Tuesday, February 15, 2011

The Happiest Toddller on the Block!

I FINALLY finished reading it and can honestly say that it's changed my entire perspective on disciplining and relating to my children!  I started using some of the techniques with Venily and have seen a DRAMATIC improvement over the last week and a half!  Highly recommended!  And I was worried that Jason would be resistant to some of the techniques b/c I knew he would never actually read it, but without even saying anything he is following my lead really well and he can see what a huge difference it has made!!!

Venily was at the point where I will admit, I often did not even want to be around her anymore and she was driving me CRAZY and now she is a completely different child!!!!!  It's unreal!  If I ever have another baby, I will definitely be reading The Happiest Baby on the Block because the toddler edition is so incredible!  There are some things that just don't appeal to me like the extreme of the "Toddler-ese" that he uses, but I have been able to adapt it to better fit our family.  The "time-ins", "FFR", and overall insight into a toddler's brain along with the importance of letting a toddler feel in control and how to validate her feelings and basically all the "how to avoid a tantrum" stuff has been a complete lifesaver!  They've literally worked like magic!

I think I'm going to read it again in 3 months just to refresh my memory!  (or sooner if we have any more troubles) :)  There are some things that I think would be really great ideas like the "Magic Breathing" and "Fairy Tale" lessons that I'd like to do, but I don't want to focus on too many things at once.  I need to get some of the other things down really well first and then maybe we'll add in some more in 3 months or so! :)

4 comments:

  1. We saw the author of that book speak at a baby expo we went to a couple years ago. I haven't read the book (I think I will now though!) but I do remember some great points he made during the talk. The one that really stuck with me (and this may be from happiest baby not toddler) was that it's important to "play the boob" sometimes, and act as though we don't know how to do something and that it's really amazing that our child can (like pretend you can't figure out the stacker toy), because as he put it, they just want to feel like they have some power once in a while, since we come across as smarter and bigger and always in control, which makes them feel powerless and more likely to try to fight us on everything. I will def. have to read it... Carlie has been driving me crazy too! Three is rough.

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  2. That's cool! LOL, yes, 3 is rough! We luckily skipped the terrible 2's for the most part, but weren't so lucky with the 3's! The "play the boob" thing is in the toddler book quite a bit! You should definitely read it, I'm so glad I did!

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  3. Im about half way through and I can see a difference when I try the FFR with Adalein. I have also started reading her bed time stories. She seems to really be enjoying the one on one time and the routine.

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  4. The only problem I am still having with Venily is when she gets hyper... like when a lot of people are over or we're at playgroup and she's running around like crazy- it's like I'm not even there and she can't hear anything I say. However, at home, with just us, she does amazing! Oh well, one step at a time, lol!

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