threelilprincesses.com

Tag: parenting

  • Aussie Giveaway Linkup #124: Ronald McDonald House

    Aussie Giveaway Linkup #124: Ronald McDonald House

    pneumonia and asthma

    As you probably gathered, there was no Aussie Giveaway Linkup last week. We were all exhausted and taking some much needed time out after little Holly was airlifted to the Royal Hobart Hospital with pneumonia and asthma the Sunday prior.

    It frightened Julian and I to see how fast everything happened. From going from her usual bright and bubbly self on the Saturday, to cold symptoms on the Saturday night and then being completely lethargic on the Sunday.

    On Sunday at 2.30pm she said: “Mum, I can’t breathe. I can’t breathe’’.

    Within a few hours of arriving at the Mersey Hospital at Latrobe, we were airlifted to the Royal Hobart Hospital’s ICU. The ICU paediatrician was so concerned, he’d contemplated flying to us.

    After steroids, antibiotics, nebuliser, oxygen, Ventolin, a week in the children’s ward and lots of tears, we were pretty happy to arrive home last Friday. I know many face tougher challenges, including some of our friends, and it makes you feel so much more admiration for the spirit they show.

    Today, we headed to McDonalds. Not something we would normally do, but it was important for us to support McHappy Day and the fundraising efforts for Ronald McDonald House. It’s only when you get into these situations you realise how valuable these services are.

    McHappy Day

    Although, Ella is still fascinated by the fact all the superheroes for McHappy Day were wearing their undies on the outside!

    Now, onto this week’s Aussie Giveaway Linkup…

    Aussie Giveaway Linkup instructions:

    If you’re a blogger or business wanting to take part in the Aussie Giveaway Linkup:

    1. Only link directly to the giveaway post/s and include the prize and end date in the linky tool below. Link each giveaway separately. If you need to delete it, hover over your link, wait until the red “x’’ appears and click.
    2. Giveaways must be open to Australian residents and be run by Australian-based bloggers or businesses.
    3. Grab the button below to add to your post.
    4. A new list is added each Sunday so bloggers need to add their links weekly.
    5. Start entering the giveaways! Entry is at your own risk. We do not take responsibility for unfulfilled prizes or a blogger/business not abiding by their own terms and conditions.

     


    Aussie Giveaway Linky
    Hosted by Three Lil Princesses



  • Aussie Giveaway Linkup #101: The no dummies edition

    Aussie Giveaway Linkup #101: The no dummies edition

    get rid of the pacifier

    There’s one real winning moment from our week and it had everything to do with the dummy fairy. Those who follow Three Li’l Princesses via Facebook, Instagram or Twitter will know the dummy fairy was visiting here last night to take Holly’s dummies to give to other little babies who needed them more.

    We used this strategy for Ella when she was the same age – 2.5 years – and it worked a treat. I’m happy to say, despite her sitting up in bed and reading until 9pm, there were no tears and she slept through the night.

    Tucking her into bed tonight, she did ask “where’s my dummies?’’. A little “remember the dummy fairies gave them to the little babies’’ speech and she was fine with it.

    I must say, it’s a huge relief. During the week I’ll share the process for getting Holly prepared for the dummy fairy – including writing the letter above – and how this time differed to getting rid of the pacifier with Ella.

    What age was your child when you got rid of the pacifier?

    Now, onto some other ways to win…

    Aussie Giveaway Linkup instructions:

    If you’re a blogger or business wanting to take part in the Aussie Giveaway Linkup:

    1. Only link directly to the giveaway post/s and include the prize and end date in the linky tool below. Link each giveaway separately. If you need to delete it, hover over your link, wait until the red “x’’ appears and click.
    2. Giveaways must be open to Australian residents and be run by Australian-based bloggers or businesses.
    3. Grab the button below to add to your post.
    4. A new list is added each Sunday so bloggers need to add their links weekly.
    5. Start entering the giveaways! Entry is at your own risk. We do not take responsibility for unfulfilled prizes or a blogger/business not abiding by their own terms and conditions.

     


    Aussie Giveaway Linky
    Hosted by Three Lil Princesses



  • How to successfully balance work, parenting and love life

    How to successfully balance work, parenting and love life

    With Valentine’s Day today and the fact many of you have spoken to us through the blog and Facebook about being a single parent, eHarmony Australia has written a great post for us on how to better balance work, parenting and your love life. Enjoy! x

    Guest post sponsored by eHarmony Australia

    For single working parents, life can start to feel like one giant juggling act. Many parents struggle to strike a happy balance between their titles as mum, dad and colleague. In the hustle and bustle of day-to-day life, the role that usually gets sacrificed first is their search for love as a single man or woman.

    The good news is that successfully juggling work, parenting and romance doesn’t have to be a superhuman feat. Here’s a look at some tips and ideas for making it all seem more achievable.

    Relationships

    Photo credit

    Let go of the guilt

    The first step to feeling better about your lifestyle as a single working parent is to let go of the anxiety and guilt about things not being perfect. At the end of the day, very few people’s lives are actually ideal. From a historic perspective, single working parents are a relatively new group in society, and institutions like welfare, daycare and maternity leave haven’t quite caught up yet.

    The key is to stop searching for perfection and let go of the super-woman working mum image we so often see in the media. Once you do that, you’ll feel a lot less pressure about how your family life ought to look and function.

    Set clear boundaries

    Your different roles as a parent and a work colleague will often compete for your time and your attention. It’s important to draw clear boundaries to make sure you’re committing your full attention and care to each part of your life. That means things like switching off the work mobile phone when you’re bathing your kids and setting clear guidelines about not being contacted by the office on weekends.

    It’s important to think about when the most important times are to be around in your children’s lives, whether it’s when they wake up, when they come home from school or having a family dinner together.

    Relationship

    Photo credit

    Use your support network

    Being a single parent doesn’t have to mean doing everything on your own. Make the most of the support networks in your life, like your family and friends. Always ask your workplace to consider new incentives to make your life easier, like an office crèche or flexible start and finish hours.

    Finding a network of other single parents in your area is a great way to find like-minded people and gain advice on the best way for handling tricky situations. For instance any singles in Perth looking to meet people with a similar lifestyle, parenting groups often meet at South Beach for a swim or coffee at the Fig Café in Freemantle.

    Don’t sacrifice your love life

    Being a mum and a worker shouldn’t mean the end of your love life. You might not have the time to head out on blind dates, but there are plenty of other ways to meet eligible singles. Online dating for instance is an easy and convenient option that locates like-minded people in your area.

    Best of all, with the option to tailor your matches, online dating sites make it easy to find singles who share your love for children, as well as your other core values and attitudes.

    What are your tips for successfully managing work, parenting and love life?

  • Life Happens and What To Expect When You’re Expecting (giveaway)

    Life Happens and What To Expect When You’re Expecting (giveaway)

    Date night doesn’t happen here often. OK, who am I kidding? It never happens.

    If we go out, it’s always for a business-related event. Or we have children in tow. We’re celebrating our 10th wedding anniversary in December and we’re seriously contemplating going out for dinner – with the girls! As long as we end the night with a movie. Although, Julian will probably choose to watch Love Actually – again. No joke!

    When Roadshow sent through two movies to review last month, we thought it was a good excuse to curl up on the couch and just forget about the world for a while. We got a nice bottle of wine, a block of Cadburys and headed for the big lounge. It’s got to be a special occasion to go in the big lounge during colder months, because it means putting on an extra heater. I know… sad, isn’t it! It brought it home to us that we need to do this sort of thing more often.

    What to Expect When You're Expecting and Life Happens

    Here are the two movies we watched:

    What To Expect When You’re Expecting

    Speaking of Love Actually, What to Expect When You’re Expecting is set up in a similar fashion, with different storylines coming together at the end – though it doesn’t quite reach the same heights. It features a who’s who of Hollywood and a myriad of plot lines. These involve Cameron Diaz as an up the duff fitness instructor, Elizabeth Banks as a heavily pregnant babywear shop owner and Jennifer Lopez as a baby photographer who takes the path of adoption.

    I went through all gamut of emotions with this one – laughing out loud one minute and bawling my eyes out the next. Julian said he enjoyed it, but it wasn’t something he’d rave about. I think it’s the ideal film to see with girlfriends, because so much of it is relatable. The characters are well crafted and funny, and the storylines predictable but will certainly sustain your attention. We spent much of the film trying to figure out which couple we were! Insert pregnant pause…

    Summation: A parenting version of Love Actually, that doesn’t quite reach the same heights.

    L!fe Happens

    Deena (Kate Bosworth) ends up with the last remaining condom in the house, leaving Kim (Krysten Ritter) unprepared. Nine months later, Kim is a single mum living with Kim and Laura (Rachel Bilson). The movie tracks Kim’s struggles as she comes to terms with dating and being a mum.

    This took a lot of getting into and we really had to persevere with it. The first half is quite dark and doesn’t feel like it’s moving anywhere. It was worth hanging on for though, as the final half of the film lifted and made the wait worth it. One of the themes of the film – friendships between women of a certain age as they change from partying to parenthood – is an interesting one. However, the script really needed some work. This will appeal if a bucket of ice cream on the couch is on the agenda.

    Summation: Worthwhile seeing for the theme it touches on, but will need to persevere through the first half.

    We’re giving THREE DVD packs of What To Expect When You’re Expecting and L!fe Happens. All you need to do is tell us your funniest or most embarrassing parenting moment. Fill out the form below.

    Terms and conditions: The DVD competition will be judged on creativity and originality. The competition opens Friday, November 30, 2012 at 9pm AEST and closes on Monday, December 17, 2012 at 7.30pm AEST. One entry per person. Australian entries only. There are three prize winners. The winners will be notified via email and name published here. Entries remain the property of Three Li’l Princesses and may be republished.

    If you would like to learn about more of our giveaways, make sure you sign up to our eNewsletters. You’ll also find more giveaways in the Aussie Giveaway Linkup.

    DISCLAIMER: I received a copy of What to Expect When You’re Expecting and L!fe Happens to review. I have not been paid to write this post. All opinions expressed are purely my own.

  • Some people don’t deserve kids

    Some people don’t deserve kids

    child in red chair

    By Julian O’Brien

    It was a typically wild winter day in Tassie and no other car was silly enough to be parked in the local playground car park. It was deserted.

    I wasn’t there to play on the swings in the driving rain and freezing wind. No, a recently discovered fetish for running and exercise meant I was spending a rare weekday off, in weather which I’d only seen on crab-fishing reality TV shows from the North Atlantic, by doing a casual 12km run.

    Yet it was not the run that was to cause me concern. Aside from being a launching point for the run that day, this park had a special place for our family and we were regular visitors…. albeit when the weather was a tad better.

    It was only back from my run, which I enjoyed by the way, my mood changed. On returning to the park, I could see another car parked not far from mine. Not that strange. What was strange though was there was a young boy not much older than our Princess Ella running around the play equipment in the Antarctic weather in just a t-shirt and jeans unsupervised.

    The real issue

    As I neared my car I could see a male and two females in the other car and that eased my mind – but only temporarily. Strapping on my seatbelt and looking to reverse, I spied out of the corner of my eye the female passenger lift a bong to her mouth, breathe in and exhale in the car. Well, that explained the “unsupervised” thing.

    I shook my head and continued reversing, but to my horror I watched as the kid ran from the playground and jumped straight into the back seat which only moments before had resembled the set of a Cheech and Chong movie. The driver in the other car started his engine and THEY started to reverse.

    A parent’s values

    Now, I’m no prude and I’ve had my share of “life experiences” but if having children taught me one thing it was I needed to take more responsibility for the sake of the souls I’d chosen to bring into this world. I was livid. I drove slowly out of the car park long enough to block the other car and report the incident and vehicle to a mate in the local police station.

    I took no joy or pleasure from that and there are still days I wonder about that little bloke in that car, hoping to God he is receiving the parenting every kid deserves. Do I feel guilty about what I did? Not on your life.

    What it did reinforce to me was that not everyone views parenting the way myself and Kel do and maybe, just maybe, we have to make a stand in our own communities at times to right that balance.

    What would you have done in the same situation?

  • The day I thought I was having a heart attack – emergency plan for kids

    The day I thought I was having a heart attack – emergency plan for kids

    emergency plan

    Ella was just three the day I thought I was having a heart attack. Turns out, it was just a bit of indigestion. I may have slightly overreacted. It prompted me to write the post I don’t want to leave my daughters helpless about teaching Ella what to do in an emergency.

    I posted about it on Facebook and got a host of suggestions on ways to educate them, including the hilarious response from Barb who, after teaching her daughter to dial 000, decided to feign collapse. Instead of ringing for help, her daughter jumped up and down on her guts… not a good result

    Ella is now nearly five and learning to read, so I thought it was time we updated our emergency plan. If you can recall, the ringing Dad bit was easy. If Dad didn’t answer, then teaching her to ring 000 was fine too.

    It was this conversation that was worrying:

    Where do you live, Ella?
    Ella: “Hippopatmus Drv, Devonport (not our real street address, in case you were wondering!)’’. That’s fantastic, except we’re missing the all-important house number.
    “I don’t know.’’ After explaining that, yes, it’s seven, we tried again.
    “7 Hippopotamus Dve, Hobart’’. What? OK, so we’d just been to Hobart for a holiday. Let’s try again.
    “Devonport’’ OK, what about the rest of the address? Try again.
    “Um, I can’t remember.’’

    Challenging? Just slightly!

    While she knows our address well now, I’ve created an emergency plan with the crucial name and address on it incase (heaven forbid) she draws a plank under pressure. At least if she forgets her address or struggles reading the words on the plan, she can spell out the letters!

    Here’s a downloadable version of our plan  (with three options depending on your phone) to take your child through the process of:

    1. Finding the phone:

    2. Dialing the number

    3. Pressing the “call” button

    4. Speaking to dad/mum

    5. If dad/mum doesn’t answer, hang up and dial 000 and press “call”.

    6. Then, for those children that can read, having their name and address clearly written.

    Click the image or the links to download a copy of the one relevant to you, print and stick near your phone.

    Emergency with phone number first

    1. With the phone number, then the call button

    Emergency plan with call button first

    2. With the call button, then the phone number

    Emergency plan using coloured dots and programmed numbers
    3. With a coloured dot to signify programmed numbers (you can place coloured dots on the number son your phone).

    Other tips from readers:

    • Place important numbers on speed dial. For example, Dad is 1, Mum 2, Grandma 3, 000 is 4…
    • Again, use speed dial, but replace the number with coloured dots. Use Dad’s favourite colour.
    • Place the coloured dots on the numbers on the phone and pictures of each person on the fridge with their colour next to them.
    • Teach kids to call “triple zero’’, rather than “triple O”. With text messaging so big these days the young are trying to dial “666″ – ie the letter “o” button!
    • When teaching children their address, ask them questions as you’re driving home. For example, “now we’re turning in to our street. Which street do we live in?’’ and count down the houses till you get to your house. “What number do we live at?’’ and “what colour is our house?’’

    Have you taught your child what to do in an emergency? What are your tips?