Is Bedtime a Badtime?

Bedtime seems to go in cycles around here. Just when we get in a comfortable phase of putting them in bed, all bathed and happy, kissing them goodnight and tiptoeing away to the melodious sound of synchronized snores, things change.

The change seems to happen the night after (or the minute after) one of us remarks to the other parent "Wow, they sure are good at going to bed these days." Then bedtime reverts to the all out war that it seems to be about two weeks out of the month.

I have a theory that it's not because we've done anything wrong that this change happens. I don't generally credit it to a change in diet, or a change in routine, or a change in the stars. It just seems like consistency isn't what they're looking for a bedtime--at least not long term. They want the routine changed every so often and by the time they tell you they want the change, it's too late.

We cycle through different pre-bedtime rituals to try and make the night go down more smoothly. From this following list, we mix and match until we have a mixed grill of a nighttime schedule that works for the next few weeks.

Reading at Bedtime: This is a classic for obvious reasons. It gives us some time to wind-down, talk calmly, and read something that is comforting (even though I like them best when they get just a little bit scary in there). My favorite bedtime stories are from Maurice Sendak, but don't stop with Where the Wild Things Are; also try Outside over There and The Night Kitchen.

Singing: I happen to enjoy singing lullabies. I don't think that it's a good idea to introduce this ritual if you don't enjoy it. It has staying power and you will have requests over and over again. I usually take this one out of the routine when I notice that my girls are staying awake just to make me sing more. My favorites to sing are "Feed the Birds," "Sweet Baby James," and "Pooh Corner." But they often make me sing a drawn-out version of The Decemberists "The Crane Wife" oddly enough.

Bedtime Music: We have a small CD player that we play lullabies on. This works sometimes as a substitute to singing and sometimes in addition to. We have a few different CDs and mixes to change things up. But, like all these others, their tastes sometime drift away from this ritual.

Story of the Day: This is especially good if we've had long, active days or had visitors. We sit and talk about all the things we did today, each taking turns coming up with details to fill it out. Then, we end by planning out our next day. This works really well for making our expectations if we have big plans for tomorrow.

Holding Hands: Sometimes I have to sit there and hold hands until my older daughter goes to sleep. This only works when she's really tired and had some kind of a scare. She is usually asleep pretty fast, or I just can't stay there all night and she moves into our bed. Holding hands is a last resort before:

Pulling my own hair out and screaming until I die: Sometimes nothing works. We have the girls shack up with us in our bed like we used to and hope to move them sometime in the night so that we can get some rest, too. The main thing is to realize that no matter how prepared you are, you're not always going to come out successfully. I don't actually recommend pulling out hair or screaming or dying, but it sure sounds like it would be helpful.

I always tell my daughters when they play keep-away with our German Shepard, "Don't play to win, just play." That's how I feel about bedtime. Don't play to win. In the end, they can always outlast your patients if you make it a power struggle. Just talk things out, give in if you must, but set expectations that this night is different from tomorrow night.

The Sex Talk

A recent trip to visit our folks resulted in my three-year-old wondering where babies come from. Something had to spawn it sooner or later, and it is probably fortuitous considering all the talk there's been around here lately about a third baby. All the same, it was somewhat unexpected and really, there was no real strategy in place. Here's how it went:

Solstice (that's daughter number one) was looking at pictures of me when I was her age. This is something that grandparents love to thrill grandkids with. This information, about me being her age at one time in the universe, got her to thinking. Finally, while in the car, she quizzed her mother on the situation. "Mommy," she said, "do you remember when Daddy was a little boy?"

She answered truthfully that she didn't, but that she met me much later. This led to a series of questions getting at the heart of the whole issue. Finally, my wife told her that we had met, fallen in love, and gotten married. "Was I there?" she asked.

My wife did her best to explain that, no, she wasn't there, that it was before she was born, before she was a baby. But that we decided to have a baby. "You went to the store?" Well, no, we didn't go to the store. She explained to Solstice that Daddy put her in Mommy's stomach so that she could grow in there.

And now, Solstice had fully grasped the situation. "Oh," she said conclusively, "He used his magic wand."

Hmm. Not exactly. But the resultant laughing was enough to end the conversation without any of the more explicit details.

So what do we do about the whole "sex talk" thing? I've read a few things lately by people in the field who say that around age 8 is the right time. But by the time my 3 year old is 8, will it be too late? And if she's this curious right now, how do we put things off further? We can't really have her telling people in public that her new sibling was put into her mommy's tummy by daddy's magic wand! That would be considerable more disturbing for those listening to this astonishing fact than the gory truth of the thing.

As for me, I cannot remember not knowing. It's not due to any lack of memory as I remember my 2nd birthday. But I'm sure at that age I didn't have a lot of wonder about the subject. I imagine that it has more to due with the fact that my mom was a childbirth teacher and somewhat of a hippie. I don't remember a single time that "the talk" was delivered to me, but many instances of simple explanation that I mainly shied away from.

Conversely, there are many friends of mine who say that their parents never told them. They had to find out friends and their varying sources of reliability. I think this is mainly a selfish point of view in parenting, where the parent hopes to avoid a conversation that will feel awkward.

I wonder how our generation will handle this one. There are lots of books that explain this with illustrations and the like, but I don't know if I really want to read the book with the cartoon penis in it every night before bed. While, yes, at this point in my parenting life I hope that my girls never have any interests in boys, I know this can't ultimately be the case. And unlike people, like our dear president, who think that sex education should be about how to avoid sex, I think it should be about education. And with the curious minds I already have in tow, I don't believe in holding back truths from a mind seeking to learn something.

I am curious to know how the more experienced parents handled this and how the others plan on handling it. I don't think that by any means this is the defining issue of our children's lives, and I think that most of the drama is parent-induced. Nevertheless, all discourse is helpful.

The Power of Language in Childhood Creativity

Certainly the most amazing thing we will ever accomplish is over and done with by age five. Scale Mt. Everest, swim the Pacific, be the first person to walk on Mars, and it doesn't matter--your very biggest accomplishment is resting softly behind you with no laurels, no medals, and hardly a thought put into it after the milestone of preschool is reached. Of course, what we're talking about is the aquisition of language.

But to say "the aquisition of language" and act like we have a true understanding of what we speak of is to make the greatest understatement in human history. To aquire, master, or even understand any form of language is to gain a cognitive universe, full of ups, downs, emotions, colors, textures, and thought. All of these notions that we have about what reality is are based on the way that we use language. Our very perceptions of reality would shift dramatically without this basic skill.

Much has been written about this that I'd love to quote, but a blog entry can only be so long and, after all, I have a point to make somewhere after this meandering, so let me show you what I'm talking about.

Words as a substitute for understanding

When my oldest daughter was just beginning to speak, she expressed her curiosity about the world through her use of language. We, in turn, showed her the world that surrounds her by also using the language. As she aquired words, she not only had ways of saying things, but she aquired understandings about the world around her. And, even if she ultimatley didn't understand the concept she was trying to grasp, using a word as a replacement for the understanding being sought was enough for her.

Here's a good example: She started to wonder where I went all day. She would wake up, and I wouldn't be there most days of the week. For her, the universe is small, the population mainly centered in and around our house, and she, of course, couldn't fathom what it was I was doing not within the framework of her universe. She said this by shaking her head, putting out her arms, and saying, "Daddy? Where Daddy?" Easily enough, her question was posed.

The answer was, "At work."

And every day, she would nod and say, "At work."

This progressed. After a week or two of this question/anser jag, she started coming into the room and announcing, "Daddy at work."

Let me ask you this: what did a 14 month old know about "work?" Nothing, really. It was a place that Daddy goes instead of staying at home. She couldn't possibly know that this was normal for daddies everywhere, or what a myriad of different meanings "work" can have, both by definition and by context. But she was more than willing to take that word and use it as understanding, as meaning. And only now that she's three does she have much of an understanding at all.

Our kids do this with everything we teach them. Every little tiny thing. They take it as understanding and meaning. So how we present the world to them doesn't just offer description of a reality, but it gives them the only reality they know. This is heavy stuff. This is their world.

Okay, so what do we do with this information?

First of all, beats me. I mean, this is a big realization, that our responsibilities are not just to teach our children to speak, but to actually design the world that they live in. My wife could have easily told my daughter that I was off "killing" instead of being at "work." And it would be easy to show the ways that my part in the system of education can lead to things like poverty and war and deaths. And this is the world that she would be living in now.

But I think this presents us with great opportunity. I don't think that children should be molded. I think it's unavoidable that we should show them our beliefs and our ideals, but I don't think they should be forced. And I think this realization about language is a chance to steer things away from the brainwashing of the world.

Instead, I think we should see the aquisition of language as a great chance to nurture their creativity. Try and expand their vocabulary, especially if you speak English. English has more words than any other language ever has and is the only language that requires a thesaurus. It is a shame that we use so little of these words.

One of the greatest writers of English was Joseph Conrad. In his very slim book, The Heart of Darkness, he shows how versatile and beautiful the English language can be. It can be, in fact, much more like mood music when describing a scene or an action, and the understanding of his meaning comes across in painted pictures rather than concrete descriptors.

This is, of course, notable because Joseph Conrad held English as his third language. His outside perspective of the language enabled him to see the true spectrum. He was free of the usuage of language that his parents and peers employed.

In many ways, it would be ideal if our children were free from the bonds of language that we impose on them. And in other ways, they will be; afterall, children get their accents not from their parents, but from their peers.

Conclusions?

No. But I think it's important as a caring father to have an expanded awareness of how we raise our kids. Creativity is an attribute that should be cultivated in our children, regardless of how it helps them do on standardized tests. We should embrace their interpretations of the world and let them indulge in their own thoughts and ideas as much as we can. Encourage them to play with language. Engourage them to think outside of the box. Ask them their interpretation of the world before offering them the easy answer. You may be surprised and, hopefully, you'll be open to the idea that you are no more right than they are; you just agree with the majority.

Five Quotes to Live By

Getting caught up in the day to day experiences of life can blind one to the things they truly care about. It doesn't do a lot of good to lose focus and lose balance. But these following quotes--chosen because they a) are great and b) aren't cliche--are short meditations on what it is to embrace one's priorities. Read through and maybe you'll find one that speaks to you today:

1. Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise: seek what they sought. ~Basho

In my writing classes, I try and stress the ideas of respect and acceptance of our fellow classmates. This is sometimes harder to achieve than you might think. In my classes students are encouraged to write about their own experiences and what has brought them to their beliefs. This causes a lot of trouble between different ideologies the students might hold. But this quote really puts into focus what I try and stress to the class. "Whatever you've been through, whatever you've done, it's brought you here," I tell the class. "We have at least something in common, some part of the goals we reach involve this place and this time. Don't knock what has brought the person next to you. You didn't need to go through that to get here; he or she did."

Basho is one of the great masters of the haiku, so it is perhaps without surprise that he is so quotable (if you haven't read any of his poems, you need to). It always reminds me that my life doesn't to be like that of the people or religious leaders whom I admire. There may be a lot of things to learn from their lives, but my lessons will be different.

2. Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover. ~ Mark Twain

Twain in perhaps my favorite author. To me, he really shows his stuff in the second part of this quote. While he, being somewhat of a sailor, may have meant it more literally than I take it, it really speaks to the adventurous nature of this quote. Many of us, I'm sure, have read and understand that first sentence in some form or another, it's the second part that really brings it to life, that lets you feel what he means. Taking this pulnge to follow your dreams has never sounded more exciting and appealing than he makes it sound. This quote often inspires me to drop my petty concerns about a project, a trip, an expenditure, or a big decision.

3. Happiness is the absence of the striving for happiness. ~Chuang-tzu

How Taoist is this quote? Just decide to be happy and you are. How can it be that easy? Well, if we apply this notion to the ways in which we are always striving to get more, more, more, then it comes to light. This can be seen as a tremendous argument for simplicity. Decide, for yourself, how much is going to be enough. How big of a house, how much stuff, how much money, how much time shopping, how much vacation time, and hit that mark. If you don't have any idea of what kind of ceiling there is, you'll keep wanting more. And if you want more, then by definition, you will always feel unsatisfied with what you have. So stop trying. Look around you, look at what you have, decide that that is enough.

4. We either make ourselves miserable, or we make ourselves happy. The amount of work is the same. ~Carlos Castaneda

I know people who spend all their time being miserable. They complain about their days, they whine about service at a restaurant, they loath their coworkers, the weather has ruined their day, etc. They are the type of people who put a negative spin on everything. And I catch myself doing this at times. It's not appealing. Look around and decide that you're going to be happy. Decide that no matter how bad this day gets, it can be turned around. The kids can have a terrible morning, whining and crying, and I can have a terrible day at work. But, in the moment it takes to complain about something, we can change our days and our focus. We can make ourselves and our families happy and remind them that the day is never lost.

5. The mind is its own place, and of itself Can make a hell of heaven, a heaven of hell. ~Satan from Milton's Paradise Lost

There's nothing like using a quote from Satan to put a positive spin on your day. But this quote is very related to the last two. It is our frames of mind that make us happy, that make us miserable, that make us satisfied or unsatisfied. And I imagine that Satan, with his experiences in Heaven and Hell would be as much an authority of their properties as anyone. So let's trust the guy. This quote is a tremendous argument to rid yourself of anxiety and pressures, of assessing your situation and being content with it, of making the most of things. If things don't turn out like you planned, adjust to the new plan.

I write these quotes down today as an affirmation. I want today to be good. I'm stressed, I'm behind in my grading, I have one more week left of my statistics class. But there are reminders everywhere of the power of our own determination to take control of our days. To make the most of things and set a good example for ourselves and for our kids.

Deep breath.

Let's go.

Five Keys to Mindful Behavior (and not losing your temper)

We don't exist in a vacuum. If we did, it would be easy to be the person we want to be. It'd be easy to manage time, set goals, reach out, and expand ourselves. Being more would be accomplishable in the next five minutes. But our time and energy is constantly hijacked, borrowed, robbed, or given away. Not always for the worse, true, but these things add up. Eventually the pressure is a bit much and we lose sight of how we want to see ourselves.

What I'm talking about is patience, I suppose, and temper. It's too often that I find myself frustrated and angry at my circumstances. I want to get X done, but Y,Z, and A are still sitting in the back of my mind, demanding attention. And I have an important meeting and there's homework due and I haven't cleaned the kitchen in weeks. The frustration of all these little factors can tie itself up in knots in my mind. And the pressure builds. And I finally snap at my wife, chastise my kid, or yell at the puppy. And the picture that I've painted of myself at that moment, that ugly representation of all the space being rented in my mind, is forever burned into my children. It momentarily tarnishes who I am to my wife, and if it's not cleaned off, it can rust.

Sure, conflict can be healthy. I don't think it's a good idea to avoid talking about issues of contention. Things need to be aired out between you and your partner, if you expect this partnership to work at all. And yes, you need to raise your voice once in a while when dealing with your kids, be stern, set your foot down. But these things should be done with intention. There is a world of difference between a calculated move, a planned intonation, and a knee-jerk reaction.

Knee-jerk reactions set you off balance. They disturb harmony. They loosen ties.

We can't be perfect all the time. But if we can maintain control of ourselves, we stand a much better chance of setting the example we hope to set for our families. Everything we do is a reflection of who we are. Losing your temper, getting angry, and being petty can really distort that image.

Kids are like sponges, if you haven't noticed. They soak everything up. The other day, my three year-old broke a crayon at a restaurant. With perfect and cold pronunciation, she said, "God damn it," and went about coloring with half of the blue crayon. My wife and I looked at each other. She didn't get it from TV. We got rid of that thing. She got it from us. And of course we couldn't be mad, but we did explain that it wasn't the polite thing to say, that we were sorry we gave her use of those words.

Sometimes our kids can be our compasses for how we act. If we want our kids to exhibit proper behavior, we have to model it. When there is a lot of traffic, I can hear her strapped into the seat behind me say, as if to herself, "C'mon, dude. Move it." I didn't realize that I said that to stopped cars until she pointed it out. If I were apt to lose my temper in the car rather than get annoyed, she would show me what I look like with road rage.

I don't mean to say that we should edit ourselves or hide who we are from our kids. Instead, I think we should mindfully express who we are based on our lofty self-conceptions. A lot of times, those self-conceptions are hard to live up to. For example, I know enough about healthy eating and exercise to be in any shape that I want to be. But through a perverse loss of control related to emotional and financial stress, I don't show this knowledge. Instead, I keep on compounding these stresses with irresponsible behaviors related to eating and spending.

Our temper acts the same way. Too often we become absorbed in ourselves and we lose sight of our goals. When we lose sight of our goals, we lose sight of ourselves. And that creates a vision of us that everyone around us sees.

How many times have you caught yourself losing your temper, getting into arguments, snapping at your family, all because you are overwhelmed? How can you fight this?

1. Make decisions based on the example you want to set
This is easier said than done. But this goes along with the idea of putting your family first. Don't reach for gratification, but instead see the decisions that you make in light of the long-term ramifications and patterns that your children will notice. Whenever possible, step away from negative patterns, especially when it comes to health, consumerism, and habits.

2. Empathize
When your kids are nagging you, before you get frustrated with them and blow your top, you really have to step back and ask yourself a few questions. What is it that they want? Why? Do you remember a time when you nagged your parents for something like that? What would have made you understand why the answer is "no?" This goes for kids being scared of the dark, not wanting to go to sleep, etc.

3. Don't presume the worst
It's easy for arguments between you and your spouse to get started through communication problems. If you feel like you've been insulted, made fun of, or otherwise criticized, don't snap back. Instead, take a step back and try and find out why this was said or if you may have even taken the comment the wrong way. Many, many problems can be avoided by taking the proper time before offering a retort.

4. Remember the importance of fun
Many times when my kids are being too loud, yelling in the house, making repeditive and disrupting noises, or otherwise polluting the air with their unlimited volume, I have the urge to yell. It's a natural response, right? But you have to take heart of the times when your kids are having fun. If it's not an appropriate fun to have in the house, by all means, change things around. But don't be the ogre that stops all the fun with a bad temper and ruins a perfectly good day. Remember what it was like when you were a kid and try and calm the tempest with understanding.

5. Change your mind
If you've had a bad day, or are too stressed or tired to respond rationally to family pressures, talk this out. Explain where you're coming from, why you have a bad headache, why you need a moment to yourself. Take that moment and earnestly try to console yourself. Earnestly try and change your mind about how your day is going to be. If you decide that you can turn things around and have a good day, you can. If you decide that you can't, then you can't. It's a simple as that. Sit there for as long as it takes to decide that you can.

Resist the knee-jerk reaction. Orchestrate your day without the use of hostility. Remember to show your kids who you want to be, and it will be much easier to become that person.

Communicating with your Spouse 101

Part of being a good father is not letting petty things get in the way of having a nice day. Most divorced women polled say that "poor communication" was the cause of their divorce. Most divorced men don't mention communication at all. Many of the arguments that married people have are based entirely on miscommunication. Those that aren't based in it are very often escalated through it. These are tough waters to navigate, so hold on tight, we're sure to run into overgeneralizations and unfair stereotypes ahead:

This is a subject about which volumes of books have been written. And once in a while they make best-seller list, aided by catchy titles, constant exposure on daytime talk shows, great placement on supermarket shelves, and they generally make a great gift that girls buy for that boyfriend who just doesn't understand them. And yet, with all the talk out there, all the cliches about communicating in relationships, this is something that we tend not to take seriously. Men have a tendency to see women as irrational when it comes to things such as communication concerns, just like we think they're being irrational with so many other things. We have a word for it: hysterical.

Hysterical literally means "acting like a woman."

Men don't see communication problems most of the time. Communication for us is cut and tried. You have conversations about things when they are of concern, and if something isn't bothering you, then why the hell should you talk about it, right? But those times that we spend in quiet, comfortable thought are the same times that our wives tend to see us in deep concern, worry, even.

Have you ever expereinced this? Your driving in the car, minding your own business, perhaps looking at the scenery. It's a sunny day, so you're squinting. All of a sudden, out of the blue, your wife leans over and says, "What's wrong?"

"Nothing."

"Then what were you thinking about?"

"When?"

"Just now, when you were making that face."

"What face? Nothing. I wasn't thinking about anything."

This happens to me all the time. What the man thinks he's doing in this case is clarifying his position. He simply wasn't thinking about anything. He was looking around, driving the car, and--he thought--spending time with his wife while doing that.

The wife sees a different story. Women tend to want conversation as a part of companionship. The fact that you weren't talking for a while suggests, to them, that something is on your mind. The fact that you were squinting is indicative of this, as well. And, to back up their theory that something is wrong, you were being defensive about your position when caught in the act of thinking about something "wrong" while driving and not interacting with your spouse.

To men, this seems illogical. And it is. In the universe of our conversational style, it makes no sense. We wouldn't assume that our buddy was bothered by the world if he wasn't talking. There's a cliche of the "strong silent type" in maledom that appeals to us. He doesn't have to say much. But women need companionship from their husbands and to them talking is a very big part of it. It doesn't have to be deep conversation, it doesn't have to be conversation that has a purpose such as solving a problem or weeding out solutions or political analysis. It's an act of involvement to talk about things and it's something we tend to forget.

This leads down a slippery slope. If a concern is raised over a conversation, such as the above mentioned car issue, men tend to brush it off as not being a big deal. We tend to think, "well, she'll get over it; it ain't no thang." But to a woman, this is indeed a big deal. There's a problem and it's not being talked about. It is, in fact being avoided by the man. While we think discussing it is "blowing it out of proportion" or "making a big deal," they see it as something healthy, as discourse leading to getting the problem out of the way.

We just don't see it as a problem, and that is a tough bridge to cross.

Here are some ways that you can side-step these pitfalls in everyday life and in the middle of arguments. They are not tricks, but movements of empathy that should be made with absolute sincerity:

• Ask her how her day was when you (or she) gets home. We tend to feel welcome to bitch, complain, or gloat over our day; women see the invitation as a note of interest and a welcome one.
• Be willing to talk things out. We tend to feel that if things keep needing to be talked about, there is a problem. Women feel if we can talk things out, there are no problems. Be calm, collected, and don't lose your temper in what can often feel accusatory.
• Verbally notice her. She change her hair? New shoes? Clean the kitchen? Don't just note these things mentally. That's what we do when we're at work or with our friends, but our wife is not our job or our friend. Verbally pointing out observations is caring.
• Don't use exclusive language. Don't say "I'm going to bed early tonight." Or "I want to go for a drive." Instead, make these things sound like invitations. "Do you want to," or "What do you think about," work much better. We feel free to invite ourselves no matter what the language. But it's these little nuances that women notice in groups of other women and are trained to notice in our words.
• Don't be quiet for too long. It sounds stupid to us at times, but just say something if you notice things have been quiet. Car rides seems especially dangerous for this. We feel like proximity means closeness, but this often isn't the case for women. For many women a lot of the time, the conversation means time spent together, not the placement of your bodies.
• In an argument, don't say "You're acting crazy." Don't say anything that suggests that they have no ownership of the feelings they're going through. Regardless if she is reading the situation wrong or not, she has legitimate feelings. Recognize and understand what they are and where they are coming from.
• Empathize during arguments. Don't just defend your point of view. And don't belittle her. Take a moment to step back and really try and see how she sees things. You could be wrong about what she feels is the problem. This is very often true, and you can spend hours arguing about different subjects. So take a moment to clarify what you think you're fighting about. Paraphrase, in your own words, why you think she's upset. Reach her on that level and get it right--with coaching if needed. Then, invite her to see things your way. You are not the same people and you have divergent takes on the same situation. Often, all that is needed is an understanding of the contrary point of view to make things better.

Of course, this is all generalizing. I don't want readers to think that I'm being unfair or demeaning of either sex. Growing up in different social situations with different social expectations has made us talk in different ways. Remember that your wife is not trying to communicate like a man but failing--she's trying to talk to you in the way that she knows how. That can be very strange for us, believe me.

Most of all, talk about conversations. Talk about talking. There's nothing wrong with trying to grasp the other point of view, not matter what the situation.

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Welcome to the Men's Guide to Women Carnival!

Welcome readers of the Carnival of Tips!

Articles by Subject

Fathering
On Being a New Dad
The Breastfeeding Father
In Defense of Fatherhood
Putting Family First
10 Rules for being a role Model
Communicating with your Spouse
Education vs. Schooling (On Steve-Olson.com)
Baby Wearing
The Power of Language in Childhood
The Sex Talk
Potty Training
Activities for a Rainy Day
Changes
Imagination and Curiosity
Should Bookstores be Socially Responsible?
Is Bedtime Badtime?
Camping with Children
Father's Day
Traveling with Kids

Consumerism
Giving Up TV
10 Altertatives to Conventional TV
20 Great Books to get you Reading
Not Willing to Give Up TV? Tame it
9 Ways to be more Productive
Marketing TV to Children
Should Bookstores be Socially Responsible?
One Year without TV
Why I hate Hannah Montana

Communicating with Family
Putting Family First
5 Reasons to Simplify your Life
Valentines Day
Communicating with your Spouse
The Power of Language in Childhood
The Sex Talk
Potty Training
Activities for a Rainy Day
Changes
Imagination and Curiosity
Is Bedtime Badtime?
Camping with Children
Traveling with Kids

Education
Hostile Educational Climate of Testing
Education vs. Schooling (On Steve-Olson.com)

Simplifying
5 Reasons to Simplify your Life
10 Rules for being a role Model
5 Quotes to Live By
9 Ways to be more Productive
Activities for a Rainy Day

Living Mindfully
Communicating with your Spouse
Education vs. Schooling (On Steve-Olson.com)
10 Ways to Claim Your Day
20 Great Books to get you Reading
5 Keys to Mindful Behavior
5 Quotes to Live By
The Power of Language in Childhood
9 Ways to be more Productive
Activities for a Rainy Day
Changes
Should Bookstores be Socially Responsible?
Why I hate Hannah Montana