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10 Ways You Can Prevent Your Child From Being Cyber-Bullied
When I was young, I had kids pulling my hair, laughing at my dress-sense (or lack thereof), deliberately uninviting me from parties, making up silly songs about the fact that I liked a boy who didn’t like me back… you get where I’m going… I was bullied. So were most of my friends. So were our parents, and their parents before them. And my story is not unique; I’m sure many of you would have your own experiences to add to my list above. Bullying is as old as the world itself. Perhaps we’re just more aware of it these days, because of the amount of reports on bullying we…
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Three Rules For Maintaining A Meaningful Connection With Your Spouse
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that marriages are under constant threat of breakdown. But, in case you need some evidence of this otherwise self-evident reality, according to Stats SA “four in ten divorces of the 25,326 [granted] in 2016 were marriages that lasted for less than 10 years”! In a high-paced world of deadlines and other family commitments, it’s often the relationship of marriage that pays the price. Perhaps because we grow complacent and take it for granted, or maybe because we feel entitled to more effort from our spouse. Whatever the reason, the fact is we need to pay serious and careful attention to our…
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Tips On How To Teach Your Kids To Clean The Dishes And Other Chores
For parents who have kids, it can be a challenge to raise them to be responsible or helpful at home. This becomes especially clear for households who don’t have any nannies or help to do certain chores, like cleaning with dishwasher detergents or doing the laundry. Assigning tasks to kids, therefore, becomes a must at this point, but you might be clueless as to how to make this effective. Here are some tips on how to teach your kids to clean the dishes and other household chores. Assign them tasks they can understand. According to Bright Horizons, kids should be assigned simple tasks or ones that they’ll understand. If your…
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10 Top Tips To Surviving The First Week With A Newborn
That first week coming home with your newborn baby brings so many emotions that it’s hard to figure out where to start. Here are a few tips to get you going… Prepare Beforehand We all know those last few weeks of pregnancy can be tough, but trust me! You will be grateful for the prep you did beforehand. We all get so excited in planning the baby’s room, that we forget to think of a few other things. Make sure your freezer and pantry are loaded with healthy snacks and meals. If you have other children, organise car-pools and play dates. Diarise all that will be happening in that first week and plan accordingly. You…
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Travel Review Morrells – A Touch Of France
A few weeks ago, my husband and I decided to take some time out for ourselves. We are so busy juggling all the balls that we often forget to put ourselves first. So we sat down one night and decided to scour the internet for a B & B nearby. That’s when we discovered Morrells Boutique Estate, which is 5km down the road from our house. We didn’t waste a moment and booked ourselves in for a night of relaxation. On arrival, I was mindblown that this venue was in the middle of a busy suburban area. Walking into reception, it felt like we were worlds away, which is just what…
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#itsok Bloggers Linky – week 35
We are at the start of our holidays, and amongst all the chilling going on we are also super excited because we have decided to homeschool our children. Long story short, we just feel that this is the right decision for us right now, and I am loving not having to make lunch boxes EVERYDAY! View this post on Instagram We have some exciting news!! Another new adventure in our lives, and yes, we are dancing about it 🙌… Although, mom is a little anxious 😂 ⬇️ Link in Bio A post shared by Jacqui Bester (@onemessymama) on Sep 22, 2019 at 5:12am PDT But, in other news, our…
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Game Review: Tech Deck Fingerboarding
You can imagine the shrieks of excitement when we received a Tech Deck press drop from Just Fun Toys to review. #AD What is Tech Deck? Tech Deck is the brand behind the fingerboards which are 96mm and replicas of their full-size skateboard counterparts. They feature real graphics from some of the biggest names in the sports such as Primitive, Element, Plan B, Blind, Baker, Finesse, Santa Cruz, Sk8mafia and Toy Machine. What was in our box? 1x Tech Deck Starter Kit 2x Tech Deck Build A Ramp Parks 1x Tech Deck 4 Pack Multipack 5x 96mm Fingerboard Singles What really impressed me about this press drop, was the fact…
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Sibling Rivalry Will Be The Death of Me!
I’m not sure what’s worse. Being asked for a snack every few minutes, toddler tantrums or siblings that just won’t give it a rest! Our family has incredibly good great days, and then there are some like today when I wish I could stick my head in the sand and pretend I’m on an island holiday. The struggle is real! Sibling rivalry is exhausting friends. It sucks the life right out of you. How many times can you say, “please stop arguing” or “please can you just listen to each other and get along?”. Not enough I guess. Apparently it stems from the need to have your attention 24/7, a…
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Finding My Joy Again
I often catch myself thinking, while watching my children play, how I wish that I could experience that same unbridled JOY that seems to ooze out of them. The pit-of-your-stomach kind of laughter, the smiles, the giggles, and innocent teasing that fills their play. I must admit, sometimes I’m a little jealous of their JOY. a joy so unencumbered by the concerns of this world… I wish I could bottle it up and take a sip each morning as I open my eyes. That it would flow through my veins and sustain me through the day. That JOY! Now this does not mean that we are unhappy in life. Or…
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Our Lives Are About To Change
These last few months have brought with them so many questions, frustrations and considerations for the future of our family. We’ve decided to take our children’s education into our own hands. It wasn’t an easy choice, it didn’t happen overnight, but sitting here writing this, I know in my heart that we are making the right decision (for now, and for our family). We’ve chosen to homeschool our children. I am still trying to find the right words to express our reasons for making this decision. I know that homeschooling doesn’t have the best “reputation”, and that there will be people that think we are absolutely insane. But let me…
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6 Reasons Why Imaginative Play is So Important
Our children need us to remind them that their own unique and imaginative play is something to be treasured and I think it is important to start with the why. Why is imaginative (fantasy) play so important in the lives of our children? Imaginative play builds developmental skills such as social and emotional skills that are needed for everyday life. When our children are actively engaged in imaginative play, they are unconsciously experimenting with the social and emotional roles that they will one day experience in everyday life. What are the benefits of imaginative play? Imaginative play helps children identify more clearly between what is real and what is pretend.…
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Which Parenting Style Do You Fit Into?
Being raised by baby boomers, parenting took on an entirely different format, it was just that, parenting. There were no definitions, no influx of information. You were raised. Point blank. Nowadays we have so much information at our fingertips that it may seem a little overwhelming. Tiresome to be honest. Being a parent now comes with definitions, titles, explanations, and “how-to” lists. What exactly are the parenting trends of today? And how do we know if we fit into any of the categories? Let’s explore… 1. Helicopter parenting We’ve all heard this term before. Picture yourself hovering over your children, constantly at their sides, taking care of every little detail,…
