Curious kids need to be tough inside

Kids are always kids. They are the most honest people in the world!! Kids are such a curious creatures one ever know. Kids will not easily get bored to ask you 1000 times for the same questions until they get satisfied with the answer and kids will not afraid to explore. By doing so, they learn.

I am a mother who will just let my son do wherever he wants to, but of course, I will have my third eye to ensure he is safe. So here is what I have identified as Emir's curiosity

Sometimes I am upset to see my house full of mess, but Emir (Nuffnang and Friso, FYI, that my son's name :)) will calmly come towards me and say "Ibu, it is alllllllllllllllllllllllll messssss!!" To him, it is an achievement for him to pull out at least 60 pages and sit on it.

Of course, he is now very firm to feed himself. Extra work for Ibu since I have to thoroughly wash his shirt. Penat wooo. But Emir will come to me and say, "Ibu, seee I feed myself" Note: Those I mentioned what he said, is exactly the word he is using.

and usually Emir loves to be left alone. I mean they do not want us to accompany him when he is exploring. His new discovery will give him pleasure and it is such a reward when he gets to share it with anyone and it is extra bonus for him if he gets the credit from us. Enough if we just said "Pandainyer Emir" and he will smile all the way..

And yes, one of his curiosity that happens to every child is he loves to imitate his parents. I don't mind Emir's imitate our behavior as long as it is a healthier behavior. When Emir imitates something, to me he practices what he sees and as parent we just facilitate what he does. I believe this kind of environment will then stimulate his growing process and thinking.

Of course at time, I would stop him to avoid any accident, and of course he will protest with either

using the most powerful gun!! or

giving me this angry face!!

But as a parent, how could I help my son to be tough inside??

I know every parents have their own style of teaching and practising towards a healthier lifestyle. As for me, I am putting this effort in 24 hours of Ibu Emir's style and divided into three categories that the child encounters - sleep, eat, play

I shall start from 12:01 am in the morning - Mickey mouse clock - credit picture to http://www.mouse-watches.com/

1. Sleeping time

So from

   

From 12:01 am to 8 am, 12pm to 2pm and 10 pm to 12pm, that consists of 12 hours Emir will get his  sleeps. For Emir's age, he needs around 10 to 13 hours of sleeping. As a toddler, the quality of sleeping will affect his activity throughout the day, and therefore, getting enough sleep is essential for Emir

2. Healthy meals

Emir's eating time will be around 8am to 8-30am for his breakfast, 11 am to 1130 am for his lunch, 430 pm to 5pm for his snack time and 7pm to 730pm for dinner. Honestly, it wont be this fixed hour but Emir will have 4 time meals per day not inclusive his milky session.

For this hour, I will ensure that Emir eats healthy food. Healthy foods consists of

Carbohydrate -(Rice) His major source of energy. Sometimes he refused to eat rice, so I will replace with spaghetti but if he is not in a good mood, bread will be his main source of food for the day. Yes, Emir loves bread, so feeding him with the bread is not a problem for me.

 Protein -(egg, meat, fish, dairy products) - Honestly, Emir is having the same source of Protein - the egg. I might say he is not the meat lover and on my side, I refused to let him eat fish after cekik tulang incident. But as I mentioned above, Emir is a fan of bread, so i will feed him with cheese instead.

Vegetables - Some say, giving vegetables to your kid is such a challenge but again not for me :). But he only has three vegetables in particular, the rest he will reject - carrot, cucumber and tomato.. He will eat carrot like nobody business which is good.

Fruits - He likes durian, but I know, durian is not quite good for kids. But anyway, he loves apple, so he will eat an apple per day. It is like a routine for him to request for an apple after his heavy meal. Again i have no worries on this part.

Calcium - This is OK :) and this is where I spent my money most for each month.

But i would like to draw your attention of breastfeeding. Yes, Emir just stopped breastfeeding for two weeks now :). I always encourage new mum to go for breastfeeding no matter how hard it is, not only it is rich to jump start baby's immune system which you could not get from formula milk but the bonding between a mother and a child is infinite.

How Friso may help? source: http://www.dutchlady.com.my/en/home.asp?page=brand&subpage=view&CategoryNameShort=category&SubCategoryID=2&ProductID=23

Frisoshield™ with P2 Dual System™ is a combination of nutrients:    

- GOS, lcFOS and Friendly bacteria - Bifidobacterium lactis to help increase intestinal bifidobacteria and help maintain good intestinal environment.

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 3. Activities time

First of all, sorry for the bad drawing :)

For me, activities time is the most CRITICAL time as it involves A LOT of child's curiosity as I mentioned above in the earlier part. After eating and sleeping, the rest of day is full of activities where Emir gets to learn every single thing around him each day. So as a parent, what should I do??

a. Protect Emir from germs

Germs are everywhere, if you could see most of my pictures above have germs all around. We could not kill the germs as it spread quickly, but as a mother, I should protect Emir from germs. But how actually i can teach Emir to protect him from the germs

i. teach him how to wash hand with hand soap. yes, he is really GOOD in this as every time he washed his hand without my supervision, ended up, I will change his wet shirt.

ii. teach him the proper manner how to sneeze or cough especially not straight to someone's face. at least he knows how to help others as well.

iii. Cleanliness of the house (ehem ehem, my house is messy but away from dirt and dust :)) and the cleanliness of food preparation is the most important of cleanliness amongst all.

b. Safe environment

Yes, the reason why I choose him to stay at the nursery is that nursery is tailored for kids activity. At my son's school, everything is small and short, the sink's, the toilet bowl , the stairs - all are custom made for kids. Unlike staying at the babysitter's house, a house is always a house no matter how tidy it is. A nice table with sharp edge, a beautiful vase on the table, coins on the carpet or cookware placed beside the sink. Yes, I dont deny my house is the same too but at our house, we know where he goes, spot he loves to play and I believe we as his own parent will keep an eye of him everytime.

Staying at nursery, he will learn on his interpersonal skill. He learns how to share, how to make friends and how to be among his friends. This skills could not be learnt from a mother but it learns from his environment.

c. Relationship between Emir and his parents

Building a relationship is an effort and I dont believe is ready and will be there. As a parent, building a relationship is like harvesting your farm everyday. The more you harvest, the straighten the relationship is kan kan (those on Farmville, will understand better) hehe. I hope I wont forget to say I love you to him even though he is already 30 years old and he too not afraid to say the same to me for the next 40 years to come.

Communication is not about teaching, but also developing relationship. We share our stories, telling him what I have gone through for the day, of course at his age, he wont really understand the situation but he knows how we feel based on how I express my feeling.

We are not at the era where scolding is the best method to teach children. Nowadays, softly educate them will definitely work and reduce rejection from the child. Communications work when he understands what we say and able to response and practice what we say.

Why I am cracking my head for the above entry??

Yes, the above statement is purely based on my motherhood experience and I do not copy from anywhere except for the picture here and there. So again, why I spent some time to share this experience..

Nuffnang Friso Gold Family Day Out is back on this coming 2 January 2010, what a good day of the year to start with. And they are inviting 80 bloggers parents to share the fun with them at Kizsports & Gym at One Utama I wont throw this chance to bring Emir there for FREE!! You can read the last year review here

Yes, they are giving away 3 days 2 nights trip to Hong Kong Disneyland for 2 adults and 2 kids for the most creative blog post, but yes, I know they are thousand good bloggers out there, I am just happy if I get the invitation.

I know two of my fave bloggers have been invited. Hopefully I can meet them and say "Hi, saya Mira, ibu Emir, saya bace blog you" what a stalker hahahaha.. You know not only kids having fun but at the same I can share some of parenthood experience too.. Nuffnang & Friso, do I have a chance ?? :)