Stuff Parents Need

Easing the chaos in the nest, one find at a time.

Using Stickers and Coloring Books for Cultural Exploration! GIVEAWAY!!!

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Putumayo Kids, the makers of some of the most outstanding children’s cds that feature songs and artists from all over the world, has just come out with a new way to celebrate different cultures: stickers and coloring books! Woo hoo!

We had the opportunity to review one of their World Culture Coloring Books (they offer Africa, Latin America and Europe, and we were sent Europe). This coloring book is AWESOME, and that’s coming from a coloring book connoisseur (that would be me, coloring was one of my all-time favorite childhood activities). First and foremost, it is an oversized book, which might not make it as easy to travel with, but does make it so much more fun to color in at home. It measures 11.5″ x 14″ AND it is created with eco-friendly soy ink and used a printer that is Forest Stewardship Council Certified.

But the best part of all is that the pictures are FANTASTIC! The images are large enough that a younger child can feel comfortable trying to color, and a budding artist will get to make some really beautiful pictures that can be proudly displayed at home. All the while, there are so many opportunities to talk with your child about the different monuments, outfits and other features shown in the pictures. This retails for $9.95 and comes with 20 pages. It’s a great find, I think!

The second book we reviewed was their Latin America Sticker Collection.  But this is SO much more than a bunch of stickers. It comes with a book that is actually a fold-out landscape meant for you to create various scenes using your stickers (which are reusable). With over 120 stickers included in each book, the possibilities are endless! I really love this book, because it gets the child actively involved in the scene, creating a whole story related to the region of the world. These books retail for $11.95 and make a fantastic gift choice for the sticker (or geography!) enthusiast in your family.

Win it!: One lucky Stuff Parents Need reader is going to win a coloring book AND sticker book from Putumayo Kids! Awesome!

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How to Introduce Baby Food: My Best Tips for #Feedingmagic

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Thanks to Plum Organics for sponsoring my post about tips for baby feeding magic. What if you let baby choose what’s for dinner? Check out their cute “Quest for Yum!” video and see what happens!

how to introduce baby food

I will never forget the day that we gave Darah solids for the first time. It was New Year’s Eve, and we had just come back from a big trip out to California. She was days away from turning 5 months old, and her doctor believed that she might be ready to be introduced to solid food. I waited about 2 weeks after he made his suggestion, and I also determined that I was going to make the majority of her food. So that her first exposure to food would be very smooth (and I mean that literally), I opted to use rice flakes instead of homemade food, which was a bit thicker.

Her first dining experience was pretty funny. She liked the food ok, but was mostly very intrigued by the spoon and by having a different texture. She only ate a few bites, and then she was all done with that for the day. That brings me to my first tip when introducing solids to your baby: Quantity is not important at first. It’s all about exposure. If your baby eats just a bite or two and then wants her milk for the rest of her meal, go with that. If he falls madly in love with the food you have presented and wants more than you prepared, go with that!

My second tip for baby feeding magic is to get yourself some equipment that makes the process of making food easier. Is it absolutely necessary to have a baby food maker? Of course not. People have made baby food for eons without them. But they sure are nice and can help you feel a lot of peace of mind about the way you are preparing the food. Our baby food maker would allow you to steam the fruits and veggies (yes, even fruit needs to be cooked at first) and then, in the same container, puree them. It was awesome, and cleanup was a breeze. We also had ice cube trays that came with a lid for baby food making, and those were indispensable. It helped us easily make appropriate serving sizes for Darah. When it was time for her to eat, feeding her was almost as simple as opening a jar. Instead, I opened the freezer and picked out a balanced “meal” and then popped them in the microwave.

how to introduce baby food

My third tip is to seek out resources for advice and inspiration. We had a book that was all about making baby food. While I found the author to be a little bit crazy in her zeal for homemade baby food, her advice about when different foods can be introduced and her instructions on how to make your own grains were referred to countless times (it’s actually still sitting out on my kitchen counter because we will sometimes make some whole grains to add to Darah’s yogurt!). This resource gave me the confidence I needed to know when to introduce certain foods. I also poked around online to get some recipe ideas, as your will find that eventually your baby grows tired of meals with just one taste. They start to crave more complex tastes, and its quite easy to put together something they will find enjoyable. I think one of the best tips I ever got online was to combine squash, which Darah didn’t especially like at the time, with pears. Once I did that, she gobbled it down every time I fed it to her!

My final tip is to give yourself permission to go with convenience from time to time. There were times when I really wanted to introduce a particular fruit or vegetable to Darah, but it wasn’t in season, so I couldn’t easily make it myself. I turned to what was shelf-stable during those times, and never had a problem with Darah turning her nose up at anything (well, except avocados, but those were homemade!). We also just went with stuff in jars and pouches any time we were traveling. It is possible to travel with your own baby food, but we just cut ourselves some slack in that department. Also, since we saved SO MUCH MONEY (oh yes, you will save LOTS), when I needed to turned to prepared food, I could go for the organic options, which felt great.

Check out one of the companies that we regularly turned to for help when using homemade wasn’t ideal. Plum Organics has a super cute video about babies choosing “yum!” at feeding time and always getting it right by going with Plum Organics. Darah always loved their food, and I would definitely recommend it to others.

So what about you? Do you have any tips for baby feeding magic? Best recipes? Advice for success? 

I was selected for this sponsorship by the Clever Girls Collective. To learn more about Plum Organics, visit their Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/PlumOrganics.


Creative Changes Reusable Chore Charts Review and GIVEAWAY!!!

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Today I am reviewing a product that has been helping families get organized together since 1990. It’s called Creative Changes, and they offer a great selection of chore charts and other organizational aides that are specifically designed to get your children involved in helping with home management.

I specifically remember when my parents realized a parenting mistake they had been making and their attempts (which were largely in vain, I’m sad to say) to correct them. I was 10 and my brother was 12. And that’s how old we were when my parents decided that we should get involved in helping keep the house up. Yup….our very first chores were given to us that late in the game. It didn’t go over well. We had no idea why we would be needed to help with things like vacuuming and taking out the trash. That had ALWAYS been done for us.

The chore implementation never really did go smoothly. We started helping out more around the house, but not because my parents were able to successfully hand off any of the chores. We would do what they asked when they got too fed up and yelled for someone to do something NOW! That’s pretty much how it worked.

I definitely don’t want that to be how things go in my house. But if I don’t teach Darah from a young age that she has responsibilities as a member of the house, it will be all too easy for me to take the same path my parents took and just keep doing it all myself.

That’s why I’m glad for companies like Creative Changes and their chore charts that have been working for decades. While Darah is too young to use these charts, it has inspired me to already start talking with her about putting away toys when we are finished, and how cleaning up is an important element on choosing to play with something.

The Creative Changes charts are easy to stick on the refrigerator and make use of dry erase markers so you can re-use them again and again. They make use of pictures to help little ones know what their chores are on any given day. You can also use stickers to help kids get closer to their incentive (if you choose to use incentives as part of your chore assignments).

I will say that the Creative Changes website is in pretty desperate need of an overhaul. It looks very dated, and the commercial on the site looks straight out of 1990. I’d love to see this updated so that potential customers aren’t scared away. It’s fine for a product to be useful for so long, but the marketing techniques need to be changed to speak to new generations of parents! I’ve seen these products firsthand, and want to encourage you not to be dissuaded by the antique look of the site. The charts, themselves, are really helpful and worthwhile, I promise!

Buy it!: You can pick up the Rewarding Kids Responsibility Kit for just $24.95. I think it is money well-spent if you maintain the discipline to really implement it with your kids. You will get some much-needed help around the house, and your kids will start to take on more ownership and pride in how their home looks. They will also develop good habits that their future spouses will thank you for!

Win it!: One lucky Stuff Parents is going to win the Rewarding Kids Responsibility Kit you see featured here! Yay!

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Best Eco-friendly Stain Remover and Hand Soap: Ecover!

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Ecover is an eco-friendly household product company. You’ve likely heard of them, as they have been around for 30 years, working hard to perfect the power of their products without compromising their gentle footprint on nature.

eco friendly stain remover My family has been working hard to switch out all our household products for green alternatives. One area where I haven’t known how to go green, though, was with stain removers for clothing. I thought my only options were to use harsh chemicals. I’m so glad I had the opportunity to try Ecover’s eco-friendly stain remover! I’ve found it to be effective on lifting stains (including berry stains, which Darah gets frequently). It’s also made from plant-based products, so it has very minimal impact on aquatic life, which is much more than I can say for the stain removers I typically turn to. I will definitely be purchasing this product again.

Another area that I haven’t really given much thought to is hand soap. I know some soaps are more harsh than others, but I thought that on the whole, soap was soap, and it wasn’t very full of chemicals. Ecover’s eco-friendly hand soap is suitable for sensitive skin and contains only natural fragrances (the fragrance piece is where many of those yucky chemicals sneak into soaps). I love that it contains aloe vera to help sooth skin and lavender essential oils for a nice, light scent.

One of my very favorite things about Ecover is how easy it is to find locally! They have a list of places where you can purchase it, and it is very likely that you will have one of these stores near you. If not, no worries! Ecover has a great online store through Alice.com. Check it out; I think you’ll be REALLY impressed with their price points! The stain remover is $4.13 and the hand soap is just $4.54. At these prices, you might as well try out several things at once! I know I am planning on purchasing their dish washing detergent in the near future.

Win it!: One lucky Stuff Parents Need reader will win the stain remover and the hand soap to try for yourself! Woo hoo!

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Lite Sprites: Exploring a World of Color

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I’m excited to tell you about a fun new toy on the market that harnesses the power and joy of color, literally!

It’s called Lite Sprites, and I recommend checking out this fun video which explains how Lite Sprites and the Light Wand works!

 

This toy is recommend for ages 4 and up. Since Darah is only 2, I wasn’t really sure if she would like the toy or understand what was really going on. I decided to introduce her to it more slowly, so for now, we aren’t playing with the color wand (I mean, let me be real…I’ve played with the color wand, but Darah hasn’t….just being honest!). She’s just playing with Prisma, her Lite Sprite. And she is head-over-heels about this thing!

I actually introduced her in a really fun way. I put her on the floor with her light turned on and didn’t mention it. I asked Darah to come into the room and I acted a bit preoccupied so that she could discover Prisma on her own. I knew she had found her when I heard her start to giggle and say, “Oooooh! Her hair glow!” I then showed her how to push the button in the back to make her colors change (you can manually do it this way, in addition to using the wand), and how to turn her off and on. She played with this toy for the rest of the night and went to bed with it. She plays with it every single day, and even took it upon herself to name her Sprite. Her name is Kadi. No idea how she came up with it, but she has NOT forgotten its name. Since the toy is a bit advanced for her, I didn’t know if it would be a hit. I think introducing it more slowly was the way to go. I think I’ll show her the wand in about 6 months. It is going to BLOW HER MIND! 🙂

For folks who want to go ahead and make use of the lite wand, I LOVE the fact that you can “collect” up to 50 more colors in your wand. This is a great tool for teaching about the subtle differences in shades, and encourages little ones to pay close attention and look for new colors. I’d like to get Darah another Sprite so that they can share colors with each other; I think that would be so much fun!We are really enjoying the Lite Sprites, and I would definitely recommend this toy to others. They are available at Target.comand retail for $39.95 for Prisma and the wand.

Disclosure: I received a complimentary product for review purposes. The opinions expressed here are strictly my own.

More Reasons to Join SittersSearch.com

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A few weeks back, I highlighted a very cool (and FREE!) online resource to help you find quality babysitting help. It’s called SittersSearch.com, and if you missed my first post, take a minute to check it out.

In addition to the great features of this babysitter finder that I highlighted originally, I wanted to take a moment to show you some additional aspects of SittersSearch.com that might make you want to get signed up if you haven’t already.

First, I want to highlight the safety and security of SittersSearch.com. Sometimes you get what you pay for, and when a service is free, you can’t really expect much in the way of keeping the information you hand over secure. That’s not the case with this website. When you are ready to reach out to a prospective sitter, SittersSearch sends them a message on your behalf that contains your message to the person, and your email address. You won’t get the sitters email address unless they want to respond back. The same is true for when a prospective sitter reaches out to you to express interest in working with you. In other words, your contact information is not immediately accessible to anyone who joins the site. There’s an additional step for added security, and I really like that.

The second great feature I’d like to highlight is the Advanced Search that SittersSearch.com offers. This can help you very quickly narrow down a list of potential candidates based on your particular needs. Perhaps you are looking for a sitter who is willing to prepare dinner for your kids. You can narrow your search to only those who state a willingness to do so! Or, perhaps you would really like to give your child additional access to a second language (my sister-in-law, for example, is placing her child in a french only pre-school for this reason). You can narrow your search by languages spoken and you just might find the perfect sitter who also speaks another language of interest to you! The advanced search can also be used to narrow down the level of work that you have to offer. There’s no need to interview someone who is looking for a full-time position if you only need help 10 hours each week, after all. Don’t get to the interview stage before you realize that you and the care giver have such different needs!

SittersSearch.com is a really remarkable sitter service because it is comprehensive, safe and totally free. That means you have more money leftover to spend on a quality childcare provider. Everybody wins! What the website really needs is more people to start taking advantage of it! Hop on and fill out a profile if you are looking for some extra help, or if you’d like to provide some extra help to families with children. You won’t regret it!

This post is brought to you by SittersSearch.com. All thoughts and opinions expressed here are strictly my own.

Why I Watch Glee

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I absolutely adore the show Glee. I’ve been tuning in since the very beginning, and I find the talent on that show to be absolutely incredible. I don’t find the plot lines to be realistic, and frankly, sometimes they are even a bit painful to watch. It’s not about the acting at all for me, and I think that the people who criticize Glee the most try to make too much of the plot. The plot is really just a vehicle (sometimes a smooth ride, sometimes a pretty bumpy one) to get to all those songs!

See, I was in show choir in high school. It wasn’t a nerdy/dorky thing to do. It also wasn’t the only cool thing to do at my school. But it was certainly one awesome option, and we had SO much fun. We didn’t break out into spontaneous song and dance a la Glee, but watching the show still brings back a lot of memories for me.

There have been SEVERAL songs from season 2 that I go back and listen to over and over again on Youtube, or on my Glee Pandora channel (you totally need to sign up for that channel if you haven’t already!). But now I can just re-live all those heart-stopping moments because I’ve got Glee Season 2 on DVD!

Mercedes’ Ain’t No Way might be my very top pick for the season. This was not a celebrated piece from the season, but I’m not really sure why. That girl blew the top off this Aretha number, and even after watching it 20 times, I still have to sit in quiet awe while I listen.

And then there’s the adorable Blaine singing Teenage Dream with the Warblers. This IS a celebrated number…it’s actually Glee’s best selling single so far (and they’ve released a LOT of singles!).

And please do not forget the duet with Rachel and Jesse St. James where they performed an acoustic version of Rollin’ in the Deep. SOOOO good!

I think Glee is pure fun, plain and simple. They take an imaginative spin on songs we know and love, and even throw in a few that we may not have known before (Bust the Windows Out Your Car from Season 1 still might be my all-time favorite Glee number, and I’d never heard of that song before the show aired). Having the season on DVD is proving to be really fun for me!

Glee Season 2 retails for $59.99 but it can be yours on Amazon right now for just $34.99 with free shipping! Woo hoo!

Disclosure: I received a complimentary copy for review purposes. The opinions expressed here are strictly my own.

Darah’s Favorite Musician Writes Children’s Books! Caspar Babypants Review and GIVEAWAY!!!

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bunny rabbit in the sunlight I’ve told you before that even though Darah might have one of the greatest collections of children’s music of any kid I know, she still has a favorite artist (how did she choose?! So many great choices!). Her favorite is Caspar Babypants, otherwise known as  Chris Ballew from a band we grownups may recall, The Presidents of the United States. She knows MANY of his songs by heart and loves to giggle, sing and dance when we play his music.

And now she loves to read his books! Chris and his wife, Kate Endle (an EXTREMELY talented artist) have created two beautifully written and illustrated books for kids. The first one is a board book, called Bunny Rabbit in the Sunlight. Darah loves the cover artwork of the bunny, because he looks just like her beloved bunny. The book has a great tempo to it, and you can imagine it being sung like a song. It’s all about different creatures enjoying all the different types of light (morning light, candle light, twilight, etc.). The pictures are truly gorgeous and we read this frequently.

my woodland wish But the book we read every single day is My Woodland Wish. This is a larger picture book, and the art inside is very cool paper collage. It’s all about a kid who is aware of all the wonderful wildlife that exists right outside her back door, and how she longs to get to play with all those creatures. The book even comes with a free MP3 of the book being performed as a song by Casper Babypants. It is absolutely beautiful, and Darah quickly picked up on the fact that there’s a clever ladybug waiting to be found on every page of the book. That is a mission she takes VERY seriously when reading.

There’s no doubt that Chris Ballew can write beautiful music. And now I see without a doubt that Kate Endle can draw captivating images. What a magical thing occurs when the two put their talents together for children’s literature. I highly recommend both books to be added to your child’s library! We’re so glad they are part of ours!

Win it!: One lucky Stuff Parents Need reader will win your choice of book from Kate and Chris! Woo hoo!

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Bringing Fine Italian Dining to Your Table: Twomato Sauce Review and GIVEAWAY!!!

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I remember the latest season of Master Chef, which I watched online. One of the contestants was an Italian man who specialized in fresh Italian cuisine. I remember being struck by how often his dishes had minimal ingredients, and yet how completely blown away the judges would be by the taste.  He would always say that excellent food doesn’t have to be complicated, which is something very easy to forget when you watch professional chefs pull out all the stops to impress the judges.

Such is the case for a company that makes flavorful, healthy tomato sauce that you can buy to use in your own kitchen. The company is called Twomato, and my family had the chance to try their Tomato and Basil pasta sauce along with 1lb of spaghetti that they also made (you can add it to your order for $4). OH MY GOODNESS. This stuff tasted SOOOO fresh! Want to know why? It’s because the company makes the sauces in micro-batches to ensure that what you get hasn’t been sitting around for months waiting to be consumed. It also has no preservatives and no artificial flavors. Additionally, each jar contains 7-10 servings of vegetables! I thought the sauce tasted like something you could get at a fine Italian restaurant (think more upscale than Olive Garden). This company knows how to choose the ingredients it uses very wisely in order to create that exceptional taste that you never really knew you were missing out on until you get to try something like this.

Twomato homemade pasta sauces are definitely more expensive than what you can pick up at the grocery store, but the taste is in an entirely different league. Jars start at $12.99 and are beautifully packaged so they make fantastic gifts. Or, pick some up for a truly fabulous date night at home. It will be cheaper than the best restaurant in town, and every bit as good!

Win it!:  One lucky Stuff Parents Need reader is going to win a jar of Twomato sauce in tomato & basil and a package of spaghetti so that you can have one of the best home cooked meals of your life!

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