Tag Archives: rivalry

Can Your Sibling Relations Influence Your Children’s?

Many of us come from families of origin where our relationships were less than stellar. In fact, this can be a motivating factor for some of us to try to build our own families where the communication is better; the relationships are stronger and more pleasant, and where our children love and get along with each other. If you come from a family where you do not get along with your siblings, you might be wondering how you can do something different with your own children. Will your sibling relations influence the way your own children interact with each other? … Continue reading →

Siblings Blaming Siblings

Bickering, fighting and blaming might be what you think of when you think of sibling interactions. If you have more than one child, chances are at least one of them has tried to blame the other for various things. For most of us, the blame seems to be forever shifting as siblings blame each other for all sorts of things both individually and in small collective groups. Is there anything a parent can do about the sibling blaming sibling situation? For a sibling to blame another sibling, it is often a temptation too great to resist. Even if the children … Continue reading →

Deck the Halls (2006)

The perfect Christmas movie uplifts and inspires, sometimes makes us laugh, often makes us cry, and always gives us the warm, fuzzy feeling of Christmas. “Deck the Halls” did absolutely none of those things for me. Matthew Broderick plays Steve Finch, the town eye doctor and also the chairman of the Christmas Festival. The town has been getting ready for the holidays and so has Steve, with his obsessive-compulsive need to organize everything down to the last speck. His wife (Kristin Davis) tries to help him see that they don’t need to be so uptight about the schedule, but he’s … Continue reading →

Sometimes They Don’t Even Know Why They Are Fighting

I know that as parents we spend a lot of time trying to figure out the motivation behind all the things our children do. Are they ill? Going through a growth spurt? Is something bothering them? At least I seem to always try to find the motivation and the reason why my kids are behaving the way they are behaving. But, I have decided, after nearly twenty years that sometimes they really DON’T know why they are doing what they are—when they say that irritating “I don’t know”—they mean it! I think sometimes my kids pick on each other and … Continue reading →