Wondering what to tell your kids about Haiti? It’s been a tough week for me as I’m sure it has for many parents. My 11 year old is overly sensitive to anyone who is hurting. It’s a good trait because she’s a kind and caring child, but it can cause her to be saddened easily, to have nightmares and to worry.

This is what I’ve told my daughter about Haiti:

Good Things Happen – but so do terrible things. Although we are focused on a sad situation, there will be positive events even in Haiti. When I learn about someone being found alive in the rubble, I share it with her. When I see people praying and singing we watch it on TV together.

We Can Help – by praying and sending good thoughts to Haiti. We also have made a donation to the Red Cross. My daughter wants to donate some money too so we are looking into non-profits that she feels a connection with.

We Are Safe – We are not in an earthquake zone, but we live in an area with hurricanes. We’ve had to face some scary times but we do all we can to stay safe. If she needs to talk about it, I go over our storm preparations with her.

It’s OK To Feel – sad, angry, scared. The good thing is that we can always talk about our feelings. We share them and can cry together. No one makes fun of feelings or belittles them in our family. We may cuddle together and have a cry and that’s normal.

We Are One People – We are learning so much about the common family of humanity. We feel closer to people in other countries because of this tragedy. She is learning about “there but for the grace of God go I” situation. There is much more to talk about concerning this and it will probably be a discussion that lasts years.

We Can Help Later – and more often. Since my daughter has learned about the poverty in Haiti, she is more aware of how much more we can do to help financially. We are considering donating money  on a monthly basis to people living in poverty.

What are you telling your kids about Haiti?

My 11 year old daughter had a sleepover Friday night. Since her birthday is close to Christmas, we try to to let her celebrate later so the attention is on her. So she had two friends over and stayed up all night with lots of noise, laughter and food.

I decided to stay awake because there’s just too much trouble that 3 tween girls can get into unsupervised. I’m glad that I did. I can’t tell you how many times I had to get up to tell them to be quiet because my husband had to sleep. He had work on Saturday. I had to tell them to stop eating at one point too because I was afraid they would get sick. That’s a first for me!

I was so tired at one point that I considered shining floodlights on them thinking maybe that would keep them quiet, or at least remind them to be quiet when they started yelling. When it was time for my husband to get up for work, I just had to go to bed. One of the girls was being picked up at 7 AM so I figured one hour of sleep would be fine.

The next thing I knew I heard knocking at the door. It was as if emergency lighting was shining in my eyes. Did the girls hear? Of course not! I explained to the mother that I had just fallen asleep and that her daughter was ready. Was she? No! After that fiasco, my daughter and her friend were told to go to bed. The party was over.

When I saw this video of a baby dancing to Beyonce’s Single Ladies, I knew I had to share it even though it’s gone viral by now.

I loved watching it over and over because it shows how adorable babies are. They make grown people talk in sing song syllables. I like to smell their sweet heads, look in wonderment at their wrinkled elbows and knees and snuggle with their Barney Rubble feet. They make me swoon when I hold them, get to cuddle them, even burp them.

I found some quotes about babies that say so much:

“Babies are such a nice way to start people.” by Don Herrold

“Making the decision to have a child is momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body.” by Elizabeth Stone

“A new baby is like the beginning of all things-wonder, hope, a dream of possibilities.” by Eda J. Le Shan