Category Archives: Kids

To IPod Touch or Not To IPod Touch, That Is The Question!

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iPod Touch

iPod Touch

I’m starting to see more and more of my friends and co-workers with an iPad, iPhone or an iPod Touch. 

Well actually I don’t see may of my co-workers with an iPod touch, but my son really, really, really want one for his birthday, and he makes this well know daily!  I’ve been resisting buying apple products because they are still pretty expensive in my eyes, but the real question is…

“Are Apple Products Worth The Price”?

With the original IPod (sans the touch), I would say NO! 

Personally, I can listen to music through a much cheaper Sansa MP3 player just fine.  Yes, working with the Sansa mp3 player required more effort, but for often $100 less, I was willing to do the extra work.

Time Have Changed!

As  you buy up the electronic device food chain, the story changes drastically!  Reviews based on other non-immediate family members, say that YES, the advanced Apple products are worth it!  Both my dad (yes, my dad have one!) and my siblings tout how magnificent these handy all-in-one devices are. 

So back to my initial question! 

“To iPod Touch or Not To iPod Touch”?

After taking my parents and siblings advice into consideration, consulting my friend Mr. Google (who has all the answers), and reading the reviews from well-respected sites like PC Magazine and CNet…  I’ve decided to take the plunge and buy my son a iPod Touch for his 11th birthday.

What do you think?  Is eleven years old to young for an iPod Touch?

MR

Nurturing Young Creativity

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My 7 year old daughter is always doing things that make me go “Wow, I never thought of that“.  In fact, she does things that I’ve never seen anyone do before!  Today I’m going to describe some of her more creative accomplishments.

paper dollhouse

paper dollhouse

Inventing

Her latest invention has been to create a doll house out of a shoebox and a slightly larger box.  With tape and what she has cut out of paper, she has created beds, swings (for the backyard), sinks, and other dollhouse furniture out of the paper and tape so that the furniture is 3D instead of 2D.

She has a lot of pride with her latest invention.  There are girls in the world that can’t afford to have a fancy wooden dollhouse (which my daughter does own too), but if they were to follow my daughter’s design or just get encouraged and try to do as my daughter has done, I’m pretty sure they would have a great time with it.  Of course, my daughter has also created paper people for her paper dollhouse too.

Books

Since my daughter was about 4 years old, she has been creating books.  She took a count of the ones that she didn’t give away and that are still in her room.  I wasn’t surprised when she told me that she had over 100.  It just so happens that one of my wife’s ancestors was a famous author, perhaps she has that same vein of creativity in her blood too.

The Youngest Blogger

My daughter thinks being an author would be cool, but she also likes the idea of having a blogsite after watching me and having one of her comics uploaded (click on: Like Father, Like Daughter: J Comic #1 – Mr Plate Runs to check out her work).  She also created a second comic called “J Comic #2 Mr Plate Meets a Lion” which is pretty good too.

I know that at first, I would have to do most of the work, but this might be the perfect opportunity to create a internet diary/scapebook to record her life.  That way my parents and other relatives could check what was going on with my daughter and indirectly my family, via her site.  I’ll probably use more video and pictures than I do at moneyreasons.com.

By creating such a site, I would be teaching her that it’s possible to do such things and I could use the site to encourage her to continue with her creative ideas.

Cheers,

MR

Summary of My Soccer Coaching Experience

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Well, after all the makeup games from bad weather, the soccer season has finally ended for my U7 Girls soccer team.

After a slow start, the girls came through with flying colors.  While we did lose our previous game, it was very close and I believe if we played them again, we would have been able to defeat them too.

Was it my outstanding skills as a coach that made the difference?

No.

Was it because I had a superstar that made all of the goals?

No, well sort of… we actually had at least 4 or 5 superstars.

What it really came down to was the determination of each of the girls to win.  The drive to win is very important in life, and when you get a group of driven girls or boys that all want to win, you have a great team.  Even if the team doesn’t have the skills that the other teams have that have played together for years.  This “Killer Instinct” or Drive is what makes great things happen in life.  It’s pinpoint focus that makes change happen!

If I decided to coach in the fall, I’m confident that we will win practically all of our games if I have the exact same team.  Most of the girls are quick to pick up whatever they are taught.  Since I have such a fast driven team, I believe that anything I teach them will be learned and applied quickly.

Here is where I have a problem.  While I’m sure my girls would do fine again, wouldn’t it make more sense to let another experienced soccer coach take over and develop the team?  I need to make a decision quickly to keep my team together or not.

Was it worth it?

Yes, in many ways that I hadn’t expected.  I’ve also gained respect for the existing coaches, but also think that some of them exhibit too much favoritism with respect to their own daughters and friends.

Decisions, decisions…   What would you do?

MR

 

 

Benefits of Coaching A Young Soccer Team

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This year my local city soccer organization was short on coaches for my daughter’s soccer league, so I took the bait and signed up.

I have to admit, it wasn’t an easy decision for me, after all you have to deal with grumpy parent,  kid issues, and time that could be spent on other more productive things.

But is this a fair assessment?

Let’s look at the benefits of coaching soccer:

  1. This role is great training on becoming a leader, even if the audience is little girls and parents.
  2. If I do a great job, I can provided valuable guidance for young minds and influence their thoughts in a positive way.
  3. Perhaps my daughter will have bragging rights, aka “my dad is my soccer coach”, but probably not (lol).
  4. I get exposure to being head of a team and all the glory of winning (or perhaps not).
  5. If I had a business to promote, I could try to develop connections in my social network.
  6. One could develop new friends and make something more of the job than just coaching.
  7. Taking this coach position keeps the number of girls on a team to a level where all the girls get to play at every game.
  8. Ice cream for the team after wins!

Now let’s take a look at the Cons of such a role:

  1. I might have to manage criticizing and disrespectful parents, so there is some stress.
  2. There might be some problem kids on the team, so more stress.
  3. A child may get injured during my watch, did I mention stress?
  4. I lose valuable time that  don’t really have.
  5. Maybe I won’t be a mind molder, after all, I’m just a short time coach.

Well, actually these points, both Pros and Cons are moot at this point since I already signed up.  If I had a bucket list, this would be one item I could cross of the list.  Plus this is an age specific task!  Once all of my kids are grown, it would be harder to become a coach for your typical 7-year-old girls.

I’m a little naive in this new coaching role, I hope I don’t disappoint!  Have you ever stepped outside your comfort zone because the benefit to the community and in particular the girls on my team outweigh the option of doing nothing?

-MR

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