exciting year

one more year is coming to an end. On the whole, this year had mixed feeling and emotions. 2004 was really good. But again we can’t blame on the year. It is attributed to what we did that particular year. One and only thing that occupied my mind this year was my daughter. If we calculate the time I spent on various activities, the time spent in thinking about her would top the list. She is a very cute and intelligent child.

In the beginning of the year she started rolling over, then she started sitting, towards the end of the year she started walking. Now she walks nicely though she often trips and falls down. It is still hard for me to believe that my daughter walks. I should really thank God for giving me such a sweet child. Now I think it is time for me think about other things like saving for my child and other financial matters.I have to concentrate on this as in no time my daughter will start running , go to school and blossom into a beautiful young woman

Becoming a father

There is a feeling of elation when you wife first tells you that she is in the family way.The way you look at her changes drastically and suddenly you don the coat of a caring and doting husband. She gives you a doubtful look wondering if all that extra care is for her or the baby. You care about her and pamper her with things that she had once asked you and you have been rejecting . Though there is a pinch in you pocket in buying all those food supplements,medicines and fruits for her, you do it with a sense of satisfaction. Whenever you tell somebody that you are going to become a father, the pride shows.

But waiting for all these months is not a big deal. The real anxiety hits you when you are informed that the baby is born and you wait for the nurse to show you the baby. you can feel a roller coaster running in your stomach.what will she be like? like me or her mohter? will she be plump or thin? will she be the girl i have been viusalizing all these months? The feeling is hard to describe. I have spoken about this to many young fathers and most of them have felt the same way. I think this happens when you wait for something to happen and when it finally happens.That too, in this matter you dont have any control. When you finally see her and hear her cry ( most babies wail during this time) it brings mixed mixed emtions.

Though you are happy ,you are scared. You should change a lot. you should become more mature as now there is somebody who will look up to you and learn. you should be more religious. you should be kind towards people. you should be a perfect guy. you should...you should... whenever you look at your father or uncles , you see them from a different perspective. you are one of them. you belong to the league. suddenly that sense of closeness sets in.

The first few months of fatherhood is something no father can forget. you like the way she smiles, moves her arms and she cries. you lie next to her for hours together and speak a language that is understandable only to you ( definitely not to the baby or your wife). This is the starting point for the eternal feud "wife or child?". Your wife starts complaining that you have changed a lot after the kid arrived and is more (or only) interested in the kid. Then the kid starts rolling and finally she starts moving. This is a timeframe where you get more physical exercise. I still dont understand the sleeping habits of the kids. it is totally unpredicatable and she wakes up and goes to sleep at will. I have always considered and prided myself on being a night owl. but i didnot expect the competetion to crop up from my own family that too from my own daughter.

If your wife is a working woman , you deserve pity.You almost end up everynight looking after the kid. She is in a very playful mood and this only increases as the clock ticks. at midnight she is full form and you are expected to give her company.. lucky are the few who can go to sleep immediately anywhere and at any time.my wife is lucky and I am not. Your whole life revolves around the kid. you constanly are on the look out to prevent her from banging her head on the TV stand, from putting your vehicle keys or the coins into her mouth and becoming a playmate whenever she demands. You start to belive you have made a good father and your kid loves to be with you.Suddenly she starts crying and wants to go to her mother as if you never existed. these are insulting moments any father has to undergo.

you go to sleep well after mighnight and when you close your eyes you think of the next days meeting with your client. You get up early and rush to themeeting, get kicked right royally, come to office, fight with your subordinates, solve the worthless confilct of your team members, pacify a few others, prepare an impossible target plan to be sent to the superioirs and break your head in finishing the pending work in an equally impossible deadline. You are pushed to the peak of irritation and start worrying about the way your life has changed. you often feel that you have to run away to some far corner of the earth and be out of all this. When you get back home you feel drained and exhausted and could not even drag yourself into the house.

but there, your kid waits and she gives a broad smile seeing you. You see the happiness in her face. hell to deadlines and deliveries. now you are a father to this beautiful kid who is happy just for the fact that you are back home. You forget that you are a dignified IT professional. you become the crazy guy whom your daughter loves. You get ready for another late night session. afterall fatherhood gives you a satisfaction that your job doesnot.

Bath

"Baths are fun! Bring plastic containers or empty water bottles to bath time. Show baby how you fill them up with water. Then pour water from one container to another. Help baby do this too. It will foster her physical skills such as eye-hand coordination. "

Parenting Techniques

Aggression, which can be both good and bad, is a normal human instinct. It spurs a baby to crawl and then to walk. It compels a preschooler to try to run as fast as her friends, and a school-age child to get good marks in school. When aggression becomes hostile, parents must help children control and use it to their advantage.

http://parenting.sesameworkshop.org/sesamebeginnings/library
/article.php?contentId=1034

Due to the powerful link between mother and baby in the womb, a newborn can't sense where she ends and Mom begins. But around age 5 or 6 months, babies discover their fingers and toes and begin to realize that their bodies are their own, separate and apart from their mother's.

http://parenting.sesameworkshop.org/sesamebeginnings/library/
article.php?contentId=86681

Babies reveal their temperament in many ways: through their attentiveness and ability to focus; their activity level; their regularity of feeding and sleeping; their ease or difficulty in adjusting to change; and their degree of sociability. By observing behavior, researchers (and, more importantly, parents) can get a glimpse of the kinds of personalities children will develop.

http://parenting.sesameworkshop.org/sesamebeginnings/library/
article.php?contentId=101140

Even if you didn't try infant massage with your first child, you might want to check it out this time around. You may find that it benefits both you and your baby.

http://parenting.sesameworkshop.org/sesamebeginnings/library/
article.php?contentId=618

Emotionally Intelligent Child

Help your child name his feelings.
With limited vocabulary and rudimentary understanding of cause and
effect, toddlers often have trouble describing what they feel. You
can encourage your child to build an emotional vocabulary by giving
him labels for his feelings. If he's acting disappointed about not
being able to go to the park, you might say, "You feel sad about
that, don't you?" You can also let him know that it's normal to have
conflicting emotions about something - for instance, he may be both
excited and scared during his first week at daycare.

If your child seems sad or upset for no immediate reason, try
looking at the big picture and thinking about what might be troubling
him. Have you moved recently? Did you and your spouse have an argument
in his presence? If you're not sure what's going on, watch and listen
to him while he plays. If he makes the Mommy doll shout a lot, you'll
have a pretty good idea what's bothering him.

Validate your child's emotions.
Instead of saying, "There's no reason to get so upset," if your child
gets mad and throws a tantrum because he's unable to put together a
puzzle, acknowledge how natural his reaction is. Say, "It's really
frustrating when you can't finish a puzzle, isn't it?" Telling him his
reactions are inappropriate or excessive will make him feel as if he
should muzzle them.

Turn tantrums into teaching tools.
If your child gets upset when he hears that he has an appointment with
the dentist, help him feel in control by preparing for the visit. Talk
with him about why he's afraid, what he can expect during the visit,
and why he needs to go. Tell him about a time you had stage fright
before a recital or were scared to start a new job and one of your
friends made you feel better. Talking through emotions works the same
way for children as it does for most adults.

Use conflicts to teach problem-solving.
When your toddler goes head-to-head with you or another child, make his
limits clear, then guide him toward a solution. For example, you can
say, "I know you're upset that your sister keeps knocking over your
block tower, but you can't hit her. What else can you do if you get
mad?" If your child doesn't have any ideas, give him options. Anger
management specialist Lynne Namka advises telling your child to first
check his tummy, jaw, and fists to see if they're tight, breathe deeply
"to blow the mad out," and to feel good about recovering control. Then,
Namka says, help your child use a strong voice to talk his anger out,
beginning with something like, "I feel mad when you yell like that."
Children should know that it's okay to be angry, as long as they don't
hurt other people for that reason.

Set an example by staying calm.
You'll also want to check how you react to your child's display of
emotions. It's important not to be verbally harsh when you're angry.
Try saying, "It upsets me when you do that," rather than "You make me
crazy," so your child understands that the problem is his behavior, not
him. Be careful to avoid excessive criticism, which tends to chip away
at a child's self-confidence.

And above all else, stay in touch with your own feelings. Some parents
ignore their own negative emotions, hoping to spare their children
discomfort or difficulty. But hiding your real feelings will only
confuse your child. By acknowledging that you're displeased without
acting upset, for instance, you show your child that even difficult
feelings can be managed.

first birthday party

My daughter has completed her first year on 13-1205. We had a small aprty on 17-12-05 in our place to celebrate the occasion. i have posted the photos in the site and you can view them by clicking here

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easy way to blog

Hi

I am doing this post through word. This is a nice way of blogging. All you have to do is download the utility and install it in your system. You get a blogging toolbar inside word itself.

what to expect from a 13 to 18 month old kid?

This chart show what to expect from a kid who is 13 to 18 months old.

pic taken in Aug 2005

parenting articles

nice articles on parenting and raising kids.

http://www.essortment.com/in/Children.Parenting.Discipline/index.htm

Child raising advice

how to teach your child independence, self sufficiency, and responsibilty. The end result will be a wellrounded child.


It is important to most parents to raise what they feel is a well rounded child. A child who will eventually become a self-sufficient adult. There are many ways to instill values of independence, and self-sufficiency in your child at a young age. These can be fantastic tools for raising a child that will look out for him or herself and be responsible for his or her own actions. The key to raising a well rounded child is to balance the parental input so that you are giving your child all he or she needs emotionally and physically, while at the same time showing your child that he or she can do a lot of things independently. It is never to early to start teaching your child a "can do" attitude.


* Give Your Child Responsibility: It is never too early to teach your child responsibility. Whether it be the job of picking up his or her own toys, helping with dishes, or helping take care of the family pet. Too many parents do everything for their children, thus instilling the idea at a early age that if they don’t do it, someone else will. This is a dangerous pattern to fall into if you want a well rounded child. Even a two year old can be put in charge of certain tasks. The mere act of being responsible for placing his or her shoes in a designated area when not wearing them, or hanging up the bath towel after a bath, can teach your child to put thought into his or her actions.



* Do Not Do What They Can Do: If your four year old says, "Mommy, go get my juice, it’s on the table" should you? No! Unless a child is ill and really is feeling so poorly that they should be made to rest as much as possible, this is a situation where you as a parent should say, "If you want your juice, it’s right over there". If you wait on your children hand and foot just because they are small they will come to expect it. If it is some task that they can quite obviously do for themselves—let them!


* Teach Your Children About Consequences: How many parents have you seen who threaten and threaten and never stick to the threats? Plenty. You may even be guilty yourself. However, if you threaten and then once a few tears are shed, cave in, you are teaching your child that there are no consequences for their actions. Stick to your guns, they will be better off in the long run. If they repeatedly do something they know is wrong and you threaten no cartoons after dinner, then make it no cartoons after dinner. Empty threats do nothing for the parent or the child.


* Set An Example: The greatest tool your child has to learn self sufficiency, independence and responsibility is by example. You are the best teacher your child has. This means that if you say you are going to do something you should try as hard as possible to live up to what you say. This sometimes means playing matchbox cars when you are tired, making a cake when you don’t feel like it, playing outside with your kids when you’d rather be reading the latest John Grisham novel. If you show your children that people should live up to their promises, they will keep that lesson for life.

Ten Tips for Raising Children of Character

by Kevin Ryan, PhD

Adapted from Building Character in Schools, Appendix One.

San Francisco: Jossey-Bass,1999

It is one of those essential facts of life that raising good children--children of character--demands time and attention. While having children may be "doing what comes naturally," being a good parent is much more complicated. Here are ten tips to help your children build sturdy characters:

1. Put parenting first. This is hard to do in a world with so many competing demands. Good parents consciously plan and devote time to parenting. They make developing their children’s character their top priority.

2. Review how you spend the hours and days of your week. Think about the amount of time your children spend with you. Plan how you can weave your children into your social life and knit yourself into their lives.

3. Be a good example. Face it: human beings learn primarily through modeling. In fact, you can’t avoid being an example to your children, whether good or bad. Being a good example, then, is probably your most important job.

4. Develop an ear and an eye for what your children are absorbing. Children are like sponges. Much of what they take in has to do with moral values and character. Books, songs, TV, the Internet, and films are continually delivering messages–moral and immoral–to our children. As parents we must control the flow of ideas and images that are influencing our children.

5. Use the language of character. Children cannot develop a moral compass unless people around them use the clear, sharp language of right and wrong.

6. Punish with a loving heart. Today, punishment has a bad reputation. The results are guilt-ridden parents and self-indulgent, out-of-control children. Children need limits. They will ignore these limits on occasion. Reasonable punishment is one of the ways human beings have always learned. Children must understand what punishment is for and know that its source is parental love.

7. Learn to listen to your children. It is easy for us to tune out the talk of our children. One of the greatest things we can do for them is to take them seriously and set aside time to listen.

8. Get deeply involved in your child’s school life. School is the main event in the lives of our children. Their experience there is a mixed bag of triumphs and disappointments. How they deal with them will influence the course of their lives. Helping our children become good students is another name for helping them acquire strong character.

9. Make a big deal out of the family meal. One of the most dangerous trends in America is the dying of the family meal. The dinner table is not only a place of sustenance and family business but also a place for the teaching and passing on of our values. Manners and rules are subtly absorbed over the table. Family mealtime should communicate and sustain ideals that children will draw on throughout their lives.

10. Do not reduce character education to words alone. We gain virtue through practice. Parents should help children by promoting moral action through self-discipline, good work habits, kind and considerate behavior to others, and community service. The bottom line in character development is behavior--their behavior.

As parents, we want our children to be the architects of their own character crafting, while we accept the responsibility to be architects of the environment–physical and moral. We need to create an environment in which our children can develop habits of honesty, generosity, and a sense of justice. For most of us, the greatest opportunity we personally have to deepen our own character is through the daily blood, sweat and tears of struggling to be good parents.

sayings

"Don't worry that children never listen to you. Worry that they are always watching you."
— Robert Fulghum, American author (b. 1937)

"Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old, he will not depart from it."
— Proverbs, 22:6

children growth charts

this site has useful info on growth charts and parenting tips as well.

http://www.keepkidshealthy.com/growthcharts/

my daughter- pic taken in Feb 2005

prathista

She is completing her first year on dec 13th