The Art of Making Memories: How to Create and Remember Happy Moments


Meik Wiking - 2019
    In his work as a happiness researcher, Meik Wiking has learned that people are happier if they hold a positive, nostalgic view of the past. But how do we make and keep the memories that bring us lasting joy?The Art of Making Memories examines how mental images are made, stored, and recalled in our brains, as well as the “art of letting go”—why we tend to forget certain moments to make room for deeper, more meaningful ones. Meik uses data, interviews, global surveys, and real-life experiments to explain the nuances of nostalgia and the different ways we form memories around our experiences and recall them—revealing the power that a “first time” has on our recollections, and why a piece of music, a smell, or a taste can unexpectedly conjure a moment from the past. Ultimately, Meik shows how we each can create warm memories that will stay with us for years.Combining his signature charm with Scandinavian forthrightness, filled with infographics, illustrations, and photographs, and featuring “Happy Memory Tips,” The Art of Making Memories is an inspiration meditation and practical handbook filled with ideas to help us make the memories that will bring us joy throughout our lives.

Dancing with the Octopus: The Telling of a True Crime


Debora Harding - 2020
    From the immediate aftermath to the possibility of restorative justice twenty years later, Dancing with the Octopus lays bare the social and political forces that act upon us after the experience of serious crime. A vivid, sly and intimate portrait of one family's disintegration, this is a darkly humorous and ground-breaking narrative of reckoning and recovery.

Raising Human Beings: Creating a Collaborative Partnership with Your Child


Ross W. Greene - 2016
    But parents also want to have influence. They want their kid to be independent, but not if he or she is going to make bad choices. They don’t want to be harsh and rigid, but nor do they want a noncompliant, disrespectful kid. They want to avoid being too pushy and overbearing, but not if an unmotivated, apathetic kid is what they have to show for it. They want to have a good relationship with their kids, but not if that means being a pushover. They don’t want to scream, but they do want to be heard. Good parenting is about striking the balance between a child’s characteristics and a parent’s desire to have influence. Now Dr. Ross Greene offers a detailed and practical guide for raising kids in a way that enhances relationships, improves communication, and helps kids learn how to resolve disagreements without conflict. Through his well-known model of solving problems collaboratively, parents can forgo time-out and sticker charts, stop badgering, berating, threatening, and punishing, allow their kids to feel heard and validated, and have influence. From homework to hygiene, curfews, to screen time, Raising Human Beings arms parents with the tools they need to raise kids in ways that are non-punitive and non-adversarial and that brings out the best in both parent and child.

It Sucked and Then I Cried: How I Had a Baby, a Breakdown, and a Much Needed Margarita


Heather B. Armstrong - 2009
    The eighteen months that followed were filled with anxiety, constipation, nacho cheese Doritos, and an unconditional love that threatened to make her heart explode. Still, as baby Leta grew and her husband, Jon, returned to work, Heather faced lonely days, sleepless nights, and endless screaming that sometimes made her wish she'd never become a mother. Just as she was poised to throw another gallon of milk at her husband's head, she committed herself for a short stay in a mental hospital -- the best decision she ever made for her family.To the dedicated millions who can't get enough of Heather's unforgettably unique style and hilarious stories on her hugely popular blog, there's little she won't share about her daily life as a recovering Mormon, liberal daughter of Republicans, wife of a charming geek, lover of television that exceeds at being really awful, and stay-at-home mom to five-year-old Leta and two willful dogs.In It Sucked and Then I Cried, Heather tells, with trademark wit, the heartfelt, unrelentingly honest story of her battle with postpartum depression and all the other minor details of pregnancy and motherhood that no one cares to mention. Like how boring it can be to care for someone whose primary means of communication is through her bowels. And how long it can possibly take to reconvene the procedure that got you into this whole parenthood mess in the first place. And how you sometimes think you can't possibly go five more minutes without breathing in that utterly irresistible and totally redeemable fresh baby smell.It Sucked and Then I Cried is a brave cautionary tale about crossing over that invisible line to the other side (the parenting side), where everything changes and it only gets worse. But most of all, it's a celebration of a love so big it can break your heart into a million pieces.

Buddhism for Mothers: A Calm Approach to Caring for Yourself and Your Children


Sarah Napthali - 2003
    Offered are ways for mothers to reconnect with their inner selves and become calmer and happier—with the recognition that a happier mother will be a better parent. This realistic look at motherhood acknowledges the sorrows as well as the joys of mothering and offers real and achievable coping strategies for mothers to renew their lives on a deep level.

Hold On to Your Kids: Why Parents Need to Matter More Than Peers


Gordon Neufeld - 2004
    This “peer orientation” undermines family cohesion, interferes with healthy development, and fosters a hostile and sexualized youth culture. Children end up becoming overly conformist, desensitized, and alienated, and being “cool” matters more to them than anything else.  Hold On to Your Kids explains the causes of this crucial breakdown of parental influence—and demonstrates ways to “reattach” to sons and daughters, establish the proper hierarchy in the home, make kids feel safe and understood, and earn back your children’s loyalty and love. This updated edition also specifically addresses the unprecedented parenting challenges posed by the rise of digital devices and social media. By helping to reawaken instincts innate to us all, Neufeld and Maté will empower parents to be what nature intended: a true source of contact, security, and warmth for their children.

Parenting Your Asperger Child: Individualized Solutions for Teaching Your Child Practical Skills


Alan Sohn - 2005
    Alan Sohn's and Cathy Grayson's groundbreaking Cognitive Social Integration Therapy (CSIT) offers practical solutions that help parents prepare their children for a fulfilling life of social interaction outside the confines of their syndrome, addressing such topics as:- The six characteristics of Asperger's Syndrome- How to identify a child's type of Asperger's--and the best approaches for dealing with it- Understanding how an Asperger's child sees and interprets the world- Replacing inappropriate coping techniques with productive skills- How to survive and learn from a crisis- How school programs can aid in teaching Asperger children - Making changes that last

The Blessing of a Skinned Knee: Using Jewish Teachings to Raise Self-Reliant Children


Wendy Mogel - 2001
    A clinical psychologist and Jewish educator use the Torah and other Jewish texts to offer psychological and practical insights into parenting and sharing practical advice on how to develop realistic expectations for each child, teach respect for adults, deal with frustration, enhance independence, and more.

The Russian Word for Snow: A True Story of Adoption


Janis Cooke Newman - 2001
    He was 10 months old and naked, lying on a metal changing table while a woman in a white lab coat and a babushka tried to make him smile for the camera.Four months later, the Newmans traveled to Moscow to get their son. Russia was facing its first democratic election, and the front-runner was an anti-American Communist who they feared would block adoptions.For nearly a month, the Newmans spent every day at the orphanage with the child they'd named Alex, waiting for his adoption to be approved. As Russia struggled with internal conflict, the metro line they used was bombed, and another night, the man who was to sign their papers was injured in a car-bombing.Finally, when the Newmans had begun to consider kidnapping, their adoption coordinator, through the fog of a hangover, made the call: Alex was theirs.Written with a keen sense of humor, The Russian Word for Snow is a clear-eyed look at the experience of making a family through adoption.

Get Out of My Life, but First Could You Drive Me & Cheryl to the Mall?


Anthony E. Wolf - 1991
    Anthony E. Wolf tackles the changes of the past decade with the same wit and compassion of the original. Today's teenagers navigate a faster, less clearly anchored world, and Dr. Wolf's revisions include a new chapter about the Internet, a significantly modified section on drugs and drinking, and an added piece on gay teenagers. This new edition gives bewildered parents a road map to the rocky and ever-changing terrain of contemporary adolescence.

Bad Mother: A Chronicle of Maternal Crimes, Minor Calamities, and Occasional Moments of Grace


Ayelet Waldman - 2009
    If you discipline, you’re buying them a spot on the shrink’s couch; if you let them run wild, they will be into drugs by seventh grade. If you buy organic, you’re spending their college fund; if you don’t, you’re risking all sorts of allergies and illnesses.Is it any wonder so many women refer to themselves at one time or another as “a bad mother”? Ayelet Waldman says it’s time for women to get over it and get on with it, in a book that is sure to spark the same level of controversy as her now legendary Modern Love piece, in which she confessed to loving her husband more than her children.Covering topics as diverse as the hysteria of competitive parenting (Whose toddler can recite the planets in order from the sun?), the relentless pursuits of the Bad Mother police, balancing the work-family dynamic, and the bane of every mother’s existence (homework, that is), Bad Mother illuminates the anxieties that riddle motherhood today, while providing women with the encouragement they need to give themselves a break.

One Child


Torey L. Hayden - 1980
    Six-year-old Sheila was abandoned by her mother on a highway when she was four. A survivor of horrific abuse, she never spoke, never cried, and was placed in a class for severely retarded children after committing an atrocious act of violence against another child. Everyone thought Sheila was beyond salvation—except her teacher, Torey Hayden. With patience, skill, and abiding love, she fought long and hard to release a haunted little girl from her secret nightmare—and nurture the spark of genius she recognised trapped within Sheila's silence. This is the remarkable story of their journey together—an odyssey of hope, courage, and inspiring devotion that opened the heart and mind of one lost child to a new world of discovery and joy.

Keeping Your Child in Mind: Overcoming Defiance, Tantrums, and Other Everyday Behavior Problems by Seeing the World through Your Child's Eyes


Claudia M. Gold - 2011
    For a young child, it is the most important of all experiences because it allows the child's mind and sense of self to grow. In the midst of the perennial concerns parents bring to Dr. Claudia Gold, she shows the magical effect of seeing a problem from their child's point of view. Most parenting books teach parents what to do to solve behavior problems, but Dr. Gold shows parents how to be with a child. Crises are defused when children feel truly heard and validated; this is how they learn to understand, and, eventually, control themselves. Dr. Gold's insightful guide uses new research in developmental psychology and vivid stories from her practice to show parents how to keep a child in mind and deepen this central relationship in their lives.

Homeschooling 101: A Guide to Getting Started


Erica Arndt - 2013
    Delving into the unknown can also create an element of self-doubt that fills your mind right off the bat. That coupled with an overwhelming task of choosing and gathering curriculum, creating lesson plans, organizing supplies, and teaching multiple grade levels can be quite disheartening.Don't worry! Homeschooling 101 is a step by step practical guide that will help you to get started, and continue on in your homeschooling journey. It is designed to help guide you through all of the steps to getting started, choosing and gathering curriculum, creating effective lesson plans, scheduling your day, organizing your home, staying the course and more! It even includes helpful homeschooling forms!

Loving Every Child: Wisdom for Parents


Sandra Joseph - 2007
    It’s a basic premise too often overlooked. This collection of one hundred quotations and passages from Korczak’s writings provides valuable advice on how to take care of, respect, and love every child. In an inviting gift-book format, this is a heartfelt and helpful reminder of who we were as children and who we might become as parents.