Parenting Tips

Good advice for parents

I try very hard to plant my basic philosophy of life into all my children. This site is built around my first parenting tip. Links to many more parenting tips can be found at the bottom of this page.

Always seek knowledge. This is why I stress the importance of filling your home with books and magazines. Raise your children with the mindset that learning is fun and then set the example. I am a self taught father, fisherman, photographer and computer nut. My house is full of these books and magazines and my nose is usually in one of them. My wife is even worse than me. She knows just about everything there is to be known about horses. If she does not know the answer to a question she can go to the bookshelf, pull the book and look it up in seconds. A big part of knowledge is not what you can retain but how fast can you find the answers. I love showing my children how to research a project or report. We look through the encyclopedias, check out the recent magazines, browse the bookshelf and then check the internet before visiting the library. Knowing how and where to find the answers to all the questions is a pretty powerful bit of knowledge.

My mom was a big influence on me in regards to seeking knowledge. While working on her doctorate degree at ASU she also worked in the library. I would visit her after school when I had a project to work on. She always amazed me how fast she could locate books, magazine articles and any other needed resources about a particular topic. I always found it fascinating to be in a huge building surrounded by that much knowledge.

Make sure your children have an abundance of books and magazines to read and enjoy at all times. Support your school at the book sales and make the library a regular habit. Also make sure your children all receive a magazine each month with their name on it.

Develop good character. One of my other studies has been in the area of self motivation. A lot of what I believe comes from this extensive research. It was during this study that I read this wonderful definition of good character. Good character is the ability to follow through with a resolution long after the mood with which you made the resolution is gone. I loved this quote so much I have never forgot it. Not a day goes by I don't repeat it to myself, and when I tried to live up to this quote my whole live changed.

I build above ground swimming pools in Arizona. The pool business is very seasonal, it has to be over 100 digress outside before people decide they need a pool to cool off in. We work in backyards all day and then I spend most of my evenings on the phone scheduling more jobs. When I am on the phone I am inside with a cool drink and the AC on. I may schedule a job for a week from Thursday, between 3-5 in the afternoon. When we arrive there on Thursday we have already built three pools and the temperature is well over 100. Myself and my crew are dead tired and not looking forward to two more hours of work. Good character says we arrive on time and do the job as promised.

Another way to look at this is to do what you promise to do. If you make a commitment to anyone in anyway, write it down, carry it with you in your wallet, purse or daily planner and remove only when the commitment has been fulfilled. This will teach you to say no once in a while and you will be reminded daily of a commitment that needs to be taken care of. Don't say it if you don't mean it, your kids will see this and catch on to this great philosophy.

A very simple way to put this in children's terms is with pets. Children make a big resolution to that pet when they are young and cute. A year or two later the pet has grown up and is either cared for and loved on a daily basis or left ignored in the corner somewhere. Teach your children to follow thru with their resolutions.

If you have parenting tips that would benefit my readers please submit them here.

Simple parenting tips from Father of the Century.

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