SMILE WHEN YOU SEE THEM The Nancy Armato Rule Antonina’s mother, Nancy Armato, is the ultimate child greeter. She smiles and beams and bursts with pride at the sight of her three children and her six grandchildren. No child who enters her home has any doubt whatsoever that he or she is completely welcome-there is no room for doubt. Grandma Nancy’s hugs, kisses, compliments, questions about a new toy or shoes, recognition of a sterling report card, or her recalling a goal in a recent soccer game-all are part of her fabulous greeting. Every child gets his moment. The children around her respond in kind. They feel so loved and welcomed by her that it literally and physically changes them. They open to her like roses bathed in the warmth of the morning sun. She adds a patina of grace to their lives when each one realizes they have given her reason to smile. Watch your son walk into a room. What is the first thing he does? He looks around at the faces watching him walk in. He is instinctively searching for the visual cues that tell him that he is welcome and a part of the family, that he is loved and wanted, and that he was missed while he was gone. The easiest and simplest way to give him the approval and welcome he seeks is to smile when you see him. A smile instantly sets him at ease. A smile says, “Yes, I love you.” A frown, or only a grunt of recognition, faint praise, or sheer disinterest, sends a message of dismissal. Let your son feel welcome from the first moment he sees you. Let him know that he is loved and important to you, always and forever. When you see him, smile, and leave no doubt that at that moment he is the most important person in your world.

Read more:
Smile when you see your kids – Excerpt from Parking Lot Rules

TREAT HER LIKE YOUR BOSS

No matter how tired or fed up you are with how things are going at the office or store or school, or wherever you might work, if the person who signs your paycheck walks in, somehow there is a little reserve of goodwill saved up, just for him or her.

From out of thin air comes a smile or a sudden lilt in the voice, or a very optimistic assessment of the absolute disaster staring everyone in the face. This good-natured version of you is like a can of emergency survival instinct, always there somewhere, just waiting to be used.

This is the source to which you might consider turning when you are completely fed up with your daughter, when she has found your last nerve and is standing on it, when you realize you have memorized the phone number of the private military academy over in the next county.

But instead of raising your voice to her, instead of saying some things you may regret later, instead of reminding her that you brought her into this world, instead of embarrassing her in front of the entire family, even though that is precisely what she deserves, just imagine . . .
What would you do if your boss suddenly walked into the room? Hmmm. Would you pull him by the earlobe? Would you stick your finger in his face and hiss like a snake? Would you ask him the same question over and over? Would you ask him the same question over and over? Would you call him a name? Would you call him by his full name in a loud voice with lots of extra pronunciation on all the consonants?

Probably not. Not if you wanted to keep your job.

To your boss you would show complete respect and consideration. To your boss you would give the benefit of the doubt. There is no concession you could not make, and no compromise that could not be reached.

Your daughter should get the same respect, if not more. Why not let her meet the kind and considerate you hiding there behind the angry and frustrated version? Why not introduce her to the resilient spirit who always finds a reason to laugh at a situation, regardless of how dire?

Let her say hello to the forgiving optimist who makes a self- deprecating remark to lighten the mood, and makes the whole room laugh. Let her hang out with the practical gamer who always finds a way to look at the bright side of things.

Treat her like your boss.
Excerpt from Parking Lot Rules & 75 Other Ideas for Raising Amazing Children by Tom Sturges

Someone may have recommended this book to you, or you may even get it for Fathers Day:
Reading with Dad.

A Great Father’s Day Gift for a Dad Who Reads to His Kids

Tuesday June 9, 2009
If you are looking for a Father’s Day gift for a dad who has always enjoyed reading books to his kids, I highly recommend Reading With Dad. While written in verse and designed in picture book format, this is a gift book for adults rather than a children’s book. The text by Richard Jorgensen and the loving illustrations by Warren Hanson celebrate the love between a father and a daughter that is experienced through the act of reading together. Beginning with the father reading to his young daughter, the book continues through her growing up years to the daughter reading aloud to her own children while still continuing to read with her dad. The book ends with her reminiscing,

[From A Great Father's Day Gift for a Dad Who Reads to His Kids]

Here’s my review of it:

My daughter got Reading with Dad and as the dad who had to read it to her, I’d have to say that I disagree with this review. The book is written in sing-songy verse and ends with dad dying and the reading of a biblical verse. If you want to spend 15 minutes thinking of how it will feel to watch your child grow up while you get old and die (while reading bad poetry), be my guest. Most of us prefer something more uplifting.

The Secret of the Junkyard Shadow is a very creative mystery story.It is about three cousins who happen to see a man taking stuff from a junkyard. Then some people say some of their stuff has disappeared! It turns out that the junkyard shadow was only trying to do good deeds! I recommend this book for ages 8 to 10. This book is not violent at all, but it is a very intriging story.

Written by Hadley (age 9)

Parking Lot Rules (and 75 other ideas for raising children) by Tom Sturges is good little volume of helpful hints Mr. Sturges has learned over sixteen years of fatherhood. While some of the tips are just plain practical (4 times to wash hands) may seem a little out of place compared to the more emotional issues he faces, such as how to communicate your love to a sixteen year old boy without embarrassing him. Other advice, such as the importance of thank you notes, also seems like filler though I can tell from other parts of the book that social conventions are important to the author. I tend to share his views on the importance of teaching basic social habits like saying “please” and “thank you,” but you might be surprised to see this advice sandwiched in between other more sentimental issues.

Still, I liked Parking Lot Rules (which refers to another practical tip about parking lot safety) and I’ll keep it on the bedside table a while. There are even a few things I want to show my wife.

Our friends at DadLabs.com are at it again with a new book that tries to put in prose what they do so well in video. And, they do a great job, with tongue in cheek article son everything about pregnancy through Year 1 (subsequent volumes will treat older kids).

The new book is DadLabs Guide to Fatherhood. It has many practical tips on subjects like picking a baby name and how to change a diaper, just as you will find on DadLabs TV, but much of the value of this book is the ability to laugh at the early stages of parenthood, just as your pregnant partner is taking it so seriously. There is a time for soulful feelings about incipient fatherhood, but also a time for having a beer and making some crude jokes using all the new vocabulary you’ve just learned in Childbirth class.

Recommended for nervous dads who need to see the lighter side, or as a fun shower gift (you are throwing a man shower, right?).

$16.95 on Amazon and other fine booksellers.

I have not given this much thought, but the idea behind this article is that dads are way under-represented in kids’ fiction, save for the famous
Hop on Pop. Let me know what you think - we’ll even do a contest. Name kids’ books with dads who are at least present in the story and extra points if they are positive literary forces.   

Where are all the nice, normal dads in children’s books?
Fathers in children’s books are rarely positive figures. But as dads do more childcare, it’s time publishers took note

[From Where are all the nice, normal dads in children's books? - Times Online ]

Contest details to come…

My nine year-old daughter has written a review of the new Buddy Talk, a new conversation starter toy from www.aroundthetablegames.com. She likes books like
Coke Vs. Pepsi , a book that asks people to make choices between two things to get them to talk about what kind of person they are. What seems like silly, surface level questions to an adult, are intriguing to kids. Whether you drink Pepsi or Coke has obviously no real value to understanding who we really are. We adults are smarter, focusing instead on what vodka we drink, car we drive, or shoes we wear.

Buddy Talk, though, looks at loftier things, like kids’ hopes, fears and dreams.

Around the Table Games has other variations on this theme for families and kids needing new topics to talk from.   

Her (very short) review:

Buddy Talk is fun to play by yourself or with your friends. If you take buddy talk to a restaurant it’s great to entertain you or your friends. It’s also great to start a conversation. It has a cool clip so it can hang from your backpack.

Scholastic Inc., the children’s publisher of favorites like the Harry Potter, Goosebumps and Clifford series, may be best known for its books, but a consumer watchdog group accuses the company of using its classroom book clubs to push video games, jewelry kits and toy cars.

[From Watchdog Group Says Scholastic Is Selling Not Just Books to Children - NYTimes.com]

While we like a lot of books Scholastic publishes, and their program to provide books to schools, it’s hard not to be quite miffed when we receive what is basically a toy catalog about three times each school year. When I was a child, living in rural Wisconsin, the Scholastic book order was my big chance to buy my own books. My mom would let me buy as many books as I wanted, given my track record of reading them all. Nowadays, the Scholastic catalog is a mixture of real books, novelizations, and just plain toys. Like everything else about parenting now, the Scholastic catalog means you have to monitor and censor. You have to go through every page of your child’s choices to determine whether they are a good choice for your child. Inevitably, there are disappointments and disagreements about what is appropriate, and even about what counts as a “book.” We address the toy issue by saying we won’t pay for any choice that isn’t a real book. No longer also is there a feeling that this is a way for a child to choose his or her own books. All of these books are available on Amazon and other outlets.

Given this new report by The Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, we hope Scholastic will get back to the roots. They have a good thing going with the nation’s schools. They shouldn’t take advantage of the situation by putting profits over books.

After many requests, we’ve finally gotten it together and put some of the articles on top subjects in a series of ebooks, downloadable in PDF so you can read them in a Kindle, iPhone, Blackberry, or old-fashioned PC. You can even print them out, and take them to the bath. They are available for top dad subjects:

1. Five toilet training tips
2. Six baby sleeping tips
3. Dad’s sex secrets for pregnancy and beyond
4. Baby names
5. Every Guy’s Guide to What to Expect When She is Expecting by Grant Eppler

All are free when you subscribe to our newsletters, except the last, which is hilarious and helpful, and significantly less expensive than the paperback version.