Life, Gluten Free

DIY Flower Vase

In a pinch, I came up with a creative way to re-use a tin can and make it into a flower vase. We wanted to bring someone flowers for her desk at work, but I didn't have time to swing by anywhere and get a vase. I also didn't have any vases (except large ones) because the rest are in a box (we're moving!). So, I noticed a tin can in our recycling and grab it.

I took some patterned paper that I had gotten at Hobby Lobby and folded it around the can. I marked where it should be cut to fit and used scissors to trim the paper. I applied glue to the can and then gently molded the paper to it. I also used a brush to apply a thin layer of glue on the outside of the paper (for sealant purposes).

The next morning it was dry and ready for flowers. I used a cup to gently pour in the water so that water wouldn't splash everywhere. And there you go, a quick and effective vase!

(it really is Spring here.. we just had a light dusting of snow overnight. Now the sun is shining and the snow has melted, as if it never was there in the first place).

Watercolor Art for Toddlers

Introducing watercolors to toddlers can be a fun adventure, especially since watercolors make such dramatic effects on paper, with minimal effort. Personally, I appreciate how smoothly the brushed glides across the paper, creating beautiful lines of color.

I recommend investing in a decent set of watercolors. We picked ours up from Hobby Lobby, in the artist section, for less than $8 dollars because I had a 40% off coupon! Gotta love coupons.

Sophie said she wanted to make a rainbow first, so I set out the supplies and let her create her rainbow - which turned out very well if you ask me.

Next, she painted a flower:

Watercolor is one of my favorite art mediums, probably because it seems so effortless to create something pretty. Here's my pig. We call him Pinky. I'm certainly not an ariste, but the great part of it is that art doesn't have to mean perfection. I think that learning through creativity is important for children, and I am glad that my daughter naturally enjoys creative expression. I never knew how much I enjoyed crafts until my daughter came along :)

My gluten-free kid

she was so thrilled as everyone sang the "happy birthday" song :)

My daughter is a thriving and healthy 4 year old who has a postive view on food and loves, loves to eat. Dietary challenges can be just that - challenging - but it does not have to be limiting and it definitely doesn't have to mean tasteless.

I attended an allergy workshop last year and I was saddened by some of the responses of the mothers. One person in particular told me that food and eating were a huge problem in her house, because her children had so many allergies. Rather than eating together, the parents hid and ate things that the kids could not have. They didn't ever sit down together and eat. The parents felt bad and the kids did not have a good understanding of social eating.

Now I don't mean to criticize anyone, but I believe that (as many people pointed out at the workshop) there are other ways to go about this and tackle the challenge.

For one, if the child has a severe life-threatening allergy to a particular food - the consesus is to simply remove that food from your house completely.

Here is what we do, and it works perfect for us.

1. We all eat the same food, with few exceptions

Our house is gluten-free, tree-nut free, etc. We don't eat anything that our daughter can't have, with a few exceptions. Both my daughter and I can't have dairy - but my husband can. It's not a life threatening allergy to either of us (we are casein intolerant) so my husband eats dairy but it's not a big deal because there are all types of alternatives (for example my daughter can eat coconut yogurt). I think the key when a family eats different foods, is that there be a compatible food for the allergy kids/parents in the house. This can help so no one feels deprived.

2. We focus on what we can eat, not what we can't

We've always encouraged a postive view of food and rarely talk about what we can't eat. My daughter knows what foods she is allergic to, but we don't dwell on it. There are so many foods out there that she can eat, and we are thankful for them.

Kids asks questions and that's okay. If our daughter mentions a food she can't have (say, strawberries) we talk to our daughter about how she can't have a certain food, but it's okay because she can have "this food" instead. However this is rare. I think because of the positive reinforcement we have about food, our daughter rarely - if ever - mentions a food that she can't have. She even makes us pretend "strawberry soup" though she's never seen us eat a strawberry (I haven't had one in four years!) and when we go to the natural grocers for shopping, she always asks to pick out a cheese for her dad because she knows he likes it.

She's learned that while she may not be able to eat a certain food, others can and that's okay. My husband is allergic to honey, so that's also made her understand more about how we all may have some type of allergy to deal with. When I make something, she will ask "does this have honey?" so she knows whether or not her dad can share. (Sophie eats 100% Raw Honey).

3. Sophie helps in the kitchen and loves the food making process.

We have made it a point for Sophie, at a young age, to help us make foods. Before she was even 18 months, she was helping us tear kale apart (for kales chips in the dehydrator). We made sure that she understood how blessed we are to have food and how much fun it can be to prepare food.

I highly recommend getting kids involved in the kitchen, even if the child doesn't have dietary restrictions. Knowing how to cook and prepare nutritious foods is an invaluable life lesson that we all should be taught.

What are some of the things that work for your family?

Have kids? make these fun recipes:

Candied Orange Slices 

Dehydrated Banana Chips 

Baked Butternut Squash and Raisins

Simple Color Sorting & Counting

I recently ordered some colorful paper cutouts from an Etsy shop, mommyholly handmade, and I dumped them out on the table for my daughter to look at. I bought them for craft making fun.

Sophie's first desire, however, was to start sorting them into sets of matching colors.

I immediately realized that this could be a fun learning tool. But of course I was not the one to come up with the idea, Sophie was the master thinker for this one. Toddlers and kids naturally learn through imagination and play, which is exactly how it should be.

So we spent quite a while color sorting and counting these fun paper cutouts. We haven't crafted with them yet, but we sure did have some fun.

And then we did some letter tracing and practiced writing letters.

For Japan With Love

I was just thinking about posting something about the recent tsunami in Japan, and now I have even more reason to.

I am participaing in For Japan With Love, a disaster relief fund started by Utterly Engaged and Ever Ours. Thanks to Bird's Party for spreading the awareness.

Japan is nearly 9,000 miles away from where I live.

But despite that, there is one thing that brings our nation together with theirs.

And that is love.

It doesn't matter if we are an ocean apart, we can have compassion for those affected by the tsunami because we are all one people.

I think of the mothers, the fathers and the children.

I think to myself, I am a mother. I have a family. I have a child.

And so do those people in Japan who have been devasted by this natural disaster.

Those little realities can bring us all together.

We may be an untangible distance apart, we may even be separated by a culture of differences..

but we are still the same. And we all have love to give.

Fundraising:

If you visit For Japan With Love, you will find a direct link to the donation site for ShelterBox, who was one of the first organizations asked by Japan to help with disaster relief. Each shelterbox is designed for that specific disaster situation but usually includes a tent, blankets, water storage and purificaton equipment, cooking utensils, a stove, a basic tool kit, a children's activity pack and other vital items.

Bloggers Day of Silence:

1. This coming Friday, March 18th, no posts at all on your blog.
2. Before or after Friday, March 18th, post on your blog about For Japan With Love.
3. Spread the awareness for http://www.forjapanwithlove.com with friends and family, please.

5 Little Leprechauns Finger Rhyme

My dad's wife shared this with us today and it is so cute. Sophie is having a lot of fun with it. 

Happy Saint Patrick's Day!

5 Little Leprechauns

Five little leprechauns scurrying by my door,
One jumped away, then there were 4.

Four little leprechauns climbing in my tree,
One hid in the green leaves, then there were 3.

Three little leprechauns, just a busy few,
One went for a pot of gold, then there were 2.

Two little leprechauns, having lots of fun,
One hopped over the rainbow, then there was 1.

One little leprechaun, with all his work done.
He slipped off for a nap, then there were none.

* check out our shamrock handprint craft if you haven't yet!

Making Food Fun

Since my daughter has food allergies and there are a lot of foods she can't have, I always jump on the chance to do something a little different to make the foods she can eat even more fun. So when I was browsing another blog, Frugal Family Fun, I noticed a post about creative ideas for lunchbox fun. I saw that she had cut carrots into flower shapes and cheese into star shapes.

My daughter can't have dairy, so I started thinking about what else I could make into star shapes besides cheese. I quickly thought of banana, apple and dried apricots! Cucumber and pear would also work well.

So I got to work cutting carrots and daikon radish into flowers and my daughter thought it was all very neat. I used a mini star-shaped cookie cutter for the fruit.

Another fun idea:

place a variety of fun-cut fruits and veggies on a plate and let your child eat them and make designs with them! Use celery sticks for stems to make flowers and have fun with food art.

Saint Patrick's Day: Shamrock Handprints Toddler Craft

I have the perfect Saint Patrick's Day craft for you to do with your kiddos this weekend.

We had fun making these Shamrock handprints so much that we decided to make a few more with rainbows and smiley faces. All you need is a few supplies and some Irish spirit.

To make ours extra special, we glued a poem on the back which I found at Yesterday on Tuesday.

Supplies:

glue

construction paper (green)

glitter (your choice, we used multi and lime)

scissors

Directions:

Using a clover pattern (I found mine here), trace it onto green construction paper and then cut out the shape.*

Write poem on a piece of paper and glue onto the back of the shamrock (optional, skip this step if you prefer).

Trace your childs hand onto the shamrock and then trace  and fill the handprint with glue.

Let your child shake glitter onto the handprint and when done, shake off excess and let it dry!

*In hindsight though, I should have made sure my daughter's hand fit before cutting them out. Her hand just barely fit and we made it work but next time I would make the clovers just a tad bigger. I also should have glued the poem onto the back before making the glitter handprint because it was a bit harder afterwards, so I used a combo of glue and tape to secure it.

A Wish for a Friend

Wishing you a rainbow

For sunlight after showers -

Miles and miles of Irish smiles

For golden happy hours -

Shamrocks at your doorway

For luck and laughter too,

And a host of friends that never ends

Each day your whole life through!

Our preschool home-based learning curriculum

My daughter is 4 years old, and we have a lot of fun learning with books, with play and just throughout the day. I believe that learning happens everyday and there are a lot of chances for learning to take place. I also believe that it can be fun, thrilling and empowering to learn. It doesn't have to be boring or feel like a chore.

I have been amazed about how much my daughter has learned already just through our everyday life. She has understood the concept of "big and little," very quickly and when she was 2 she soon started telling me that "this is smaller .....  this is bigger than that." We never even tried to teach her that specifically, it was just something she learned along the way!

My husband and I decided to homeschool our child well before she was born, because we felt it was a very wonderful option. I was homeschooled myself, starting after grade 7 and I really enjoyed it. I was thankful for the opportunity to graduate at an earlier age because I was able to go at my own personal pace. I started community college when I was 17. This isn't true for everyone who homeschools of course, and it isn't about finishing the race faster than anyone else. It just so happens that I was able to focus better while being homeschooled and I felt confident that I was able to begin college earlier because that was what was right for me.

So, we are excited about officially starting preschool with our daughter. We are interested in Oak Meadows homeschool curriculum, but while I am waiting on the catalog to come, I have purchased a few things to get us started and I thought I would share it.

Here's our current preschool curriculum plan:

3 workbooks by Active Minds:

Math - basic math skills, counting, telling time, understanding number values, etc

Phonics - consonant and vowel sounds, lettering writing, memory building, etc

Reading - word recognition, pre-reading fundamentals, beginning and ending sounds, etc

Emotions:

We purchased a set of six books on emotions written by Cornelia Maude Spelman. Education about how to identify and handle our emotions is as important as other types of learning. Understanding our emotions is a powerful tool to give kids. Learning about our emotions and how to properly manage them can help children succeed throughout their life, making it easier for them to work well with others, promotes self-awareness and guides them on how to best deal with situations that can come up. Because it IS okay to have emotions, they are perfectly normal.

Art & Nature:

the four seasons, learning about nature and animals, crayon drawing, watercolor art, singing and finger/hand play, various crafting, storytelling

My daughter knows her ABCs, but I couldn't resist this lovely set of ABC Flash Cards by Eric Carle. They are so sturdy, thick and colorful. I highly recommend them. It is great for letter recognition and as we go through them, we talk about what other things start with each letter.

I also really like Learning Resources and we have some things from them for learning shapes and counting. There are many different ways to approach home-based learning and we are enjoying the process of finding out what works for us!

Baked Butternut Squash and Raisins

March is national optimism month, apparently! Malia at Yesterday on Tuesday gives some ideas of how to celebrate.

Before I read her post, I saved a page from our page-a-day calendar to share with you all and now it's very fitting, seeing as March is national optimism month.

This is from our page-a-day calendar by Louise L. Hay.

" This is a great month to practice gratitude. I am grateful for every part of my body and how well it works for me. I am graetful for all my relationships; for the work I do; for my home, my automobile, the roads I drive on, my clothing, my ability to love and express joy, the beauty of nature, the foods I ate, the water I drink, and the air I breathe. These are only a few of the things I am grateful for this month. "

I bet we all have a lot to be grateful for.

Baked Butternut Squash and Raisins

gluten-free, grain-free, nut-free, egg-free, dairy-free

Ingredients:

4 tablespoons coconut oil (melted)

3 tablespoons water

1 small butternut squash, peeled and diced

1/4 cup raisins

1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

 salt to taste

Directions:

Peel and cut a small butternut squash into cubes.

Add to a bowl and mix in the other ingredients, except for the salt (unless it is your preference).

Add to a glass baking dish that has been coated with coconut oil.

Cook at 400 F for about 30-40 minutes, or until done.

*every oven is different, check your dish as it is cooking and add a tad more water if necessary.

The raisins will plump and the butternut squash will visibly soften.

Sprinkle a bit of sea salt on top and serve as a dessert, or along with dinner (for example: good along side a salad and organic turkey burgers).