Read a great article this weekend in “The Orlando Sentinel” about allowances for children. Here’s some of the advice the author gives about how much to give your kids:

Beginning around the ages of 5 to 7, give 50 cents for each year old the child is.

At age 10, give $1 per years old.

Ouch, that second one could get costly for parents. A 14-year-old will get $56 a month. With the rising cost of gas and food, $56 would be a substantial chunk out of the family budget. I remember when I was in about the eighth grade, I got $5 a week. And, I was happy for it. A classmate of mine got $10! Her parents were rich. I remember dreaming of what I would do with $10 a week.

Since my son is only two, I don’t have to deal with this issue for a few more years. Gives me time to decide how much, and for what, I’ll give him.

The article goes on to talk about giving your kids money as a tool, to learn from and to teach proper work ethic. Read the full article here.

There is a great article in Parent’s Magazine this month about raising confident kids. I think this is a cornerstone of parenting. Too often we are worried about how many words out kids can spell properly, how well they do in math are they getting into the best schools, but do we spend as much time worrying about if we are teaching out kids to be confident individuals?

The article breaks it down into a few categories:

• Consider your compliments
• Don’t rescue your child
• Let him make decisions
• Focus on the glass half full
• Nurture his special interests
• Promote problem solving
• Look for ways to help others
• Find opportunities for her to spend more time with adults
• Fantasize about the future

Read the entire article here.

I’m always looking for things to do with my son and recently found a Web site that is dedicated to telling people about sites that offer free stuff for kids. It has a lot of downloadables: Coloring pages, printable play money and alphabet tracing sheets — just to name a few.

I also found a clever page on the site called, “101 Things To Do with Kids.”

Be sure to spend some time here: You’ll find lots of activities that you can entertain your child with — and he/she may learn something along the way.

Mr. Rogers is one of my all time favorite TV personalities so it is fitting that I honor him on my blog today, the “Won’t You Wear a Sweater? Day.”

Rollins College is honoring Fred Rogers (aka Mr. Rogers) with a celebration of his life, on what would have been his 80th birthday. Mr. Rogers went to college at Rollins in the ’50s.

I remember watching Mr. Rogers when I was a kid. Loving the land of make believe. His gentle nature and soothing voice always captivated me. When my family made a big move, from Canada to Florida, the one constant was that Mr. Rogers was on TV in Florida too!

I’m sure my son would love Mr. Rogers — especially the train. I think I’ll honor Mr. Rogers with a tribute video tonight with the family.

Related:

• “Rollins College Celebrates Life of Fred Rogers” at Rollins.com.
• Orlando Sentinel’s “Rollins strives to preserve neighborly spirit of Mr. Rogers.”
• Mr. Roger’s company, Family Communications.

I’m not sure how much I can write about the episode that ends with my two-year-old son breaking his tiny, precious little two-year-old leg. If I tell the truth, it’ll show that I’m somewhat mad at my husband for judgment oversight. If I ignore the details, I can tell a tale of how parents can avoid this happening to your child.

HMMM.

Truth hurts.

We are having a quite lovely day at the local theme park, grandparents in tow. My son is having a blast, although a bit tired from skipping his daily nap. It’s afternoon, and we’ve successfully navigated most of the park. The only place left to visit is the playground. We walk by and don’t stop. My motherly instincts says it looks a bit too much for a toddler. Then, I rethink it and decide it’s OK because I see several small slides and things to climb on for kids his age.

We go in and have a blast on slide number one. Mommy takes him, then PopPop takes a turn, then Daddy takes him on the slide. Then, Daddy says, “let’s try something else.”

I think to myself, “I’m going to sit this one out and read up on where we can go for dinner.” I sit on a rock, take my book out and proceed to “take five.”

When I get up I see my husband and son climbing up a steep rope netting to a tall, tall slide. I call up to my husband, but he doesn’t hear me. It’s too late for my opinion. They go down the slide together. When they come up, my son is crying. This is when we leave.

My son falls asleep on the ride home and we decide to take him to the night-time pediatric clinic (if you don’t know about these places, learn about them! They are amazing and let you avoid the ER). After an hour and a few X-rays, we learn that something is wrong and the doctor orders his leg splinted. It’s not until Monday morning that we learn it’s an official “crack” that requires a full-leg cast for four weeks.

My husband feels terrible about the situation and I’ve gotten over being mad. Thank goodness our son is in great spirits about all of it. It’s just one of the many things we, as parents, have to deal with through a lifetime.

It’s been almost three weeks since “the incident,” and I’m fine with it now. We’ve all gotten over feeling like rotten parents and realize that little legs twist, bones break and there’s nothing we can really do about it.

Lesson for parents: When in doubt, sit it out. When I originally wrote this post my recommendation was to be more cautious, but the reality of the situation is that we never know what’s going to happen and it’s what we do after “it” happens that counts.