughts on a day that hasn't quiet gone to plan.

I even looked into a couple of schools, montessori schools. 

But then got totally annoyed when I got told that my daughter was too old to be accepted into their school, based on the fact that she had never been in a montessori preschool or school before. I was very insulted to think that at the age of 9 she was considered too old to learn something new. But I realised that it really meant that they didn't have the time to spend with her to catch her up to where everyone else was.

Any way I climbed down from my indignant soap box and decided screw them, my daughter can learn anything, I just had to change how I was teaching it.

So then I asked around on some of the facebook home schooling groups I am a part of about unschooling. I got introduced to lots of websites and blogs, like:

http://sandradodd.com/unschooling.html - Unschooling

http://livingjoyfully.ca/unschooling/stages.htm - The 3 stages of unschooling.

I enjoyed reading these 2 blogs and found it interesting to find out what 'unchooling' was. But I had also been pre warned that these 2 blogs are more 'radical unschooling'. 

While I am still trying to get my head around what these to terms really mean, I won't say to much about either of these terms, except that there are parts of the philosophy that I like and others that I don't think would suit us as a family. 

The blog I am really enjoying reading though is:

http://www.storiesofanunschoolingfamily.com/p/blog-page_3768.html

I found this blog, real, if that makes any sense. 

They seemed like your average family, that had been through the ups and downs of life, and along the way they had found there way to home school and then modified it to what suited them and their children.

So after reading up and getting a rough idea of what this 'unschooling' was, I decided to give it a go.

I had been advised to 'deschool' myself and my daughter before really getting in to the 'unschooling' journey. 

So what ever you want to call it, I decided to do it :)

Tuesday -  We started off the day with a couple of arguments, but I was determined to have a different day to Monday. Miss Personality was a little apprehensive about what was going on. She thought I was tricking her when I said "You can do what ever you want today".

I wrote my usual daily journal of observations of what Miss Personality chose to do with her day, wow!

It was awesome to watch her happily chose to all these fun activities because she was interested in it. 

At the end of the day I asked her "How would you like to do every day like this?", her answer was "Are you serious", with a happy little grin on her face. 

Wednesday - Miss Personality learnt about mummies and pharaoh's, she watched a movie about gymnastics, she created a comic strip on line, she measured in metres and compared with feet and centimetres, we played scrabble and she looked up the Megalodon Shark on the ipad. All because she wanted to learn about these things. It was awesome!

Thursday - We went do hubby's work for the day, where she got to do a lot of things, that until I sat back and really observed it all, realised that a lot of learning was happening here too. But she did it all with a smile on her face.

Friday - Went just as smoothly, with a happy child and happy mother, because there was hardly any arguments and Miss Personality was getting to learn what she wanted to learn, and chose it when she was ready.

Not sure what the to call what we are doing, so I won't and just enjoy the flow of it all.

I have found people get too caught up on labels, so I just won't label it.

This week reminded me why I wanted to home school after all.

I wanted my daughter to learn, not because she was told to, but because she wanted to.

To be a free thinker, to have passions of her own, to be happy.

I think we may be on to something good here, :).