Lessons from a Chore Chart

Giving is an important part of our family.  A few months ago, I noticed the girls were entertained by finding loose change around the house and collecting it "for the act of giving it away".   I wanted The Princess to learn that, while giving is a wonderful thing, she can also save some for herself.  And she should not only SAVE some for herself, but give herself some SPENDING money as well.  

Some might think that our kids are too young to have a chore chart and to be getting money.  I think kids are smarter than people give them credit for and learning about money from a young age is essential.  Our kids don't get an allowance, they get commission.  The chore chart,  which is a great way for them to learn to contribute to the family by doing some tasks, is OPTIONAL.  I don't hound them to do their chores.  To be honest, they are way more into it than I would even like them to be!  (Because when Hammie does her chores, I still have to supervise, so it makes more work for me!)

What sort of chores do they have?  Well, our girls are two years and soon to be five years old.  Their chores include:  

We've Got Mail!

If you are looking for an easy project to entertain the kids then this is it!  Seriously, I made this while drinking my morning coffee.  AND it entertained my girls for most of the morning. . . and then again in the afternoon!

There is nothing quite like playing Pretend!  But let's face it, pretend is way more fun when you have props!  And to make mommy even happier, I threw in something educational too.

Here is our mailbox.  I took a box and cut a hole in one end (so that when you pick the box up you can get all the mail).  I wrapped most of the sides in brown packaging paper. . . I would have done all the sides, but I ran out!  The girls never even noticed!  Lastly, I cut a "mail slot" and taped on a priority mail sign that I cut from an old box.

Here comes the educational part.  On our envelopes I put a capital letter, on the "mail" itself I put a lowercase letter.  Now the girls have a matching game!  This game is way too easy for The Princess, but it's perfect for Hammie.  Later maybe I will add some site words for The Princess, but remember, this was during my morning coffee so you can't expect grand things from me at that hour!  Also, mail is not complete without a stamp, so I cut some labels down and wrote "STAMP".  Not very original, but it served it's purpose.

 Time for the matching game!  Even though it was too easy for the Princess she still loved it!  Our dog slept through all the excitement.

Fine motor skills at work!

A favorite task:  MAILING the letters!

The Princess got to play the Mail carrier first

Like any good mail carrier, making sure she has all the letters

Filling up the mail bag!

Everyone in our house received mail that day, including the pets!  And this brings me back to: there is no toy as fun as an empty BOX!

New Year, New Plans

I am a big fan of New Year's celebrations.  Now that we have kids we celebrate in different ways, but no matter how you celebrate it's a fresh start!  January 1st comes and there are endless possibilities for the new year.  Whether you are a person that makes resolutions or not, it's a good feeling.

  I was on Pinterest trying to come up with fun New Year's activities for the girls and I came across this really fun blog with printable parent & child date cards.  Our family is going to be going through some big changes in 2014.  Happy changes, but changes that will affect our kids and our time spent with them.  The Hubby and I decided that getting some one-on-one time with our girls could be a really great transitional tool for them and us.

Mr. Christmas Tree Jingle

I always thought that Elf on the Shelf looked like so much fun, but I never could see us adopting a tricky little Elf that is going to make more messes for me to clean up.  Don't get me wrong, I love seeing all the pictures of these little Elves and the creative mischief they get into!  For our family we really strive to do character building activities and that's when I started to think that the Elf might just be able to help us out with that!

Santa must have read my mind because yesterday, an Elf showed up!!  The Princess was excited but a little leery at first.  (Is four when you start to lose your belief in magic already?  Boy I hope not.)  But when her little friend came over and started talking about her own magic Elf that really got her excited!  She went to bed super quick last night just to look for Mr. Christmas Tree Jingle the next morning. Mr. Christmas Tree Jingle.  Jingle for short. What a great name, right?  Reminds me of a preschooler of mine whose mom was having a baby and she desperately wanted to name her Snowflake Cupcake!  Ah, four year olds.  Love them.

So just where did Mr. Christmas Tree Jingle end up?  Keep checking the blog as I will be adding pictures all through December!

Day 1:

Happy November! Crafts!

Last year we decided to make a Thankfulness Tree. (pictured below)  I had enough leaves for each day of November and everyday the three of us would write what we were thankful for.  (We just said out loud what we thought Hammie was thankful for because she was so little)  Everyone had such a great time filling it in that it was a requested project this year.  New tradition?  I think so!

Each year I have sloppily tried to draw a tree. . . the girls seem to know what it is so that's all that matters!  (Plus you get to cover it up with lots of leaves!)  This year I decided to make enough leaves for everyone to have their own leaf each day.  We even added some little birds this year, I think it makes the tree really fun!  Check out #4 on this cute Blog to find the leaf/bird templates

A Healthier Halloween

I've had some inquiries about what has been happening in my kitchen this apple season. . . I promise, I will get to that. . . but this is not that post.  Since Halloween is right around the corner it is only right to discuss all that candy!  

I will start with a few questions I've gotten about our own family's Halloween traditions:

Family Files #3

Squeezing in a quick Family Files post before our busy Sunday begins.  I've been hoarding so many pictures to share with you all!

The Princess said she was bored one morning (seriously only 10 minutes after she woke up, really??), but I humored her and made a quick batch of playdough.  It entertained them for hours.  My mom used this recipe when I was a kid.  It's super easy... I only had about half of the cream of tartar it called for and it still turned out great!  (recipe below)

Shake It Up: Homemade Ice Cream

 We have been having some fun with our girls making homemade ice cream. YUM.  I remember making ice cream in resealable bags a couple of times in school.  It was always fun.  I turned to Pinterest, of course, to try to remember what exactly to put in the bags.  Does everyone out there have an ice cream maker now??  So many of the homemade ice cream recipes told me to just add the ingredients to the ice cream maker. . . um. . . I am looking for something a little more old-fashioned than that!  (not that it wouldn't be fun to have an ice cream maker! But we would seriously be eating ice cream way too often then!)

I read a few recipes that said you could shake it up in a plastic bag and then did what I usually do with recipes. . . WING IT.  The pictures below are from two separate ice cream making occasions so don't be confused when we are making chocolate ice cream and then pictures show our girls eating vanilla chocolate chip!

 What you will need:

Peanut Butter Ball Cookies

Today I am sharing a super easy, healthy recipe that my whole family loves!  The given name is No Bake Energy Bites found at Gimme Some Oven, but my girls call them Peanut Butter Ball Cookies.  These are great because you can throw in whatever you have on-hand or whatever you think will taste good.  Today I will share with you how we usually make them.


I actually doubled my recipe this past time, because everyone loves them so much.

Ingredients (single batch- makes 20-25 one inch balls):

Family Files #2

 Just a little bit of what we've been up to lately:  Heavy on pictures, light on words.


Our 4th of July:

The Princess went to her violin lesson on the 4th so we made her teacher a little 4th S'mores plate.

We tried to theme the whole day out, including meals and snacks.  Here are our "fruit rockets".

 Whipping Cream

 Whipping Cream:  Whipped.  You can add powdered sugar to sweeten it, but I think it's fine when it's mixed with already sweet fruit.  

 Ended up being a pretty cute snack!

Family Files #1

This is for our friends that enjoy seeing what we have been up to not only with our attempt at healthy living but our day to day life..  A lot of our Mommy friends enjoy getting some fresh ideas for their families and hopefully you find something helpful or at least entertaining.  This is post number one in hopefully a series of Family File posts.  While we haven't been up to too much this is what we have been up to:

We have been searching for a safe, natural toothpaste.  We had some luck with us at Trader Joe's.  For the girls we still cannot find anything we are happy with.  HOWEVER,  Honest (no, I never stop talking about this awesome company that has changed our lives!) has finally come out with adult and children's toothpaste and I will let you know how it is when my July order gets here! So excited!

Honest. . . Products We Love

I sound like a broken record, but The Honest Company founded by Jessica Alba, actress and author of The Honest Life, and Christopher Gavigan, author of Healthy Child, Healthy World: Creating a Cleaner, Greener, Safer Home,  has to be my most favorite company!   Here is a list of what Honest products are free of directly from the Honest web page:

Our HONESTLY FREE GUARANTEE means you won't find the following list of toxic nasties in our products or packaging:

phthalates, sodium lauryl/laureth sulfates, PVC, parabens, benzene, chlorine, synthetic fragrances, triclosan, formaldehyde-based preserving agents, nanoparticles, TEA, MEA, phosphates, polyethylene glycol (PEG), quaternium 15, DMDM hydantoin, 1-4 dioxane, bisphenol-A (BPA), alkylphenol ethoxylates (APEs)/nonylphenol, BHA, benzalkonium chloride

(We hereby confirm this to the best of our knowledge based on information from our raw material suppliers & manufacturers.)

When The Princess was two months old she was diagnosed with Eczema.  Her skin would break out in red, rashy areas and they were super itchy.  When it got really bad we used Hydrocortizone and it would clear it up.  I felt bad putting Hydrocortizone on her skin all the time, but I also knew she was itchy and miserable.  I tried every natural baby soap and lotion out there.  Ones specifically for Eczema, baby ones, sensitive skin ones, the list goes on.  There were two things that helped, but nothing made it stop!
For the first few years we were getting by with Aveeno Baby soap and lotion and Aquaphor.

Upcycled Patio Garden

We searched Pinterest for a garden solution.  I did not inherit my mother's green thumb, we have a tiny patio, a large "dig-happy" golden retriever, and a budget of as close to nothing as we could get.  According to Pinterest, a raised garden would take care of the tiny patio problem and maybe a portion of my lack of green thumb problem.

Chocolate Milk Solution

We could not figure out the best way to completely wean Hammie.  We were down to nursing only one time a day, but she did not like cow's milk.  We tried whole milk, 2%, and then we tried adding Nestle's Chocolate syrup (no high fructose corn syrup).  She didn't like anything.  So out of desperation I bought a gallon of chocolate milk. . . with high fructose corn syrup and all.  It worked!  She was completely weaned and she was happy.  We as parents were not happy.

We spent years eliminating high fructose corn syrup from our diets, (We are not of those that think it's fine in moderation. . . good luck with moderation when it's in everything you eat!)  and we were not okay with giving it to our 19 month old every morning.  We could buy organic I thought, but then we run into the problem of ultra-pasteurization.  If you want to read about ultra-pasteurizing This Website has a good article on what exactly it is.  Is ultra-pasteurizing really a problem?  We're not sure, but for US, we don't want to be eating or drinking anything that has gone through a process that can actually change its taste, texture, and proteins.  Our rule is that if it gives it a super long shelf life we probably don't want it in our bodies.

We asked around without much success.  Was there a chocolate milk on this Earth that we could give our daughter without worry?  What should you do when it doubt?  ASK YOUR MOTHER.  I texted my mom and she texted back, Oberweis.  OBERWEIS, DUH!  I'm not sure why it never crossed our minds, maybe because we have to leave our small town to even find it!

Pizza Night!

It's true.  We have a lot of pizza nights.  Lately it's been once or twice a week!  Here are a few reasons why we have been having a lot of pizza nights:

1)  It costs MAYBE $4.10 per pizza.  Depending on which frozen pizza you buy at the store this is either barely more than you spend or possibly LESS than you spend for a frozen pizza!  MINUS all of those nasty chemicals!