6 Ways To Bring More Mindfulness Into Your Home

About the author

I am a young mum to 3 beautiful daughters, originally from Sydney, Australia - now living in country NSW with my partner of over 10 years and our girls.

4. Sit up at the table for dinner

I get it, it’s soo chaotic in the lead up to meal time - all you wanna do is put the food on their plate, and tell them to sit down, watch TV and eat their dinner! And then you get that 5-10 minutes of complete silence while everyone watches TV and eats… But, here’s the thing. After a while, it does come back to bite you. Why? Because when everyone is sitting up at the table eating a meal together, you have eye contact, conversations happening, and here’s the key word: connection. I feel like in families and relationships in general, connection is key! When the kids are watching TV, there is zero connection happening. They will soon run back up to you, and demand all of your attention because they’ve just been in a trance watching the screen and they want to come back to you and see where you’ve gone. I know it can feel harder, but let them get involved and it becomes easier! Tell them to set the table, put the food items in bowls in the middle of the table, and let them help themselves! It’s a great activity for their motor skills and will benefit you so much more in the long run.

5. Use a technique throughout the day called “connect and release”

This is a complete game changer when it comes to parenting! We all know the feeling when your child wants your attention the entire. Day. Not just for a few minutes, but what feels like constantly! So how can we encourage independent play? Independent play always seemed like such a crazy concept to me that I used to brush it off. I just figured my kids would one day grow into it. Until I came across this amazing technique called connect and release. When I had my third baby, I quickly found out that giving my older children just 10 minutes of focused attention doing what they want in the day was enough to completely change their behaviour from deprived and desperate for attention, to being completely happy and content. That is what you do with connect-release! If you want 5 minutes to have a tea and a biccy in peace, the way to do it is to spend 10-15 minutes of uninterrupted attention with your little one/s, and then set them up with an activity they can do on their own such as blocks (don’t opt for things like crafts or Duplo which requires assistance from you), and tell them you need 5 minutes. Because they’ve just had a big dose of your undivided attention, you’ll be surprised at how well this works!

6. Help your children get grounded on the daily

Did you know that there are tonnes of health benefits just from walking barefoot in the grass? Just google it and you’ll see! Sometimes when we’re really caught up in the snacks, mealtimes, activities, screen time, toilet visits, all the things in the home, we just need to get grounded again. The easiest way to do this is to reconnect with nature. Get into the habit of spending time outdoors, even just in your own backyard! When things are really crazy, I love to throw out a picnic rug and lay on the ground with my little ones. Or, give them a shovel and an old pot and ask them to dig some soil. They could even use their hands! I also love doing nature play activities on really rough days. See these 5 easy nature play activities using flowers here. The feeling of getting in touch with nature when you’re feeling overwhelmed is unmatched. Everybody feels like they’ve had a reset, and after a while you can feel recharged enough to get back into the usual tasks around the home again.

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• 5 Super Easy Christmas Traditions With Kids!

I don’t know about you, but once Christmas has been and gone, it’s like a storm ripped through our home! A good storm at that, but usually I am actually ready for some peace afterwards. The chaos of Christmas can mean schedules have been thrown to the side, with all the late nights, socialising, lots of screen time watching Christmas movies, eating plenty of junk food, and honestly just letting your hair down a bit as a parent. Which is great! I mean after all, that’s what makes Christmas so much fun - getting away from the daily grind that comes with daycare runs and getting to bed on time every night for school the next day.

But, that can also mean that after a few weeks, everything feels a bit all over the shop and things can get a bit out of hand. Maybe you’re feeling a bit more ready to stop feeling bloated and eat better, start getting a bit more sleep and bringing more mindfulness back into the home.

Plus, it’s the new year shorter after Christmas, and what a better time to start the year off right with a refreshed routine! I always love looking at what I was doing previously, and how I can be 1% better everyday in our day to day routines. The new year is like a fresh start, and mindfulness is high on my priority list for us as a family.

2. Keep the kids play area clean

We all know how nice that feeling is when the house is clean. Just think of the feeling you get when you check into a clean hotel room: aaahhh. So relaxing, instantly! This is the same feeling the kids get when their play area is clean and tidy. This is their main spot in the home they gravitate towards, so ask yourself what sort of energy it’s supporting? When I recently did some work around why I sometimes yell as a mum and why my kids don’t listen to me, something that was brought up was that their spaces need to be clean, organised and kept so that it supports calm. I know it’s yet another thing in a huge list of things to get done. Sometimes I can barely unpack the dishwasher or go to the toilet let alone clean the toy area! But now it’s one of my priorities, along with the dishwasher. Because it’s the kids main area, and let’s be real, if the kids are calm, I am calm.

Now that we have a third baby, it’s been a challenge to say the least. I knew it was going to be hard, but I thought I would just “figure it out”. Which yes, I have had to figure out, but man, it’s been tough!

So, here are 5 ways to bring more mindfulness into your home for your family:

1. Boost the activities, reduce the screen time

One thing I’ve realised as a mum of 3 is that craft activities do not have to be complicated. Sometimes it’s as simple as colouring, but even doing a craft with a paper plate or coloured paper can be just as simple, too! I used to quickly shrug it off and say those kinds of activities are for daycare, but actually, they are a great way of giving everyone something to do at home aside from playing with toys or watching tv (cos let’s be real, how long do those toys reallyyy keep them entertained for…). I love putting on some gentle music, gathering everyone around to the table, and doing a craft!

3. Support play with upbeat, calm music

When you finally do turn the TV off, it can feel really quiet. And sometimes it’s good to have some sort of background noise to help facilitate the vibe you want in your home. Well, a great way to achieve this is with music. Did you know there’s whole playlists on Spotify for calm kids!? And they don’t just have kids music! One of my favourite go to playlists has carefully curated music by artists like Taylor Swift, Jack Johnson, Jason Mraz, and the list goes on. The songs selected are mostly acoustic songs and not only do my girls love it, but I do as well! It’s perfect for the whole family to bring a content, calm energy into the home.

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