{"id":9768,"date":"2015-08-20T05:00:54","date_gmt":"2015-08-20T10:00:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/?p=9768"},"modified":"2016-09-07T11:36:48","modified_gmt":"2016-09-07T16:36:48","slug":"reading-and-a-giveaway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/?p=9768","title":{"rendered":"Reading… (and a Giveaway!)"},"content":{"rendered":"

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This summer has flown by. The days and weeks passed so quickly, I didn’t realize until I really took a look at Milo (who is on the verge of turning eight years old) just how quickly things can change over the course of three or four months. Over the summer, he lost four teeth, gained two very professional-looking adult front teeth, and grew two inches and a whole shoe size. I know this is only the beginning; his growth spurt is a sign of things to come, things that I wasn’t quite sure I was ready to broach with him just yet. Thoughts of the physical changes of puberty in a few years make me a little nervous — how do I talk to him about these things so that I don’t make him feel uncomfortable, and more importantly, how do I keep the lines of communication open so that he feels that no matter what, he can come to me with any and every question?<\/p>\n

I think the answer lies partly in this book: The Boy’s Body Book<\/a><\/em>, by Kelli Dunham, illustrated by Steve Bjorkman (p.s. — there’s also one for girls)<\/em>. The book is a general guide to questions relating to puberty, relationships, bullying, school pressure, peer pressure, healthy living, and stressful situations. What I like so much about this book is that yes, it gives boys good, straightforward answers to these questions, but it also gave me<\/em> an idea of what to say when these questions come up. I like feeling like I’ll be ready for those questions!<\/p>\n

With a new school year starting, this is the perfect book to give to a boy to help him feel a little more prepared for issues he might face in school. There’s a great section on healthy eating in school, good study habits, and also about tips on how to handle not getting along with a teacher. I found this last part interesting and helpful, and liked that the advice here (as well as throughout the whole book) continually encourages to communicate with parents about problems.<\/p>\n

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If you need to bring up an issue with a teacher, do it after class. Most teachers are more relaxed one-on-one than when they are dealing with a whole classroom of kids.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Sometimes it may feel like the problem is the teacher, when the real difficulty is that the subject they teach is one you don’t like or that you have a hard time with. If the class is hard for you, make sure the teacher knows you are doing your best.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

The book also discusses added responsibilities of getting older, such as managing money, managing time, and how to navigate new relationships. But perhaps my favorite part of the whole book is the entire page devoted to a tricky emotion for boys. Is it okay to cry?<\/em><\/p>\n

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Can I tell you how much I love this page?! I wanted to yell, YES! out loud, hug my boys, tell the whole world to stop telling our sons that men don’t or shouldn’t cry, and then write a song about it.<\/p>\n

You don’t have to stop all the tears. In fact, it’s really important to cry when you need to. Crying is a release of strong feelings, and if you don’t ever have that release, it can cause you problems in your mental and physical health.<\/em><\/p>\n

It goes on to say that every boy should have a really good friend with whom he can cry and not be judged, and that he should be that friend to someone else. Also included in this magical page is the physiological side of crying and the release of chemicals the body is trying to rid itself of. Such a good advice, such good information!<\/p>\n

The Giveaway:\u00a0<\/strong>The kind and generous folks at Cider Mill Press are offering The Boy’s Body Book<\/em> to one of our readers* for free! If you have a son, friend, cousin, grandson, neighbor, etc. who you think would enjoy this book, please enter by leaving a comment (make sure to leave your email address so I can contact you if you win). A winner will be chosen at random and announced on Saturday. The giveaway is open until 5pm CST on Friday, August 21st. Good luck, and thanks to Cider Mill Press for sending the book our way, as well as sending a copy to one of our readers!<\/p>\n

*Giveaway open to U.S. and Canadian readers only. Sorry we cannot currently\u00a0ship elsewhere!<\/em><\/p>\n

**UPDATE** The winner of The Boy’s Body Book is KAC! Congratulations! I’ll email you shortly to get your address!<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This summer has flown by. The days and weeks passed so quickly, I didn’t realize until I really took a look at Milo (who is on the verge of turning eight years old) just how quickly things can change over the course of three or four months. Over the summer, he lost four teeth, gained … Continue reading “Reading… (and a Giveaway!)”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":9784,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[186],"tags":[48,132],"class_list":["post-9768","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-books","tag-motherhood","tag-reading"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9768","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9768"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9768\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9787,"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9768\/revisions\/9787"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9784"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9768"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9768"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9768"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}