Unique Mother’s Day Gifts

Give Mom something special to pamper and relax her this mother’s day. These unique Mother’s Day Gifts make a fun and different surprise for mom on her special day.

10 Stress Free Tips to Pamper Mom This Mothers Day

Mothers Day is the day we set aside each year to show appreciation to our own mother and to the mothers in our lives that we love. Traditionally Mothers Day is the big “Flowers and Chocolate” day. While most moms do enjoy lovely flowers and chocolate, below are some ways that we can pamper mom with gifts and activities that she will remember for years to come.

1. Give Her a Massage

Treat mom to a relaxing massage. Besides just feeling good massage offers many benefits to your body such as reducing stress and anxiety, improves circulation, relieves general body tension and muscle stiffness, improves muscle tone, removes toxins from the muscles, improves flexibility in muscles and joints, improves the immune system, promotes healthy skin and much more. (Editor’s Note: Find out more about massage)

2. Spa Gift Basket

Mom will love a gift basket filled with an assortment of stress relieving goodies to pamper herself on Mothers Day or anytime she needs to relax. Some ideas of what you can include in her Spa Basket are scented bath gel, bath salts, body lotions, candles, eye pillow, bath pillow and bath brush.

3. Journal/Scrapbook

Moms love to record special events, especially those events that include special moments with their children. A journal is a great affordable gift where she can record her special thoughts and memories. You can take it a step further by giving her a scrapbook where she can also add pictures, fun borders, scrapbook embellishments and more to her written thoughts. This gift can last forever!

4. Candles

Scented Candles are a really affordable and practical gift that any mom will love. Candles provide a relaxing mood and can help her to de-stress by providing memories of special events. A baby scented candle can remind her of when she first held you. A peppermint scented candle can bring back memories of Christmas you spent together. Candles come in many shapes, sizes and scents so you are sure to find one to remind mom of a special time you both shared together. Once you find a scent mom likes add a little note to the gift card of what special time you spent together the scent you chose represents.

5. Facial

Moms love to be pampered and a facial is a wonderful relaxing way to do it. You can treat her to a spa for a facial by a licensed practitioner or you can give her a facial gift basket filled with skin care products according to her skin type for her to do at home at her leisure. (Editor’s Note: Don’t forget to check out our homemade spa recipes)

6. Clean House

Treat mom to a “Clean House Day” where you clean her house from top to bottom while she spends her day relaxing and enjoying herself doing whatever it is she likes to do.

7. Mommy and Me Day

Mommy and Me days are not just for mom and little ones anymore. You and mom can spend the day doing whatever is relaxing and enjoyable to you both. Having lunch or dinner together, watching a movie, going to the spa for massages and facials together, whatever she would like to do. The point is to give her the gift of knowing that you love her and enjoy spending quality time with her.

8. Send Her on a Date

Sometimes mom just needs a little time to get away from the everyday chores in life like cooking and cleaning the house. Send her on a date with dad to their favorite restaurant.

9. Yoga

Give the gift of good health to your mom this Mothers Day with a membership to a Yoga class. Yoga is great for relaxation and flexibility as well as being a fun way to get fit and stay fit.

10. Give Her a Hug and Tell Her That You Love Her

This tip is sometimes the most overlooked! We all love our moms but sometimes as we get older and get busy with our own lives we take mom for granted and forget the gift that is most important to her- US! Spend quality time with mom. Give her a big hug and tell her that you love and appreciate her. It’s a free gift and one that mom will love most off all.
Erica Brooks is Owner of Stress Away Family Shop which includes Stress Away Bath Shop and Stress Away Bridal Shop. She specializes in offering products, tips and resources to help you to combat the everyday stresses of life. You can reach her at stressawayfamilyshop.com and stressawaybathshop.com or via e-mail at service@stressawaybathshop.com

Understanding Toddler Temper Tantrums

Temper tantrums are a common occurrence in toddlers. Gain a better understanding of toddler temper tantrums.

Although toddler tantrums can be both embarrassing and traumatic, it may help you to understand that this is just another normal phase of your toddler’s development. Most tantrums are due to the fact that your toddler just doesn’t have the necessary vocabulary to express his newfound feelings.

He’s gone from being a bystander in life and just letting the world pass him by to fully diving in and wanting to explore and grab every little thing life has to offer. Along with this newfound thirst for life also come many emotions and the feeling of not being able to express these emotions.

That’s why when your toddler feels tired, hungry, or just bored and cranky he will result to having a tantrum as a way to change a situation he doesn’t like or has any control over. By the same token, your toddler may also have a tantrum when she doesn’t get her way.

When your toddler does have a tantrum, you certainly shouldn’t give in as tempting as it may be, if you’ve said no to something you should stick to no. If you give in now, you’re child will think next time he throws a tantrum he’ll get his own way too. This will create a cycle of repeat tantrums.

You should, however, be close at hand and ready to give your toddler a big hug once he has calmed down. Reassure him that you still love him and let him know how pleased you are that he has regained control. This will emphasize the fact that he has been able to control his emotions and will give him the confidence to know he is able to control himself at certain times.

And above all try not to get too frustrated or upset by your toddlers tantrum. The worst thing you can do is loose control yourself; this will only make the situation worst.

As your toddler goes through this normal phase of development, keep the future in sight, you’re teaching your toddler how to control and deal with his emotions and the tantrums will soon pass.

We Recommend:
Better Behavior Wheel
Child behavior management and positive parenting (without spanking) made easy with this upbeat, fun parenting tool. Effective parenting becomes easier with this unique child discipline tool. The atmosphere in your family will improve immediately as behavior modification is accomplished with fun and effectiveness.

Traveling with Kids

by Susanne Myers

A little preparation will make a big difference in how enjoyable traveling with your kids can be. Use some of our tips and ideas below, whether you and your children are traveling by car or plane. After all, this is the time of the year when we are ready to relax and rejuvenate, not stress about how to get to our favorite vacation spot while listening to “Are we there yet?” every 10 minutes. Outlined below are some ways for you to make sure both you and your kids are comfortable while traveling.

Dress everyone in comfortable loose clothing and pack a spare outfit for everyone where you can easily reach it during your trip. Pack a small pillow and a light blanket for each of the kids, as well as their favorite stuffed toy or doll to snuggle up with at night or during naptime. These not only work great on the plane or in the car, but will also make your kids more comfortable once you arrive at your destination.

Whether you travel by car or by plane, pack some drinks and snacks for the kids, so you don’t have to rely on rest stops, kiosks at the airport or the meals that are served on the plane. We usually give our daughter only water in the car. It’s not nearly as messy as some of the fruit juice or sports drinks if it gets spilled. To make plain water a little more interesting and to keep it cool, fix an insulated zippy cup or sports bottle with ice water. And believe me, they will spill it sooner or later, even if the cup claims to be spill proof. Some good choices for not-so-messy snacks are trail mix, pretzels, teddy grahams, dried fruit, fresh apple slices (drizzle them with a little lemon or lime juice to keep them from turning brown), mini marshmallows, and baby carrots. Come up with some snacks that your kids love and put them in individual zip-lock bags.

The zip-lock bags also come in handy to pack up some crafts supplies like crayons, stickers, blunt scissors and glue sticks, for the artists in your family.

To keep your little one’s entertained, you may also want to pack some coloring books, picture books, or pack a child friendly novel, like the Harry Potter books to read aloud in the car. Audio books and music CDs or tapes also come in handy.

For some great travel games you and your family can play, take a look at Car Travel Activities for Kids.

If you are traveling by car, plan in frequent stops and let the kids run around. You may want to pack a jump robe, ball or Frisbee to make moving around more fun. If you are driving through the night, plan a longer stop an hour or two before bedtime so the kids can wear themselves out and release all this build up energy before going to sleep.

Instead of eating lunch at a fast food place or restaurant off of the interstate, try bringing a picnic. You can cater to your family members tastes and it is bound to be cheaper, better and more healthy than what you would be able to find fast food place. Your kids will appreciate not having to sit still again and the sunshine and fresh air will do wonders for all of you.

If you are traveling by plane, bring some small toys, picture books, coloring books etc, to entertain your child in the seat. Depending on your child’s age, bring some gum, hard candy, zippy cup, bottle or pacifier to have them suck or chew on something during take-off and landing to equalize the pressure in their ears. You may also want to pack a sweater for your child, since the air temperature in the plane can be quite chilly.
To keep your kids excited on longer trips, make up some small goodie bags for them. Collect some Kids Meal Toys for a few weeks, or purchase some inexpensive toys at the Dollar Store and put them individually in some small brown paper bags, or even wrap them. Tell your kids that as long as they are being good, they will get a new goodie bag every 2 hours or so. You’ll be amazed how well behaved they will be, and you will keep them from being too bored on a long trip by giving them something new to play with.

We Recommend:

Snappy Travel: A Magnetic Fun Book

A great book for the car or plane ride because it’s all about travel and has magnetic pieces to move around as you flip the pages. This makes to book very interactive and keeps things interesting, since the story is slightly different each time. Very cute!

Rubberneckers- The Ultimate Car Game

The objective in this game is to look outside and find certain things to receive points. It’s a great way to keep older kids occupied, and younger kids interested and distracted from the travel time!

Lewis N. Clark Li’l Lewis Kid’s Travel Pillow

Finally, a travel pillow just for kids and it comes in 15 different animal shapes from alligator to hippo, so your little one will find his or her favorite animal and enjoy using it.

Don’t forget to take lots of picture and have them developed through Snapfish. Sign-up and get your first roll of film developed for FREE! Plus, your photos are placed online for FREE to share with family & friends.

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