Llama Llama Time to Share...

Welcome to another Book Review Tuesday! Tuesday is beginning to become my favorite day of the week! I really look forward to picking out books that Thomas and I get really excited about. This week, "Llama Llama Time to Share" by, Anna Dewdney takes the cake!

Image found from Amazon.

It is a great story about sharing your toys with your friends. The one thing I love about it, is that it does not come across preachy or repetitive. The rhymes are phenomenal and like always with any Anna Dewdney books the illustrations are AWESOME! Baby Llama has a very hard time sharing his Fuzzy Llama doll with his new friend. Fuzzy Llama's arm gets ripped off when he tries to snatch it back from his new friend. They work through the problem and in the end Baby Llama can't wait to share his toy with his new friend.

This book is perfect for children eighteen months plus who are just learning how to share. Especially if your child is in a daycare or a school setting. When children get to school sharing is most definitely encouraged. They share crayons, paper, books, markers, crafts, and much more! This book comes in handy when teaching the importance of sharing your things with others and showcases sharing from an extremely positive viewpoint!

XOXO,
-D

Book Review Tuesday!

Running a parent-child blog can get to be a little hectic at times. You want to make sure you incorporate a little bit of everything for everyone. You want to capture the attention of Parents, Grandparents, Caregivers and Friends. That is why we aim to be all around worldly and different.

We like to bring you new ideas for recipes, crafts and overall advice and guidance and of course our own self experience as a mommy and a caregiver. However, beginning today we are trying something a little different. We welcome with open arms, Book Review Tuesday! Every tuesday we will showcase a new children's book and explain not only why it is a great story to read to your child but the benefits and lessons it will provide and show your child. Book Review Tuesday will run through the entire summer and may change course for a bit. But, as of today, it is here to stay.

I pondered different books to showcase as the very first book we bring to you. There are so many amazing children's stories out there. They all have great lessons and illustrations. For today, I thought I would start out with, "Little Blue Truck" written by, Alice Schertle. I am sure many of you have heard and read this children's book. It is just fabulous! 

Little Blue Truck is a story about a small friendly blue pickup truck. Little Blue is friends with all of the barnyard animals. He is always lending a helping hand to anyone in need. Every time he passes by all of his friends he lets out a cute, "beep, beep, beep!" The illustrations in this book are colorful, bold and big. It is just the right amount of color to capture the attention of your little one without being overbearing. The story has a steady and catchy rhythm. "His heavy duty dump truck tires, were sunk deep down in muck and mire." Thomas LOVES this story. He even knows what line to say next and always gets super excited when I take it off of his book shelf! This book is also filled with tons of animals. While reading the story you say all of the animal sounds so your little one learns. Before you know it they will be a professional cow caller! 

Little Blue Truck leaves your child with a few very important life lessons. Always lend your hand to a few good friends! It showcases teamwork, compassion, humility, what happens when everyone pitches in and works together and, staying true to yourself. From all of the wonderful illustrations, different vehicles, animal noises and many lessons that fill this book, this is a sure fire hit to add to your child's library! You can order it offline or just go take it out at your local library. 

What are some of your child's favorite story books that you would love to see showcased on Play Dates & Sippy Cups? Comment below and let us know! 

XOXO,

-D

The Importance of Learning to Lose

In todays world of "everyone wins" mentality, it is as important as ever to teach your child to lose. A lot of younger kid's sports programs do not keep score, and it's making the upcoming generations a big group of sore losers. Even at home, parents are letting their children always win at games they play. The "everyone wins" mentality is not setting up children for real life. As we all know, in real life, not everyone is a winner. In fact, more times than not you will be on the losing side. Without learning to lose with grace at an early age, kids these days start to lose and just give up.

My husband and I are very competitive people by nature. Both of us hate to lose. Our 2 1/2 year old daughter Makenna is the same way. She loves to win, but she isn't a sore loser when she loses. I am big on not letting her always win. Every night we race up the stairs to bed. She usually makes my husband carry her, and it's an all out race to see who can get up the stairs and into bed first. Sometimes they win and sometimes I win. Sometimes I let them win (don't tell my husband lol). It's okay to let them win sometimes. What is most important though, is teaching them that when they lose, not to give up. When Makenna and the little boy I nanny for play games, I don't help either of them win. When one of them lose they usually tell the other, "Good job!" and clap and get excited for them. They generally like to see the other succeed, even if that means they didn't. I have nannied for children that if they lost or I didn't let them win, they would storm off crying and refuse to play again. As she gets older, I don't expect my daughter to be excited that she lost. But with age, I hope comes the ability to realize that with hard work and determination, it can be her winning next time.

Parents...I'm sorry to be the one to tell you this, but not every child is an all-star. Except my kid of course ;) One day your children are going to experience losing. What kind of loser do you want them to be? One that stomps away crying or the one that doesn't give up?

Feel free to share your tips and stories below about teaching your children to lose. We would love to hear from you all!!