I’m about to tell you something really big.  This one tip for parenting has the power to transform your family.  If you can implement just one change in your household, make it this one. Are you ready for this?  Ok…here it is:  Eat family dinners around the table.  I didn’t really know this wasn’t the norm until I started talking to other people about it.  As it turns out, family dinners around the table aren’t as common as I thought.
     According to the web site www.thefamilydinnerproject.org, “Recent studies link regular family dinners with many behaviors that parents pray for: lower rates of substance abuse, teen pregnancy and depression, as well as higher grade-point averages and self-esteem. Studies also indicate that dinner conversation is a more potent vocabulary-booster than reading, and the stories told around the kitchen table help our children build resilience.”  What other thing can you do as a parent that has so much benefit for so little effort?
     Right now, some of you are saying, “This crazy woman doesn’t know our family’s schedule.”  I get it.  You’re busy.  I remember the weeks that had multiple sports practices, school functions, board meetings and homework to finish.  Sometimes you are just glad to shovel a little food into your kids on the way to the next thing on the agenda. 
     I’m not talking about serving a gourmet meal every night of the week.  It really doesn’t matter if the meal is frozen fish sticks or even a Happy Meal.  The key to this tip is to sit around a table.  Maybe that table is in your local Wendy’s or Chipotle.  That’s ok too.  Just gather as a family and eat together.  Ask each other about your day.  Tell them about something you read or something that happened at work.  Let them tell you about the math test that was so hard or the science experiment that went wrong. 
     If you’re new at this concept, you might have a jar of conversation starters that each person draws from.  These might be something like “Tell us something that made you laugh today” or “Tell one new thing you learned today.”  You can look on Pinterest for a million ideas for these kinds of prompts.   
     Put your phones away.  Make this a family rule that no one is allowed to look at the phone or the tv until you’ve had dinner.  Model this by putting a box or a basket on the table and having everyone stow their device until everyone is finished eating.  It is a rare occasion that there is an emergency so important that it can’t wait for 30 minutes until you all get finished. 
     For those of you with younger kids, I know that mealtime might be the most stressful time of the day.  Getting dinner on the table, trying to find something that your picky eaters won’t complain about, cleaning up milk spills and making sure the toddlers aren’t feeding their dinner to the dog make this time of day a hair-raising experience!  Can I just encourage you to keep trying?  There will come a day that you’ll have intelligent conversation and you won’t be reminding your preschooler to take another bite every 45 seconds. 
     Now that my kids are grown and gone, my favorite dinners are when they are gathered back around the family table.  Yes, we’ve added more chairs to accommodate daughters-in-law and grandchildren and sometimes it’s a big messy event.  We still have milk spills. Sometimes we have debates about politics or current events.  But mostly what we have is laughter and teasing and everyone telling stories about things that have happened during the week.  It’s a time to reconnect and share a little bit of our busy lives.  Oh yeah, and we eat.  I can guarantee it isn’t a gourmet meal and sometimes it’s just Chinese take -out or pizza.  That really is the smallest detail.  The best part is when we linger over the empty plates long after the meal is over because we’re still talking. 
     So as you’re slogging through the years of sippy cups and cutting everybody's meat, take heart.  Eventually these meals will morph into something you’ll enjoy and in the meantime you’ll be getting to know the people that your children are becoming.    And take it from a mama who has a few miles on the odometer….the results are worth it.

     There’s a lot of parenting advice out there but if you want to really succeed at ruining your kid, these 5 easy steps will get the job done.  (P.S. If they ever tell you that you are the meanest parent in the world, you are doing this all wrong.)

1.  Make sure they know that they are the center of the universe.  Always side with the child over the other parent.  Make sure that all of their needs are met first and that they don’t have the responsibility to think of anyone beside themselves.  They are only kids, after all.
2. Make sure they always win.  If you are playing games with them, you don’t want to be the bully that beats them fair and square.   This will teach them to expect to win in everything and helps develop their “sore loser” muscles.
3. Make sure they have every new thing.  Did a kid on the bus have a bag full of shopkins or a stack of pokemon cards?  Did their friend get to buy 157 tiny erasers from the student store?  Well, then, make sure that your kid isn’t the ONLY one that doesn’t have ALL OF THE THINGS. 
4. Make sure they know you will always believe them.  Even if a teacher tells you they did something wrong.  Even if another adult points out bad behavior.  Remember, they are little and always innocent.   And most of those teachers are only in it for the money anyway.
5. Make sure you give in if they ask often enough.  The best way to accomplish this is to tell them “no” a few times and then act exasperated when you change your answer to “yes”.

    I’m sure there are plenty of things I’m missing, but if you concentrate on these 5 things, the rest should come together naturally.  Those of us who work with children will be able to tell if you are succeeding at this.  Yours will be the kids who always have to be first.  First in line, first picker for teams, first one up the stairs, first one on the bus….  They are the kids who always blame someone else when they get in trouble.  They will throw their friends under the bus in a hot second and make sure that we know they were just doing what everyone else was doing. 
     They are the kids who want to be on the inside of every inside joke.  They are the kids who want to point out how they fit in and how others stick out.  They are the kids who always have someone to sit with and protect the seats all around them for their friends. 
     They are the kids who you can hear bragging to their friends because they don’t have a bedtime and their parents let them have a say in all the decisions.  They are the kids who aren’t a bit intimidated when a teacher informs them that they’ll have to contact the parents.  These kids know whose side you’ll be on no matter what.
      I was a failure as a parent.  My kids would gladly tell you that I would never let them win at games and I didn’t care what new thing all their friends had.  I was unbending and rigid when I gave them an answer they didn’t like and I always believed it when another adult told me something rotten they did.  In spite of all that bad parenting, they have grown up to be responsible adults.   And you want to know the weirdest thing?  They are turning out to be failures as parents too.  And nothing does this mama’s heart more good than to hear my words come out of their mouths. 

                Kindergarten….it ain’t what it used to be!  In days gone by, kids went to kindergarten to learn their ABC’s  and how to use scissors. Now they are expected to come IN to kindergarten with a baseline level of skills which include recognizing and writing the alphabet and even some sight words.  Kids who haven’t had some sort of preschool experience or parents working diligently with them at home are already behind before their school career even starts!
                I can tell you from experience that there is a real difference in kids who have parents who are engaged in the learning process.  A few years ago we had a little guy who was clearly at the top of the class.  His parents were not Ivy League scholars or prominent executives.  In fact, they were just average working class laborers who made their child a priority.  They did some things that really made a difference and probably didn’t even know they were doing such a great job!  Every week when they came to school, they had been talking about the new letter of the week and trying to guess what the letter would stand for in our phonics chant.  It was just a little game that dad and son would play on the way to school, but it sparked a curiosity in that child that made him eager to learn.
                So how can you build a firm foundation before they step into the classroom on that first day?  Here are 10 things that will help your little one get ready:

1. Read to them.  Read the same stories over and over and read new stories whenever you can.  Go to the library and explore all of the choices, then buy the books that are clear favorites.  I’m a book snob, so I don’t advocate buying lots of cheap books.  I’d rather own a handful of really good classics than a whole shelf full of books that are poorly written.
2. Talk to them.  Seriously.  Put down your phone and talk to them.  Tell them what the workers are doing when you pass a construction site.  When they ask questions, give them real answers.  If you don’t know (exactly why is the sky blue?) tell them the truth but then show them how to find the answer. (OK, you might actually pick your phone back up to find the answer, but that’s sometimes a good way to find information.)  Spell things out when you see print in the environment and tell them how those letters make a word.  Point out letters on signs that are in their name. 
3. Teach them how to hold a pencil or crayon and let them write regularly.  Gently correct their grip until they get it right.  (If this is a problem, try using crayon rocks that force the right grip to use them. Amazon sells them for about $10.)
4. Let them cut paper.  Yes, I know it’s messy and yes, I know they might cut their hair off.  Almost every three year old does that.  My older son cut his cousin's hair off--and that was worse by far than my younger son cutting off his own hair! Sit with them and supervise, but let them cut!  Teach them the correct way to hold scissors.  Start by asking them to fringe a strip of paper then graduate to drawing lines and have them cut on the lines.
5. Play games like Candyland and memory match games.  Also—don’t let them win unless they win fair and square!  More on this later….
6. Play with playdough regularly and use tools for cutting and squeezing.  And yes, I know this is messy, but it will build fine motor skills and hand strength.
7. Let them help in the grocery store and the kitchen.  Show them how to measure ingredients while you cook and ask them to help choose the correct size or color of the items you buy at the store.    Yes, this takes longer and yes, this is probably messy too.  It’s ok.
8. Teach them to spell their name.  Make a game out of it or come up with a rhyme to help them remember it.  When they know how to spell it, move on to writing it.  (And make sure they capitalize the beginning and use lower case for the subsequent letters.  Their teacher will thank you.)
9. Turn off the TV and the tablet.  Kids who are entertained constantly don’t learn how to sit quietly for a story or know how to wait without being plugged in.  A little boredom is actually not a bad thing.
10. Help them learn to play well with others.  Take them places where there are other kids and help them learn to be social.  Teach them to introduce themselves and ask others to play with them and coach them if they need encouragement. 

     If you are looking for a preschool to help you prepare your little one for school, we’d love to talk to you at our Spring Open House on April 10th.  We also offer Summer Preschool Playgroups that are a great way to ease into the preschool experience.  Check out the rest of our web site for more information about these events.

              When I was a little girl, I was playing too near an old metal fan.  My grandpa showed me his hand that was missing part of a finger and warned me that if I wasn’t careful that would happen to me too.  As it turned out, that was a big fat lie.  A few years ago, many years after my grandfather died, I was relating that story to someone and my husband said, “You know that he was just kidding, right?  He cut that off in an industrial accident.”  What?!  All those years I believed something that was patently untrue!
             Here’s a classic:  when my kids were little I told them about the eyes that only moms have in the back of their heads.  One night as I was rocking my toddler he was groping around the back of my head and running his fingers through my hair.  Finally, annoyed, I asked what he was doing and he said that he was seeing if he could feel the eyes in the back of my head.
                When my older son was little we lived in another state.  I had complete control in a way that people who live near grandparents will never have.  I told him that the ice cream truck was just a nice man who played music for the children.  When we moved back to our hometown and the ice cream truck rolled through our neighborhood, my mother totally blew it and bought him ice cream. 
                When I was about 5, we saw a baby fox lying dead on the side of the road.  That was so traumatic and I was distraught over the poor little creature.  What was even worse was that my mom told me it was because he wasn’t holding his mommy’s hand when he crossed the street.  Of course, it was easy to remind me of the fox whenever I balked at holding her hand to cross a street or parking lot after that.
                My 4 year old grandson still needs to take a nap, but he always says he isn’t tired.  I tell him that he only has to lie still for 10 minutes with his eyes closed and then he can get up and play.  Works every time.
             When my best friend’s kids were little, she was trying to get them to confess about something.  She told them she would just have to go back and watch the video tape and see if they were lying.  They were terrified of being caught in a lie and blurted out their misdeeds.  Incredibly, she rode that horse for years—threatening to review the invisible tape whenever she needed the truth.
              My daughter in law got a Roomba for Christmas.  She has the kids convinced that if they leave their toys on the floor, the Roomba will suck them up.  Wanna see them freak out?  Turn that baby on while the door to the playroom is open.
               Time for confession, mamas and daddies.  Tell me what lies you have told your kids.  Some of you are saying right now that you never lie to your kids.  Oh really?  I mean, even if you cut out the classics like Santa and the Tooth Fairy, I’ll be willing to bet that you have told them the Paw Patrol dvd is broken or that the candy machine at the store is broken before.  Come on.  Fess up.  There’s no judgement here.