With school starting back up many young people and their parents have to readjust their sleep patterns. Getting into a new sleep pattern can be tricky, but a good night’s sleep is one of the greatest responsibilities for a parent. Schools provide one meal a day and plenty of opportunity for learning, but without adequate rest during the evening a child can never reach their full potential.
This doesn't mean they necessarily need a new mattress to go along with the new backpack, but re-evaluating their sleep habits and environment before school starts can help get any new student off on the right foot.
Check the room, are there little to no distractions. Go visit the room after the child has gone to bed, but not after the adults have shut everything off. Is the Television playing so loud a night that the children can be distracted by it. Many programs at night have more adult themes and shouldn't be heard by little people. Also homes with very small children might have the televisions turned up to drown out noise from small children or the sounds of dinner being prepared throughout the day. As activity slows down take the time to soften the volume.
Check light levels. The bedroom may only have a nightlight, but a hall light may be shining in or placing strange shadows on the walls.
Inspect all the around the bed. If there are too many blankets they can weigh the child down and prevent as restful a night. If the child is in a toddler bed should they move up to a twin mattress? Check that the mattress still works for the child's body. As children age their needs change as well. If the bed structure is still fine, but they need a little more give than the traditional child's mattress provides, consider a mattress pad to improve things. A memory foam mattress pad can turn a traditional firm bunk bed mattress into a bed fit for a princess. New sheets can also be used as an incentive for good bed time behavior.
Habits at night are also key. Set up a routine and try to stick with it. If summer has allowed for more lax bed time patterns plan a week or so in advance to get back in the swing of things. Especially with new students, who might be nervous about the first day of school, a few trial runs through the morning routine will help encourage the bedtime habit. It never hurts parents to check their routine as well. They don't want to be clinging onto their bed mattress, when they should be coaxing a child out of theirs. Reward the family with their early start lunches packed and all by a morning at the park and a picnic. Late summer heat waves make playground equipment to hot to handle, but in the early morning it should be more practical.
It is never to early to acquire good sleep habits, and waiting to adjust an inappropriate mattress is only asking for a grouchy child. So as students get back to school, set them on the right foot and get them ready for sleep.
By now, most folks have heard about the Jet Blue flight attendant who got fed up with things after an altercation with a passenger, grabbed a couple of drinks, popped the emergency chute and exited the plane.
Now maybe the flight attendant was just having a bad day after not getting a good night’s sleep the night before. Maybe he just needed to get a new memory foam mattress to solve all his problems.
But even if he already has a king size memory foam mattress, he was in a public facing position and most anyone who has worked in public facing positions has experienced those days where nothing that is said and done is sufficient for the customer. Now everyone knows the customer is always right no matter what the issue may be. However the reality is, sometimes the customer is quite capable of making extremely unrealistic demands on anyone and everyone with whom they come in contact.
The Jet Blue flight attendant has become a bit of a folk hero in some parts of the working universe, probably because so many people who have worked in public facing positions have wanted to react to a situation with a customer in a similar fashion. Especially when faced with customers making the unreasonable demands.
Of course, there are days when customers can make quite reasonable requests and it is the person in that public facing position who is unreasonable. The unreasonable requests and the unreasonable response goes both ways. Sometimes it is the customer who needs to get a new memory foam mattress and a good night’s sleep and sometimes it’s the person in the public facing position who needs the new memory foam mattress and a good night’s sleep.
Whichever direction the unreasonable arrow is pointing, whether at the customer or the worker, everyone has those kinds of days. When the problem is with the worker, the customer may only have to deal with the one unreasonable person but when the problem is with the customer, then those customer problems can be compounded because the worker is also trying to deal with all the other customers, most of whom may be making reasonable requests but just by the very nature of multiple individuals making requests for time and considerations, even if the requests are quite reasonable, the level builds and builds until the blow-up occurs.
Most workers are not able to make quite as dramatic an exit as grabbing the drinks and popping the emergency chute, so most just mumble under their breath and go on. But most everyone can find a nice comfortable mattress to sleep on and that good night’s sleep goes a long way to keep the explosions down.
Depending on where folks are in the country, kids are or soon will be going back to school. One of the often overlooked aspects of a good education is a good night’s sleep each night. It may not be quite as important as good nutrition and diet to learning, but it is up there on the list of things that help kids to learn better.
A good mattress can help children get that good night sleep each night. It can be siblings sleeping on bunk beds with twin mattresses or twins sleeping on a full mattress. It can be an ortho memory foam mattress or a conventional mattress but either way, the mattress can help the child get the needed eight, nine, or ten hours sleep each night.
Now there are other things besides the mattress that impact a child getting that good nights sleep. Some children want a touch of light (the nightlight) while others want things to be as dark as it can possibly be. Some children want things to be as cool as possible while others want a sauna- like atmosphere. And good luck to the parents who have one of each sharing a room, as it is virtually impossible to find the happy medium between the light/no-light and the warm/cool aspects.
The timing and content of the supper meal can have a major impact on a child’s sleeping patterns. Some children will do a good job of the “clean up your plate and eat all your vegetables” just so they can eat the chocolate ice cream and chocolate cake for dessert. Others will do so for the opportunity to eat a bowl of Cheerios as a reward. And still others will make meals out of nothing but junk food if allowed to do so. All of these can cause a child to not sleep well.
Now part of reality is, most all children, over a school year, will have nights where they just don’t sleep well. Even on the night before the first day of school, the excitement can keep the kids awake and active later than the parents might like and make them feel tired the next morning. The older kids will of course want to stay up later than they should, just as they have done all summer and then want to sleep in the next morning.
But it is understandable if they want to sleep in when they have a nice, firm, sleep inducing mattress.
Anything that purports to be “Real” anything but is based on selective editing on a television network, has to be, pretty much by definition, unreal. Yet Bravo TV network is now pushing the latest in their “Real Housewives” franchise of “reality television” shows.
The cast of the most recent group of “housewives” has been doing the publicity tour. They’ve appeared on “The View” and on “Hoda and Kathie Lee,” among other shows. And the most famous, er make that maybe infamous, of the “housewives,” Michaele Salahi, has whined that Whoopi Goldberg was mean to her on The View and abused her after.
In case, you missed it, Ms Salahi and her husband, were the couple who snuck into a White House State dinner, causing all sorts of questions and problems for the Secret Service and eventually leading to the resignation of the then White House Social Secretary Desiree Rogers.
Bravo TV was implored by many to not reward the Salahis by picking Ms Salahi as one of the “housewives” but apparently, the free publicity was too much for Bravo to ignore.
Now no one knows if Ms Salahi had a good night sleep the night before her appearance on The View or whether she sleeps on a memory foam mattress or whether her mattress is a king mattress or queen mattress. The same thing applies to Ms Goldberg. She may or may not sleep on a king size memory foam mattress. She may or may not have slept easily the night before the “housewives” appeared on The View.
But how and what type of mattresses the Salahis and Ms Goldberg sleep on have little bearing as, like most everyone in the world, they all have to get up each day and go about their business, whether they slept on a comfortable mattress the night before or not. In fact, all of them have better opportunities to have a nice sleep on a good king mattress than many other people.
And just as elite athletes learn to deal with sleeping on mattresses of different sizes and comfort levels while going out and performing the next day, so must actors and reality show cast members learn to deal with life’s little annoyances, even if they spent the night before tossing and turning on a maybe not quite comfortable king mattress (or even on a twin mattress or a camping mattress). Of course, the elite athlete actually has to perform live and usually does not get a do-over or second take or have the benefit of selective editing (unless it is editing of an interview sometimes).
It is now August and Major League Baseball’s “Non-Waiver Trade Deadline” has passed. This just means the Major League general managers don’t have to jump through extra hoops to make a trade. They can still make trades through the end of August but current Major Leaguers have to pass through the “waiver wire.” The waiver wire process allows any team lower in the standings to claim a player before he can be traded to a team higher in the standings. Many teams put their entire rosters on waiver early in August just in case they want to make a trade later. If another team puts in a claim now, the first team can withdraw that player but can’t make a trade with him later. Often, a team lower in the standings will put in a claim just to keep the higher team from getting a player. Of course, occasionally the first team will go ahead and release the player to the team claiming, so there is a large amount of gamesmanship involved by all involved.
But the Non-Waiver Trade deadline usually means more than a few players will be sleeping in strange beds on strange mattresses for a couple of months, even when they are at “home.” Maybe with their former team, they were in a furnished rental apartment or even an apartment with their regular bed and mattress, no matter what size it may be. But after the trade, they have to find a new place to live for a couple of months and get used to a new mattress. If they’re lucky, they might find a nice corporate rental with a king mattress and a good view. If they’re not quite so lucky, they might find a furnished studio/corporate rental with a full mattress on a Murphy bed. If they’re real unlucky, they might be forced into finding a room at an Extended Stay or Executives Suites Hotel for a couple of months. This probably happens more frequently for the minor league players who get traded mid-season though than it does for major leaguers.
Whatever their situations, the players who are traded in the middle of the season are living away from home even when they are “home.” They probably do not have access to a queen size memory foam mattress or a memory foam mattress of any type. They surely have a place to sleep but it might not be a peaceful restful sleep each night. The amazing things about athletes at all levels is their abilities to focus and play their sports, no matter what the adverse conditions.
Sometimes a homeowner realizes they need an extra mattress for an unexpected guest. They have the room, even a frame, but this guest needs a real bed not an air mattress. Perhaps it is a mother-in-law or old friend, but this guest certainly isn't going to be sleeping on an inflatable mattress on the floor.
Craigslist, which has been the go to fill many apartments and first homes, is a great option to find an inexpensive gently used mattress. It might even be from a grandparent’s home as they downgrade to a more manageable condo. There are also less reputable folks there. As in actual businesses that set up shop and do some unscrupulous advertising in the online classifieds section. The tactic is bait and switch. It is very easy for mattresses as there are so many levels of comfort and degrees of firmness.
An eye catching price is mentioned in the ad and perhaps $70 for a new pillow top twin mattress or $80 for a full sized mattress. The price will be certainly worth calling after. After the appointment is made to look at it, the customer finds rather than one or two mattresses, but a whole mini show floor. There is a nice pillow top right inside the door that is striking and plump. Testing for comfort goes marvelously, the item is fine and just as the deal is about to be struck the price is revealed.
The previously advertised $70 or $80 dollars is not quoted, but some figure 3 to 4 times that amount. The bed so admired is not the advertised one, but a much higher end mattress. Down the customer walks; down the walk of shame, down market towards a lower end mattress towards the end of the row of mattresses. Walking towards a mattress so full of metal and lack of cotton or even polyester fillings start picking up the local radio stations. This surely is the advertised mattress. But alas the salesperson points to the floor where an old fashioned floral printed plank lies.
The customer is regaled that men don't mind the firm mattress so much because their body weight compensates. When asked about the pillow top, terms like European style start coming to their lips. Because in Europe they are apparently used to sleeping on bare springs with a thin sheet of floral polyester to protect their hardy skin. Gulags come to mind certainly not Parisian comfort. Certainly time has been wasted, not even a mother-in-law would sleep on this bed and certainly not an old best friend who would certainly prefer the inflatable or a hide-a-bed found on the road side to this wire contraption. The bait has been laid and if the customer is desperate they will switch up market. Perhaps not to the just inside the door mattress, which is mostly for ooohing over, not selling, but half way between where the price is “just right” and comfort is not too overly compromised.
This happens every day with everything from toilet paper to turkeys in grocery stores, but customers know the value of those goods and they know they can walk away and find a good deal half a block down at the next grocery store. Unless research time has been used wisely with reputable shops there is no basis for comparison and the bargain will eat any budget. Beware and be willing to walk away.
The advertised mattress is out of stock anyway. Save time and look for a real deal at a reputable mattress store.
Many textbooks have been re-written in the last few years. History texts have been updated by school boards and English classes have expanded their scopes. These texts are not beach reading, page turners; in fact many would make any mattress feel like a million dollars.
Parents should still take the time to read over their kids’ textbooks. Keeping up on the subjects being studied by children helps parents answer informed questions and more importantly helps them answer the questions their child will inevitably ask while doing homework. Many have watched the program "Are You Smarter Than A Fifth Grader" and discovered that they have forgotten a lot of their grade school lessons, but no parent wants their child to think they don't have all the answers too quickly. (There really is little a person can do about teenagers.)
Many children go to sleep on their twin mattresses much earlier than their parents and therefore parents have the time to brush up on their basic skills. Teachers will often provide outlines of their subjects for the year and this can direct a parents cramming sessions. This also provides parents with a planning opportunity for extra-curricular activities that will expand the knowledge their students are getting. An historical site that can be visited to reinforce an in class lesson, or a trip to a nature park to explore a habitat learned about in science.
Fractions don't have to be learned simply by worksheets, and planning on doubling a recipe or “accidentally” finding a recipe that is twice or three times too large can allow a student hands on experience. Cookies are particularly good for this experiment as too many can always find homes at a senior center or church gathering.
These texts have also gotten very diverse in their structure. Many have online components that show actual videos or link to larger graphics than can be fit in a standard text book. Some historical figures have had their entries shrunk to make room for a wider variety of data. Talking about how the perspective of a figure changes over time can also provide conversation topics when the child is not as talkative. Perhaps comparing their knowledge of someone like George Washington to that of a bed mattress and how slowly the child grows and fills out the bed mattress. The simple facts they learned in Kindergarten will be filled out during the whole course of their education. Reading their texts can allow a parent to remember just how basic or complex an understanding their student is receiving.
So perhaps a parent should consider tucking themselves onto their foam mattress with a text book instead of the latest thriller, it could help them become more informed and it might just work better than a glass of warm milk to put them to sleep.
StarCraft 2 has finally come out and followers are reporting dramatic loss of time resting on their mattresses. The first challenge is the standard single player game with approximately 26 to 30 missions. The new story line and visual adventure will keep players up well past any reasonable hour of sleep. No foam mattress will be able to help this level of sleep deprivation. Parents of this teenager rated game will not be able to monitor the full length of play without generous doses of coffee and sugar themselves.
The full reviews detailing what they might want to be concerned about for the younger players will likewise take many days to be posted as the reviewers have to play through so many scenes to go back and report on it. As soon as those marathon sessions are over the expansion packs that lead the single player through the two other key races will cause the cycle to repeat again. There is some down time between the releases to allow players for fully explore the human based game before moving on.
The in-cut videos are expected to be more seamless than the previous versions of StarCraft as they are rendered with the same graphics engine that is powering the game. Any player will attest to loathing hiccups in the game play for a movie clip. This used to be mostly related to pointing out the stark contrast in graphical quality between the clips and the game, but as the games rendering algorithms get more smooth, there will be less reason to start thinking about that lack of sleep. This will keep the heads from their pillows that much longer and the beds mattresses empty a little longer.
Then there is the Battle.net where players can pick their race and compete against anyone in the world. This is a great way for friends who have been dispersed by moves to keep playing. There are also games forming amongst strangers so a player doesn't have to worry about crushing their friends’ hopes before settling in their own bed mattress.
Perhaps with all the sleep deprivation that is anticipated with this release it would be a useful gift pack for the gamer in the house to get the game and a gift certificate for a new memory foam mattress to help them recoup after the initial thrill has faded from the game.
Chelsea Clinton
is married.For many folks, this comes
as a bit of a shock to the system and brain as for many, the enduring memory of
Chelsea Clinton is as the gawky twelve year old who lived in the White House
with her parents in the nineties.
But she is no
longer that gawky twelve year old who first came into the consciousness of the
United States during her father’s presidential run in 1992.Instead, she is a poised woman, a thirty year
old college graduate of Stanford University with Masters degrees from studies
at both Oxford and Columbia.Of course,
with the brains her parents have, it’s not all that much of a surprise that she
would wind up going to high powered universities but that is still an
impressive list.
Over the years
there have been many presidential children who have come to be known by the
voting public.Today there are the
daughters of President and Mrs. Obama, Malia and Sasha.Sasha Obama is the youngest child of a
President since John Kennedy, Jr. was an infant.Amy Carter was a little younger when her
father became president than Malia Obama was. Often the children of the president are adults living their own lives by
the time their fathers got elected to the office.
Chelsea Clinton’s
marriage was held in the small town of Rhinebeck, NY on the Hudson River.It is doubtful that Chelsea got a good
night’s sleep on a nice memory foam mattress the night before her wedding.The excitement of the wedding being so close
to hand probably would make for a restless night sleep no matter how
comfortable a mattress she might have had and since she was most likely not
staying anywhere near her regular bed and mattress, her sleep would have been
that much more disrupted.
The Clintons
worked very hard to maintain Chelsea’s privacy during her years in the White
House and she has managed to maintain that level of privacy for herself as an
adult.The Obamas are apparently trying
to maintain a similar level of privacy with their daughters and are probably
hopeful that Malia and Sasha can maintain themselves and represent themselves
as well as Chelsea Clinton has done.It
is difficult for most anyone to maintain their sanity and a sense of proportion
as they grow up in the public eye and that much more difficult when your father
is President of the United States.The
public feels a sense of proprietary ownership for the children of the President
even though they are not the politicians. In essence, these children are the princes and princesses of America.
Summer with hot
exteriors and cool interiors can easily end in a cold, but sometimes the
sniffling and coughing has more to do with the dust hidden under the
mattress.Even a very tidy house can
have hidden dust spots under the beds, bookshelves, or dressers. Many people
who vacuum every week don't take the time to clean under the bed. This doesn't
need to be a weekly or even monthly task. This used to be done in the spring
when folks first opened up their homes windows in the spring. Spring now has sports
starting up and activities pick up at school leading a day of cleaning to be
postponed over and over again. While the kids are out of school take advantage
of the extra hands to rearrange the bedrooms and while everything is moving,
get the carpets vacuumed and the floor swept. Even beds that are up against a
corner will have dust and dirt collecting, in fact there will be dirt along
both covered sides.
Be sure to bring
this up as a game or special chance to redecorate. Perhaps offer a special
reward if everything is cleaned by a particular time. Drawer pulls and a lamp,
or a duvet cover and sheets can really make a room look nice and fresh.
It is a great
chance to think about about the current storage options could off season
clothes be stored under the bed in boxes and prevent future buildup. Those
boxes might need dusting when they are pulled out, but it might be easier than
moving the furniture. Check the location of air vents and be sure not to
disrupt them. Flooring types might make cleaning easier from an angle. A smooth
wood, laminate, or tile might be cleaned with a Swifter like brush. Any rug
should be beaten or washed. Carpet might be harder to get clean, as it will
hold and hide the dust, but it is just as important. Those allergens are hiding
down there, although unlike the smooth surface they won't blow under the
mattress as easily.
Dressers can also
hide dust and cobwebs, there it can also pool with just a little help along
between the furniture and the wall. Be sure to move any pieces that can and
clean the vertical surfaces not just the horizontal ones. Any vanity should
cleaned under often as hair and other debris will collect there. Dust and
debris collects under ever bed size from king mattress to twin mattress.
Allergies to a dust buildup can be gradual and irritated by normal seasonal
allergies or can be provoked by an earlier cold. If the mess turns out to be
particularly bad, a handkerchief over the nose and mouth can stop a person from
breathing in the particles.
Don't let the
dust bunnies under the mattress waste good vacation time.
Mattresses
Accessories
Beds