My Feelings Matter – A book for little people with BIG feelings

We are HUGE book fans here at Kids in Adelaide and we LOVE sharing our latest and greatest book finds with you all……ESPECIALLY when they are a little bit special like this one is.

My Feelings Matter is a special book for 2 reasons….

1. It was written by my good friend Sara, who is also the owner of Teepee Learning (remember the alphabet flash cards we posted a while back?)

2. It’s not only a beautifully written and illustrated book, it’s also a book that can HELP. My Feelings Matter uses child friendly pictures that show a different emotion or sense on each page and helps kids explain how they are feeling. We all know that kids are REALLY good at feeling ALL the feels…….but sometimes some kids can find it REALLY hard to actually verbalise those feelings, or communicate them to us. This book helps them to find the words to describe feelings like “bored” “scared” “all too much” “anxious” “happy” and more.

I asked Sara a bit more about the book, why she wrote it, why it’s important and why it’s a great addition to any kids home library

What made you want to write this book?

I wrote this book first and foremost for my son Hudson, but I also wrote it to help children and their families all around the world live a happier life through communicating feelings.

I use to make feeling cards of my own to try to help him back when he was 4 years old and had trouble communicating to me.

Hudson would get very angry when he couldn’t do something and needed help. Simply because he couldn’t use the world “help” and actually ask for it.

When I made these cards with a picture and told him what each picture was for he was so happy!

I would stick them to the fridge for him to grab off. If he was angry when he went to start throwing things around or wrecking things I would ask him to get a feeling card off the fridge and let me know what he is feeling.

I know he has Autism but I believe ALL children regardless of special needs need to be taught feelings. Just to name them is a fantastic start and then learning how to communicate them is something amazing. Children may be little but they have BIG feelings.

Who is this book dedicated to?

Of course it is dedicated to Huddy. Hudson is my eldest child and he teaches me so much every day just by being who he is!

What’s one emotion you have the most trouble expressing?

What an interesting question to reflect on – I would have to say as an adult, asking for help when I feel overwhelmed when it is “all too much” as we say in the book.

I am just like Hudson in that regard and as a Mum who has two young boys, a job outside the home and a small business it all gets too much sometimes. I become stressed, anxious, and all the other

reactions that come with not saying “this is all too much”. I think this is why I am so switched on to noticing a meltdown before it happens when Huddy has had too much of his surroundings.

I immediately make changes so that he can relax without all the crazy stimulation our busy world has to offer children. We are all about making things slower around here.

What has been the best feedback so far?

Well because the book is literally brand new to the children’s book/resource scene I have not had the chance to get feedback. I can’t wait for when I do!

However my best feedback has been from my own two boys. Hudson once used the word “overwhelmed” from hearing that word once in my book. (It’s now call “all too much”)

He didn’t say anything else just that word and I immediately knew I had to change the surroundings of where we were (which was cold, very loud and completely new to him, he didn’t know anybody).

For him to tell me how is feeling was a huge moment in our family of success! We were able to take him outside, calm him down and then leave the party as going back in didn’t work. Meltdown once

again avoided! My three year old also uses words he hears from the book as he can relate them to the pictures like “sad” or “happy”.

My Feelings Matter by Sara Stace is available online for $24.95 from www.teepeelearning.com