The Parenting Oasis

Parenting Oasis Summer Plans April 19, 2009

 Ok- its official.  We have a new schedule for the warm weather.  Last year was our first Parenting Oasis summer and although we had some wonderful days, we also had too many quiet, lonely ones.  We lost money and wasted precious energy.  So this year we have decided to focus on more behind the scenes work- fundraising, networking, grant writing. 
So here is what the summer will look like.  We will be open this Saturday and one Saturday in May for the API meeting.  Then no Saturdays until fall.  We will be open both Tuesdays and Wednesdays until Memorial Day and then drop to only Tuesdays until fall.  Tuesdays we will continue to focus on the Becoming Momma group but can offer any other things that people are interested in doing.
This week, Wednesday we will host another volunteer meeting from 11-12.  Then we have a couple of great things going on.  First we have a Balancing Work and Motherhood meeting at 11, then at 12 an introduction to cloth diapering followed by a diaper/baby stuff swap and sale.  Come hang out.
Check out the class Sacha is offering on Tuesday April 28th- Reading to Your Child for Literacy.
Maureen

Parenting in Partnership April 13, 2009

Next Sunday, I am offering my class- Parenting Together: Right from the Start at Blooma. Somehow, in the midst of all the things you have to figure out in those first months of parenting something important happens that many of us don’t notice.  Somewhere in those early months, parents become partners and that partnership sets the tone for your marriage, your home environment. Doing this intentionally is difficult with all the other changes going on around you.

I can’t tell you how to parent.  I believe strongly that parenting is a highly intimate personal relationship and most “experts” seem to offer some kind of one size fits all model of parenting. Parenting is a dance between you and your child and then there is the other dance between your child and their other parent. It seems the hardest part of parenting is when my dance and my husband’s end up tripping us all up.  When we are both home, we don’t quite know who’s leading.

Respecting your partner’s relationship with their child means trusting that we share core values and are heading mostly in the same direction. It means putting relationship ahead of rules.

Want to hear some more?  Call Blooma, get a babysitter and lets talk.

Maureen