Kids Zone: Darling Clementine baby lit

What don't they have for kids these days?  I'm loving these children's books based on classic and timeless stories. I think Emilu would enjoy them too. You can buy them at Darling Clementine.
 

Kids Zone: Ceative playtime

Kids play with the darnest things. When I was a child we played elastic band, a game where two kids get inside a long (35") elastic tied at the corners and held by their ankles.  A third kid jumps inside the loop doing a variety of tricky jumping steps as the band gets higher and the game gets harder.  We'd play for hours on end, and sometimes when there was a shortage of kids we would use chairs to hold the elastic in place. We also played with marbles and the game of STOP, with paper and pencil we would go down the alphabet writing all the things we knew with that letter and adding points.

There's an undisturbed innocence when you watch children play with the most creative and organic things.  I always said my kids would play with toys and things that sparked their creativity and curiosity.  I'll do my best when Emilu starts playing seriously.

{Images via HipHip Hooray}

Women who make beautiful things

I came across this jewelry shop while watching bits of the Today showing the other day.  Kathy Lee was wearing a beaded necklace, which she revealed was made by a group of Ugandan women.  Now that I'm DIYing bracelets and other jewelry pieces, I was intrigued by their work.

The company is called Thirty One Bits and their mission is simple, to empower women to rise above poverty, thanks to these women, who made it possible. Did I mentioned the beads are made of paper!
I have my eyes on a couple of bracelets for this Summer. Would you buy from these amazing women? Mother's Day is a good excuse to get a beautiful necklace, and you will be helping a worthy cause.

Children's books

Let's talk about books for children, which I know nothing about.  Really.  I know something about books for adults, but only a little, since I don't have time to read (for now, I hope) and don't know which authors have published new books anymore.  I read somewhere, in a blog, that children's books have their own developmental valve and many are written keeping this in mind.  When I was little, I read whatever book cruised in front of me, regardless of age and maturity appropriateness.  No one was watching closely what I read or didn't read.  It was actually liberating and made me appreciate reading even more.  Besides I was always wanting to read what my elders were reading, it looked far more interesting than what I was reading.  Anyway, I was browsing online and found these three books, which look fascinating.  I wonder what taste in books Emilu will have.

A cousin of mine has started reading The Little Prince to her three year old girl.  It's the first chapter book she reads to her and she's so into it. I don't remember my first chapter book. Which one was yours?

Images via Grasshopper

The Age of Overparenting

via Boston Magazine

Thanks to a friend, I came across an article in Boston Magazine entitled Welcome to the Age of Overparenting. The article is so enlightening in many aspects of modern day parenting, that everyone who is a parent should read this.

When I was growing up in the 80s, the parenting style I was brought up on might now be considered slightly negligent and completely unattached.  We had to go after, instead of being nudged or sometimes pushed by our parents, as is the case today in overparenting households,  the things we wanted in our lives. After all, back in those days, our parents let us watch TV, play with the most original but not so safe toys, and some didn't stop to consider whether our schooldays were productive enough. And we turned out fine, didn't we?  We are those kids, now in our 30s and soon approaching our 40s, running the bus lines of e-commerce, social media technology and grassroots organizations. Somewhere between playing outside and staying up late, we developed a green conscience while acing our business classes in college.
 

Source: mamaiscomic.com via JuliaB on Pinterest

I know tiger moms have always existed in the parenting jungle of our lives, but don't you think they are becoming the norm in some zipcodes around the country?  And this, I confess, scares me.  Not because I  feel intimated by them, or fear my child might become dumb if she doesn't receive a tiger education at home.  It scares me because we are robbing our children's childhoods and compensating this with technology and the false promise of a secure future where there isn't room for mistakes or for idleness.

I'd like to try to be a parent for my Emilu first and foremost.  And then, a friend, a teacher, and of course when needed, an untigerly critic.