We focus on children's needs for warm, nurturing relationships with their parents—and on parents' experiences and feelings as they take the time to meet their children's needs.

Transitioning Home discussion groups

Submitted by catherine myers
on February 18th, 2012 at 4:25:49 PM

Edited 4-14-12

Enrollment in the Spring groups has ended; to indicate your interest in future groups, please see the Transitioning Home webpage.

A parent who leaves the paid workforce to be at home often experiences unexpected feelings and questions related to being an at-home parent. This Spring, Family and Home Network re-launched our Transitioning Home parent discussion groups. During this six-week series of meetings, we cover many topics including:

·    Expectations, personal identity and the potential for personal growth

·    The needs of infants and the critical mother-infant relationship

·    Myths and realities of a home-based life

·    Family, community, cultural influences

We’ll meet online, using Google+ hangouts. For a limited time, we are offering FREE enrollment in these groups (please note that while we will make every effort to include you in a group, due to scheduling challenges we may not be able to offer groups to everyone who expresses an interest).

Each Transitioning Home discussion group will include up to 6 parents and a facilitator from FAHN; meetings will last 90 minutes. Materials for reading between meetings, reflection/writing opportunities, and both individual and group exercises will be provided. Some materials will be emailed to you each week, some is offered on a private website just for Transitioning Home participants. 

The enrollment period ends on April 9, discussion groups begin meeting that week.

We would really appreciate your help in spreading the word about this opportunity!  For more information, and to indicate your interest, please see the Transitioning Home webpage.

Table Talk

Submitted by catherine myers
on February 29th, 2012 at 6:01:30 PM

Mom and sociologist Dina R. Rose, Ph.D. says "It's Not About Nutrition" and she helps parents understand the science-based feeding practices that lead to life-long healthy eating.

She writes:

Proportion, variety and moderation are easy for toddlers to understand.

  • Proportion: We eat more fresh, natural foods than anything else (including crackers, hot dogs, sugary yogurts, candy, cookies...) 
  • Variety: We eat different things on different days. 
  • Moderation: We only eat when we're hungry. We stop eating when we're full.

Read "Table Talk" and let us know what you think. 

Housewife? at-home mother? feminist?

Submitted by catherine myers
on February 23rd, 2012 at 2:13:36 PM

This essay by Nancy Vazquez has long been a favorite. It's included in our Transitioning Home discussion group materials: More about the discussion groups here.

Depth

by Nancy Vazquez

Back when I was dating, there were a few boys, and later men, who were put off by the fact that I was brainy and ambitious. I had the feeling they weren't quite comfortable with a girl who made better grades than they did or a woman who didn't hesitate to voice her feminist views.

I wonder about those men now. I wonder what they would think if they could see me folding laundry with my sons as we wait for my breadwinner husband to come home for dinner in our typical suburban house. I wonder what they would say if they knew that I had become a brainy, ambitious, feminist housewife.

Read more....

 

Some New Year's Non Resolutions

Submitted by Katie Rice
on February 13th, 2012 at 6:26:11 PM

 

Happy New Year!!

This year I don't resolve to:
 
lose weight
get organized
make more money
exercise more
write more
read more
or
spend more time with family and friends
 
Those resolutions never seem to last anyway...
 
I do vow to appreciate what I have today:  good health, time with family and friends, financial stability, time to do what I love most:  reading, writing, running, biking, walking my new doggie (more about her to come), and adequate space for everything I need. I may not have an overabundance of these things, but I have what I need right now.  Overly high expectations of myself and others invariably lead to a dead end.
 
I think, in this new year of 2012, we could all use a bit less self-transformation and a bit more self-appreciation. Let's turn down a notch our unending quests to try harder or be better versions of ourselves. Let's find more contentment with who we are right now and appreciate what we accomplish every day just by authentically being ourselves. Not ideal, airbrushed, romanticized versions of ourselves, but rather the real, imperfect, genuine and good enough ones.
 
The concept of not trying harder contradicts everything we read and see these days, but I truly believe we accomplish more when we positively focus on what we are versus what we could be. On what we're doing right versus doing wrong. Awareness of our present situation helps us recognize what's working good enough in our lives, and how certain unrealistic ideals can simply be let go. Often this simple, singular approach can work even better than setting numerous goals that not only are vague but also don't account for the way we are wired.
 

Read more...

self-appreciation
positivity

Making Human Beings Human

Submitted by catherine myers
on January 20th, 2012 at 3:22:37 PM

The great Urie Bronfenbrenner, professor of human development, wrote in a 1988 essay:

"In order to develop normally, a child needs the enduring, irrational involvement of one or more adults in care of and in joint activity with that child. In short, somebody has to be crazy about that kid. ...Of all the settings that help make us human, the family provides the most important developmental conditions: the love and care that a child needs to thrive. A healthy child and future adult is one who has such devoted people actively engaged in its life--those who love it, spend time with it, challenge it, and are interested in what it does and wants to do, in what it accomplishes from day to day. Other settings, such as school, church, or day care, are important to a child's development, but nothing can replace this basic unit of our social system: the family is the most humane, the most powerful, and by far the most economical system known for making and keeping human beings human."

Urie Bronfenbrenner, “Strengthening Family Systems,” in Making Human Beings Human: Bioecological Perspectives on Human Development, 1st ed. (Sage Publications, Inc, 2004).

Welcoming our first website editor!

Submitted by catherine myers
on January 10th, 2012 at 5:03:27 PM

We’re happy to introduce our first volunteer web editor, Joanne LaSpina. With experience as a blogger on her own site, Joanne was willing to dive into learning how to use FAHN’s website building tools. She’ll be adding content to the FAHN website—and started with her own article. Challenging Journey: Food Allergies was first published in our monthly journal Welcome Home. Thank you, Joanne, for volunteering!

 

Happy New Year!

Submitted by catherine myers
on December 29th, 2011 at 4:34:01 PM

We just sent out our E-News – with the link below you can read it online: it includes some exciting news about our 2012 plans as well as links to the latest additions to our website. Please pitch in to support our work with a tax-deductible donation—since 1984, individual contributions have kept this grassroots nonprofit organization going. At the bottom of the E-News, there’s a “subscribe” link—sign up and have it delivered to your email inbox. Happy New Year to all!

Family and Home Network's E-News

Make Believe

Submitted by catherine myers
on December 13th, 2011 at 6:21:29 PM

...play is critical to children's expression of strong feellings such as anger and fear. Play offers children opportunities to reflect on their experiences and to explore possible future scenarios... read more of my review of Dr. Susan Linn's book The Case for Make Believe: Saving Play in a Commercialized World.

Gift-Giving: You Won't Find This in a Store

Submitted by catherine myers
on December 5th, 2011 at 4:43:57 PM

Here are some out-of-the-box ideas on gift giving from our staff and volunteers...

Please share your own ideas by posting a comment (comments are moderated so there will be a delay before they appear).

 

Fostering Appreciation In Children

Submitted by catherine myers
on November 20th, 2011 at 8:58:58 PM

From long-time editor and writer Nelia Odom: Fostering Appreciation in Children

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