Children

Single mums facing child support cuts

SINGLE mums will receive between $10 and $100 less each week from their former partners after the Child Support Agency sends 1.5 million parents new assessments by the end of this week.

By July 1, about 60 per cent of divorced fathers will pay less under the overhaul of the system.

The lobby group representing single parents is urging the Rudd Government to review rules passed by the Howard government two years ago that drastically changed the system.
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Coastal dads top nation’s child-pay shame

FATHERS in coastal regions are the nation’s worst offenders when it comes to shirking child-support payments.

New data shows many parents, most of them fathers living in Queensland’s resort towns have turned their backs on their children.

Child Support Agency statistics show parents in leading tourist destinations including Broadbeach, Mermaid Beach and Palm Beach, on the Gold Coast, and Deception Bay, north of Brisbane, are the least likely to meet their child-support payments.
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Free baby shower game ideas

If you have been asked to host a baby shower, part of the occasion would involve playing games

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Handling child behavior problems

Is your child giving you a lot of headaches? Is he/she disobedient and answers back when you tell him/her off?

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Scrapbooking Ideas for Kids

Scrapbooking Ideas for Kids   by Kathleen Hudson

Many times at auctions, or estate sales, a box of books will turn up a real treasure, like a scrapbook that was kept by someone in their youth and sometimes through their adulthood. The book could be 50 or 60 years old, and a source of great fun to look at the pictures, news clippings, and personal mementoes.

The hobby of keeping such collections is enjoying a resurgence of popularity, with people of all ages finding new and inventive ways to record special events or occasions in their lives. Scrapbooking ideas for kids can be very basic to start with, because once they catch on to the fun, they’ll start developing their own sense of style and preference for decorating.

A scrapbook with reasonable quality paper makes a great special occasion gift for a child, along with glue, scissors, and perhaps a simple book on creating your own special treasure trove of memories.

Give them a start on their hobby by helping with the first entry, to celebrate the occasion such as a birthday. Cover a page in the gift paper that the book was wrapped in, and then tape or glue a photo of them in the center of the page. A package of 2″ x 4″ white labels is a handy part of any scrapbooking package, as they provide a clear area to put text, and can be stuck over top of an older label with outdated information. This is a handy way of adding your caption or comments to highly decorated pages.

Colored pencils, crayons, markers, and other artistic tools will also contribute to their enjoyment, as they use them to enhance a page with a photo of their new puppy, by drawing bones, mailmen, balls, and other doggy subjects around the picture.

Scrapbooking ideas for kids are only limited by their imagination in what they collect and use, from photos, to news clippings, souvenir programs from concerts, hair ribbons, ticket stubs from movies and more. They can even make mini scrapbooks of things like a visit to Grandma’s, and give it to her as a Christmas present.

About the Author

Kathleen Hudson is an avid scrapbooker and shares some of her best scrapbooking tips and ideas on her website at http://www.yourscrapbookingtips.com. Visit the site to add new creativity to your scrapbooking layouts.