I haven’t totally mastered this yet but I can say that when my children were 1-2 years old, they can sit at the dinner table throughout dinner. You see children attention span is very limited. They cannot sit doing nothing for long. They like to explore and do things. Create little activities for them to occupy themselves with.

For younger children, you can put a bowl of honey stars for them to pick and eat. When Emily was young, she likes to pick rice one by one to eat. As for Tim, he likes to draw. Ask Vien, he almost drew every paper mat on the table and ask the waiter for more. You can also give them finger food and let them eat on their own. Take color pencils and notebook for them to draw or color.

This has to be done when they are young. If you cultivate the habit of letting them run around during dinner time, it will stay with them and you will spend more effort chasing them around.

Generally medicine is sweet with added flavor, only a few antibiotics are difficult to swallow. Some children when they see the medicine bottle or the syringe, they will either scream or run far away. Again, there is the fear associated with either the syringe or medicine bottle.

You try taking a syringe and take out a Vitagen drink, showing it to your child. Pump out the Vitagen and give it to your child. See whether he/she will run away. You can try it with Ribena, Yakult and any drinks your child like. Do not try it on babies, they are not allowed to take these drinks, only milk or breast milk. :giggles:

Once your child does not have the fear, you can try it with medicine. Of coz, do it when they are sick and really need the medicine. Do not show them the medicine bottle.

Another tip when pumping the liquid into the child mouth, always point the syringe to the side of the mouth, giving a small squeeze each time until it is finished. This is to prevent choking. Always put your child in an upright position.

Lastly, never use medicine to threaten your child. Some older generation folks like to say “If you are naughty, ask the doctor to give you medicine.” This will only create more fear with medicine.

Note: Always keep your medicine out of your children reach. Better put in a lockable cabinet.

How to make bath time fun for your children? My children just love bath time because they love playing water. I have 2 small stools for them to sit and a big pail in front of them. I filled the pail of water and put some toys in the pail. Toys like cups, plastic bowls or containers where they can fill them with water. As I wash their hairs, I make shampoo while foam that they call ice-cream to fill the cup.

You can also throw in a small towel and teach them to wash her toys. By the way, I also trimmed their hair during bath time. They will be distracted by playing and doesn’t notice that I have cut their hair. My children just love bath time and never once I have to drag them into the bathroom.

I am starting a series of parenting tips here. I would like to share my ideas on some of the success I had with my children. These tips may or may not work with your child because children are born with different characteristics. If it works, please drop a comment.

Many children do not like you to touch their nose or clean it. They will yell and scream if you ever go near to it. It happens when they are baby up until 2 or 3 years old. As they grow older, they probably will let you clean without any problem.

How do you overcome that? Firstly, you need to take the “pain” out of the picture. Maybe first time when you clean their nose, they felt the pain. After that, they will not trust you with their nose. You can play a “nose touching game” with them. You request your child to touch your nose and you touch theirs without inflicting pain. After many times of letting you touch their nose, they will trust you with their nose.

When they trust you with their nose, you try to clean in gently without inflicting any pain. Simple. Bottom line is when you touch their nose, it is not always cleaning and let them feel that it can be fun too. Believe me, once they trust you with their nose, you can even put nose drop without any problem. Funny, now my children like to squeeze my nose, inflicting pain on me.

On the top of Queensbay Mall Penang, there is a new skating rink. I took Emily and Tim to watch teenagers roller blading round and round. Entrance Fee is RM16 unlimited playtime. They were fascinated by it. I took a chair for Emily to stand and watch while my hubby and I took over dinner. One thing I like about the rink, the surrounding have places to eat. I wonder how long the rink will last, if it doesn’t, I hope they convert that to KidzSport. :giggles:

The place brought back some memories of my school days. Yeap, I used to go to roller blading rinks with my friends. We used to hang out there a lot. I learn how to skate when I was six years old. My sister bought those four wheeler skates that are adjustable in size. Where I live, we have a long verandah where we can practice skating. It was fun skating back and forth.

When my children wake up from sleep or nap, it is very fortunate that they are not grumpy or moody. First thing Tim wakes up, he will go downstairs to look for the daddy as he knows daddy wakes up early. As for Emily, she can snores in deep sleep and next moment her eyes will be wide open looking for me.

Today we wanted to go out for dinner and Emily hasn’t waked up from her nap. She was snoring. Daddy whispered some secret words into her ears. She tried to open her eyes, after a few tries, she succeeded and woke up straight. Guess what those words are?

By the way, our record time from waking our children up from nap to getting out of the house is 15 minutes. Cool isn’t it? 😎

Secret Words: Want to eat your blue ice-cream? Some of you had it correct. Bravo! :good:

Gbay: Stamps

How many of you like to flip channel with the remote control? I am guilty of doing this all the time. Now I cannot do this especially when the children are around. It is always 2 against 1. When the channel land on a cartoon show, I can flip no further. I have to stop for them to watch until the show is over. Darn….

That is why I am now here blogging instead. Tim wants to watch the cartoon and I have to let him. Oh well, now you know how much control I have over the TV.

Here is Malaysia, there are only 5 channels for me to flip, RTM1, RTM2, TV3, NTV7 and TV9. Not that many huh? Yeah I don’t have Astro. It is a good thing. Spend more time on useful stuff. I wish they have a feeder for TV in one channel, just like blogs.

Today my church held a fun time for children. 100++ children came and we were overwhelm with the great response. The children had fun because of all the activities line up for them, we have simple bible quiz, mini stores for games, balloon making and bible story time. Of coz not forgetting the food like fish balls, sausages, nuggets, ice-creams and many more finger foods. We even have candy floss and ice popsicles. Yeap, we got a candy floss machine.

Children were coming to me for balloons. I made flowers, swords, hats, dogs and others. Thanks to Hooi Lin who was able to get some tough good quality balloons for me to do balloon twisting. I hope her gal’s birthday party turns out great. It was a tiring day for my family. My children were overwhelmed with all the food and games. I do not know how many ice popsicles, fish balls, sausages and ice-cream they have eaten. It was a great day to sum it all. Sorry I didn’t have much time to take pictures of the event.

Yesterday, Tim and Em went to the park with daddy while I can peacefully watch my favorite TV. My enjoyment didn’t last long when Tim came home crying. Daddy told me he fell down while running in the park. He has minor bleeding on his knee and elbow. He was frightened and crying.

Tim refused to let daddy touch the wound or let him wash the wound. I came to the rescue. I took out the first aid kit, a bowl of water and some cotton. Wet the cotton. Here is the trick. First distract Tim, he was busying looking at the things in the first aid kit and Emily was kepohing asking mummy what is this and what is that.

Second, do not touch the wound, wipe the area around the wound. If you wipe the wound straight and the child feel pain, he will never allow you to touch him. After wiping around the wound, you can slowly work you way into the wound.

After cleaning it with water, apply the yellow antiseptic lotion. The one I had was good because Tim didn’t feel any pain at all. I know some iodine lotion will cause a little pain. You can use some cartoon plaster to cheer your child up. I used the Superman plaster on his elbow which he was very pleased with.

This morning I had an early meeting at 8am. Emily was still sleeping and I let her sleep in. I thought after the meeting I will take her to the babysitter. Halfway through the meeting, I heard footsteps coming down the stairs. Oh no, I was afraid she will make noise or cry while I am on the conference call.

She peeped into my room. All I did was put my finger up my lips, asking her to be quiet. She tip toe into my room and play quietly while I was having my meeting. Amazing, I just couldn’t believe it. She must have woken up on the right side of the bed. She was playing by herself until the meeting was over.

Sometimes she has a stubborn character whereby you tell her not to do something, she will refuse to comply. I will scold her. The next time, she will learn to comply because she dislikes me scolding her. She did ask me not to scold her. I guess you just need to be stern once for them to experience it that you mean business.