Safe Search Kids - Education, Parenting, Internet Safety for All

There’s no denying that the divorce experience can be difficult for everyone involved. Even in the best-case scenario outcome that is a joint custody agreement, there can be hurdles to overcome. Nevertheless, as parents it is vital to make sure your children settle into a routine after your separation as soon as possible.

Consistency without continued confusion is vital while making certain every child feels loved and supported by both of you. This means taking steps to ensure your co-parenting approach is a caring and stable collaboration.

This certainly isn’t always going to be an easy task. So, let’s take a look at a handful of tips you can use to positively influence your co-parenting after a divorce.

Address Conflict

Divorce is an emotionally-charged situation. There can be resentments and disagreements on both sides after the formal process is complete. However, it’s important to make sure this doesn’t spill over into your co-parenting. As such, you both need to commit to actively addressing elements of conflict as they arise, rather than allowing them to fester and exacerbate the situation.

Learn how to talk about conflict. Avoid using language associated with blame when there is some aspect of behavior or parenting that you disagree with. Wherever possible, talk about conflicts in-person, as text messaging and phone calls can be easily misconstrued. Choose a neutral venue and calmly discuss the source of any issues.

Most importantly, collaborate on a route forward. Compromise is not always easy to achieve, but it needs to be a feature of your co-parenting approach. You won’t always be able to agree on all issues, but you need to be open to finding common ground as co-parents to ensure the well being and protection of your children between both of your homes.

Keep Communicating

Let’s face it, there will be times that you simply don’t want to talk to your ex after your divorce. While this is understandable, it also doesn’t make for a positive co-parenting experience. When there is any kind of communication breakdown, this leaves room for misunderstandings, mistakes, and resentment to breed. It is also likely to result in your children receiving inconsistent messages from their parents.

As such, you both need to commit to keeping in regular communication with each other, even if this is limited to parenting elements. You can also find your relationship in general will be more pleasant if you maintain regular contact. Some people even find this easier to achieve without the emotional baggage of an unhappy marriage.

Maintain Your Parenting Plan

A parenting plan is a legally binding document that sets out the requirements for your childrens’ care following a divorce. If you and your ex’s attorneys have been ethical, it will have been shaped to ensure you and your children benefit from a fair division of parental responsibility and time sharing. As such, it is one of the most important agreements to form part of your divorce finalization. Both you and your ex need to ensure you stick to the terms of your parenting plan.

If your former spouse breaches the plan, taking the matter to court isn’t always the best immediate response. Expert family lawyers and solicitors advise that spouses should first try to reasonably discuss the matter and refer to the terms of the agreement. Don’t respond with a tit-for-tat breach of the plan yourself. Make a note of the circumstances, though. If the problem persists, provide the details to your attorney and seek their advice on how to proceed.

Support the Blend

After the divorce, you and your ex will naturally want to move on with your lives. This could involve you both becoming involved in new relationships. Over time, other children could be brought into the equation, resulting in blended family situations. This isn’t unusual; around 50% of families in the U.S. are remarried or recoupled. But it can certainly be difficult, especially given that your children will have new step-parents in their lives.

Always aim to be civil when interacting with your ex’s partner. You don’t have to be best friends, but your kids will take notice of your relationship with one another and issues here can make them feel uncomfortable. Work together to cultivate respect between your families, including stepparents as they offer stability to each child.  Recognize the difficulties and commit to a collaboration that provides the best experience for one another and your children.

Wrapping Up

Joint custody is often the best outcome for you, your former spouse, and your children. That doesn’t mean to say it’s always smooth sailing. It’s important for you and your ex to make efforts to address conflicts as they arise and keep communicating with one another regarding a number of issues, including child support payments. Remember that your parenting plan is designed to prioritize your childrens’ welfare, so you must maintain it. If a blended family situation arises, work to ensure everyone is respected and supported. It takes some effort and coordination, but a successful co-parenting experience is vital to your and your childrens’ well-being.

Additional Resources

• • Homeschooling and co-parenting while going through divorce
  • How Children of Single Parents are Affected

Old family photos are not like any other photos you own. Not only that it signifies your family ties, history, and heritage, it bears personal value to you and your family members. Photos share stories and carry deep emotions that words can’t describe.

These photos serve as a remembrance to a family member you lose and a great way to share and pass around fond memories with the younger generations.

We share family photos for a variety of reasons. For one, it’s our way of maintaining relationships with our loved ones. Or, it may be to celebrate a special occasion like Father’s Day or to simply strengthen our relationships with distant friends through social media.  Sharing family photos lets the people we love know that we value the relationship, and photo sharing expresses our desire to nurture it.

But in order to preserve your family’s legacy, sharing your old family photos with friends and other family members needs to be safe and secure.

Ways of Sharing Family Photos

There are tons of ways to share these photos online, but their security and safety may be in question. The security and safety of the images we share have become a problem when technology makes it convenient and fast but poses a significant risk because of privacy and security issues.

Photos (especially digital ones) provide a lot of information such as location, date, and time. And if these pieces of information are accessed by others outside your circle of friends and family, they can be manipulated and used to harm you and your family as a whole.

There are two methods of sharing photos: digital or online photo sharing through social media, cloud-based softwares, and other online applications, and the “old school” printed images.

While both of these methods are great, you need to establish effective ways to ensure that you are safely sharing your precious family photos.

Digital Photo Sharing

Sharing photos online takes only a few clicks and taps on your digital device, but as much as they offer convenience and digital storage, they are not as secure. Though this may be the case, there are ways you can minimize the risks of privacy breaches on the photos you share by taking the following safety measures.

Social Media

The most common mistake of social media sharing is that people tend to get too comfortable with sharing everything without realizing that other people are not on social media to socialize. Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and other social media sites have become a hub of scammers and hackers whose purpose is to trick people into giving out information they can use for their own agenda.

Explore Privacy Settings

When sharing photos on social media such as Facebook, read and understand the privacy settings before you share. This might sound tedious, but these privacy settings are created to ensure you understand how a specific platform uses stores and access all information you share within that platform.

Privacy settings allow you to choose the audience you want to access and view the photo you share. You can restrict specific people or groups of people by making a selection in the privacy settings dropdown.

Beware of Red flags

The red flags in social media have become sophisticated over time. You can almost never tell who the person you are communicating to because of hackers and scammers who pose to be someone else to get your information.

Confirm the person’s identity by contacting the person through other means like texts, email, or by calling them. This will ensure that the person asking you to share a photo is really the person you know and trust.

Another red flag to look out for is when you receive a new friend request from a person who claims to be one of your family members. In some cases, they could be someone else entirely. Withhold sharing photos with someone you have not established trust and whose identity you have not confirmed yet.

Cloud-based Photo Sharing Software

A more private way of sharing photos online is through cloud-based photo-sharing softwares such as Google Drive, Onedrive, and Dropbox, to name a few. Sharing photos through these platforms are completed through user-to-user sharing or through a sharable link.

Confirm Email Address

In this method of sharing photos, whether through user-based sharing or a sharable link, you need the person’s email address to complete the sharing process. Though email addresses are private, it is hackable. Taking extra precautions by calling or texting the owner couldn’t hurt to ensure your photos are not compromised.

Instant Messaging App

Unlike the examples listed above, instant messaging apps like Messenger, Whatsapp, and telegram also allow users to send and share photos but are more geared toward sending individual photos than sharing bulk images through the cloud. These apps are also hackable; hence taking the extra step mentioned above to protect your photos is highly advisable.

Sharing Physical Photo Print

If you want to avoid the risk of digital photo sharing entirely, sharing old family photos as physical photo prints is the best way to go. It gives an intimate, ethereal sense in a tangible way that allows family members to display old family photos on their office desks or display a large wall portrait in their living room or bedroom.

You can choose to share individual printed photos, framed portraits, or an album of photo compilation.  It doesn’t have to be an expensive process. You can print photos at home, or visit a local printing service that offers different types of photo prints. For those looking to share memories in a more creative and consolidated manner, using an online photo collage maker can be a fantastic way. It allows you to combine multiple old family photos into one beautifully crafted image, making it perfect for both physical and digital sharing.

Granted that physical photo prints accompany the cost of printing, the end result of a timeless display of family heritage that you can pass along to your family members will last throughout the years (with the right amount of care). Besides, without the risk of these treasured photos getting into the hands of the wrong people is worth every penny.

Final Thoughts

However you want to share your old family photos, whether through digital means or old school photo prints, the importance of making sure that they are safely shared with family members, and friends cannot be undermined. Following the safety precautions above will significantly lower the odds of compromising the memory and legacy that your old family photos represent.

Every parent wants their kid’s birthday party to be special, fun, and absolutely perfect. Throwing a party at home might make you feel like you have limited options, but that’s actually quite the opposite. A DIY party means having complete control over the preparations, decorations, and everything else in between.

Here are some awesome ideas for a memorable birthday party for your little one without leaving the house:

1. Put Every Surface To Work

A party at home doesn’t always have to be confined to the living room. Pepper your whole house with decorations and repurpose other rooms into snack corners or game areas. If you have a backyard or garden, consider having an outdoor cookout for an alfresco hang out with your child’s guests bored kids.

Your child and their friends will surely enjoy some barbecue or roasted marshmallows where you can set your grill. Moreover, you can cook and conduct some games simultaneously to avoid dead air during the party.

2. Let Your Child Make The Call

Your house, your rules – so you don’t have to stick to traditional party traditions. Whether your child wants to have a game day or a movie night, order pizza in place of home-cooked meals, get their opinion on anything and everything.

To add fun and excitement to the party, you can list some parlor games that your child wants to play for their party so that they won’t get bored during the celebration. After the activities or games, you can reward them with fun prizes.

Additionally, your child can also decide whatever they want to have for their birthday party.

3. Bring The Party Online

Arrange a virtual party for family members and friends who couldn’t make it to the party. Choose a specific activity that will be the focus of the event so it won’t be reduced to an awkward hi-hello with faces on a screen.

Furthermore, you can still have a theme and designs for your kid’s online virtual party. For example, you should select your kid’s favorite as a theme. Having backgrounds can make your child’s online party fun.

To make the virtual party even more exciting, you can also prepare online games that each virtual guest can play. You can also send cakes or food to them so that they can also enjoy themselves while virtually having a birthday party.

4. Create Some Do-It-Yourself Decorations For The Party Theme

If you’ve decided that you’ll conduct the party face-to-face, it can be more special if you can have do-it-yourself (DIY) party decorations with things you already have. You can even find free decorations online like printable decors that you can cut and paste to your walls. It may be a game-themed party where kids play a variety games or if your child loves cartoons, you can have a cartoon-themed birthday. You can print out cartoon characters to use as decorations for your walls.

Furthermore, you can also involve or let your children help decorate their party so that they feel that they’re part of the enjoyment.

5. Buy The Cake That Your Kid Wants

A birthday can’t be complete without a cake to blow. Your child shouldn’t miss the sweet and creative cake they can eat after singing happy birthday to them. You can always choose a theme your child wants and request it from professional bakers, and let your child enjoy it.

Moreover, you can also add sparkling candles to add more thrill to your child’s cake and ensure that it’s safe around the kids. The birthday cake can be the highlight of your kid’s stay-at-home birthday too.

6. Don’t Forget The Gift Opening And Giveaways

Of course, you shouldn’t skip the part where your birthday boy or girl will open the gifts that they received from their friends or the guests. Moreover, this can be an exciting part of the birthday party and see them open their birthday present. Opening gifts in front of the guests can provide an exciting feeling too.

Before ending the party, you can give out goody bags or small souvenirs as a token of appreciation to guests who attend or join your kid’s birthday party. Giving back to your guests means that you appreciate their time and effort to attend the birthday.

Conclusion

A stay-at-home birthday party can be a great option if you have enough space and want to customize the whole event that your child likes. Even if you’re just at home celebrating, the main point of throwing a party is that your kid likes the theme and having fun with their friends and guests.

Your child has been accepted for college and you couldn’t be prouder. However, if this is the first time you’ve had to wave a child off to college, there are probably many things going around in your head about how they are going to cope.  Apprehension, mixed with excitement for your teen, is natural for any parent.

Here are our top five tips for parents of new college students to help you and your child through the first year.

Encourage Your Child to Keep in Close Contact with Their Academic Advisor

Regularly checking in with their course advisor will help keep your child on track with their studies. It will also ensure that they don’t end up in a situation where they must take extra classes (at an extra cost) to catch up. Their advisor will help keep them on track with their credits and ensure they’re making the required progress towards their degree.

It’s always easier to nip any problems in the bud than to try and catch up later. These professionals can also help with things like creating a recommendation letter, finding clubs on campus, or offering valuable study tips so building and maintain a relationship with them is a great idea.

Investigate Local Scholarships or Those Offered by the University

Set up a meeting for you and your child with the university’s scholarship department to learn more about available scholarships. Quite often the university will hold general meetings to provide details of funding offered. Encourage your child to apply for scholarships and grants online. They can build a profile before they can be matched to eligible scholarships for college. If something suitable is available, they can then apply directly.

Note that funds from a scholarship can be added to the student finance account at any time during the school year, not just at financial check-in. So, if you haven’t already looked at scholarships, it’s not too late.

Keep Records of All College Expenses That Are Tax Deductible

If you are supporting your child financially, the college will send you a tax form at the end of the year. Ask your child to keep and send you receipts for purchases that are related to their coursework such as books, supplies and equipment. You can then use these as tax deductibles.

Find Out if There is a Parent Program at the College

We all know how our children forget to keep us informed about what’s going on. Joining a parent program will help to keep you in the loop about any opportunities and events for parents and families on campus. The program may include activities such as family sports days, barbecues, and tailgate parties. Ask about the possibility of joining at move-in or orientation day and sign up for any newsletters that may be available.

Find Out What Books They Will Actually Need

Don’t rush out and buy all the books on the reading list. You may find yourself paying for books that are never used. Most textbooks can be found at used book sites online or can be loaned from a library. If a student emails the teacher in advance, they can ask if a particular textbook is needed. Sometimes they are not. Students can also access books via online forums from prior students of the course either for free or a very low cost.

Nurture Independence

As a parent, your instinct can be to help your kid as much as possible. The problem with this well-meaning impulse is that it can result in a child growing toward adulthood who is unprepared to solve problems on their own. It can feel good when your kid needs you, but it’s to their detriment if you prize this over letting them be independent. It’s important to let them feel proportionate consequences for their actions; if they don’t study for a test or complete an assignment, they won’t get a good grade on it.

Dealing with the Change in Your Life

The academic life of a child is a time of nearly constant change.  It can be often be tough to cope with, especially if they no longer want to do the same activities with you that they used to or seem to be pulling away from you. It’s important to remind yourself that as long as they aren’t moving toward something harmful, this pulling away is a sign you’ve been successful. Of course, you can continue to be a support to your child while preparing them to be their own person and to take on the world with confidence.

Resources for University and College Prep

• Should your child go to trade school or college?