It’s all about creating rhythm.

One of the sites I’ve bookmarked for myself that I absolutely love because it keeps my favorite recipes organized for me and provides me with my weekly grocery list ready to print is Meals Matter.  You’ll definitely want to check it out and make meal planning an enjoyable and easy task.

You can vary the chicken recipe each Tuesday, but the important part of this plan is keeping to the theme of the dinner - chicken.

Of course, if you’re a vegan or a vegetarian, then it might be bean night or tofu night. You get the idea.  Enjoy this yummy recipe; the kids will love it!

Aloha Chicken Kebabs

© 2007-2008, Raelee Peirce, BA, CPE, CPC. nobleMother.com

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• The 3 Secrets to Managing Preschool Power Struggles

One family is from a Mormon background but is choosing not to raise their child with religion.  They aren’t teaching her there isn’t a God, but they aren’t teaching her there is one either.  She grew up with a lot of apocalyptic messages and she felt that it made her very fearful and self-righteous; mom says she will expose her daughter to the teachings of all the religions when she is older and let her decide.

Another family is from a Catholic and Jewish background and although mom believes in God she is leery of having her son “go through that” (i.e. Catholicism).  She was disturbed by the “fire and brimstone” message of  the sermons she heard at church. Her husband  has become a curious Agnostic.

Another mom questions whether or not it is wise for her and her family to not be involved with religion, she believes those who attend worship services on Saturdays or Sundays might have more self-discipline. She says she’s an Agnostic who wants religion but can see that joining an ethical social group might be just as helpful.  She concludes in the end that she isn’t going to start going to church but that she isn’t anti-religion either.

The last family depicted in the short podcast dialogue is a mom who describes her family as a church-going, prayer-before-meals, kids-going-to-Sunday-school Christian family. She is confident and feels secure that choosing religion is helping her raise her kids in order to nurture a relationship with God and to grow in their faith as a family.  As a child, she grew up in a small town and attended a Southern Baptist church.  The sermons were fear-based and scared her, thus her decision to join a non-denominational church that is focused on God’s love feels more comfortable.

Wow!  I have to say, that if I were raised in a religion that taught me to fear God, taught that I was born sinful and needed to repent or I would burn forever in Hell, and that the future looked bleak for the world, but that I would be saved if I did what God told me to do, I too would be one of the many leaving organized religion behind.

Being raised as a Baha’i is like living in a completely different religious culture; I have such a different lens to see the world, how God works, and I have such a positive perspective of the future to give my children - that does not exist only for us, but for everyone.  I don’t believe God is human.  I don’t believe there is a fiery Hell where those who don’t believe will burn forever.  I don’t believe there is only one religion that leads to Heaven-how could I when I believe all religions stem from the same Source.

No wonder so many people look at me like I have 2 heads when I try to stand up for organized religion; the organized religion that I know is not what has been the reality for most people.  What has humanity done to Spiritual Truth? What happened to the teachings of religion of love, justice, peacefulness, spirituality, unity, wisdom, compassion, and idealism? They seemed to have been replaced by mankind’s creation of dogma, ritual, fear, and condemnation.

I encourage you to watch this dialogue; do you relate to any of the moms in the video? If you could create a sacred, religious tradition for you and your family, what would it be like?

© 2007-2008, Raelee Peirce, BA, CPE, CPC. nobleMother.com

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• The 3 Secrets to Managing Preschool Power Struggles

We paid the bill and got their coveted balloons.  In seconds from being free from her chair, my dd bolted for the gate that led out to the parking lot.  I was still getting my ds out of his high chair and noticed her running around the corner of the restaurant out of sight.  My husband had gone to the restroom and there, on my own, I felt like I was trying to run after a tasmanian devil.

I caught up with her and found her stepping on the flowers in the mulch beds.  I requested that she wait with me on the walkway.  My ds was itching to crawl on the cool cement and I knew that would be a mistake - to have both of them running amuck right during the dinner rush in front of the entrance.

My dd shocked me with her defiance as she turned around and yelled, “No! I don’t want to!”  This talking back and angry defiance was becoming exhausting and far too common around the time she turned 3.5.

Despite my knowledge as a parent coach and a parent educator that her behavior was common for her age and that a firm, consistent, patient response was all that was required, it was such a challenge for me not to want to scream back, “Don’t you dare talk to me like that!”  I loved her more than anything and I knew it was her behavior that wasn’t likeable, but I had to work hard not to transfer my feelings of frustration on her - I remember feeling that I didn’t like her and it made me feel like a horrible mom.

Have you felt this way?  Are you struggling in your response to your 3 year old’s behavior? I wish that I had the tools and techniques that I learned from becoming a facilitator of the Virtues Project three years ago when I was experiencing my daughter’s 3 year old challenges.  My experience with my ds is so much different now that I have even better ways of being consistent, firm, and patient.

Using the language of virtues has been a gift for all of us.  I know how to recognize teachable moments, how to set clear boundaries, and I use a powerful skill of listening that helps me reconnect with my children when we’re struggling. You can learn these techniques and not only help your child, but help you nurture your relationship that will bring out your best too.

Don’t miss out!  Be sure to check-out the up-coming training, Building Stronger Families: Parenting With Virtues in 2009!

© 2007-2008, Raelee Peirce, BA, CPE, CPC. nobleMother.com

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• The 3 Secrets to Managing Preschool Power Struggles

By Guest Blogger, Karly Randolph Pitman

Learning to nurture ourselves sometimes entails picking ourselves up after a fall. When we slip up, fail, or creep back into bad habits, it’s easy to become discouraged. We can lose our focus, where one mistake turns into several, causing a negative spiral that becomes harder and harder to break.

The quickest way to keep one mistake from blowing up into a series of mistakes is to find ways to get back on track:  sooner, rather than later. Here are four things to do when you encounter a setback:

1. Don’t snowball mistakes. Snowballing is diving into all or nothing, black and white thinking. Our minds reason:  since we screwed up, we might as well keep screwing up. A good example of this is when you’re trying to make changes in your diet. Let’s say you’ve made a commitment to eat whole foods, but one night, you eat half a bag of potato chips. Snowballing is when you think, “Since I ate the potato chips, I might as well have ice cream, too.” You can stop this habit by, instead, putting on your pause button. Take a deep breath, and visualize yourself stopping. Sit with the discomfort of messing up. Let it pass through you, without having to act on it. Then, simply start over-right away. Don’t wait until tomorrow, turning the night into an eating free-for-all. Don’t turn one mistake into ten or twenty. Just start over, let go of your regret, and your mistake-which is past, and what you can’t change-and focus on what you can:  this very moment.

2. Make small changes. Often, we maximize the importance of the big things, and devalue the little things in our personal growth. So we tackle the biggies:  changing our thoughts, or improving our relationships, but fail to take into account the positive accumulation of many, small changes. But small changes add up over time. They give you roots, a solid foundation, from which to tackle the big obstacles. When I healed my negative body image, small changes like eating breakfast every day, eating regular meals, getting proper sleep, and spending time each day alone were essential to feeling good about my body. Furthermore, they are what keep me feeling good about my body.

3. Do one thing differently. We often make the mistake of trying harder when we fail, thinking that we will get it “right” next time. But often, we fail not from a lack of desire, or motivation, but because we’re going about change in the wrong way. You’ve heard the adage that insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, while expecting a different result? Break out of this pattern by thinking about how you can correct the problem. Then act on it:  do one thing differently. For example, if you find yourself unable to stay out of the kitchen at night, undoing your healthy daytime eating with a nightly binge, switch up your nightly routine:  go for a walk after dinner, brush your teeth after eating, call a friend. Maybe it isn’t a question of willpower; maybe you just need a change of scenery. See what works, and then follow that path. Use mistakes as learning opportunities:  How can I succeed the next time?

4. Add self care. Self care is akin to an immunization, inoculating you against “disease:”  people pleasing, overeating, overspending, drinking, and other self destructive behaviors. Your spirit, your authentic self, wants to be cherished. It wants to be loved and adored; it wants your attention. Like a child, if it’s not getting your attention in positive ways, it will find ways to get your attention in negative ways.

Minimize the power of negative habits in your life by feeding your spirit with regular bouts of self care. This keeps you operating from a surplus, rather than a deficit. This keeps you from feeling deprived, which is what usually drives our compulsions to overeat, overspend, or drink in the first place.

Karly Randolph Pitman, mother of four, writer, speaker and the founder of Firstourselves.com, is transforming the lives of women through self-care. Karly is the author of Heal Your Body Image: An Inspiring, Step-by-Step Guide to Loving Your Body, Overcoming Sugar Addiction: How to Kick Your Sugar Habit, and a forthcoming book, The Soul of Motherhood. Sign up for her free newsletters to feed your spirit, love your body and stay sugar free at Firstourselves.com.

Karly is a voracious reader, a whole foods cook, a runner, a spiritual seeker, a thrift store connoisseur, and a crafter. She loves being a brunette, an extrovert, a busy mom, and a girly girl who prefers a skirt to jeans any day.

© 2007-2008, Raelee Peirce, BA, CPE, CPC. nobleMother.com

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• The 3 Secrets to Managing Preschool Power Struggles

However, my 35 month old ds does not like variety nor is he open to trying new foods.  To help him eat what is for dinner, I am providing this structure so that we have familiar meals each week.  My goal is to make each dinner healthy and delicious. So far, he has become very excited about the meals and has eaten a few bites more than usual; some dinners he prefers more than others.  My six year old is absolutely thriving with this new plan and we hope it will just continue to get easier for her little brother!

I thought I would share with you our taco night recipe and hope to inspire you to adopt this new plan.  Some of the benefits have been that I spend a lot less time planning dinners for the week.  I’m ready to grocery shop Sunday night or Monday morning; my list of groceries is the same every week!  I’ll be sending you my dinner recipes in the next few weeks so you can slowly adopt it or create your own!

Since I’m trying to cut down on meat and I’m striving to get the kids to eat more fiber, I substitute black beans and we use Ezekial tortillas made from sprouted wheat; they have 5 grams of fiber per tortilla!

Click Here for a great recipe!

© 2007-2008, Raelee Peirce, BA, CPE, CPC. nobleMother.com

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• The 3 Secrets to Managing Preschool Power Struggles

As a parent you can be a strong moral example, you can create a respectful relationship with your child, share your moral beliefs, and expect moral behaviors - these are wonderful ways to bring up morally intelligent children.

Today more families are choosing to be non-religious or to leave God out of the moral, ethical picture of family life.

It’s hard for me to imagine not providing the kind of security and beauty that I associate with God, with my children.  Without the knowledge or belief in a Great Spirit, Yehweh, Allah, or God (and it is my belief these are all names for the same Creator), I believe ethics and morals become meaningless rules and obligations without context for a greater purpose. For many who believe in a Creator, it gives them a sense of purpose to know that there is something bigger than ourselves out there, a Source that embodies all of the virtues.

It can be comforting and grounding to believe that there is a  Creator who loves you unconditionally and will never leave you.  There are so many examples of how belief in a Creator has helped peoples all over the world get through challenging and perilous times - slaves, the Jews during the Holocaust and after, all Wars…

But I think a belief in a Creator can help your preschooler even through the small challenges of daily childhood - being scared of the dark, going to a new school, the death of a pet, friend, or relative, or getting through a divorce or some other separation from a parent.

Each night my husband or myself tuck our children into bed and ask if they would like to say their prayer.  It has only been recently that our ds who is turning 3 in January, has decided to share his prayer with us.  He tells us all to be reverent and so we close our eyes and fold our hands in our laps and peek out to see him doing the same - his pudgy fingers clasped, his eyes shut tight.  We then hear his small voice reciting his prayer that we’ve been saying with him since before he was born; nothing is sweeter as he says,

“O God! Guide me, protect me.
Illumine the lamp of my heart.
Make me a shining star.
Thou art the Mighty and the Powerful.”

Do you need a Creator in these challenging times we are facing?  If so, how do you share your belief in a Creator with your children?  If not, where do you find your strength, your compass and how are you teaching your children how to rely on that strength?

© 2007-2008, Raelee Peirce, BA, CPE, CPC. nobleMother.com

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• The 3 Secrets to Managing Preschool Power Struggles

How do you limit or take away television when it is the only time your child will settle down so you can accomplish tasks?

How do you put your preschooler to bed without a power struggle?

How do you respond when your child protests the same thing every day?

If you want answers to these questions, be sure to listen to the newest podcast and click here:  nobleMother’s Blog Talk Radio Show!

© 2007-2008, Raelee Peirce, BA, CPE, CPC. nobleMother.com

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• The 3 Secrets to Managing Preschool Power Struggles

There’s hope!

*You don’t have to resign yourself to sending your little guy into time-out for every infraction.
*You can learn how to talk to your preschooler so that she will listen to your words and want to cooperate.
*You can learn how to set boundaries that will teach your children about respect, self-discipline, and cooperation.

Can you imagine requesting your 4 year old to put away his toys and seeing him actually do it??

Or, if he refused to pick up his toys, knowing exactly how to handle it without feeling irritated and exasperated or guilty for yelling at him?

There is a way to discipline that supports your desire to be firm, loving and effective without shaming, isolating, or hurting your child.

The program that I facilitate is called, The Virtues Program: Bringing Out the Best in Our Children and Ourselves.

You might think, “Is this a religious parenting workshop??”

No.  We tend to place the word “virtues” into a religious context.  I will not be teaching a particular religious doctrine, although these qualities of character are considered to be spiritual by many.

We all believe in these universal qualities, qualities like compassion, respect, honesty, cooperation, self-discipline, trustworthiness, helpfulness, and courtesy.  These are virtues.

To find out more about the dates, venues, and cost  for the program, CLICK HERE

© 2007-2008, Raelee Peirce, BA, CPE, CPC. nobleMother.com

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• The 3 Secrets to Managing Preschool Power Struggles

Sometimes our to-do list becomes a greater priority than the well-being of our family without us even noticing.  It is especially more challenging to notice our children’s behavior and have the energy to correct it during a busy time of year like the holiday season.  There’s a part of parents that wants to overlook their child’s misbehaviors because “the parade is going to start soon” or you “don’t want to be late to Aunt Judy’s holiday house warming party.”

There’s so much you want your children to see and to do and you don’t want them to miss out.  Meanwhile, our kids can become quite overwhelmed with all of the “fun” and we start seeing more tantrums, rudeness, and defiance from them at the most inopportune moments!!  How can your 4 year old have a meltdown just before getting on the Santa Train?  How can this be happening?

It’s okay.  Let’s breathe together.

We know how fun the holidays are, but for our preschoolers, everything is still new and it can be a lot to take in, even when it’s dazzling, or especially when it’s dazzling.  Remind yourself to practice these virtues to help you keep your preschooler happy this holiday.

1.  Practice Joyfulness. Definitely share your joy and enthusiasm for the special times of the season with your child. Share why this time of year makes you feel happy, warm, and excited.  Your child will love to hear stories about how you experienced the season as a child.  Perhaps there is a simple tradition you remember that you want to start with your own children.  Pick an afternoon to share it with your preschooler.

2.  Practice Moderation. Pick and choose what to do. There’s always plenty of activities to do during this busy season.  Choose a handful and before you tell your child about how amazing it will be, hold off.  On the day of the event, assess to make sure your preschooler is ready for the activity.  Has she had enough rest?  Much of the meltdown madness is due to children and parents being overtired from doing too much.

3.  Practice Detachment. Lessen your expectations. We’ve had years to enjoy the traditions of the season and we know how exciting some of the things will be for us and we hope will be for our children as well.  Don’t be surprised if it turns out to be just “ho hum” for your little one.  Stay detached from wanting it to be as exciting for them as it is or was for you.  Strive to experience everything with your children from their perspective and see it through their eyes.

4.  Remember Simplicity. Winter walks, baking special treats, reading a good snowman story, snuggling in front of a fire, playing holiday music, and looking at the lights…this time of year is filled with images, smells, and sounds that define the spirit of love, family, and giving.  Don’t forget to just sit back, stay home and enjoy the little things that make winter magical, rather than running around trying to “create” the magic.

5.  Practice Self-Discipline. With so much going on and your little one tantruming or pouting because they want something - whether it’s another piece of fudge or a toy you were wrapping for their cousin - stay calm.  Give yourself permission for a time-out; a time-out for yourself, not your child.  When you feel like you’re going to explode or you can’t bring yourself to call your child to a virtue, excuse yourself to your room or the bathroom for a few minutes and collect your thoughts.  Your child will be grateful!!

Need more help with your child’s behavior?  Start 2009 with a bang and create a new family plan by registering for the up-coming parenting program:  “Building a Stronger Family:  Parenting With Virtues.”

© 2007-2008, Raelee Peirce, BA, CPE, CPC. nobleMother.com

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• The 3 Secrets to Managing Preschool Power Struggles

Do you feel like you’re falling apart? It happens to every mother. I have four children, and with a large family, it seems as if one of my children is always going through a challenging stage. This means lots of work for me, the mom. As the one who holds the balance for our family, the nurturer in me tries to find creative solutions to meet my children’s needs alongside my own. Sometimes I find a plan that works. At other times, I don’t. The turmoil makes me want to run away from home, makes my anger boil with frustration, and can even make me dislike motherhood.

But life is always in flux. As Pema Chodron reminds me in her fabulous book, When Things Fall Apart, things come together again, then fall apart, then come together again. Parenthood is dynamic. Nothing stays the same.

A time of ease follows a difficult time. Just this past weekend, my house teemed with neighborhood children as my son and his friends raced around on an adventure involving legos, magic potions, and pumpkins. Meanwhile, my daughters played dress up and dolls with several friends, with my toddler tagging along behind. It was a wonderful day:  no tears, no fighting, no exasperated parents.

It was a reminder that not every day is drudgery or a battle of wills. There are fun days, too.

If you’re in a stage where things are falling apart, trust that life will come together again. The ease will come. Particularly if you’re caring for small children, when the physical demands of motherhood are intense, trust that this stage, too, will pass.

Karly Randolph Pitman, mother of four, writer, speaker and the founder of Firstourselves.com, is transforming the lives of women through self-care. Karly is the author of Heal Your Body Image: An Inspiring, Step-by-Step Guide to Loving Your Body, Overcoming Sugar Addiction: How to Kick Your Sugar Habit, and a forthcoming book, The Soul of Motherhood. Sign up for her free newsletters to feed your spirit, love your body and stay sugar free at Firstourselves.com.

Karly is a voracious reader, a whole foods cook, a runner, a spiritual seeker, a thrift store connoisseur, and a crafter. She loves being a brunette, an extrovert, a busy mom, and a girly girl who prefers a skirt to jeans any day.

© 2007-2008, Raelee Peirce, BA, CPE, CPC. nobleMother.com

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• The 3 Secrets to Managing Preschool Power Struggles