"It's smaller than I thought," says my nine year-old.

"It looks like urinals," says my six year old.

"I place my finger on the cast all votes button, and the boys said, "Press it Mom."

Afterwards, my six declared, walking on the sidewalk toward our house, "You just changed the world Mom!"

Ya gotta love a child's big picture vision of the world and what each of us is capable of creating in this life.

I told the boys that when they wake up tomorrow morning, I'll have written the name of our new President on our dry-erase board in the kitchen. My six year old was giddy with excitement. "I can't wait," he said. That, and his tooth is about to fall out. Out with the old Prez and the old tooth...

Which reminds me...we passed by a grocery store today that was empty.

"Wow, they went out of business?" asks my six year old. "Yikes! The economy must really be bad."

I kid you never.

What did I know at six?

Speaking of which...

Five days until that odd candy-gathering ritual that has my six year-old on the fence.

"Why does it have to be so scary and spooky with skeletons and tombstones and fake blood and fake monsters trying to kill you and scare you to death and make your eyeballs all red and pop out and your tongue be green with slime?" he asks, casually, you know, while driving back from Borders bookstore.

Yes. Why.

"Do they do this in Italy?" he asks.

"Do they do this in Iraq?" he persists.

He plans to be a spy on Friday. Maybe his first assignment, I suggest, is to discover the answers to these questions. He nods, and asks for my fingerprint.

I wonder if diagnosticians are considering adding a whole new roster of stressors to better reflect the times. I read recently that more than 60% of Americans are suffering from stress, indigestion, headaches, cardiac and respiratory difficulties, and sleep problems. More sleep medication and anti-depressant are being prescribed and consumed than ever before.

And I think...what about the kids? They are taking anti-anxiety meds too. I have two boys with their own occasional anxious thoughts, emotional breakdowns and fitful night's sleep, and I can share my antidote to the stress that seizes them as it seizes any big person out there.

1. 4-square breathing: My kids get stressed or panicked about something and suddenly one or the other of them will go off and do three or four deep breaths. When we get that extra few hits of oxygen, our body chemistry changes. Without it, we shallow breathe and our amygdala becomes "hot" and we want to bash something or bolt. Fight or flight. My friend Doug Bench calls that little fear factor in our brains, "Miggy." The way 4-square works is just...breathe in for 4 counts, hold it for 4 counts and breathe out for 4 counts. Do 3 or 4 of these, and you will feel the difference.

2. Hand or foot Massage: I get out the hand cream and talk with my nine year old son in the dark while I rub his fingers and palms, gently squeezing each to the tip the from elbow to palm. His whole energy downshifts. My six year old loves massage too but hates the smell of lavender. "It smells like rotting gym socks mixed with stinky cheese." Yum.

3. Good thoughts. A few years ago, my husband and I created this nighttime ritual called Good Thoughts. A visualization thing, really. But it's so powerful, the kids float off to peaceful sleep in no time. I am going to record a CD of it and share it with any parent who wants to try it with their kids at night.

I think this is a CRUCIAL time to talk about coping strategies with our kids---but moreso to model healthy coping skills for them. I know I've been walking and talking faster, sighing more. The kids hear it and pick up on it. Thankfully they tell me to sit down and then proceed to hug and smooch me back to reality.

I want to hear your ideas. If you have created positive and effective ways of calming yourselves and your kids, please share them with me and I'll post your idea with your first name (or whatever you give me permission to post).

He wanted to drive to New York and play in Central Park. But he didn't want to play soccer or play in the playground by the huge rocks off the Columbus Circle entrance...or run across the Great Lawn.

He wanted to play Central Park. As is, playing Carnegie Hall. But outside. With drums. As in the kind that you bring from home in a van from New Jersey.

"I have a vision of playing under a tree," he said. "And just playing for hours, filling the air with great rhythms and maybe, just maybe, gathering a crowd who would be inspired and maybe even impressed."

"What's the difference between inspiring and impressing?" I ask.

"Hmm," he says, "Well, impressing is having people think you're good...and uh...inspiring is making people feel good, kind of like excited and happy?"

"So...impressing is like receving something from people," I reply, "And inspiring is like--"

"Giving," he says, finishing my sentence. "I want to do both. So can we do it? Can we go to Central Park?"

Hey, we lived in NY for 12 years (actually 8 miles outside midtown), and we'd hardly balk at a chance of spending a gorgeous day in Central Park. So, the drum kit was packed up, and my husband rolled the suitcase filled with cymbals, collapsed stands while our son pushed a dolly with four drums piled like a totem pole, and our six year-old and I carried a picnic lunch and a bag of soccer balls and pilons, just in case we wanted to take a break from be-bop.

We got into the park, and sure enough, drummer boy spotted the perfect perch he envisioned in his mind. It was off the beaten path somewhat, in front of a massive climbing rock, just over from the main path enough that he wasn't in the way and just close enough that everyone who passed by got wind of the rhythm. He set up shop and began to riff. In a few minutes, a crowd gathered. And there he was playing for a small fan club of New Yorkers, who nodded and stared and grooved to his beats.

He was in his element. And then, the unexpected. Some people mistook his empty suitcase for a tip bin and began tossing in dollar bills.

He didn't want any money so he'd take breaks and move the bin out of view. But, when he went back to play, his 11 year old friend from NY placed it back in front.

He played for 3 hours.

And at 4 pm, he was ready to pack it up. The boys couldn't believe that people had thrown in $34.

"Can I have ten?" asked my six year-old.

"Sure."

Back in the parking garage on 58th, drummer boy sits back in his seat, swigs some bottled water and sighs.

"Thanks for making my dream come true Mom and Dad," he says. "This was exactly how I pictured it in my mind."

The first is by a brilliant scholar, speaker and former educator, Alife Kohn, and is called "PUNISHED BY REWARDS." It has a fascinating interview with the now late B.F. Skinner, "father" of Behaviorism. One of the most interesting chapters is called Bribes for Behaving: Why Behaviorism Doesn't Help Chlidren Become Good People. www.alfiekohn.com He has an article on his site that turns conventional beliefs abnout praise on their head, called "Five Reasons to Stop Saying Good Job!"

I read another wonderful book called "HOLD ON TO YOUR KIDS", by Gordon Neufeld, PhD. I met with him a conference where we were both speakers and he and I talked for some time. He is from Vancouver. A brilliant researcher and the book speaks such sense and goes to the heart of it all. www.gordonneufeld.com

And by Dr. Daniel Siegel, M.D...."PARENTING FROM THE INSIDE OUT." If you are interested in knowing how and why you react the way you do, how your own childhood experiences have wired your brain, literally, and how you can "change" those neural pathways to render yourself less negatively reactive (or more proactive and conscious), then this book will knock your socks off. The chapter on Rupture and Repair is especially good.

We all "lose it", some of us recover quickly, some of us fall into ruts and traps and negative dynamics, some never "find it" again, and some are determined to pave a new path. These books offer heaps of inspiration, insight, powerful ideas and fire in the belly for any parent hungry for positive change and a more 'connected' relationship with their children--and themselves.

My friend Heather is about to have her second book published. "BEYOND CONSEQUENCES" (Vol. 2) November 1st. Visit her site at www.beyondconsequences.com