Spotlight on: Thanksgiving

Rexanne's Web Review 
Web Sites & Insights

Issue #85 - January 1, 2005 

Brought to You By: Rexanne.com

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Welcome all newcomers and faithful readers! 

Happy New Year! I see we all made it through the holidays in one piece. :-) We had and are still having a whirlwind of activity. It's been good fun and spending quality time with family and good friends does have 
its rewards. 

Is everyone thinking about resolutions? I'm not. I'm thinking about taking a break from the madness and relaxing this month. Please do the same. I know you've been going strong for at least a month and you have my permission to sit back, relax with a cuppa whatever and enjoy this newsletter. Unless the kids need you, stay put and stay calm. You deserve a break and I so love having your undivided attention. ;-) 

Who's in the mood for love? Valentine's Day is a short 6 weeks away. Get a head start and visit my Valentine's Day site for romance, love inspiration and all the WWW Valentine goodies you can stand: Rexanne's Valentine

In this month's issue, I've taken a reader Mike's suggestion and devoted a portion of topics to Dads. I think they deserve accolades and attention more than only one month a year! Considering that moms generate the majority of attention when it comes to parenting, we'll give dads this month, too. :-) Love you, guys! Be sure to visit Mike's site, Fatherville.com which is our featured site of the month.

I wish you all the most prosperous and joy-filled new year ever. Live your lives with gusto, love your kids with every fiber of your being and remember to enjoy each minute! 

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Reader's Comments:

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Kathy wrote:

"Hey there everyone! Remember the donations I asked for, for Billy Gowacki? Thanks for 
your generosity and prayers and everything! Here is the website with the updates: Billy"

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Jill wrote:

"I can relate to your holiday madness. I made a resolution five years ago to give my adult children our family holiday traditions to carry out. Now I'm a happy, calm Grandmother who sits back and watches her children make the holidays merry for their own kids." 

Good for you, Jill. I'll be delegating as soon as my children are adults, too! 
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OK, here's the scoop:

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Quote of the Month: Parents need to allow themselves to learn from their child, since the child teaches us how to be parents. - Ruth Schmidt Neven

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Supporting the sponsors and advertisers in Rexanne's Web Review keeps this newsletter alive and a portion of revenue is donated to various children's charities. . Each advertiser has Rexanne's Seal of Approval. Please visit them today.

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This Month's Web Review Sponsored By: Christmas Depot

This is the very best month to buy Christmas goodies. Everything at the Christmas Depot is marked way down and you'll find hundreds of substantially reduced prices on all your favorite holiday treasures. 
Thomas Kinkaid and Department 56 collectables, Christmas lights, ornaments, wrapping paper and decorations. Take advantage of the season's end and have everything ready for next year's holiday needs. 
Go shop the Depot and be happy: Christmas Depot

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Parenting & Family Topic of the Month: Nurturing Fathers
by: Mark Brandenburg MA, CPCC

There were probably good reasons why men were the ones who were out hunting big game for dinner while their wives stayed at home many centuries ago. 

One reason is that men probably threw spears with a little better velocity. Another is that women seem a bit more comfortable in the midst of the emotional turmoil that constitutes family life. 


Things would be easier for fathers if they could just leave or push a button when things got emotionally messy. The truth is that most men don't want to deal with a lot of maintenance when it comes to their families. If the family’s been doing well in the past they feel it should continue to do well. They enjoy 
being with their families when things are going smoothly, but they struggle when there’s emotional turmoil. 

And when there's emotional turmoil, men have a tendency to "leave" emotionally. 

While staying away from the emotional episodes in the family would make it easier on fathers, it also tends to keep your kids from really feeling accepted by you. The message you give to your child is clear: I accept you but only if you act or behave in a certain way. If you don’t behave in a way that I approve of, I 
don’t accept you. (Remember that this is the interpretation made by a child.) 

Fathers have all sorts of escapes that they can use when they’re uncomfortable with life at home, including excessive working, TV watching, golfing, or just puttering around the house. While these activities can give fathers temporary relief, they don’t do anything about the major issue—their own ability to handle the 
difficult times with their children. 

How you deal with these situations, and whether you become more nurturing in general as a father, are issues that will determine whether you have close relationships with your children. 

Since a high percentage of fathers say their own fathers were emotionally absent for them when they grew up, this is a difficult issue for many. When you haven’t been nurtured by your father, it's more difficult to be nurturing to your children. 

Many fathers simply haven’t learned the skills. 

While it's easy for fathers to show their love for their kids when they’re acting “good,” problems can occur if they don't show them they care when their behavior is below par. This is often under the mistaken assumption that if they nurture their children or show they care while their kids are struggling or crying, 
they’ll encourage more of this behavior in the future. 

The problems can happen when your kids respond by suppressing their “bad” feelings and lose an important part of themselves. Emotionally well-rounded kids have access to all of their feelings, not just the “good” ones. 

Nurturing fathers have learned to allow and accept all of these feelings. This doesn’t mean that you're encouraging your kids to whine or cry. It's entirely appropriate for you to kindly ask your child if they can talk in a different voice when they’re whining. This is quite different from leaving whenever they whine or harshly asking them to stop. 

The difference is in how your child perceives your acceptance of them while they're struggling, and this perception is often quite accurate. 

So how do you learn to be more nurturing and to be more accepting of your “entire” child? 

Here are some ideas: 

• Figure out the pattern that now exists in which you're falling short as a nurturing father. What are your triggers? How do you react? Having enhanced awareness is always a good place to start. 

• When your kids are struggling, think in terms of what your child needs. Notice how easily you can become critical of your child. Consider a hug or positive attention. 

• Get to know the intimate details of your child’s life: who their friends are, what they do in recess at school, their favorite toys, etc. The more you know about them, the more likely they'll be to share feelings with you. 

• Find ways to nurture yourself. If you don’t know how, start to experiment. What is it that relaxes you and has you feeling rejuvenated? Reading a book, time with friends, or getting a massage might work. If you don’t know how to nurture yourself, it can be difficult to know how to nurture someone else. 

• Make a concrete plan for yourself. If you normally avoid your daughter when she's whiny or crying, look for opportunities to jump in and “be there” with her during those times when she’s not at her best. Remember it’s crucial that she knows you accept her,  in both good times and bad. 

• Don’t be surprised at the depth of the feelings that are produced when you start to nurture. It can produce shame, anger, and sadness in fathers who haven't had much nurturing themselves. Consistent attention to this will improve your skills and possibly have your children wondering what happened to dad! 

Fathers who continue to avoid their children when they’re not “behaving well” are missing out on a chance to experience real closeness with their kids. This is a learning opportunity that’s simply disguised as a pain in the rear.

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Mark Brandenburg MA, CPCC, is the author of “25 Secrets of Emotionally Intelligent Fathers.” 
 For more great tips and action steps for fathers, sign up for his FREE bi-weekly newsletter, Dads, Don’t Fix Your Kids. 
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Know of a good parenting or family site your fellow readers might enjoy or do you have a topic you'd like to see covered in this section? Please send your ideas in for possible publication in an upcoming 
issue: Parenting Site
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Food & Cooking Site of the Month: The Sandwich Lovers Club

Looking for ways to unlock your sandwich's potential? Or perhaps just looking for a pretty weird site? Sandwich Lovers Club is here to provide you with all you need to know to make your sandwich more than 
what you'd expect, dedicated to the art of making a great sandwich. Features a message board, photo albums, recipes, thoughts and opinions about anything 'sandwich'.

Bon Appetit!
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Advertisement: A Mighty Fun Time

Discover How You Can Have Fun With Your Preschool Age Child every day of the year, with a simple to use e-book and materials you most likely already have around the home. Amazing “risk free” e-book has more than 240 activities, games and crafts, So you will never hear your precious preschooler say “I’m bored” again.

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Kid's Site of the Month: Switch Zoo

Here's a fun site where kids can create their own versions of animals. Switch the animals' heads, legs and tails to make new creatures at this surrealistic virtual zoo. Kids will also find lots of animal facts on this site for Educational, silly fun. :-) 

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Freebies of the Month: Screen Savers & New Year E-cards

Decorate your favorite computer with gorgeous, fun or meaningful art with screen savers and computer wallpaper. These are safe downloads, without any surprises. Download as many as you'd like. Or re-visit each time you want to change your computer's look as a holiday approaches or whatever you're in love with at the moment. Screen Savers

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Send your friends and family a top of the line e-card to wish them a Happy New Year with Card Fountain's cutting edge email greetings: New Year E-cards

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Advertisement: The Proper Care & Feeding of Husbands

Ladies, take note: Dr. Laura has given us a great guide to nurturing our guys in this excellent book. While Dr. Laura can annoy me at times, i mostly love and respect the woman. She offers some of the best advice around and while her style might sometimes be construed as abrasive, she's usually absolutely right on. This book is a must read for all women, whether already married, engaged or looking for a life partner. Men are pretty basic creatures and they have tender feelings just like women do. Nurture your men, ladies. Reading this book is a gift to your men and a gift to yourselves.

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Tip or Trick of the Month: Missing Socks

If your laundry fiasco is anything like mine, you end up with single socks at the end of the day with no match in sight. This drove me about as crazy as I can get until I figured out that the missing socks would 
magically resurface sometime during the next week's laundry escapade. My solution was to stash all socks without partners in a zippered gallon size plastic bag and store it in my sock drawer. When The sock 
pile for the next week's laundry is ready to be sorted, I dump the extra socks from the baggie in the pile and most weeks, the pairs even out. If there's still a spare sock or two, it goes back into the baggie 
until I find it's mate. 

Another good sock tip I read a while ago is to pin pairs together before tossing them into the washer. No chance of them going missing this way and it makes sorting clean socks a breeze. Teach your children 
to pin their dirty socks together before throwing them into the hamper. 

Have a tip or trick your fellow readers would enjoy or could use? Please send it in for possible publication in one of the next issues: Tips

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Time Waster of the Month: Color Wheel
Because life is supposed to be fun!

Ready to get your brain back in gear for the new year? Color Wheel will challenge your mind, memory and reasoning skills. Scramble the wheel and try to put it back together with all colors aligning. Good luck and have fun. :-) 

Feed the kids first ...

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Featured Site of the Month: Fatherville.com

Fatherville.com is a great site for Dads. But it's also a great place for moms to get some insight into what dads are thinking and feeling about being a parent and a father.

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--- Advertisement: Suzanne's Best 

OK, guys have part of this newsletter and now one for the ladies ...

Suzanne's Best is a collection of former model and current makeup artist, Suzanne's best finds. And what finds they are! Really cool and gorgeous purses you won't see anywhere else, the very best makeup, 
cosmetic brushes and lip balms, plus beauty tips on the web site that Suzanne shares to help make this a gloriously beautiful year for us moms. :-) Enjoy these products and drop Suzanne a line, telling her what you think about her site and products. She'd love to hear from you. Be sure to let her know you found her site through Rexanne's Web Review.  Suzanne's Best 

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