Sleep Music

Are You Playing Sleep Music to Your Baby

If you are a new parent you may not be aware of the value of playing sleep music to your baby at bed time. As many parents and scientific research can tell you, playing music for your baby while he is trying to drift off to sleep can help him relax and fall asleep much more quickly than simply leaving him lying in his crib in silence.

Your choice of sleep music is just as important as your decision to use music in the first place as some music is more effective than others. Consider the case of heavy rock music, the fast beat and loud rhythms are more likely to over stimulate your baby instead of calm him down. At Joy Filled Music we have created a very special CD of music that will not only help your baby drift off to sleep, but help him to sleep longer and give you a chance to get a good night's sleep yourself. 

Children Sleeping

Music Helps Keep Children Sleeping

When your life is filled with lots of activities and your neighborhood is not the quietest place to be at night, your children can't help but be affected by it. One good thing about children is that it usually doesn’t take much to get them to relax and drift off to sleep. One of best ways to help children with sleeping is to play a little music softly in the background.

At Joy Filled Music we have worked together to create a CD filled with music that has been chosen specifically to help your children with sleeping. More than just music to help your children unwind and drift off to sleep at the end of hectic day, our music CD contains a selection of songs and stories that offer positive reinforcement while they sleep that will help to build their self-esteem by touching there subconscious mind. 

Baby Music Online

Try Our Baby Music Online Before You Buy It

Finding the right music to help your baby drift off to sleep is no easy task as there are so many different styles and choices to work through. Although choice is always a good thing, sometimes having too much choice can be a bad thing. At Joy Filled Music we want you to feel good about the music you are going to be letting your baby listen to and have made it possible to try our baby music online.

We believe that the only way for you to really know if the music you are planning to buy is to listen to it. Unlike so many online retailers who only allow you to listen to a very short clip of their baby music online, we want you to listen to a complete track so that you are 10% satisfied that you are making the right choice.

Seeing Your Child's Gifts

Even when our children start getting older, they still adore the reassurance they have always taken for granted about how much they are loved.  And what an important role we can play in seeing their gifts by reflecting to them what we are experiencing in their company.

I remember my mother telling me I could do anything I wanted to do.  I shrugged her off, but I have to admit, that is one of the key voices in my head 'I can do anything I want to do.'  We are creating voices in our children's subconscious so we may as well make them positive ones.

Taking the time to watch our children and reflect what we see is the best kind of reinforcement as it is very specific so the child can tell it is true.  For example, I noticed you put your plate into the dishwasher last night and tonight, you are such a great contributor to our household.  Thank you.  Or I loved the funny story you told at dinner, I love to laugh.  You have a wonderful sense of humour.  Catching them being thoughtful, kind, sharing is wonderful - just watch your child glow as you reflect back to them what you see.

How to Easily Enroll Your Child

Children LOVE hearing stories, particularly children under 9 (but even those over 9 tend to still like stories).  So whatever it is that you want to enroll your child to do, all you need to do is create a make believe story modeling what you want.

For example, if you want your child to be polite to guests when they visit your house.  You can tell a simple story about the bear family - mama bear, father bear and their 2 cubs.  Each cub can have an interesting personality to make the story more exciting.  Your story can include one cub being rude to all the guests and some of the natural consequences of that (parents not being very keen to have that cub over for playdates with their cubs perhaps).  Then how the cub learns to be kind and welcoming to guests and some natural consequences of that and how everyone felt when it all worked out.

Whenever I am stuck and trying to figure out how to teach something, I find this method helps my child learn in a way that is fun for them.  From a science perspective, until age 9, a child's cognitive brain is not well developed yet, so stories is a way they can retain the information more effectively.  Also it creates a lovely connection time between us parents and our child...and forces us to use some creativity in our day....I find I even have fun with it and am sometimes surprised where the stories take us.

Why not try telling a story out and see what happens....it makes car rides much more fun.

How To Best Support Your Child When They Have Troubles With Friends

I was talking with a friend today, and I realized as parents, it is so hard when our child's feeling are deeply hurt.  We just want to make our child feel better and sometimes we are tempted to minimize what they are experiencing wanting them to see it as more minor too - hoping that will take the pain away.    And at times this or a quick fix can work well.  But a big part of our role is to support them in solving things for themselves and there are some wonderful techniques for that.

And before we start solving issues, we need to help soothe them as we anyone is really upset, their brain is in fight or flight, so they are not in the best problem solving mode.  So if it isn't an easy fix, it is best to empathize with the child.  This isn't easy because sometimes it may seem foolish to be upset about something that seems small to us, or even perhaps more challenging is when we can remember the pain of being excluded, whispered about, or feeling betrayed by a friend and it actually feels worse when we see it happening to our precious child.  We may just want to try and make it better fast.

What helps me in taking the time to empathize is the image of an unconditionally loving grandma in a rocking chair, who is holding a child in her arms really listening and understanding.  These warm arms without speaking are saying, it's all going to be alright, and i understand your pain, you are loved.  I think if we feel understood, we feel a little less alone in the world when we are troubled.

So by not minimizing or trying to fix everything, and instead of discussing the thoughts and words, taking the time to resonant with our child's underlying feeling.  Sometimes I've found that is all my daughter needs is to be understood (words like "I'd feel so hurt if that happened to me, I can remember that kind of thing happening and it was awful...." can help).  The warmth between us is much higher when she feels understood, and then sometimes the whole thing is forgotten, or sometimes when she is through the emotional period, we can work on solving the issue.

The image of this grandma helps ground me and slow me down.  My first reaction is wanting it to be different for my child and when I sit in a loving accepting place, I feel more able to be of a comfort to my child.   My hope is that she will continue to feel she can share her disappointments as well as her successes with me.  And when I slow down and feel, I can recognize what is happening for her and decifer if it is fear, disappointment, anger or hurt or all of them.    We all have these feelings so we can empathize.  I know when I feel held and understood, I am more able to face the world and deal with it.    And I notice when I can provide that for her, it helps build her resilience.  In fact, sometimes I envy her resilience and how well she can bounce back into life and I learn from her.  The gift of many children is that they teach us how to let go and see each day as a new one, and a little understanding and love goes a long way.

Environmental Education - be cautious

I have rotated from being inspired and in awe of our planet earth to being overwhelmed by the enormity of the environmental issues we have created (climate change, sewage/trash/air pollution...). As we were using cloth diapers, I was sure I would educate my child to be very environmentally oriented. But I changed my mind.

Someone told me about a study in Germany (I don't have the link, if anyone does please send it to me) that by by doing so much environmental education on school aged children, by the time they reached grade 12, rather than being inspired, they were apathetic and felt like, it was too late, too much of a mess to fix so why bother. I feel this way sometimes too and it isn't good for me or for my footprint on the earth.

So what works? Waldorf has a good philosophy in this area - they focus on helping a child discover the wonder and awe of nature. I think any good environmental education program's main focus is to help children (and us their parents) remember not only how fragile our ecosystem is, but also how miraculous, beautiful and intelligent it is. It is when I am connecting with that awe and love of our earth and our creatures that I want to take care of it from a place of love, even if they are small steps, one step can matter - helping a bug out of my house rather than squashing it may be a small move, taking the bus, composting and seeing the compost go back into the garden. I am happier in that place, and I do allow myself time to understand what is going on in the world of climate change etc., but I agree with Waldorf's philosophy that childhood is a time of wonder.

If our children grow up knowing the power and wonder of nature and have a deep love for our earth, there is a better chance they will come up with solutions we haven't even thought of, or live in a way that is more in line with the earth. She is growing up recycling, picking up litter, composting, and has enjoyed building fairy houses, and our footprint could be better.

When my child is older, she'll learn about the huge overwhelming issues like climate change, but why overwhelm her now. It is more than I can handle, why pass it off to our kids too young.

A recent study of 1, 150 seven to eleven year olds in Britain found that over half the children were losing sleep worrying about climate change. http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php?/site/article/2950/ If Einstein was right, that we cannot change a problem with the consciousness that created it, then our approach of informing/scaring our children (who have so little power compared to us adults) about climate change, endangered species etc., may not be the best way to solve our problems.

I am voting for wonder based nature education, information on steps everyone can do in their own life, ways to help, and save the climate change education for later. In fact, maybe all us adults could use a little more awe and wonder in our lives too for new perspectives and hope.