12 Soothing and Essential Ways To Make Christmas Less Stressful

How are you feeling about this holiday season? Excited? Joyful? Apprehensive? Anxious? Stressed? Overwhelmed? And here’s the thing, hopefully there’s a bit of the first two feelings jingling around your body, but if you’re like most modern-day parents, then you might also be feeling a lot of the latter as you hurtle towards the bigContinue reading “12 Soothing and Essential Ways To Make Christmas Less Stressful”

How to set (and stick to) gentle boundaries that work

Why gentle boundaries work The theory around attachment styles and how important a child’s attachment to a primary care giver is for their emotional and physical wellbeing isn’t new (check out Bowlby’s work around 1958). But more and more are now realising the importance of the attachment within their parenting. And reaping the benefits. Attachment-basedContinue reading “How to set (and stick to) gentle boundaries that work”

How to respond when people tell you you’re parenting all wrong

Three times this last month I’ve been told by three different people that my daughter is “too much”. I’ve been told that she’s “too emotional”, “too demonstrative”, “impolite” and “inconsiderate”. Although it’s true that she can sometimes be these things, she is often emotionally aware, capable, polite and thoughtful too. She’s only 6 and she’sContinue reading “How to respond when people tell you you’re parenting all wrong”

The problem with punishment

A generation or so ago, parents still held a very clear idea of how children “should” behave. Tides are changing and as we’re becoming more aware of how a child develops and what’s going on in their brain we’re starting to understand more about why they act the way they do; why children can seemContinue reading “The problem with punishment”