This week's episode is with Elaine and I, your hosts of this podcast and business partners. I first met Elaine when she was struggling to understand her son's needs and to support him. I was the parenting coach to the Halligan family and am delighted to have witnessed Sam metamorphose from the troubled state he was in at 7 years old to a happy, confident and successful young adult.

Elaine and I have enjoyed many years of working together and 10 years as co-directors of The Parent Practice. So we thought it would be nice to wrap up this first season of podcasts by doing something together, despite being on opposite ends of the earth!

By the wonders of modern technology we bring you our Christmas special! (Even if you don't celebrate any festival at this time of year I think you will find some useful ideas and tips in here.

Listen to this episode with Elaine and I if you want to learn:

• How to resist pester power in our very consumerist society
• About getting clear what your values are
• How the 4 gift rule can put a cap on parental spending at Christmas
• How to encourage gratitude in children and a culture of appreciation in the family
• How perfectionism can make festive periods stressful and unreasonable expectations can lead to huge stress and we end up shouting at our children
• How to deal with critical relatives
• How to set things up through chat throughs and role plays so that children behave in ways a bit closer to our expectations
• How important it is for parents to get in training physically and emotionally before times when there are a lot of demands on us
• How to get your partner on board and share the load fully

In our celebration of vulnerability and perfect imperfection I share one of my own Low Parenting Moments and what I learnt about parenting in public as a result.

And Elaine also shares her top tip for raising children to be confident, happy and successful.

Links

To get in touch with us:

www.theparentpractice.com

the parent practice on facebook and on instagram