Latest From The Blog
How to Help Your Children Conquer their Fears
When our children become paralyzed with fear, it’s hard to know how to help them! A father I know remembers seeing his son in this state during a family vacation at Lake George at the base of the Adirondack Mountains. His son, eight years old at the time, wanted to...
How to Help Your Child Survive the Wilderness and Why It Matters.
Children today are spending very little time outdoors. According to the National Wildlife Federation, “The average American boy or girl spends just four to seven minutes in unstructured outdoor play each day, and more than seven hours each day in front of an...
Sneers and Snarls: Why the Preteen and Adolescent Years Are So Hard for Girls
A mother recently told me that her eleven-year-old daughter is starting middle school in the fall. There was an open house for the school in the spring, and they decided to make it a family affair and take a warm evening walk there together.As they walked onto the...
Five Tips for Parenting your Preteens and Adolescents
Parenting a preteen sometimes feels like you've gotten lost in a foreign neighborhood without your trusted GPS. What used to make your five-year-old laugh doesn’t work anymore with your thirteen-year-old. An adolescent's maturity can seem inconsistent and...
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Appreciating the Past, Planning for the New Year
Happy 2015! I love this time of year—something about being able to start anew and the excitement of what lies ahead. It’s also a good time to reflect on the year that passed, appreciate ourselves as parents, and put our attention towards the things we want to change...
Parenting Through the Holidays…With Less Stress
For some of us, the holidays conjure up pleasant memories of being with our families when we were young and we look forward to spending some quality time with our kids. But for some parents, the stress of getting it all done, working within limited economic means, and...
How is Parenting by Connection Different from other Parenting Approaches?
What's different about this approach? Unlike other approaches, Parenting by Connection emphasizes parent-to-parent listening tools to reduce the stress of parenting. When we can talk about what parenting is like with someone who will listen with warmth and attention...
Making a Good Mix: Seven Tips for StepParents and Blended Families
Developing happy and harmonious relationships in any family comes with its challenges, but blending two different families has its own particular bumps and bright spots. It can take several years, or more, for stepfamilies to find a groove that is comfortable for...
“No, We Can’t Send Him Back”: Five Keys for Preparing Your Family for the Birth of a Sibling
Two days after my son was born, his five-year old sister carefully and quietly carried his bouncy chair to a room in the back of the house that wasn’t used much. When I walked back into the living room and found him gone, she said, “Camilo has gone to the baby...
Kathy, Mother of two in Albany, California
When I first started working with Julie, I was dealing with whining, fighting between my two daughters (3 & 7), and losing my temper. It seemed like chaos was the status quo, and I wasn’t sure how to sustain harmony, a sense of safety, and peace of mind. I...
Raining Peanut Butter Crackers
Special time is one of those Parenting by Connection “listening tools” that I both love and dread. It’s a time that you designate to be with just one child, from anywhere from five minutes to an hour, doing whatever they want to do. You refrain from texting or...
How Parenting by Connection Can Help
Introduction to Parenting by Connection
Lydia, Mother of a Five Year-Old
Julie's Building Emotional Understanding class was my first introduction to Parenting by Connection and it changed my life. Julie is a compassionate, honest, and inspiring instructor. The material and exercises changed the way I parent, helping me give myself...
Lucia, mother of three
I think that the Building Emotional Understanding Class with Julie Johnson was the best investment in parent education that I’ve ever made. On each conference call, I was reassured by the warmth in her voice, I felt respected and understood. Julie was able to answer...