Responsibilities Flip Chart

I love Pinterest. During nap time or when I can't sleep at night, I like to look at all the awesome craft, parenting, travel, etc ideas...there is so much out there! I've actually done quite a few of my pins and most of the time even take pictures so I can blog about them. I just haven't been doing a lot of blogging lately...

One of the things I finally got around to doing was the Chore Chart. I've pretty much been obsessed with the idea ever since I saw the Pin months ago...You can find the tutorial here.

I actually modified it a bit and used colored file folders as the base. I thought that would make it easier but in the end it took me quite a bit longer than I had imagined.


You can also see the printing on the inside of the folders. I thought about trying to cover it up somehow but in the end, just wanted to get it done.

Since he is only 3 years old I figured five responsibilities per chart was enough. There are some others I could have added like "Potty" for night time, but I decided it was better to have just a few and hope we could make/keep things like going potty part of the bath time ritual. 

I chose a yellow folder for the morning (good morning, sunshine!) and a blue for the evening. Using free clip art from the internet made it pretty simple and I then added some color with color pencils (our printer is perpetually low on ink). So, when it's open you have the pictures as well as the words for each responsibility. Once that responsibility is accomplished, you "flip the flap" and see that it is "Done!" Last night, we opened all the flaps for the morning so they'd be ready to go. This morning we opened all the flaps for the evening so when we go up for bed, it's ready to go.

It was fun to see the finished product - I really like to do things that end up nice and are going to be useful. Bubba helped me figure out where we going to hang them and we used them last night and this morning. He seems pretty excited about them in general and looks forward to "flipping the flaps" as he accomplishes each responsibility.

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Tooth Brushing Chart

Quite a while ago, I saw a really cool tooth brushing chart on Pinterest. When I went to the blog post on Dukes and Duchesses (you can see it here), I noticed in one of the comments that the author said she might be willing to make and sell the charts if people were interested. As soon as I saw that, I knew I had to have one.

We've been working on getting Bubba to get in the habit of brushing his teeth every morning and night. Sometimes, life gets in the way and it's easy to forget the teeth. I thought with a chart like this on the mirror, it would help keep us all on track.

I got the chart in the mail yesterday. I've never worked with transfer paper so luckily one of the e-mails included directions. It still didn't come off as well as easily as I would have liked but I finally got it. Then, I was so excited to get it on the mirror that I probably could have been a little more exacting. You can see in the not so great picture that it's a bit crooked. But "perfect is the enemy of good," right?

I think Bubba will really like it. He seems to be like me in that he likes to mark things off or in other ways show he has accomplished something. I've still got to put the marker on the mirror for him to use but other than that, we're ready to start keeping track/marking off tooth brushing.

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Can I be a butterfly?

One of the blogs I have been reading as long as I've even known what a blog was is Roni's Weigh.

I've used her graphs and charts to try to help me lose weight. I've used her recipes from Green Light Bites to make healthy and good tasting meals and snacks. I've read about her good days and when she faces her fears and tries new things. I've read about her bad days and how she handles them. Her blog is one of two that I still read five years after I started (Pioneer Woman is the other...).

Yet, in one of my comments a few days ago, I unintentionally made her feel bad. I feel as if I hurt a friend though we've never met. I'm not sure if she actually felt bad or sad but I do know my comment inspired a post. Reading the post, I got tears in my eyes (and again, just as I type this). 

Let me back up a little and go back to the original post that inspired my comment.

Roni wrote a post about how she lost her weight. It was a great post. I liked pretty much the whole post but one of my favorite parts was this:

"When I started I simply made an effort to move more. Do more. Taking after-dinner walks, playing active video games, taking the stairs, hiking at parks, going bowling — these were the baby steps that led to things like step classes, which led to running, which led to boot camps, which led to CrossFit. Don’t underestimate a simple goal like moving more. You never know where it will lead and I speak from personal experience, it’s awfully fun to find out!"

After reading and re-reading the post, I wanted to tell Roni how much I appreciated it. I thought about my comment quite a bit and this is what I ended up saying:

"This post reminded me of why I started following your blog in the first place - years ago. Lately, I've been skipping some of your blog posts because they seem so far away from my reality - I can't see myself ever doing the things you do now...
This post reminded that you started the journey a long time ago and have worked your butt off (literally) to get where you are today. You are an inspiration and I appreciate you taking the time every now and then to remind us that it's not an overnight trip - it's a lifelong journey. One that we have a choice every day to start or put off until tomorrow..."

The point I was trying to make was that she has been and continues to be an inspiration. That I have been following her for years and will continue to do so. I might not be able to see myself doing cross-fit or tough mudders like she does - but she started out with baby steps and look where she is now! Just because I can't see myself doing those things, doesn't mean I should ever think that I CAN'T do them. Just like Roni and everyone else, I've got to start somewhere and believe that I can do anything I set my heart and mind to do. I've got to remember, just as I said in my comment, that it's not an overnight trip - it's a lifelong journey and I'd best get started.

A few days later, Roni posted about going from being a caterpillar to being a butterfly. It was another great post. Unfortunately for me, it started out with my comment. Roni stated that through my comment "Sam touched on a fear I have. One I think gets magnified because I blog. Not only am I trying to figure out this whole weight loss,  maintenance, fitness, new identity thing, but I’m doing it in a very public way, which also happens to effect my livelihood. Hello, pressure!" 

Adding pressure or making her doubt her livelihood was totally not what I meant to do with my comment. I so admire people like Roni who blog - especially those who blog openly (not hiding behind a nickname, etc...) and who blog about real things such as trying to lose weight, trying new things and risking failure, and just all in all about how life is not easy or perfect but you just have to go for it. They open themselves up to people like me who make comments about their writing sometimes even critiquing their thoughts and fears and everyday existence. People who don't even comment using their real name (though "Sam" is my real nickname...).

Roni went on to talk about how hard it is to change and about how hard it is to really accept yourself once you've made the change. She ended with the quote: “How does one become a butterfly? You must want to fly so much that you are willing to give up being a caterpillar.”  – Trina Paulus

She made me think about and realize that I have allowed myself to stay "comfortable" (as in "it's what I know", not that I'm happy with it) within the lines I've drawn for myself and for years have not tried anything new or scary, no matter how much I think I want it. I guess that's the main problem for me - I think too much. I haven't found or embraced the one thing that I want so much that I'm willing to do the work (like building a cocoon...) to get there. I so want to be the butterfly. All that's left is to see if I'm willing to do the work to make it happen.

This is one of my longer posts and it's pretty rambling. The bottom line is that I get inspired by Roni and that's why I read her blog. She has been so brave - not only to make hard changes in her life but to tell the whole world about them. I started this blog hoping to do the same. I hoped to make significant changes in my life and to record the process here. I've still got a long way to go...

[I just posted another comment for Roni with a link to this post and somehow my whole name popped up! AACK. My heart is racing and I'm freaking out. And I'm really mad at myself for allowing it to happen even though I've got no idea how it did. I think it had something to do with "signing in" with google vs just typing in "Sam"...? I've tried so hard to keep at least part of my life private - there's so many weird people out there and so much openness on the web already, I try to limit it as much as I can...I don't mind my first name vs my nickname popping up but my last name too!? How did that happen and how do I get rid of it!? NOW! Any suggestions...? Ugh, I feel like I was right to stay off the internet/blogging world for a year. Look what happens when I try to do something new...

I'm totally obsessing about this...I feel so stupid. It's not as if Roni and I are friends, she doesn't really care what I think or don't think. I just wanted her to see my post and that she inspired me to have a blog. Not only that but now it doesn't even look like I'm the same person who made the original comment because there are different names for both the comments. How stupid does that make me look? Now I've got my full name, my blog address which I've only given to about three people, everything, out there in the blogosphere. Why? Because of stupid pride. Aargh...so much for my short life as a wanna be butterfly. Now all I want to do is crawl back into my cave and hide out from the world again...]

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Fighting Fatigue

The other day, I happened across the Dr. Oz show and they were discussing how to fight fatigue and increase energy. I didn't have time to watch it right then so I recorded it and watched it this morning.

Dr. Oz had a doctor on who discussed how she researched and learned about the best ways to fight fatigue and fix your whole body/system and "get your energy back."

Dr. Jennifer Landa discussed four critical steps that can help you get your energy back right away (my own paraphrased transcript of show. See a video of this Dr. Oz show here):

1. Recognize the connection between gluten and iron. If you are sensitive to gluten ("25% of us may be sensitive to gluten") the gluten attacks the intestinal cells causing inflammation; causing us not to be able to absorb nutrients like iron which can lead to anemia. When you eat you should feel more energized. If you're gluten sensitive, you feel more tired after eating.

Fatigue Fighting Solution: Cut the gluten (do as much as you can to reduce foods with gluten) and add Vitamin C (citrus, peppers, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, etc) which will help you absorb iron.

2. Increase your Iodine. "Iodine is the building block of thyroid health." "Research shows that 1/3 of the population is not getting enough iodine." Why? As people try to reduce and/or cut salt out of their diet, they no longer get the iodine that has been added to the salt. One way to know if you are deficient in iodine is exhaustion. In addition to that, trouble losing weight and losing your hair - especially the outer third of your eyebrows (!) are thyroid symptoms. This is what really got my attention because I've noticed over the years that my eyebrows have gotten shorter. Now, I have no idea if I really have a iodine deficiency or thyroid problem but I do know that I've been using sea salt for the last few years and never even thought about it not having added iodine like table salt.

Fatigue Fighting Solution: Get more iodine in your diet. Seaweed has a lot of iodine but the easiest way is to make sure you are buying iodized salt. They now have sea salt with added iodine - make sure it says "iodine" on the label. Dr. Oz specified "we're not telling you to add more salt to your diet, we're simply swapping out the kind of salt that you're eating."

3. Recharge Your Liver. The liver is the powerhouse of metabolism in the body. It breaks down everything that we eat and turns it into energy. It also gets rid of toxins in the body. If you have too many toxins in your body it slows down the functions of the liver and makes you sluggish.

Fatigue Fighting Solution: Drink Dandelion Tea twice a day. It helps the liver work more efficiently so you have more energy.

4. Boost Testosterone. For women who have a tenth the amount of testosterone as men, testosterone is critical for our energy, our emotions, helps with "foggy brain" and helps get fat off while maintaining muscle. Stress (cortisol) lowers testosterone levels. To bring testosterone up, you need to figure out how to lower stress and cortisol levels.

Fatigue Fighting Solution: Pranayama Yoga Breathing. Sit on knees or Indian style. Belly breathing - block one nostril with thumb while breathing in and out. Then block other nostril with fingers while breathing in and out. Take nice, deep belly breaths. Do this for 5 minutes a day (twice a day is even better). If you have to, Dr. Oz recommends going to the bathroom where no one will bother you.

Following this, Dr. Oz and Dr. Landa discussed Monk Fruit (Lo Han Guo) - a fruit used as sweetener for centuries in Southeast Asia. Traditional Chinese medicine has been using this to treat diabetes and obesity for centuries. It has a very low glycemic index and stimulates insulin secretion. You can get it in packet form (orange), drops, and even scoopable forms for baking and recipes.

I am always so tired, no matter how much I sleep that I wonder if (hope?) some of these things could really help. I suppose they can't make it any worse so you really haven't got anything to lose.

I'd love to know your thoughts and/or if you try any or all of these Fatigue fighting Solutions...

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Dinosaur Birthday Party

Palm trees, bananas and leaves from my 2009 baby shower!

Not quite a month after the party, I'm finally getting around to posting about it. I had so much fun gathering ideas and planning the party. The absolute best decision I made was planning to have it at the Gym. We love "My Gym" - Bubba has so much fun every time he's there. The people who work there are great and help the kids have fun in a safe environment.  Having the party at the gym allowed me to spend all of my time on the fun stuff and not worry about cleaning or any of the yucky stuff.

T-Rex Track Cookies

Brontosaurus Bites

Dino Bones (Dino Treasure Stones in back)

Cretaceous (Pop)Corn

As I've already discussed in previous posts, I made quite a few dinosaur themed snacks as well as the dinosaur treasure stones I used for decoration. Since Bubba likes cupcakes more than cake, I made some of those too (with dino cupcake liners and cute dinosaur toppers). I also dove deep into my closet and pulled out the box of baby shower decorations my sister made for me back in 2009. She made such amazing safari themed decorations that I also used them for Bubba's 1st birthday. I decided the palm trees (made out of organic diapers and ribbon), bananas (diapers and washcloths) and a few other things would be the perfect "icing on the cake" for the dinosaur theme. I would have liked to have printed the names of everything on the little signs but I ran out of time. I figured hand writing them was better than nothing because I really wanted each snack to have a little sign. Having dinosaur themed names for the food was part of the fun, at least for me...

We were not allowed to show up more than 10 minutes prior to our start time so I was a little worried about getting everything set up and ready before people arrived. I drew up a plan of where I wanted everything so my husband and the My Gym teachers could help. When we got there, they already had the yellow tablecloth on the counter and were ready to help. Having the plan in writing really helped a lot because I didn't have to explain what I wanted.

Stegosaurus Eggs (Oreo Truffles)

We got everything set up before the first people showed up. I didn't get really great pictures because the two different people I thought would be there and be able to take pictures weren't able to make it. I think you'll still be able to see how great it turned out though...

It was very gratifying to see everyone having such a great time and enjoying all the snacks. One of the teachers even said it was the best party she's ever seen. I'm pretty sure she's only been there for a few months, but I'll still take the compliment. :)

The best part? After playing with and entertaining the kids for over an hour, the teachers did almost all of the clean up! I just had to gather whatever I wanted to take home and put it back in my handy dandy plastic bin. Then we just went home and relaxed.

One of the other "extras"was to get Bubba a birthday shirt. I found what I thought would be perfect on Etsy. His favorite color is black and his favorite dinosaur (at the time) was a stegosaurus...they made it look really great and got it to me super fast. I was going to post a picture but since the shirt has his name on it (and he's wearing it) and I'm trying to keep at least some things private, I decided not to...trust me though, it's really cute.

Sorry the pictures are kind of wacky, I've spent over 30 minutes trying to get them to look normal but it's just not working. At least I have some to show you - better than nothing, right?

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Dinosaur Treasure Stones

One of the fun things I did for Bubba's birthday was make Dinosaur Treasure Stones. It was a really fun activity to do together from beginning to end.

I found the link through Pinterest (of course) and gathered up all my supplies. Here's what you need:

1 cup flour

1 cup used coffee grounds (I got mine, along with a lot of weird looks, at the local Dunkin Donuts.)

1/2 cup salt

1/4 cup sand (I got a small bag at Michael's) 

1 cup water

Mix dry ingredients together. Slowly add the water to make a stiff dough; you may not need all of the water - you don't want it to be too runny. [I scratched my bowl pretty good with the sand, so make sure you use a bowl you don't mind to get scratched.]

Fresh stones on top; stones 6 days later

Hide surprise inside

Knead on a floured surface until fairly smooth. Break off dough in the desired stone size and hide the surprise in the center.

Set in a safe place until totally dry - at least 3-4 days. [I put my stones on parchment paper lined baking sheets; turned them over every 12 hours or so...it took closer to 4-5 days to dry.]

Once they are dry, they look and feel like stones. You can "carefully" break open the treasure stones using a hammer (we used a wooden hammer so they wouldn't damage the dinosaurs). If you put them in Tupperware, be advised they will release moisture and need to dry out again.

Deciding on the size of the prize inside makes a big difference - my dinosaurs were not very big at all yet I still ended up making two batches of dough and ended up with about 18 treasure stones. The stones were also a good size so as mentioned above, they took a long time to dry. It was a good lesson in patience for Bubba. 

We didn't have enough treasure stones for all the kids either at the party or at school, so after using them as part of the decorations at the party, we ended up breaking them open ourselves at home. The whole family had a good time breaking them open and finding the cool dinosaurs. Since the stones were just sand, flour & coffee, we just swept all the remains into the mulch when we were done.

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Dinosaur Party Treats

As I mentioned in the post about the dinosaur cake, along with the cake I planned to serve dinosaur track cookies, dinosaur eggs, a dinosaur vegetable tray and a couple other dino themed snacks.

The dinosaur track cookies were sugar cookies made from a box - Krusteaz brand. I'd never even heard of them before, but everyone complimented me on how good the cookies were. Bubba enjoyed helping me make the dough and scoop it out onto the baking pan. We flattened them and used a large plastic dinosaur foot to make the tracks. After the first batch we learned it was better to bake them for a little more than half the time and then add the track print and a little cinnamon. Overall, it was fun and pretty easy to make these cookies.

The dinosaur eggs were also pretty easy. I used the standard "Oreo Truffle" recipe I got from Bakerella years ago. I rolled the truffles into an egg shape and used Wilton White Candy Melts for the coating. On several of them, I added a couple "spots" to make them look like dinosaur eggs and to cover up ugly spots in the coating. (You can see a picture of the dinosaur eggs on this post) Another very simple project. It takes a while just because you need to put the balls in the freezer for a while and also need to keep re-melting the coating. Totally worth whatever time it takes though - they're addicting. I forgot to take pictures but I have some from before the party - I'll include them in the party post.

The veggie tray idea came from a fruit tray picture I saw on Pinterest. I wanted some kind of veggie offering and this seemed like a perfect way to do it. I used cauliflower and broccoli florets, baby carrots, mini grape tomatoes and green grapes for the dinosaur body. I really wanted to put an eyeball on one of the grapes but couldn't find my edible pen. Again, easy peasy. Didn't take much longer than preparing a regular veggie tray would have.

It was fun involving Bubba in all the preparations and seeing how helpful and interested he was in what we were doing and why. I'm also grateful for having a very patient and understanding husband. He just let me do what I wanted to do and helped when and where I needed it. The prep was so much fun, I can't wait to tell you about the actual party!

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