Tag Archives: kids

ABCs of Racing – A Kid’s Series about Racing

ABCs of Racing teaches concepts about racing with Red Racer as your guide. Full of gorgeous illustrations, the pages are inspired by actual tracks and racing situations around the world, to engage both kids and parents. This is not your ordinary ABC book!

  • 34 vividly illustrated pages that follow the alphabet with explanations for each new racing term!
  • Great for kids of many ages, particularly for 3-8 year olds.
  • Easy to introduce concepts and terms around car racing for your kids, but fun for adults, too!
  • Available in both English and Spanish versions, with over 10 different definitions and images across the two.

Preorders are available at http://redracerkickstarter.com/ .  The Kickstarter just launched on 2.22.22 and were already awarded a “Project we Love” badge.  They are close to 50% funded with 26 days to go. The books go for $20 each but there are plenty of cool custom rewards and add-ons too you will want to check out. 

Andy, the author, with his two biggest fans!

Make sure you check out these cool books today! http://redracerkickstarter.com/

How to Get Your Children to Become Eco-Conscious

Creating long-lasting habits in children should start at a young age. Kids are quite curious and their little brains soak up information like a sponge. Once a child gets to have an experience, it usually leads to help them latch on to new ideas and gain new perspectives. As a parent, it’s important to teach your children lifelong lessons that will last a lifetime. This includes friendship, sharing, morals, and compassion as well. Compassion comes in many forms from being, animals, right down to nature itself on Mother Earth.

It’s essential to teach your children at a young age about the importance of the environment as they’ll be the ones to inherit it. All it really takes are some gentle pushes and nudges here and there to get your children to pick up habits. Starting small and gradually doing bigger actions is going to be the best way to get your child to become active on sustainability. These are some helpful tips to get you and your children starting today on saving the environment.  

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Begin by spending more time outside

In order to get your child to feel a connection to nature and grasp the understanding of our impact, getting your child outside more often will help them build an appreciation towards it. Appreciating the outdoors will eventually lead to respect for the earth. There are plenty of outdoor activities you and your child can do together such as going to the park, playing games, or even doing some gardening.

Making changes at home

There are a variety of ways you can get your kid involved in the eco-friendly changes at home. Gardening is one of the best ways to get you and your child outside. This allows them to learn about nature, biodiversity, and patience. This can also teach your child about the hard work, time, and labor that goes into growing food such as fruits and vegetables. There’s something invigorating about getting to pick your own harvest and have the chance to eat it. Getting them to experience this form of satisfaction will give them an understanding of how great it is to garden.

There are other changes that can be done at homes such as installing solar panels from one of the best solar companies, switching to Star or other low energy appliances, plus low flow toilets and showers are excellent as well. Letting your children know that you are making changes within the household will give them a gentle nudge that they should also be involved in helping the environment.

Watch movies with them

Kids are very impressionable, plus their active imaginations may need some visual assistance to help them grasp an understanding of what’s happening to the world. There are plenty of TV shows and movies that are geared towards children that do help in pushing the fact that the environment needs saving. The classic 1980s TV show Captain Planet is a good example, but a more modern take would be Pixar’s Wall-E as this movie portrays the harmful effects of consumerism. 

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Talk about where the trash goes

If you’re wanting to know how to reduce your eco-footprint at home then it can first begin by looking at what goes into the trash. This is something that the whole family can get behind. Most neighborhoods have a recycling collection that separates paper, plastic, metal, and everything else from each other. This gives your children an understanding of what material is what but it also helps them in understanding producing waste. Give your child a talk and landfills and why everyone needs to make more of an effort to produce less trash. Talk to them about what can have a second life and why recycling is so important.

Composting and rain collection

If you and your little ones are doing some gardening outside, then there’s a chance that you’re composting as well. Composting sounds a little complex and scary to come families but it’s fortunately quite easy to do. Composting is wonderful for the environment and it gives your children the chance to understand what can and what can’t be composted. 

Composting is also something that many people don’t quite understand the benefits of, but it’s great for your gardens and the environment. It doesn’t need to be costly either, which is one of the best perks. Compost bins are quite affordable and can be found at your home improvement store.

Rainwater collection can also be very handy for your garden and it can save you money. Rainwater collectors can come in a variety of sizes from 100 liters up to 300 liters. However, you should look in advance whether or not you can collect water. Some cities, counties, and even states have a complete ban on it. So it’s best to look into this beforehand so you won’t risk breaking any laws.

Avoid buying anything brand new

One of the best ways to get your children to understand money management and the environment is through talking with them about the harmful effects of consumerism. Children are very impressionable, things are being advertised to their left and right. It makes children want things without understanding why they want them, plus it creates this expectation to keep up with constantly changing trends.

It’s so important to talk to your child as early as you can about the harmful effects of consumerism. Let them know it’s okay to want things but it can be harmful if they’re wanting things that they’re not going to use or need. Buying things that are brand new isn’t always necessary, and there are plenty of thrift shops that have affordable items. Getting into the mentality that second-hand items are just as good and that you’re helping save the environment is going to really help in the long run. This helps your family fight consumerism and stay sustainable.

 Donating items

Just like it’s best to purchase second-hand items, it’s best to try and give a second life to old items. If you and your family have clothes that are no longer being worn, or your kids have toys they no longer play with, then look into getting them donated. You can donate your items to thrift shops, clothing drives, churches, homeless shelters, and plenty of other places. 

This is going to help families have access to clothes and other things that they may have not been able to afford or have access to. Just make sure everything that you and your family are donating is gently used. As in, no stains, broken parts, tears, rips, or anything else in these donated goods.

Think about eco-friendly alternatives before tossing things out

Donating items is a great way to give a second life to something, but what about something that probably can’t be donated? Children tend to throw away things without putting much thought into them. Help get you and your child to think outside of the box. Ask if something can be given a second life before it gets thrown out. Can this item be recycled? Can this item be repurposed? Can it be reused? Can it be sold or donated to someone? These are some things that your family should get into the habit of thinking about before just throwing things into the garbage can.

Make goals

There’s always something new each month that your family can do. Look into making some goals with your children and see what can be obtained. Maybe make a goal about how much can be plated, or how much can be recycled. The possibilities for making goals can be endless. It’s all about making these habits enjoyable for your children so they can stay with them for the rest of their lives.

8 Tips for Raising Confident Children

Now more than ever it’s so important to begin practicing confidence and raising your children to be confident as well.  Thanks to social media, societal pressures, the fast fashion industry, and the constant changes within beauty standards, more and more people become far more self-conscious. This has unfortunately reached young children as well. Television shows, YouTube videos, apps, games, toys, and anything else that a child consumes for entertainment is some form or another usually telling children that they need to change something about themselves.

This is terrifying and it especially shouldn’t be affecting children! As parents, how can we stop this? It’s important to know that you can’t control everything, you can’t control everything that your children see, do, and what they’re exposed to. It’s just not possible. Since their environment can’t always be controlled, it’s important to know that you can at least counteract it by raising your children to be confident.

Raising confident children, and letting them eat, live, and breathe self-esteem is going to be the best step to take as a parent is letting them know that they’re beautiful the way they are. It lets them know that they’re doing enough, and most of all, it helps them to not compare themselves to others and question themselves. These are some tips for helping your children become confident and to help you as the parent raise your little ones into becoming confident children with high self-esteem. 

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Start young

You’ll want to start this the moment you find out that you and your partner are going to have a child. Many soon-to-be parents, and even young parents, begin putting expectations onto their children. Putting expectations on your child, especially when they’re still just a fetus is going to set yourself and your child up for failure. This isn’t the way to grow confidence in your child, and this isn’t the way to have a healthy relationship with your child either.

Sure, while the idea of you and your partner fantasizing about your child becoming the one to cure cancer, become the next president, or major athlete is a very attractive idea, it’s better to not have those ideas or expectations. Instead, shake things up and envision all the fun possibilities that your child is going to have, thinking about their personality traits, what they’re going to find of interest, and how their character is going to be. In general, put healthy expectations on your child and build them up by thinking about their qualities, not what they can or will do.

Let them know that they’re perfect the way they are

It doesn’t matter how old or young your children are, you should always let them know they’re beautiful both inside and out. Starting young is going to be the best way to let them gain their self-esteem and to block out negative thoughts that state otherwise. This also includes not criticizing them often, especially when it comes to their appearance. If they styled their hair a certain way, compliment it. If they’re picking out their outfits or discovering their own style, just praise them.

Tell them it’s okay to have some insecurities

Everybody has their own insecurities, it’s just something that cannot be avoided. Let them know it’s normal to have insecurities but they shouldn’t eat them.  Sometimes it’s fine to make changes because they may solve a bigger issue and they can help. Everyone has insecurities and sometimes there need to be solutions to these.

There’s nothing wrong with that and it should be accepted. However, if insecurities become a major problem and it’s obsessive, that’s when a problem happens. Even when raising confident children. It’s best to understand that in the end, they’ll still have insecurities eventually within their life.  It’s just something that you’ll have to let it be.

Let them know change isn’t bad

As a parent, it’s vital that you let your little ones know that there isn’t anything wrong with making changes. Changes can even be a good thing that helps. For example, many parents will look into CO2 Laser Release | Lip Tie Infants | Tongue Tie Infants for these infants. As this is something that is known for causing breast feeding difficulties and other problems, the parent looks into making a change for the baby that will help them. Making changes about yourself or letting the parents help with making changes can truly be a good thing. A part of confidence is understanding this. 

Show your confidence

Children love to emulate what their parents do. If you’re wanting to raise a confident child then you’re going to have to be confident yourself. This isn’t an easy task, confidence isn’t something that anyone is born with. It’s just something that comes naturally with a good environment and positive reinforcement. However, this is quite possibly going to be a mental challenge.

Parents have a lot of insecurities, whether it be age, their parenting styles, their occupation, weight, just basically anything at all. This can even include insecurities about common hair problems that should worry you anymore. In general, you’re going to have to mentally challenge yourself to drop your insecurities and accept yourself for who you are. Remember, to raise confident children means you must be confident yourself.  

Teach them to accept compliments

This also applies to you as the parent. Sometimes it can be difficult to accept compliments, to a degree we’re almost programmed to not want to accept them. Accepting compliments isn’t bragging, it’s someone saying something nice. Teach your children to accept these compliments, accepting compliments is a way to let this positive reinforcement in. Positive reinforcements are the way to allow confidence to grow.

Build up your child

Building up your child is going to build up their confidence, belief in themselves, plus it’s going to help their development into a good person. If they did something good, cheer them on and praise them. If they’re sad and crying, hug them. Speak nicely to them, encourage them, and recognize their positive behavior and actions. This is all going to help them and it’s going to be incorporated in developing high self-esteem.

Get your whole family on board

Family, your friends, babysitters, and anyone else that is involved with your children. While it may be difficult to get teachers on board, trying to get others on board will help. It’s important to try your best to surround your children with positive reinforcement. You want people to be around your children that are going to be nice to nice, share words of wisdom, and encourage them.