His second marriage was the result of his getting the girl he was seeing pregnant. It lasted five very turbulent years. Their child is now 6 — and she also has three older children by another man.

My problem is that my boyfriend remains in contact with his three ex-stepchildren. In his words, “I divorced their mother, not them” and expects me to accept that those children are still his children for the rest of our lives.

His reasoning is that they’re his son’s siblings and they will always be a part of his life, as will his son’s mother. Is it fair to ask me to accept three former stepchildren? They really never were a family.

Read the answer…Home & Garden | Stepchildren still are family, even after divorce | Seattle Times Newspaper

AN Adelaide mother went to court to prevent her daughter from referring to her ex-husband’s new wife as “Mum” or “Mummy” or “my other Mummy”.

‘The woman, who cannot be named, argued that her ex-husband was deliberately undermining her role as their child’s mother, by encouraging his new wife to answer to the terms “Mum” and “Mummy” and “Mummy-D” (D being the first letter of the stepmother’s first name.)

The battle has been going on for almost as long as the child has been able to speak. Her parents separated when she was four months old.

The Family Court case sets a precedent for Australia’s million-strong blended families, where arguments over who is to be called what are commonplace.

In the Adelaide case, the mother, known in court documents as Ms Klement, argued that the stepmother should not be permitted to refer to herself “as a motherly figure”.

By consent, her ex-husband agreed that his new wife should not be “Mum or “Mummy” but thought “Mummy-D” was fine.

The mother said the father was “attempting to replace her as the child’s mother by encouraging the child to call his new wife “Mum”. She said the new wife would sign the child’s school notes “Mum” and take the child to medical appointments, where she “presented herself as the mother”.

Ms Klement was “adamant that the child should only call her Mum” or any variation of “Mum”.

The stepmother rejects the accusation that she presents herself as the child’s mother.

The court declined to make an order that the child not refer to her stepmother as “Mummy-D” in part because the judge was concerned that such an order would lead to further litigation “where it would be up to the court to determine whether the father had breached the order in relation to encouraging the child to use the term Mummy-D”.

The court also expressed hope that the child would grow out of “Mummy-D” and begin calling her stepmother by her first name.

It was the only dispute between the separated couple.

All other matters, including where the child should live and go to school, and how much child support should be paid, had been settled in pre-court mediation, after more than six years of litigation.

The parents have a shared care arrangement.

News Source…Mother fights to stop daughter calling her stepmother ‘mum’ | News.com.au

Read more…How to Be a Good Step Dad – Wheretofindpedia

Wheretofind

As a parent, it might be challenging to give both children the amount and the type of attention they need. However, there are several ways to make all of your children feel valued.

Read more…Blend a New Baby With an Older Step Child – Wheretofindpedia

Wheretofind

Add to this the fact that anything you add to the slow cooker or crockpot disperses its flavor slowly throughout the cooking time and you have a great way to stay on budget.

Vegetarian dishes tend to be cheaper than meat ones, so you might want to try cooking a bean stew or lentils in your crockpot for cheaper meals. With the addition of a few vegetables, you’ve got a tasty dish that can be served over rice. If you want to make pasta sauce, this can be very easily done, you just need to slow cook the tomatoes and onions with herbs added in the last hour. Freeze the extra for later use and you have a huge savings over those pre-made sauces.

Many dishes cost just a dollar or two when made from scratch, so skip the prepared items and use your slow cooker to cook cheap cuts of meat, vegetables, soups and stews, or even prepare your own chicken stock by cooking your chicken carcass for 24 hours or so in water. Things that would normally take a long time and require a lot of attention are now able to cook overnight or during the day while you are out and about and busy with other things.

Cook cheap meals in your slow cooker and your family will eat well for next to nothing. You can stock up the next time there’s a sale on tough bits of meat and just pop them into the crockpot for 10 hours to soften them up . . . you won’t regret having a crockpot.

About the Author

Looking to cook cheap for your family? At TheGourmetMama.com, you’ll find great, easy recipes to impress everyone in the family.

Read more…New South Wales — Relationships Australia

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Steps

1. Sit them down. Bring them into the main family room and sit across from them with your partner.
2. Be sensitive. If you only have one child then no matter how old they are, hold their hands, show affection. If you have two or more children then just speak in a sweet tone.
3. Ask how they feel. If your child/children see your partner as a parent then you should skip this step as it may make things worse. If they do not see your partner as a parent then ask them how they feel about them.
4. Tell them how you feel. Tell them that you love your partner but you will always love them just as much,
5. Break the news. Tell them you are remarrying.

How to Tell Children You Are Remarrying

I can see that children’s needs are important but I believe that parent’s rights to a child they brought into the world should be also. As long as their child’s basic needs are being met and they are not coming to any harm I believe that parent’s rights should be paramount to the decisions of custody.

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