My favorite books chapter 3: Parenting Books

My all time favorite parenting books is Siblings Without Rivalry by Faber and Mazlish. I reread this book at least once a year. It is a fun read and very anecdotal as well as bringing out some great points. The authors of this book have really invested time and energy in to viewing life from a child's perspective. One of my favorite parts to this book was when they likened the arrival of a new sibling to your partner getting an additional spouse. It was hilarious, and pointed. To quote:

Imagine your spouse puts an arm around you and says,'Honey, I love you so much, and you're so wonderful that I've decided to have another wife just like you.' When the new wife finally arrives she's very young and cute. When the three of you are together, people say hello to you politely, but exclaim ecstatically over the newcomer."Isn't she adorable!"

The same authors also wrote How to Talk so Kids Will Listen, and Listen So Kids Will Talk. Another really fabulous book that I have read several times. They really dive in to the reasons behind why kids behave the way they do and invite you to really think yourself.

I am currently reading Calm and Compassionate Children and enjoying it. I don't think its one that I"ll read over and over again but definitely worth the current read. One point they did make was that often when parents letting children do things "just to make the kids happy", the children aren't really happy. This hit home for me especially with the following example, I let Ike play 20 minutes of video games a day. When he does starfall.com or even Lego.com usually it all goes pretty smoothly. However, he got Lego Pirates of the Caribbean for his birthday. He begs and begs to play it and 9 times out of 10 he ends up in tears. I felt like letting him play it was something nice I could do for him but really it was making him miserable.

Summer Goals -- for me!

I have a lot of things I want to do with the kids this summer but I have decided there are a lot of things I should try to do with myself this summer too. Here are my summers goals:

1. Practice the piano 5 times a week. This is one of Ike's goals also and I do believe in leading by example. Besides, I love playing the piano -- I just get so busy with housework & regular work that I forget to stop and do fun things.
2. Volunteer at Reruns for Kids -- a consignment store benefiting Family Building Blocks. I have some free time this summer and this is a great cause.
   
3. Wear my hair a different way every day of the week. Okay -- this may just be stupid but I have this huge head of hear which every day I shove back in to a crappy pony tail. I want to try doing some different things with it. I did a partial french braid this morning and it took my like 15 minutes. I remember in high school I could bust a full french braid out of my hair in about 5.

You'll notice I don't have a goal about cleaning the house or getting organized because I am always doing those things anyway. Also, I didn't need a goal about keeping up on my reading because that is one thing I always make time for anyway.

My favorite books chapter 3: The View From Saturday

This was written by E.L. Konigsburg and seriously, I LOVE this book. It is such a calm book. You really get to know the characters. It is a refreshing book which focuses on how a little kindness and a little consideration really has a lasting impact.

My other favorites by E.L. Konigsburg in no particular order are:

• From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler
• About the B'nai Bagels
• The Outcasts of 19 Schuyler Place
• The Second Mrs. Giaconda
  

Elizabeth Schaefer loaned this book to me and I am forever in her debt for it.

My favorite books chapter 2: Monster Books

The Monster at the End of This Book is a CLASSIC. I loved this book when I was a kid and both my boys love it as well. I remember when my nephew was about 3 years old he lived for this book. My favorite part was always pretending that I had broken down the brick wall because I was very strong!

Another book a friend of my reminded me about was There's a Nightmare in my Closet. We recently borrowed this from the library it was a hit. I definitely need to buy a copy of this one.



These books are both great especially if your kids are going through a scared-of-monsters phase. Both books are very empowering to children. "Do you know that you are very strong?" Both show a different perspective on monsters and both are books I love to read myself.

My favorite books chapter 1: Wordless Books

So I have this huge list of books I think everyone should read and read to their kids. I decided to post a few of these because I know I am always interested in finding great books. (So if you have suggestions, please leave them in the comments.)
My first category of great books is "Wordless Children's Books." There are tons of these that are awesome but are two favorites are:





These books are so wonderful to look at over and over again. The illustrations are amazing and both the boys like to look at them on their own as well --- which is always nice.

A Frugal Version of Shake & Bake Nuggets

I was shopping last week and realized that while a box of shake-n-bake isn't overly expensive, per se, it is really expensive considering its about 99% bread crumbs. So I decided to find a homemade version.

I found this one:
http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/homemade-shake-and-bake-mixture/Detail.aspx

And it was awesome! I made a half batch and used about half of that on about 1.5 lbs of chicken tenders. I baked them in the oven for about 25 minutes at 400 degrees.The kids thought they were eating McNuggets, HA! Little did they know they were getting actual chicken breast.
The one thing I would change is I would add a little Cayenne pepper but other than that it was great. I put the extra in the freezer, not sure if I really even needed to refrigerate it but that seemed liked the safest choice without wasting any of it.

Art Day

On Saturday afternoon, we had a art day at our house. We started making Rainbow Bags. I got this recipe, and a few others, from my Learning Activities parenting class at LBCC. Its part of the soon-to-be defunct Perwinkle Child Development Center.



Here are the directions:
Mix in a sauce pan:

• 1/3 c sugar
• 1 c corn starch
• 4 cups warm water

Stir and cook over medium heat until thick. The corn starch will thicken the mixture all at once. Once it start to thicken in to globs, pull it off the heat and whisk hard!


Here is my assistant Simon helping me stir the mixture




Divide the mixture evenly into 3 bowls and using food coloring make one red, one blue, and one yellow. (We went a little too heavy on the yellow and it turned out orange.)















Here is my other assistant mixing the color into the sauce. The other picture shows the three colors all mixed up.






















Now the fun part! Scoop a couple large spoonfuls of 2 or 3 colors in to a zip lock sandwich bag. Press the air out and seal with packing tape.





















These bags are really fun to make especially if you let the kids be part of the cooking process. Simon is figuring out how colors mix and this was a really nice tactile experiment with mixing colors. Eventually all the bags turn purple-brown. This is also a good life lesson. Simon said to me, "Unmix the colors Mom!!"

After the rainbow bags we whipped up a nice new batch of homemade no-bake playdough. Here's the recipe, it is super quick.

"Cooked" Playdough
In a large bowl mix:

• 2 c flour
• 1 c salt
• 4 tsp cream of tartar

Add to this mixture:

• 2 cups of boiling water
• 1/8 c oil
• Food Coloring

Stir until thoroughly mixed. Knead until cool enough to use, although my boys and the kids at their school LOVE to play with the warm playdough. Store in an airtight container.

Monty Hall Solution

The answer is that you switch. If you switch you have a 2/3 chance of switching to a car, rather than switching to a goat. There is a very elegant Bayesian explanation but I plan to use a tree diagram in class so here it is (stolen from wikipedia.)

Monty Hall

I had a really, really busy winter term and didn't get a chance to post anything to this blog. I was just barely keeping up with my grading. Spring term should be better.

I am teaching a new class next term. The first topic in the class is combinatorics followed by probability -- 2 of my FAVORITES. So I am planning to lead off with the Monty Hall problem. (Again, one of my all time favorite problems.)

Here it is -- see if you can figure it out.

You are a contestant on a game show. You must choose 1 of 3 unmarked doors. Behind 1 door is a sports car and behind the other 2 doors are donkeys. You choose one door. The host then opens one of the doors you DIDN'T choose and shows you a donkey. Do you stay with your original choice or do you switch doors?