Thank you to YOU, our listener, for joining us in this journey of 150 podcasts with companion blogs! This pause invites us to explore Tim’s favorite 5 episodes and Leah’s favorite 5 episodes followed by YOUR favorites!! What is your personal favorite?

While preparing intentionally for your preschooler seems like an option in for the summer or school year, it should rank high in importance. Why? First, you don’t want to waste these ripe learning years. Secondly, if the little ones don’t have a plan to keep them busy, they will keep you from accomplishing your goals with the older children. Preschoolers are naturally curious. They love to play. Use this curiosity to play purposeful.

My hope is that you have a wonderful relationship with your parents. You are visiting them as frequently as you wish your children will visit you when they are grown. When you do go to your parent’s home for a visit, remember these easy ideas and make your visit one of the best ones ever!

Since I was a young woman, I have worked with children. As I dearly love these young hearts, I am particularly attuned to the anger seen in so many of them. Sometimes the anger comes from a wounded place or a response to bullying. Other times it is the result of neglect or a head injury. This blog explores practical helps for the prevention and cure of anger in children. Yes, there is prevention. Yes there are cures. Yes, more than just identifying the problem, there is help.

Anger in a child is a real response. While God holds each of us, even a child, responsible for his or her sin, God does hold parents 100% responsible for the sins which provoked him to that anger. Check out 25 ways that parents provoke their children to anger. Loving my children well means that communication on this topic must remain open to self examination on this topic as well as others.

Emotional health is vital to our physical and spiritual health. Taking inventory of our whole person is critical to moving through each day with our optimal potential. When thinking about embracing my everyday, it is especially important to recognize any toxic thinking patterns that might sabotage any capacity for growth. Latency or underdevelopment may hamper what I could be or eliminate future success. If shame is a reoccurring theme in my thoughts, it might be identified as a bully. Let’s explore shame in contrast to guilt along with the healthy pathway to eradicate this type of toxic thinking.

Being a parent is just hard work. The stages of childhood change rapidly. Approaching the subject of dating with your child can be downright intimidating. Before you begin, know that dating is radically different from how it was when you were a teenager and young adult. Sexual promiscuity is rampant. Sexual identity, date rape, binge drinking, emotional cheating, sexting and a host of new and more shocking behavior is the normal for today’s teens. Becoming more acquainted with today’s culture is a necessary, on-going job of today’s parents.

As a former rough water lifeguard and eager health enthusiast, I completely support physical exercise being part of growing a whole child.  However, I struggle with the emphasis on sports in today’s youth culture.  Every kid walks away from their chosen sport someday…….then what?  Many coaches and parents fail to identify the lifetime value of sports because they falsely assume they are training the next state champs. So when the lights go out, when the cheering stops, when it is time to “leave it on the field”…. what do we have when the game is over?

Due to the financial strain families feel in the current economy, discussions about food costs occur more frequently than ever. Many rising costs offer us little options for keeping our funds in-line with earnings. However, food is one of those more flexible categories. Discover easy-to-implement ideas on how to save money without scissors.