♥L-AMP: Loving Alternatives to Mainstream Parenting♥
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this sounds awesome, I know that when I simplify it affects me in ways that really help my kids. first I have more time for them, and nicer looking space.
and it makes it easier for them to manage as well. for example when there is less to put away, they feel proud because its easier for them to do their share.
sorry to side track but I didn't know there was this kind of parenting book and it made me think about my own life (and another wave of simplifying so we can pay better attention to our money)
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Quoting Imamom4sure:
this sounds awesome, I know that when I simplify it affects me in ways that really help my kids. first I have more time for them, and nicer looking space.
and it makes it easier for them to manage as well. for example when there is less to put away, they feel proud because its easier for them to do their share.
sorry to side track but I didn't know there was this kind of parenting book and it made me think about my own life (and another wave of simplifying so we can pay better attention to our money)
No side-track at all! It sounds like you'd love this one too. He goes into very specific measures (and some may find them extreme) but I've seen the benifit of it...and in the end, if it were down to my kid's well being and my "stuff"...:P~
We are cluttering-collecting-quasi-borderline-hoarders...BUT...I have an appreciation for order and organization and I KNOW how to do it, it's just my DH and I are both BAD at maintanence. Lucky for me (and it's a mixed "luck") my husband has a job that takes him away from home all week long now, so it lessons the amount of damage that is done...and leaves it in my hands. While overwhelming at times, this is also empowering! I'm really trying to make the first "step", which Payne recommends as the environmental simplification, reducing TOYS and STUFF int he home and especially the child's space and room.
We live in chaos right now, with an impending move out of state...BUT I'm taking this opportunity to SIMPLIFY and GET RID of things! I want to start anew!
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I think it was "flylady" that really sent the message home for me, you see when I had just one kid, and starting before he was even born, I was so excited about him, I would buy all kinds of things and good deals for him and toys was my favortite.
I had accumulated so much, someone came to the house and asked if I was running a day care, (all I had at the time was one kiddo, LOL) he wasn't even old enough for much of the stuff!
then my dd came, and all of a sudden, I was being pulled in different directions, and had accumulated too many things that I was overwhelmed with loads of laundry (from accumulating clothing) loads of dishes (from accumulating dishes because I previously hated doing them so much that I would think we just needed more since we kept running out of clean ones) and too many toys! so much to put away, and move around etc. my time with the kids became limited and stressed. because of needing to move the stuff to keep things save, and losing stuff, and being late, arrrgh, it was awful, and I was getting mad at my son and all the messes he was making.
and then I decided to check out flylady (at suggestion of a friend) and I bought the book, since I still relate better to books then to websites, and in the book, Sink Reflections it had a quote, that really jolted me to reality. I don't remember it verbatim, but it explained how our stuff makes us impatient with our loved ones, and would we rather be taking care of our stuff or taking care of our families, its a difference between yelling at them and enjoying them.
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Wow! What a powerful statement!
I don't remember it verbatim, but it explained how our stuff makes us impatient with our loved ones, and would we rather be taking care of our stuff or taking care of our families, its a difference between yelling at them and enjoying them.
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Thank you for sharing. I will put this book on my list to read -
Great one!
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I love flylady. I've been flying since 2007. For me, it was not just the physical clutter, but the mental "stinkin thinking" that had to go to. I had to learn to ask myself why I wanted some 'thing'. My routines and missions keep me focuses. I am nearly done decluttering from our last move and its nice seeing so much space.
Quoting Imamom4sure:
I think it was "flylady" that really sent the message home for me, you see when I had just one kid, and starting before he was even born, I was so excited about him, I would buy all kinds of things and good deals for him and toys was my favortite.
I had accumulated so much, someone came to the house and asked if I was running a day care, (all I had at the time was one kiddo, LOL) he wasn't even old enough for much of the stuff!
then my dd came, and all of a sudden, I was being pulled in different directions, and had accumulated too many things that I was overwhelmed with loads of laundry (from accumulating clothing) loads of dishes (from accumulating dishes because I previously hated doing them so much that I would think we just needed more since we kept running out of clean ones) and too many toys! so much to put away, and move around etc. my time with the kids became limited and stressed. because of needing to move the stuff to keep things save, and losing stuff, and being late, arrrgh, it was awful, and I was getting mad at my son and all the messes he was making.
and then I decided to check out flylady (at suggestion of a friend) and I bought the book, since I still relate better to books then to websites, and in the book, Sink Reflections it had a quote, that really jolted me to reality. I don't remember it verbatim, but it explained how our stuff makes us impatient with our loved ones, and would we rather be taking care of our stuff or taking care of our families, its a difference between yelling at them and enjoying them.
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Interesting, I might look this up. Thanks! I have cleared up a lot of the toys from our playroom lately because I was spending more time picking up the mess than playing with the kids. We still have way too much clutter. Now that it's summer I find we're so busy doing other stuff outside that they don't play with toys very often anyway.
It's funny, I find that the people in our family who buy a lot of toys for the kids (or the more expensive ones) are the ones who think that adults shouldn't play with children (they should "entertain themselves"). I don't mean to sound unappreciative - I mean, it's nice that people want our kids to be happy. I just think that the kids would be happier with people's attention than with the excessive toys.
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I have one more comment to make (I hope it's relevant since I haven't read this book). I visited DD's future kindergarten class and was impressed with the building and the teachers, but the actual classroom seemed cluttered and overwhelming to me. There were posters up with winter scenes on them and it was May. There were nursery rhymes and the alphabet and everything you would expect, but there was SO MUCH of it. I found it overstimulating myself and I was only there for a few minutes!
Anyway, I read some reviews on amazon and bought this book (it isn't at my library yet).
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I liked that book too. But there is another book on that same topic that I liked ALOT more. I read it every Christmas season to help me find center. It's called Living Simply with Children: A Voluntary Simplicity Guide for Moms, Dads, and Kids Who Want to Reclaim the Bliss of Childhood and the Joy of Parenting by Marie Sherlock