Time passed, and she was going to her father's house. I wanted to encourage her to stay. I wanted to keep her from him, but I knew that it wasn't my place. As her mother, it is not my job to keep her from her father. Its my job to give her what she needs to heal and let go.

Everyone likes to win, and little kids are no exception. But you cannot win them all, and losing throws young children (and older ones) into a tailspin. How can you help your child learn how to lose?

How two young mothers, who were also special education teachers and La Leche League Leaders, went from having their own little support group to founding a global nonprofit organization with the vision of helping parents achieve a more compassionate relationship with their children through Attachment Parenting.

Parents who try to understand their baby's babbling let their infants know they can communicate, which leads to children forming complex sounds and using language more quickly. The study's results showed infants whose mothers attended more closely to their babbling vocalized more complex sounds and develop language skills sooner.

Wonder in the first years of life creates the roots of self-motivation. It is the foundation of a personal connection to the world, the nexus of the self. Wonder cannot be scripted. It arrives unbidden. And while we cannot call forth wonder just when we want it, we can be expectant. The best a person can do is to be always listening, always watching, open to the possibility that something amazing might come our way, aware that it is possible, or even likely, that the marvelous will arise out of the commonplace, amid the happenings of everyday life.

For me, Attachment Parenting has been like a life preserver in a cultural sea that is constantly in turbulance and posing many dangers.

The processes of first finding our sadness and then our tempering elements are human processes that help us keep our perspective on life and develop the resourcefulness adn resilience we need to adapt to the circumstances that come our way. In helping children to grow up, our thinking must be oriented toward supporting these processes and paying attention to the signs of them becoming stuck.

Over the past five years, my parenting style has shifted as my children have grown. Their needs have changed, so the way I relate to them has also changed. However, one thing that hasn't changed is my commitment to maintaining a secure attachment.

Mothers who live in neighborhoods with plenty of grass, trees or other green vegetation are more likely to deliver at full term and their babies are born at higher weights, compared to mothers who live in urban areas that aren't as green, a new study shows.

The first international standards for fetal growth and newborn size have been developed by a global team led by scientists. Now, for the first time, all 120 million babies born each year across the world can be assessed using a common set of standards, reflecting how babies should grow when mothers have adequate health, nutrition, medical care and socioeconomic status.

Becoming a mother has taught me the real meaning of "living in the moment." Before I became pregnant with our daughter Zara, I really thought living in the moment meant squeezing every possible drop of productivity out of my day. I am finding courage to let go of rigidly held agendas and just listen.

Tulane University psychiatrist Dr. Stacy Drury has been given $2.4 million by the National Institutes of Health to test a provocative new theory - how well children bond with a parent in the first year of life leaves lasting genetic protection, potentially shielding them from disease risks well into adulthood.

The MommyMeds app, from the InfantRisk Center at the Texas Tech University Health Science Center, gives new and expectant mothers a fast and convenient way to access evidence-based information about medications and their safety during pregnancy and breastfeeding. The app is based on Dr. Thomas Hale's Medications and Mothers' Milk, considered worldwide to be the authoritative source of medication information for pregnant and breastfeeding patients. Dr. Hale is one of the world's leading experts in perinatal pharmacology.

There's now overwhelming evidence that a child's future health is influenced by more than just their parents' genetic material, and that children born of unhealthy parents will already be pre-programmed for greater risk of poor health, according to researchers. "The reality is, the child doesn't quite start from scratch -- they already carry over a legacy of factors from their parents' experiences that can shape development in the fetus and after birth. Depending on the situation, we can give our children a burden before they've even started life," experts say.

"The reality is, we can now say with great certainty that the child doesn't quite start from scratch – they already carry over a legacy of factors from their parents' experiences that can shape development in the fetus and after birth."

API seeks donated items for annual online auction
Last year, friends of API donated a 7-night stay in their lovely home pictured here.  API received 100% of the winning bid. Goodwill for the donor, goodies for the winning bidder and continued parent support from API.

We've all hear the saying, "It takes a village to raise a child," and it is still true, even in these modern days of computers, mobile phones, dial-a-pizza and TV on demand. In fact, I would say now, more than ever, we all need our little village.

Prior to having children, I was full of ideas about what kids needed and how I would parent. Once I actually became pregnant, the sheer amount of overwhelming love I felt towards my unborn child radically shifted my entire world. My perspective on parenting and children was altered in a way I could not have foreseen prior to my son’s arrival. I realized that all of my ideas were the result of societal influence and the way that I was parented. Once I had this realization, I knew that I wanted something different for my children, which ultimately led me to Attachment Parenting.