Rocks to Riches – A Tween’s Guide to Wealth

Rocks to Riches by Elisabeth Donati and Jan K. Ruskin is a wonderful story about friendship, teamwork and the road to wealth.  Not just financial wealth, but the wealth of following your dreams and the support of friends.

The book follows four young teens – Ace, Jack, Millie, Nan and Nan’s five year old sister Kara.  As the hot summer unfolds, the children gather at Jack’s house each day to decide how to entertain themselves.  Ace and Jack are new step-brothers, Millie is the ‘rich’ kid, and Nan watches Kara while their mother works as a waitress and attends accounting classes.  For comic relief we also meet Jack’s pot bellied pig Chubbs who has been banished from the house to a backyard pen after causing havoc in the kitchen.

A chance discovery of an old gold mining pan starts the kids on a treasure hunt.  Millie is particularly interested in finding treasure as we later learn to save her family from financial ruin.  But what the children find is much more precious than gold.  Each chapter is a subtle financial lesson based on an inscription from rocks found by the children.  With help from the adults in the story, the lesson is discussed, understood and absorbed by the teens.

You must read the book to find the rocks that lead to riches.  However, the general theme is to plan, be ready and be open to opportunities.  Learning to readjust as new opportunities arise is also important.  The perfect example of this is told through Nan and Kara’s mother and I would be giving away the ending of the book if I said any more!

Rocks to Riches is targeted to 9 – 14 year children.  I believe it is also appropriate for older teenagers and I even copied the rock inscriptions to post on my bulletin board.  For adults, the same lessons may be found in Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill.  The story is told in an engaging manner that held my interest the whole time I was reading the book.  It is an excellent tool to help teach your children about wealth in all it’s many forms.

Leave a comment about this blog post and enter to win a copy of  Rocks to Riches.  Comments must be left by 12 midnight PST on Friday, May 18th, 2012.

How to talk to your daughter about sex, periods and STD’s.

Start Talking: A Girl’s Guide for You and Your Mom about Health, Sex, or Whatever is THE book with all the answers for you and your daughter.  Written by psychotherapist Mary Jo Rapini (of TLC’s series Big Medicine) and OB/GYN nurse practitioner Janine J. Sherman, Start Talking lays out chapter by chapter all the information you need to know about such topics as menstruation, birth control, sex and STD’s.

I learned so much from this book while I was reading it.  And I regretted I didn’t know about Start Talking when my daughter was younger.  It would have made certain conversations so much easier.  To compensate I plan on giving a copy to my sister who has an 8 year old daughter.

Each chapter has the same format.  Information about the particular topic is thoroughly explained in the text and with simple drawings.  The authors also provide real life stories from patients they have treated. A series of questions that a daughter or mom may ask about the topic are then presented with the authors providing answers and scripts on how to approach the topic with each other.  This is nicely exhibited in the ‘Table Talk’ section of each chapter.

Both being doctors (and mothers of daughters), the authors also stress the importance of girls having a health provider that they can trust.  Although we hope that our daughters will always share what is going on with their bodies with us, that might not always be the case.  Your daughter may be embarrassed about something as simple as a yeast infection and having a relationship with a doctor before any issues arise is important.  In the end, our daughter’s health and well-being is the main goal.

Mary Jo Rapini and Janine Sherman do not shy away from any topic in this book – date rape to eating disorders is discussed in a way that provides information and gives you confidence to approach the topic with your daughter.  You can read the book with her or pass it back and forth and have discussions or ‘table talks’ about the different topics.  I would highly recommend this book to every mom with a daughter.

Leave a comment about this blog post and enter to win a copy of  Start Talking: A Girl’s Guide for You and Your Mom about Health, Sex, or Whatever.  Comments must be left by 12 midnight PST on Friday, May 11th, 2012.

How to Help Your Daughter Love Herself

On my flight back from Miss Expo on Monday morning I had the wonderful pleasure of reading More Than Saying I Love You: 4 Powerful Steps that Help Children Love Themselves by Dr. Andie Goodman Weiner, Ed.D. Dr. Andie, in very simple prose and with exercises at the end of each chapter, lays out the steps to help children learn to love themselves.

Dr. Andie’s premise is that every child is born a loving being.  As a child grows though, she is exposed to outside influences that shape her perception of herself.  These outside influences are parents, other family members, teachers and caregivers, and other people that will regularly be in a child’s life.  These people will have either a positive or negative impact on the child. And as Dr. Andie also points out in her prologue, children are growing up in a very complex world and they need to be able ‘self-love’ in order to avoid destructive behavior.

Dr. Andie starts each chapter with a letter to her daughter, Aly.  The letters are written at each stage of Aly’s life, from birth to when she was packing to start college.  The letters are very moving and reflect Dr. Andie’s internal struggles on how best to guide Aly through her growing up years and give her the tools to be self-loving.

I think the most important lesson I learned from this book was Dr. Andie’s use of ‘YOU’ when talking of various situations with her daughter.  Instead of saying ‘I love the crayon drawing you did in school’ Dr. Andie would ask Aly ‘what do YOU think of the drawing?’, wait for a reply and engage Aly in her own thoughts about the drawing.  By turning the ‘I’ to a ‘You’ Dr. Andie removes herself as the one giving approval.  Therefore her daughter is not looking outside of herself for approval, she is turning inward and validating her own feelings.

Dr. Andie believes that children who love themselves are “more accepting and compassionate toward others.  They appreciate their own talents, make wise decisions, and refrain from hurtful behaviors and relationships”.  For Aly this was confirmed when she wrote her college essay and described the lessons in self-love she learned from her mother.  The college essay starts off the book and you learn right away the meaning of self-love to a young woman.

I would recommend  More Than Saying I Love You: 4 Powerful Steps that Help Children Love Themselves to any parent.  The message is so important in today’s society, especially for girls, that loving oneself is the key to standing up for what you believe in and what you are capable of.

Leave a comment about this blog post and enter to win a copy of  More Than Saying I Love You: 4 Powerful Steps that Help Children Love Themselves. Comments must be left by 12 midnight PST on Friday, May 4th, 2012.