Giving your toddler to a caregiver to take proper care of  in your  absence is  a common everyday  occurrence in mothers.

But before you take that final decision to give your beautiful baby to  anyone to take care of there are certain things you have to consider if  you do not want to regret your decision at the end of the day.

These are the things you should consider before handing your child to  any caregiver:

Open Relationship
Is your caregiver a person with whom you can develop an open  relationship? Do you truly feel that the person you are  considering  handling your precious baby to is worth it really? If you feel  differently from the above, please reconsider your stand for the sake  of your dear toddler.

Relationship with Your Baby
Are you so impressed that this person is the kind that your baby will  enjoy staying with? This is important because you will not be around to know what transpires between them.

In another way, does this person enjoy working with children in the real sense of the word and not just for the money derivable from the service? If someone is working for the money and not for the deep interest in the service, there is no way they can deliver the right service as we want it.

Provision of Activities and Materials
Can your caregiver provide the necessary activities, materials and  equipments for your toddler to play with and help him/her to learn and  grow at the same time?

Knowledge of Basic First Aid
Your caregiver should have the knowledge of basic first aid treatment  in order to help out where there is a medical problem from the child. This must be made a priority as there is a risk if the caregiver is lacking in this basic knowledge.

Enough Time for Each Child
The caregiver must be able to give enough time for each of the children  in his/her care for things to work out well for your child and for you  to benefit fully from the money you are paying the caregiver for the service.

A qualified caregiver should be able to properly care for your baby’s  physical needs such as feeding and changing of the diapers.In addition, he/she must be ready to find time to hold the baby, talk  to the baby and play with the baby most of the times as long as the  baby is in his/her care.

Provision of a Safe Environment
A safe environment is important for your child’s safety and for this  reason; you should ensure that the caregiver you want to give your  child to must provide this basic amenity. Actually, this should be of  concern most especially when the child has started to crawl and walk.

These are the six main things you have to consider before appointing  any caregiver for your dear toddler.

You will agree with me that these are worth considering for the sake of  your baby. If you love your baby enough, somebody else should, as much  as possible, do the same for your baby in your absence since they shall  be earning their pay from your hard-earned money.

Anything short of this should not be considered at all. Do not compromise in matters of baby caregiving, please, for the sake of your  baby if truly you love him/her.

Enjoy your parenting efforts.

Sikaz

Most babies develop diaper rash at some point during their infancy. For  some (medically unexplainable) reasons this seldom happens to babies  who are breasted.

Diaper rash is used to describe an irritation which occurs in the area  which is covered by the diaper.

The diaper rash announces its arrival through the redness or arrival of  small bumps on the baby’s lower abdomen, buttocks, genitals and thigh folds. Generally, surfaces that mostly have contact with the soiled diaper.

Mothers should not worry so much for this type of diaper rash clears itself off in three or four days if appropriately taken care of.

Diaper rash may likely occur under the following conditions:

When a wet diaper is left for too long, the skin becomes susceptible to a chafing. When the urine in the diaper decomposes it forms chemicals  which further irritate the baby’s gentle and tender skin.

Leaving a stool-soiled diaper on the baby for too long is bad for the baby’s tender skin. The stool will attack the baby’s skin which makes it more susceptible to a rash.

When baby’s body is left unkept, unclean and wet.

The remedy to the diaper rash is very simple indeed, and where a mother  tries to use it then there will be a reduction in the baby’s risk of  diaper rash.

Mothers should …

Ensure that the baby’s diaper is changed as soon as possible after a  bowel movement.

A soft cloth should be used to cleanse the diaper area and then water. Immediately after a bowel movement just do this.

Frequently change the diaper in order to reduce the baby’s skin  possibility of been exposed to moisture.

The baby’s bottom should be exposed to air when practicable.

Ensure that air circulates inside the diaper anytime you use a plastic  or disposable diaper with tight gathers around the abdomen and legs.

Mothers should note that some diaper rash are very  obstinate.Where,after you have tried all the above suggested ways to prevent the occurrence of the diaper rash and they fail, you should use  a lotion or ointment.

If  the rash is a moist type, use a drying lotion. This should improve  the rash within 2 or 3 days. If not, then you should pay a visit to  your pediatrician who will expertly diagnose the possible cause of the  rash and prescribe appropriate medicine for it.

Enjoy your parenting efforts.

Sikaz.

Mothers are such nice creatures, but they are somewhat so very impatient with their toddlers when the latter “fail” to live up to their expectations.
One aspect that agitates the minds of mothers in their toddlers is speech development in the babies.
Most mothers fail to realize that the speech mechanisms in children develop gradually.
But in their haste to see their children speak, mothers get both themselves and their children worked up.
Understanding the speech process or the gradual emergence of communicable sounds in the toddler will do mothers a world of good.
The following are the stages of speech process in a toddler:

0 – 8weeks
Baby makes basic noises which are associated with hunger, pain, discomfort etc.

8 – 20weeks
Cooing noises and laughing develop. They are short bursts initially, but they become more often from three months.

20 – 30weeks
Baby does a lot of vocal play at this stage of his development. Many different sounds are produced at this age.

6months
Baby starts to produce strings of sounds as he babbles.

9 – 11months
Jargon begins. Melodic sounds that seem like real speech are babbled by the baby.

12months
Baby produces his first meaningful words. Congrats mum!

18months
Baby is capable of producing a vocabulary of about 50 words. He could understand five times as many words now.

Two years
Immature speeches are uttered in addition to the production of three –and-four- word phrases.

Three years
Baby expands his vocabulary but it is still unintelligible. He may not be fluent in producing his sentences. He will asks questions in phrases instead of using question words.
Now, you can relax yourself!
Your knowledge of the above process should reduce your anxiety over your baby’s speech development. Be patient with him, and he will soon master everything to your delight.
You may try this book , which will teach you how to talk to your toddler. l recommend it for its effectiveness

Happy dialogues as you now chat with your toddler!
Sikaz

What can you do to be a beter dad to your children?

This is a very cogent question every father needs to ask themselves as they engage in parenting

Being a dad to your children is a delight for those who have made up their minds to embark on thwe journey into fatherhood.

The following are the ways by which yopu can become a better father to your children and make them happy at all times.

1. Ensure you are home early enough to be with  your family during the day. If your children are at school,you can  make plan for them to call you when they get home.

2.Try spend a few unhurried minutes on the phonewith your children when they return from school.This will demonstrate that you care about the things that are happening in their lives.

3.You may spend some valuable time with your everydayYou can hang out with them and give them your undivided attention.
4. Listen toyour children’s ideas. Through this process, you will get to know those things and personalities that are important to them and why. But you can’t do this while distracted.

5.Once a week just try to make time to have some fun togetherwith your children.For instance, you can decide to have a game of basketball,soccer, baseball etc.Just do something with them.You can take turns picking the week’s activity.

6.As a father,you must always try to talk and teach your children positive values. It is wrong of you to just assume that your children will pick up the necesary values you want to impact in them asn they learn from you.Tell your children why you feel the way you do. And show those values that you want your children to adopt.

Don’t ever forget the fact that when your children are very young,you may want to go to the park or beach together as a family,involving their mother too.But as they are growing up, they will develop different taste to the one you are used to giving them.You must go along with them to have a rewarding time at the end of the day.

Finally,l will want you to always remember that nobody is perfect.Make effort to implement the ideas that you have been able to get here.

For you to have read this far, this shows simply that yopu truly love your children and you intend to be a better dad.

Enjoy your parenting enterprise,

Sikaz

Do you have a teenage child who is brilliant, creative and perhaps ‘friendly’ outside the home, but turns out to be somehow hostile and defiant at home.

Has your child ever ran away for hours or even days in protest against your decision about what he is trying to do or is already doing?

Relax as you are not alone, so many other parents are experiencing the same the from their teenage children these days.

The following are the steps you should take when your teenage child is becoming rebellious:

1. Try to find out what is bugging him, but count yourself lucky if he tells you.
2. Start to give him some space and latitude and recognize the fact that he is a
young man who possesses raging hormones.
3. Offer him new, more flexible rules .Don’t allow for any question from him, neither
should you explain. Just give them to him.
4. Give him chances to make his own mistakes, which are also opportunities to earn
trust. Never expect him to be perfect, he is still a teenager, after all.
5. Treat him as if he has just packed into your house; negotiate with him and set new
boundaries.
6. Don’t be tempted to hold any family counseling section where you would unwittingly
be forcing him into talking about his feelings in front of his sisters and his mom, l’m
sure he will hate that. The possible result would be that he will lie and say whatever
everyone wants to hear.
7. Recognize that he is a grown up and he needs some serious adult responsibilities, and
some trust too.
8. If you are going to pick your kid up at the park, you must agree on a meeting place
somewhere nearby because teenagers do not always like being picked up in front of
their friends.
9. Learn how to communicate with him. He will respond best when approached indirectly
and talk about things which will not make him feel that he is that exposing himself
emotionally thereby subjecting his feelings to a risk.
10. Don’t ever bring in counselors as it will worsen the relationship between you and
your kid instead of improving it.. The child may see it as an admission that you
can not cope on their own. The likely consequence of this is probably going to be a
loss of respect from your child.

Rebellion is a thing everyone of us have tried (in our past years )at one time or the other.Therefore, it will be advised that you should try all of or any of the above solutions and see which one would work.

The main point,however, is to see your teenage child as a human being;who is still young but who is trying to grown up faster than his age.For this reason, he cannot be perfect and should never be expected to be so.