How we are avoiding kids devices

Any parents with me on how big of a struggle it is to keep our kids off the tech? Now we have ZERO judgements on parents that choose to allow phones and iPads for their little ones. We are all trying to make the best choices for our babes. Who the heck knows what the best options are anyway right?! With that said, we have chosen to keep phones and iPads out of our house with the kids. Now, it has come up plenty of times on when they will be getting their own devices but so far we haven’t been getting to much push back. I sense that it will be coming on pretty thick with Capri soon since most if not all of her friends have phones. Here is how we are tackling the conversation of explaining why we choose to hold off on devices for them.

A handful of years ago, we were working on the lesson of how our facial expressions can really be inviting with a smile or can be off putting without one. Totally different topic obviously but I’m going somewhere with this. It led us to really studying the faces around us. We looked at billboards, our friends and kids while we were out and about. I asked both of the girls randomly who they thought looked happy, nice or even most beautiful amongst the people we observed. Every single time it was the person with a big smile on his or her face. Someone who wasn’t smiling didn’t look approachable or happy. This excercise quickly turned to observing people on their phones. Adults and kids. The overwhelming consensus was that no one looked happy or like they were having fun while they were on their phones. The most fun looked like it was being had by the kids and parents chatting at the restaurant, the kids at the park playing, the arts and crafts projects, even our friends at birthday parties.

Our hope with this lesson was that it taught the girls to make this decision based off their own observations and not just our rules dictating to them what they can and can’t do. Either way our rules weren’t going to change but it at least helped support our rules by making the girls a part of the choice.

Tween beauty products Capri is loving

Capri is in the full swing of all things tween! That awkward age of stinky armpits, braces, zits….we all remember it. How do we handle the changes without getting to overboard? Don’t worry mama, I think I have figured out some stuff and products to share. I asked Capri what her favorite beauty products were and here is her list. We are working on getting ahead of all that fun stuff by working on creating some easy and age appropriate habits in our beauty regime. Here are some of the products we are adding to the mix that she is all excited about.

COOLA Classic Face Sunscreen

this plant based formula is non-greasy and SPF 50

Ursa Major Essential Face Wipe

These face wipes are perfect for late dance nights or when we have been a little extra sweaty. I even snuck some and they take of makeup like a champ. These are great at keeping those pesky little zits from popping up. Love that they are individually packaged to throw in a dance bag or overnight bag.

Tweet Tweet Meow Deodorant

Grapefruit is our fave scent

Baking soda Free Sensitive skin deodorant that keeps fresh all day

Made with Certified Organic, Vegan, Cruelty Free, & Fair Trade Ingredients in the US

Aluminum free, Paraben free, Sulfate free and Plastic free packaging

Conair Hot Rollers

I don’t who you are if you did have a hot roller moment at some point in your life. I’m a little to nervous about her frying her hair off with a wand or burning herself so hot rollers were the perfect happy medium. She can get her hair curly with no risk of burning herself.

Braids, Buns , Ponies and Pigtails styling book

50 different hairstyles with simple tutorials . This books is really cute and all the styles are done on girls. Such a fun gift too with bobby-pins and scrunchies.

When to not be a "mama bear"

“Mama Bear” by definition: A woman, especially a mother, who is extremely protective of a child or children. We have all been there right?! I believe there is nothing more scary than a mama bear protecting their baby. It’s a very overwhelming feeling to make sure that no harm in any way comes to our babes. As my girls are getting older we are inevitably coming up against more situations that make my mama bear instincts flare. I want to bubble wrap them from disappointments, hard lessons, unkindness, gossip, failure, literally all of it. The hardest part for me is to separate the times where I need to step in and protect them and the times that I need to buckle up my mama bear desires and let the situations play out with quiet advice from the sidelines. Our biggest goal is to help our girls become capable and smart. To treat unkindness with strength but love. To apologize if we have hurt someone’s feelings unknowingly. Most importantly to never have a victim mentality.

We had a situation recently, where one of the girls was up against a little bit of bullying. As soon as my girl shared the situation with me, my hackles went up. I literally lost sleep over it for days. I gave her my best advice on how to calmly diffuse the situation but the behavior got worse over a couple days. She calming went to her on day one and tried to talk it out to see what the root of the issue was. We discussed at home what she may have done to the little girl to make her react like this all of a sudden. We wanted to make it better but weren’t sure how. I always want the girls to look at these things from someone else’s shoes in case they unknowingly hurt someone’s feelings. To be sensitive to other’s perspectives. To never be reactionary. The next day behavior really ramped up. It was just getting unkind and I really had to make the tough decision on to step in or not. My thoughts went straight to “I’m going to discuss it with the mom”. I would certainly want to know if one of my girls was being unkind. I discussed me stepping in with my girl . I never want to take action without her knowing. I like us to be a team on this sort of thing. I had to weigh the worst case scenario in my mind. If I stepped in with the other mom, what would the ripple effect be of that? 1. I am now potentially spotlighting this other little girl and making her even more mad at mine which could lead to more unkindness. 2. I am not letting my girl deal with her battles herself. How will she ever know how to handle these sorts of issues in the future when I’m not there to step in? After lots of thought, I explained to her that I wasn’t going to discuss it with the mom and why.

So here is what we did. We decided to build a couple scenarios to practice what she would say if certain things happened. I’m a big fan of being mentally prepared for potential confrontations so you aren’t caught of guard. Being prepared I’ve always found keeps you from feeling helpless, frazzled or the situation escalating. Our big goal was to not allow someone to mistreat her but also deal with it kindly and firmly. She needed to stand up for herself. We decided on “ Please don’t talk about me behind my back. I would really like to get back to being friends again.” If gossiping was continuing. Another option for if unkind behavior was happening would be “ Please don’t be mean anymore, I would really like to be friends again if we can”. The truth was, my babe did still want to be friends with this girl and I agreed. Thankfully, the little girl snapped out of whatever was bothering her the next day and all went back to normal so my babe didn’t have to use any of our scripts. Phew! Crisis averted and I’m so happy I didn’t step in like I really wanted to.

I know this was a very little hiccup for my girl and there are so many serious bullying issues that so many mamas have to endure with their little ones. My heart breaks over it! I pray we help our babies be strong and brave and always enable them to stand up for themselves kindly.

How we are teaching confidence to our girls

I whole heartedly believe that any and all success that has happened in my life have been gained by confidence. It’s the single biggest lesson we are actively being very intentional with while raising the girls. I believe with confidence, they won’t be talked into situations that they don’t want to be a part of, they will feel good about standing for what they believe and not be swayed by their peers, they can move and shake in life knowing that they can handle any situation etc. Here are some of the very intentional ways and practical steps we are working on our building confidence in our girls.

Enforcing their voices- listening and hearing their thoughts. Of course, not everything they have to say is riveting or interesting, but to them it is, so we like to give them a platform for it each night. When we sit down for dinner, we take turns sharing the best part of our days. We very intentionally don’t discuss the negative. We find that giving any air space to negative just sucks the life out of the night and isn’t what we want to give attention too. We want them to be focused on finding the good always in their day. We go around each of us and discuss the best part of our day. It can be anything from crushing a test, seeing a butterfly, eating a really good sandwich or getting to wear our new shoes. Anything goes! Letting them actively share what’s on their mind has been really interesting. We are trying to make sure that both of them know that their voices are important to us.

Not everyone is thinking about you- to juxtapose the above, we also are very intentional with making sure that we instill the certainty that not everyone is thinking about them. Everyone is worried about their own stuff. We don’t take things personally. We aim to not overthink and just believe the best of intentions from everyone. We can only control ourselves not others and we can’t worry ourselves about what someone else may or may not be thinking or doing. Stay in our own lane.

Self deprication- to piggy back on the last topic, we keep a really strong sense of humor in our house. Really strong! We tease insesently! We are very conscientious to be kind but we don’t take ourselves too seriously. Both Erik and I have pretty similar senses of humor. I really never take myself to seriously and can whole heartedly poke fun at myself. None of us are perfect and will never be! Why not keep our opinions of ourselves light and fun. We know who we are and what we stand for, the rest is just fun. Nothing can be that serious! Drama free house is the goal always! Check back with me in a couple years when all of us are pmsing at the same time!

Valuing their opinions on silly topics like shoes and what dress to wear- my dad gave me this advice a while back and I really took it to heart. He suggested giving the girl’s some say in things like what shoes I should wear to date night, what lipstick works best, or which earrings. It’s fun to see what their tastes are and what they think looks good together. I know these are fairly frivolous things to be deciding on but it gets them involved and subtly lets them know that they opinions matter to me. It also teaches them how to put together an outfit for an occasion and what goes into the look.

Letting them be in charge of adult things like the airport and parking places- this one is HUGE!!!! We are so fortunate to travel a lot as a family but also with my mom for our girl’s trips. When I was little she would give us our tickets at an airport and we were supposed to lead the way to our gate. We do this with every trip we do. If they know how to navigate their world they will be less intimidated when they get to adventure on their own. This practice also helps teach them how to problem solve when things get confusing or tricky.

Enforcing social graces like eye contact and conversation skills- this is such a lost art in our digital age. There is nothing more powerful than eye contact and conversation skills. To be able to enter any room and not be a wallflower is big in our house! There will be a lot of situations in their life where they are uncomfortable or not sure how to interject themselves but by leading with a smile and knowing how to converse they will be able to handle any awkward moments. We practice this every time we sit down for dinner with our “best day” conversations. Each person has to follow up with a question about each other’s day . This helps teach them to ask about others and not just talk about themselves. We also are very hard core with eye contact and manners in restaurants. Each of them has to order their meal for themselves, look at the waiter, smile and use their pleases and thank you’s. This includes every time the waiter fills their water. They are taught to stop what they are doing look up at the waiter and say thank you every time. It’s a lot but we feel it’s so important to teach them that they are not the most important person there and to acknowledge when someone does something for them.

All in all, we aim to raise them to feel good about their choices. To make decisions on their own and never be followers. If we reinforce these things with not only words but by actions and exercises daily, we hope that when they get into a tricky situation they can fall back on who they are and what they know.