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Kids yoga

THE MOTHER’S DAY MINDFIELD

May 9, 2016 By Nicole Kear Filed Under: Dispatches From Babyville Tagged With: advice, Brooklyn, children, dispatches, humor, Kids yoga, lifestyle, Mother’s Day, parenting, raising children

In my first few years as a mother, I totally fell for the Mother’s Day hype. It’s very name, and the Kay jewelers commercials that run constantly, led one to believe that it’s a day in which those who constantly cater to the needs of others finally have their needs catered to, the one day among the other 364 in which mothers are given their due, honored for the terrific martyrs they are.

Awesome idea. Stellar. Too bad it’s a load of malarkey. I should clarify here that I’m a holiday person. I make homemade costumes for Halloween and throw elaborate themed birthday parties for my kids. I hurtle myself headlong into Christmas, like a moony teenager falling in love for the first time. Once, when my kids and I boarded a bus only to discover the meter was broken and no fare required, I declared it “Free Bus Day” and we sang jubilant songs on the theme, on and off all day.

I like celebrations. And I especially like celebrations in which the person being celebrated is me.

I respect, but do not understood, folks who try to ignore their birthdays, people who forbid their spouses and co-workers to make a big deal. David, my husband, is one such person, and it caused some arguments in our early years together.

[pullquote]

I’VE RECONCILED MYSELF TO THE FACT THAT I WILL NEVER GET A WHOLE DAY OF HUGS AND KISSES AND GRATITUDE.  BUT I CAN GET FIVE TO TEN MINUTES. 

[/pullquote]He has a particularly strong aversion to surprise parties, which I discovered when I threw him one for his twenty-third birthday in our living room. I convinced him to take a nap, and while he was sleeping, I hung streamers, sneaked out the German Chocolate Cake I’d spent two hours baking according to his mother’s recipe, and ushered in the guests. When everything was ready, I woke him from a dead sleep by crying: “The kitchen sink! It’s flooding! Come quick!” Still half asleep, he stumbled into the living room in his boxers and T-shirt and when everyone yelled “Surprise!” he about-faced with nary a word and marched right back into the bedroom.

Looking back, my surprise party plan was not as well-conceived as I’d thought. I nailed the surprise part—the party part, not so much.

Of course, in marriages we give our partners what we want. I have been waiting patiently for several decades for someone to throw me a surprise party—for my birthday, Mother’s Day, International Women’s Day, even Free Bus Day, I’m not picky.

Sometimes, I wonder if maybe David has been planning a surprise party all this time, and he’s just playing a long game, so that I’ll be absolutely flabbergasted when it happens. It’ll be Mother’s Day in my seventy-sixth year of life and David will contrive for me to play mah jong with my girlfriends (by that time, I will have started playing mah jong and calling my ladies “girlfriends”). But when I arrive, instead of being greeted just by Ethel and Martha and Frances (my friends’ names will age along with them), I’ll be greeted by a room packed full of friends, my children, my grandchildren, maybe even the barista of my favorite coffee joint, who’s always thought of me as a mother figure. The mayor might swing by for a minute, say a few words.

There will be not only a chocolate fountain but a prosecco fountain and a marble bust in the exact likeness of me. This will all be possible because one of my three kids will have become a billionaire, having invented the cure for the common cold. After everyone yells “Surprise!” David will turn to face me, leaning on his walker, and he will say: “All these years, you thought we were slacking off, but we were really planning this. Happy Mother’s Day “

And I will finally feel satisfied on Mother’s Day. I will finally feel adequately honored.

It is no surprise that on a recent Mother’s Day, David’s card to me read: “I love you. I hope you have a great day. Just manage your expectations.”

For my part, I think my needs are fairly simple. While I would certainly enjoy a ticker tape parade, I don’t expect one. All I want are heartfelt, homemade cards from each of my children, some kind of dessert with so many calories it’s illegal in some states, and the privilege of choosing the afternoon’s activity.

Of course, I can’t help but hope that, on this one day, my kids will tone down the bickering, or even eliminate it—for one day, how hard is that? I can’t help but dream that they might toss me a moment of gratitude, in the vein of, “Thank you for your joie de vivre and the priceless gift of hope”—that, and maybe pick up their dirty clothes off the bathroom floor.

I always tell my kids that “practice makes perfect—or at least, better” and this is true of Mother’s Day celebrations, as well. Over the past eleven years, David and I have gotten better at hopping around the Mother’s Day minefield, without detonating any explosives.

The primary lesson David had to learn was that it is his job to oversee the children’s card-making. This came as something of a surprise to him. It was a little like watching the sausages get made.

When the kids were in nursery school or Pre K, this was a non-issue because their teachers made the construction of such cards mandatory. Those cards were the best, the Rolls Royce of Mother’s Day cards. Quality materials, like heavy weight card stock and tempera paint, were used. Time was devoted to the enterprise. The cards were both funny and sweet, including phrases like: “Today, I wish for you a donkey!” and “I lov u mame beecaws u ar nis and pretee and giv me candee.”

But when the children were either too young for too old for nursery school, they fell into a dead zone of cardlessness. A two-year-old will not think to make a card for her mother. A six-year-old will think to do it but lack the follow-through to make it happen, hatching extraordinary plans and then getting distracted, permanently, by a stale gummy bear under the couch. Thus, there was one Mother’s Day early on in which I waited and waited for the official Presentation Of the Cards and alas, I waited in vain.

“Why didn’t you have the kids make cards for me?” I asked David.

“That’s their responsibility,” he countered.

Then I let forth a bitter laugh. An “Oh, to be as ignorant as you!” chuckle.

“Why do you think you get Father’s Day cards every year?” I asked. “I stand over them and make sure they do it. And not just a two-second scribble either. I make them go back and revise and give you the good stuff. Acrostics, Haikus. Drawings with verisimilitude.”

So David started overseeing card construction. He doesn’t have the natural ability of a Pre K teacher, and I’ve yet to receive a sonnet, but he gets the job done.

I’ve learned a thing or two myself. I’ve learned to lower my expectations. The lower, the better. If I could bring those expectations to street level, and then pulverize them underfoot, that would be ideal. As it stands, I’ve managed to get them from Sky High to about Fifteen Stories High, which isn’t half bad.

I’ve reconciled myself to the fact that I will never get a whole day of hugs and kisses and gratitude. But I can get five to ten minutes. And the good news is, I don’t just have the chance for these moments on Mother’s Day. Because I’m a mother every day.

Much as I’d like to shout “Action!” and instantly call up Hallmark moments, these moments tend to happen spontaneously, sometimes at the most inconvenient times. I’ve noticed children get very lovey when it’s way past their bedtime or you’re in the middle of talking to someone else about something very important or when you really, really have to go to the bathroom. No matter when they occur, I try to savor the tender moments. I have a whole folder full of heart-melting, no-occasion notes from my kids, as well as drawings of me and them holding hands in a field of flowers and hugging in a room full of cats and smiling while standing next to Frankenstein (mysteriously, I am always wearing a pearl necklace, though I do not own one. Pearl necklace, I’ve learned is the signifier for “Mother”).

That’s to say nothing of the moments we share for which there is no paper trail. The early mornings when my three-year-old clambers into my bed and nuzzles in my shoulder. The bedtimes when my nine-year-old will curl up next to me as I read Little Women aloud. The sporadic, sudden hugs from my eleven-year-old who is so much taller than me that my head nearly rests on his shoulder now.

String these moments together and you get one hell of a Mother’s Day. n

Nicole C. Kear is the author of the memoir Now I See You (St. Martin’s, 2014), and the forthcoming chapter book series for kids, The Fix-It Friends (Imprint, 2017).

Filed Under: Dispatches From Babyville Tagged With: advice, Brooklyn, children, dispatches, humor, Kids yoga, lifestyle, Mother’s Day, parenting, raising children

I AM YOGA

April 25, 2016 By Susan Verde Filed Under: Bending Towards Brooklyn (Yoga) Tagged With: cobra pose, downward facing dog pose, happy baby pose, Kids yoga, relax, yoga, yoga practice

The word “yoga” means union. Yoga is the connection between mind and body. My own yoga practice is a way to handle stress, find calm in my mind and strength in my body, and be present as an educator, a parent, a kid’s yoga teacher, and a person in a busy world.

Kids are yoga. Their practice begins naturally as part of their development when they are just infants. Tummy time is Cobra pose. When they are on their backs grabbing for their toes, it is Happy Baby pose. As they grow, children, like adults, encounter stress on many levels, from bad dreams to arguments with siblings to pressure from friends. There’s school-related stress, stress from overscheduling, and, in extreme cases, stress from trauma. The poses and games, the meditations and mindfulness activities of children’s yoga help kids strengthen their bodies, calm their minds, and become aware of the mind-body connection in a noncompetitive, playful way. Kid’s yoga, with all its components, is a toolbox for helping a person manage a world that often feels too big to handle.

My hope is that this playful story of what it means to be yoga serves as a way for children to tap into all that yoga has to offer. As they read, play, imagine, explore, express themselves, and breathe, they can know that whoever they are, however they are in this big world, they fit in just fine.

Child's Pose

 

DownDog

 

IAMYOGA7

 

Book By Susan Verde • Art by Peter H. Reynolds

Filed Under: Bending Towards Brooklyn (Yoga) Tagged With: cobra pose, downward facing dog pose, happy baby pose, Kids yoga, relax, yoga, yoga practice

Toddlers, Tantrums, and Tree Pose

January 28, 2016 By Jessica Phillips Lorenz Filed Under: Bending Towards Brooklyn (Yoga) Tagged With: children, Kids yoga, Park Slope, postnatal, prenatal, toddler yoga, yoga classes

Uh oh. We have a hitter. A shover to be precise. As soon as any of my other students get close to him, he turns his body square to face them, pauses, and then pushes them, sometimes to the ground. There are tears. Can you imagine this happening in an adult yoga class? Power Vinyasa yoga would take on a whole new meaning, eh?

But in my world of teaching yoga to toddlers, this is just part of business as usual. Because, sometimes, small children hit or push or pull hair or take something that doesn’t belong to them. Because they are toddlers! They are walking babies who may or may not be able to communicate their complex feelings and discoveries. There are countless developmental arguments to support the simple fact that very young children are learning how to be in the world. What better place to nurture the nebulous transition from being the center of the universe to part of a community than a yoga class?

Why yoga?

The benefits of yoga for tiny practitioners mirror the benefits for adults. Yoga cultivates a practice of meditative concentration or focus. I am easily distracted. It can be difficult for me to dig in and concentrate on something, like writing an article for the Park Slope Reader, say. My own yoga practice has helped me tremendously on this front. Little children are building up the mental muscle it takes to focus, too! And all the while the bright, new world beckons from all angles. Focusing is a skill and takes practice!

Brianna Klemm’s original objective for coming to a yoga class with her twenty-month-old son Casper was, “to get my toddler out of the house!” Over time, yoga became a big part of how Klemm understood her son; “Because of this class I know how quickly he can learn, I know how many of his body parts he can identify, I know he can follow instructions and pay attention. Class has been an amazing tool for learning about my kid.

Other benefits for toddlers include body awareness, reinforcing gross and fine-tune motor skills with playful activities, and learning how to balance. Most new walkers have an adorable wobbliness and, like older humans, tend to favor their dominant side. When we practice yoga with our tots, it becomes an even richer experience. Let’s model for our children how good it feels to move our bodies and hope this healthy habit lasts a lifetime. Oh. And it’s fun! Yoga can be a lot of fun. (Even if you hate real, grown up style yoga.)

So what does a toddler yoga class look like?

When most people think of yoga, they imagine a quiet, calm room, sitar music, and healthy people stretching their sweaty bodies in complicated ways. They may even imagine shivasana—the comfy copse-pose relaxation that happens at the end of class. Then, using some sort of mental photoshop, they replace the adults in their mental image with seventeen-month-olds and everything short circuits. A robot voice goes off inside their heads: Does not compute. Toddlers scream. Toddlers bang walls. Toddlers eat sand. Will not yoga. Repeat. Will not yoga.

Yoga is not a practice reserved only for strong, fit adults! For young children, yoga can be a way of exploring animals and shapes, overcoming obstacles, learning about their bodies, embodying dramatic play, balancing and stretching, and discovering what they didn’t know they could do.

Let’s get rid of that image of the relaxing, quiet yoga class, OK? This is different! Toddler yoga classes are typically lead as a ‘mommy & me’ partner style class. Every child has an adult to accompany them. Parents and caregivers are the key to having a great class. The more involved the parents are, the more both the child and the adult will get out of the experience.

Yoga Play Activities

So what do you do with new walkers through threes in a group yoga class, then? I believe that very young children do well with structured group activities. It gives them a sense of security to know what’s coming next.

Don’t worry that your little one needs to behave in a certain way. My job, as the instructor, is to help support that learning through safe, age appropriate, engagement. That’s it. Your little one may seriously not do a single thing I say—and I don’t expect them to. They may be taking in more than you think. There is a bit of leap of faith that my parents have to take.

Abstract thought is lost on most small children. That’s why I like to use lots of puppets and stuffed animals in my classes. Not only do the puppets represent a concrete image of the animals, they also help small children understand compassion and gentleness. I like to let students feed the puppets and give them kisses. Then it’s time to become the animal! In tot yoga the down dogs bark, frogs hop and say ribbit, and trees balance with their leaves blowing in the breeze.

Can’t make it to class? Here are a couple of games you can play at home.

I Went to the Farm and I Saw a…

This game is a playful way to organize some traditional yoga postures around a kid- friendly viewpoint. You can play at home by having a few varied stuffed animals at hand. Say, “ I went to the farm and I saw an…” and then pull a stuffed animal out from your pile. If your child is verbal, see if they can say the name of the animal. If not, tell them the name and then show them the yoga pose. This game can become very silly if you find an octopus at the farm! (Again, have fun with it.)

Poses and Pages

Reading a book to fifteen walking babies is a bit like being approached by tiny zombies. They just keep getting closer and closer and closer. Every time a new animal character is introduced in the book, we do a yoga pose associated with that animal. That means you, too, mom! Find a small open space at home, pick a couple of stories, and have at it. The stories will come to life as you embody the animals. This is a great way to share books with an active child who may have a harder time sitting still for an entire story.

Songs and Music

Music is a terrific way for a young yogi to access poses. Songs have had a big impact on Davina Wilner’s daughter Adelaide. Wilner writes, “It’s been fun to watch her language progression through yoga. She started off just repeating a few words from class, such as, “tree pose” and “down dog.” Now she likes to sing every single one of the songs she’s learned at class when we’re at home.”

When Adelaide broke her arm and had to spend hours in the ER in the middle of the night, “the only thing that would keep her calm was when I would sing the final song we sing at the end of yoga class, “My little light shines to your little light, Namaste.” I have never in my life been so thankful to know a song!

But what about “the shover”?

It’s important to remember that nobody is teaching their tot how to pull a barrette out of someone’s hair or push a kid over when they are off balance. That’s not real life. Being in a group with the same families each week gives us a chance to support one another. Incidents at the playground have a fleeting quality; it’s easy to vilify “the shover” and “the shover’s” parents there. As a parent, I love knowing that other people in my community care about my kids! It’s tough to be a human animal. I’d much rather kick up my heels in horse pose. Nay!


Jessica Phillips Lorenz teaches yoga to babies, tots, and families at Bend and Bloom in Park Slope on Fridays and Saturdays.

Filed Under: Bending Towards Brooklyn (Yoga) Tagged With: children, Kids yoga, Park Slope, postnatal, prenatal, toddler yoga, yoga classes

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