Owner: Woman with Many Hats URL:http://www.womanwithmanyhats.com Join Date: Sun, 18 Feb 2007 12:43:15 -0600 Rating:0 Site Description: What do I think I\'m doing, trying to juggle being a WAHM with a WAHD, homeschooling 3 kids ages 10-2,and not dropping anything? I don\'t know. Maybe we\'ll all learn something. Parent hacks, tips, musings, and amusing anecdote. Site statistics:Click here
Fast, Better-Than-Coffee House Coffee 2007-02-18 17:37:03 Don’t all parents have to like coffee? Between late nights with a newborn and waiting up for a teen? Staying awake when driving kids home from a sleepover they decided they really didn’t want to be at, or an away game?
So I’ve found a way to make great coffee fast.
And this is coming from someone who has never really liked coffee.
No, really. I won’t drink coffee out, usually; if I go to Starbuck’s I usually only get a Frappacino or chai.
My parents, on the other hand, are the typical two-cups in the morning and maybe more during the day types. I always liked the smell but couldn’t get past the taste.
But when I was in college, they started getting Gevalia beans and grinding it fresh. They raved over it. I tasted. It was drinkable, at least. So when I came home for visits, I’d usually drink a cup. In grad school, I learned to like espresso, when an Italian friend introduced me to the real thing with the real stuff brought from Italy. Read more:Coffee
, House
, Coffee House
Making College Affordable 2007-02-17 18:48:19 A friend of mine has a daughter who started college this year. They have always homeschooled. Last year, they were hot and heavy into college preparation, including selecting a college. They thought they had that narrowed down by September of ‘05.
Then, they went to a seminar on making college affordable. My friend June really couldn’t explain it to me, but the person giving the seminar just came out with the video below.
YouTube Link
Education, Videos Read more:College
Cool Math Video 2007-02-17 00:43:24 If you’ve been with me thus far, you may have noticed that unlike many parenting sites/blogs out there, this isn’t just for new parents of young babies. I’ve had articles on teen drivers and chores, and I know some of my readers are seasoned parents.
We hear so much about low test scores, our poor performance compared to other industrialized nations (or maybe we don’t), our low graduation rates. When we listen to the policy wanks, rarely do we hear any real information that isn’t tied to a request for more funds (and higher taxes).
So this recently-re-graduated meteorologist mom’s insights are very refreshing. She went through school the first time about the same time I did, in the 80’s, when already there was so much concern about the sharp drop in academic scores since the mid-60’s. She came back for a second degree a few years back, and then soon thereafter had her kids enter school. What an eye-opener! Math is something that ca
Solid Lotion in the Winter 2007-02-16 17:26:58 This winter, at our annual family Christmas outing to an historical village, I bought some solid lotions. My middle child, 7, has eczema and extremely dry skin.
Little did I know just how useful those were going to be this winter! They’re cocoa butter, coconut oil, beeswax, and natural fragrances/flavorings. They were 3/$10, so I got Orange Vanilla, Amaretto, and Rain.
Mine were obviously handmade using a mold shaped like a votive candle holder. I put them in plastic bags in my purse–I guess I could melt them and pour them into old breathmint tins, but not until they shrink a bit more, which is happening sloooooowly. I’ve heard that some makers use deodorant tubes (new) to make them, but most users prefer tins or just loose.
So here’s what we’ve done with ours:
A great, protective, moisturizing hand lotion
On cheeks to prevent windburn (for the two-year-old)
On hands to help heal scrapes (for the older two, rock climbing)–the coconut oil makes it Read more:Solid
Menu Mailers: The Rush Hour Cook 2007-02-15 03:26:42 If you’re hitting this blog for the first time and don’t know what a menu mailer is, please click “Menu Mailers” in the categories and read up on one of the best Uberhacks around!
Instead of weekly, it’s monthly. You get four weeks of 6-day dinner menus on the first of every month; scaled to 2, 4, or 6 people (you pick which when you order). Recipes and shopping lists included. The author has a weekly TV spot on the news in her area, which is now syndicated in many markets. Menus are somewhat kid-friendly. One testimonial on the site says it’s a mix of quick-to-fix, casserole and crockpot mostly; but pretty “modern” food (without being gourmet). Price is $24 for 52 weeks!
A couple of things that are a little different: the shopping list is not coded to the menu, so you don’t really know why you need cheddar cheese, for example, unless you read through the menus. So if you know you have to skip a night, you’ll have to read car
Early Literacy, revisited 2007-02-14 03:20:34 I have more to add, and some to change, about the Your Baby Can Read program I reviewed a few days ago. I’m basing this on my phone conversation with Dr. Titzer, who is a very nice guy, considering I mangled some information!
At the time Dr. Titzer started working with his oldest daughter, he had not read Dr. Doman’s work, although he did later.
Dr. Titzer’s idea was to make learning about words similar to learning about objects, using a multisensory and interactive approach. It’s actually very different from Doman’s approach, which is quite a bit more quickly paced. Initially Dr. Titzer was working with his eldest while she was a baby, based on studies on how babies learn about objects. It wasn’t until later that he happened across Doman’s book, but by that time he had already developed his own approach and his baby was already reading.
Dr. Titzer gave me a few ideas on how to use Your Baby Can Read during our conversation (I said he was Read more:Early
Keeping Kids Warm in the Cold 2007-02-13 05:57:30 Where I live, we’ve had nearly three weeks of temperatures with highs in the single digits, with only about 24 hours of a break. And I have crazy kids.
By crazy, I mean that when my older daughter was two, I regularly found her on our deck, in winter, wearing a tank top and a sock. Or nothing (and understand that I found her within seconds of her going outside). We never could get her to keep her coat on in the car, and now, at nearly eight, we still can’t. She keeps them on the floor underneath her seat and will only put them on if we go into a store as a concession to my “silly” concerns.
She’s the craziest of them. But the ten-year-old will often go out with a windbreaker over a t-shirt when there’s snow on the ground, or in Crocs. And the two-year-old tried the same thing for the first time when it was three degrees out–she rapidly changed her mind, though.
(Really, they come by this naturally. The one thing I repeatedly got in troub Read more:Keeping Kids
Early Literacy 2007-02-10 20:03:57 I’ve been testing an early literacy program with my two-year-old for over a week now, and am seeing such amazing results I think I can review it now. I was going to wait for a month or so, but I’ll update this review again later.
The program is called Your Baby Can Read. It was developed by Dr. Robert Titzer, a psychologist who was using with his own babies the research of Dr. Glenn Doman. *I have since learned Dr. Titzer worked entirely independently, and didn’t read Dr. Doman’s book until after he had already developed his program. Dr. Doman published Teach Your Baby To Read in the 80’s, based on work he was doing with brain-damaged children. In the course of getting these kids verbal and literate, he learned a lot about the way normal children acquire language.
Dr. Doman’s book was just a book. Parents who wanted to implement his ideas, as my cousin did with her kids, had to come up with the materials themselves. Dr. Titzer did this indepen Read more:Early
Real Self-Esteem 2007-02-08 00:59:19 One of the main goals of many modern parents, and the schools, is self-esteem. We have all kinds of things built-in to children’s toys now that tell them “Good job!” “You did it!”
The big question is what is their self-esteem built on? A recent study reported in the Washington Post showed that the kids with the lowest achievement actually had the highest self-esteem, at least when it comes to learning mathematics. “…countries such as the United States that embrace self-esteem, joy and real-world relevance in learning mathematics are lagging behind others that don’t promote all that self-regard” (Washington Post, For Math Students, Self-Esteem Might Not Equal High Scores, Oct. 18, 2006).
I’ve long thought that kids are smart enough, even when very young, to realize they’re being conned if they are praised for something they don’t have control over or didn’t do. The other day, I thought it was my two-year
Kids and Computers 2007-02-06 18:36:52 If you’re reading this, you likely have a computer in your home (you might be reading this at the library).
Believe it or not, there is still controversy over how much computer time kids should get, and how young. I have a two-year-old (as well as my older kids), but then my high school classmates have grandkids, some of them.
Computers began to come into the home market when I was in high school. They weren’t really widespread even when I was in college, but by the time I was in grad school they were. By that time my friends were having kids, and the controversy was in full swing.
On one side are those who say that kids under the age of 3-5 or even 8 should not have any computer access. CBS News reported in July of 2004 that the pendulum is swinging away from technology use for very young children, yet there are still many computer programs and websites marketed to them. And when I hear other, younger parents of 2-year-olds talking, it seems they’ve never even h
Eating Out with a Toddler 2007-02-20 00:11:22 Call us crazy, but we have nearly always taken our kids with us when we go out to eat. I don’t mean Chez Donald’s, either. For example, one week postpartum, we went out to eat in our area’s premiere real French restaurant, accompanied by our new baby (the two-year-old stayed home with Grandma). It was my birthday; it was her one-week birthday; so we celebrated. She slept through the whole thing.
One thing we found when our oldest was around twelve months old is that buffets are a GREAT idea when eating with little ones. There are numerous ethnic buffets in our area, from Indian to Chinese to Mexican and more; as well as standard American fare. I think one of the reason our kids aren’t very picky is that they were exposed to so many different foods from an early age.
For example, we found out our oldest LOVES bacon. He’s Bacon Boy. If there’s bacon on the buffet, that’s it. And we found out he adores garlic chicken, raita sauce, alfre
Spiced kids, anyone? And a hiccup remedy 2007-02-21 06:21:30 I’m having a migraine today, so in lieu of the normal ideas and advice, I’m posting a couple of anecdotes about my fun and funny kids.
Lark, my two-hear-old, funny (not her real name) –last night she wanted to sit on my lap, and when she did, she pulled her thumb out of her mouth with a POP! Then she said “Tastes Gooooooood!” and stuck it in MY mouth! And then asked “Taste good to you, Mommy?” Silly little peanut. No. It tasted like a cold spitty thumb.
Renaissance Man (husband) took Bacon Boy, 10, and Willow, almost 8, (not their real names either) to Cub Scouts last night, and I was left home with Lark. I had a migraine and just couldn’t go. After I started feeling better, I had a lot of fun with little Who-Who. She is talking so much, mostly in sentences; she still mimics a lot too. At one point she wanted a drink so we went into the kitchen. While I was getting milk for her, she got a napkin out of the basket on the table, Read more:Spiced
, remedy
Two More Ways to Get Kids to Do Chores 2007-02-22 18:17:51 For those trying to read this last evening to this morning and couldn’t, Lark reset my password and I had to learn a bit about dealing with my database in order to change it. New rule: I can’t leave my WP Dashboard open and leave the computer anymore!
Back in January, I wrote about the most comprehensive and customizable chore system I know of, Managers of Their Chores
, which is a book with materials to make the Chore Packs the system uses. Here are a couple of more options.
The first one is Chore Buster. This is a free email service that allows you to quickly set up chore charts for your kids and have them emailed to you weekly or daily (you pick). You enter the names of the people to do the chores, edit to say whether they should have more or fewer chores, and then enter the tasks, their difficulty level, and how often they need to be done. Then Chore Buster assigns the tasks and emails them to each person in the frequency you’ve specified. The kids c
"Brave Knights and Heroic Courage" 2007-02-23 17:47:26 Michael Flaherty is the president of Walden Media, which brought us the movies Holes, Because of Winn-Dixie, and The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, and the upcoming Bridge to Terebinthia. He recently spoke at Hillsdale College on the topic of literacy and its worth in today’s world. Hillsdale College, incidentally, is the only college in the country that takes absolutely no money from the federal government; not even student aid.
His speech is titled “Let Them At Least Have Heard of BraveKnights
and Heroic
Courage”. It’s a reference both to what C.S. Lewis says about Eustace Scrub in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, where Eustace fails to recognize he’s facing a dragon because “as I have said before, he had read only the wrong books” and in essay in which Lewis says, about sheltering children from anything scary, “Since it is so likely that they will meet cruel enemies, let them at least have heard of brave knights and heroic coura
Menu Mailers: What's for Dinner Tonight 2007-02-24 19:32:08 I’m continuing the series on Menu Mailers with another service I’ve found. These are pretty tough to find through the usual search engines, because they return all kinds of things for restaurants, software menus, menu design services, and shipping services.
What’s for DinnerTonight
offers seven dinner entrees with options to “spice it up” or “make it kid-friendly”. Recipes include traditional American, ethnic (they say like Italian, Oriental, Mexican, Pacific Rim) and some gourmet. Menu, shopping lists, preparation and presentation suggestions, and color photos of what it should look like. Also coupons and specialty meals, like holidays, are included. It emphasizes how much better they are than any cookbook (which I think is true of most menu-mailer services over many standard cookbooks). Like most other menu mailers, you can log in remotely (like from work) and print out your shopping list and menus if you forget them. Buttons allow you to
Grab the Slug While Ye May 2007-02-26 16:06:57 Do you keep a lookout for “teachable moments” with your kids?
One abnormally warm day in January, we were all heading for the car, when Lark started screaming. Renaissance Man went to check out what all the fuss was about:
Lark had discovered a slug. Sort of Slugzilla, in fact.
Despite the oddity of seeing a slug in January, and the fact we were about to leave, I ran back in the house and grabbed a couple of books. Ren. Man, meanwhile, picked up Lark and explained to her “That’s a slug. Slug. They eat leaves and they like the rain! They eat leaves” (and not little girls, he was suggesting. From her standpoint it seemed like either a monster or a giant, animated booger). When we got where we were going, which involved a lot of waiting around on my part, I sat down with her and we read the books: Usborne’s Lift the Flap Bugs and Slugs and Creepy Crawlies.
When we got home, the slug was still in the vicinity. But now Lark wanted to watch it. L
“Put Down the Book. What You Want is a Toy!” 2007-02-27 23:04:07 This is a direct quote from a mom who visited my book booth earlier this month to her toddler son. And boy, I was sad for that little guy. What his mom handed him was a neon plastic alien cup as tall as he was.
This is a BIG soapbox for me, but one I think is one of the most important things in our culture today. For example, 70% of prison inmates can’t read above the fourth grade level. 85% of kids in the juvenile court system can’t read. Of prison inmates, if they are taught to read, only 15% will end up back in the system. One big indicator of poverty is under 25 pieces of literature in the home. Kids living in poverty are read to at a rate of 48%, compared to 58% of kids not in poverty (still an abysmal rate–Federal Interagency Forum on Family and Child Statistics, 2002).
This directly effects our society: According to Pfizer Corporation, illiteracy costs the country $73 million per year in direct medical costs. 90% of welfare recipients are high school d
Cool Chemistry Video–Ultimate Blog Party 2007-03-02 17:33:27 Here is a wild video for the Ultimate
Blog Party
! It’s soap (dish soap) and either methane from a bunsen burner, or hydrogen/oxygen. There are instructions here and here.
YouTube Link
Imitate at your own risk!
Please come check out the many interesting blogs at The Ultimate Blog
Party! It’s full of all kinds of great blogs from interesting, intelligent moms–over 200 of them!
(This is my official Ultimate Blog Party
post. I’m required to tell you about me. So…I’m a WAHM, a professional literacy pusher for Usborne Books , with three kids ages 10, 7, and 2 that I homeschool. I really have my hands full! Some days I go from kissing a toddler belly and avoiding the jammy hands grabbing for my hair to putting on my black suit and giving a literacy presentation to a room full of media specialists. I have to switch hats pretty fast some days!)
chemistry, Education, experiments, Videos
Drooling and Shrieking and Teething, Oh, My! 2007-03-01 16:03:08 Teething babies: for months on end, they have trouble sleeping (so the whole house does, too); shriek in pain; and produce enough drool to fill a wading pool and enough laundry to generate an extra load every couple of days. Add possible fever and diarrhea to that list, and diaper rash. It’s misery for all involved.
The “normal” remedies don’t work too well: gels taste nasty and can be dangerous because they can numb the tongue and back of the throat when swallowed; and you can’t tell if you’re putting it on the sore spot anyhow. Teething rings only work well for the front teeth. Frozen carrots or ice in cloth can become choking hazards. And none of them help the teeth erupt faster.
So with Lark, when she started teething, we were having MUCH worse problems than with the first two. No one was getting sleep; we couldn’t keep up with the clothes she was soaking with drool (or the bibs); she had a bad rash and was about as reactive as she c Read more:Teething
Cool Baby-Wearing Videos 2007-03-03 18:02:23 It’s still the Ultimate Blog Party all week, and I’m showing videos! Here are two that show how to use a wrap and a shawl to carry babies and toddlers on your back. Studies show this kind of carrier is better for a developing baby’s hips than carriers with stiff frames.
Babywearing is a GREAT parenting hack! I didn’t find one that worked for me until my third child. Then, instead of having my trunk taken up by a stroller, I could tuck the fabric into my backpack purse. Or if I was out running errands, I could just wear it, and put Lark into it when I got out of the car. We’d go on living history museum trips, and I’d feel a little sorry for the moms who were struggling uphill to push their strollers along the dirt paths. Or I’d go out shopping and have no trouble walking between racks.
Not only that, Lark was perfectly content. I had early warning of her needs. Instead of being below the level of action, she was just below chin level,
A 5th Grader On Math Programs 2007-03-06 15:29:41 A couple of weeks ago, I posted a video on why the U.S. is so far behind the rest of the world in math. And now, here is a testimonial from a CHILD, who went from using one of the programs mentioned in the other video, to two of those mentioned as being great! Interesting that even this little girl could see a huge difference in one year. YouTube Link
For some reason this video won’t post, so here’s the link: 5th Grader
On Math
Education, math, Videos Read more:Programs
Calmer Parenting: ScreamFree Living 2007-03-07 15:35:47 This looks intriguing: a video on parenting without screaming. We’ve all yelled at our kids, right? Unless they’re under about two and a half or three? The full website is at ScreamFree Living
. Here’s a short intro video:
Google Link
parenting, Videos Read more:Parenting
What Does Montessori Education Look Like? 2007-03-08 15:52:25 Continuing the Party Videos for The Ultimate Blog Party, here’s a video that explains and shows what a Montessori
education looks like for the age group 3-6. This is about as close as you can get to visiting a school–which most Montessori schools allow you to do anyhow. Includes snippets with older kids who went to a Montessori school.
YouTube Link
Education
, Videos
No-Cry Sleep Solution 2007-03-09 18:50:17 Here’s another good video. We all know that when our kids don’t sleep, everyone’s miserable. It can affect everything from the family’s health to our careers.
Regardless of your family’s sleep philosophy, there are some excellent tips here. And don’t forget my self-discovered method for setting your baby’s schedule from day one (or two or three–early, anyhow).
If you’re visiting for the Party, thanks for coming! I hope you like what you see and find some useful ideas. There will be more!
YouTube Link
babies, parenting, Sleep
, Videos Read more:Solution
Get Things Done with Remember the Milk 2007-03-10 19:23:53 Does anyone else feel like they gave birth to their brain along with their baby, and now there’s a big, echoing cavern where it used to be?
Last week, I was supposed to drop off some milk to a friend who wanted to try organic, fresh milk. Her house is just off the route I travel to Willow’s ballet lessons, and due to weather and illness, Willow had to make up a few lessons. So we were going to ballet every day last week. And every time we had to pass my friend’s house.
And three times in a row I forgot to drop off the milk!
The worst time was when I consciously thought of it as we were getting into the car after the lesson. Willow started peppering me with question after question on all kinds of topics: what are we doing next week; when are we seeing our cousins again; why do some girls not put their hair in buns for ballet; why is the moon round sometimes and not others; etc. She asked me questions all the way home.
Which is where I was when I realized I’d Read more:Remember
Video: Making Sure Your Baby Carrier Fits 2007-03-12 17:31:31 I’ve mentioned before that with my first two kids, I didn’t use my baby carrier much because it wasn’t comfortable for any of us until they got to be nearly a year old. I’d recieved three baby carriers at my shower and didn’t like any of them. Then I bought myself the only sling readily available 10 years ago, the NoJo.
I didn’t realize it didn’t fit. I guess I thought he was supposed to ride at hip level in a reclining position (so few people used them in my area then I’d never seen anyone to know). No wonder he didn’t like it! When he was old enough to sit up in it and straddle my hip, it was ok but not very comfortable for me.
So I’m glad to have found this video!
YouTube Link
babywearing, parenting, Videos Read more:Making Sure
The Top Five Useful Things in Your Kitchen 2007-03-14 15:36:38 It’s yard-sale season again. And the tables are full of all kinds of barely-used kitchen gadgets that probably sounded like a good idea at the time.
But then, there are other things I *never* see at yard-sales, unless they are used to death!
What are the top five useful things in your kitchen, the ones that won’t hit the yard-sale table until they are at least 15 years out of style? Assuming you have a fridge, stove, and dishwasher. Here are mine:
Osterizer blender
Toastmaster Baker’s Hearth combo breadmaker/oven/toaster
Large crockpot with removeable liner
Good chef’s knife–this is individual preference
Metal colander on a stand–for draining and straining
What are your most useful kitchen items?
Gadgets, lists, parenting Read more:Useful
, Kitchen
The Top Five Useless Things In Your Kitchen 2007-03-17 01:13:48 Ok, after weathering a couple of crises (including Willow’s 8th birthday), I’m back!
This is a question I’m sure we’ll all have fun with. All of us know we have things we either thought we had to have, or someone else thought we had to have. You know the kind of thing I mean: the gadget that has a function that either occurs once in a blue moon, or that is essential for cooking in a tiny region of, oh, Latvia and nowhere else (no offense to Latvians!). Or that causes more work than it saves.
Here are my Top Five:
The Onion Slicer. My poor, sweet grandma thought I needed this. But it has super-sharp blades and it’s round. You’re supposed to roll it over the round onion somehow, and between the round onions and the round blades, it’s multiple accidents waiting to happen. And there is no good way to store it without risking cuts just getting it out!
The Hot Sandwich Maker. For awhile, this was fun. But if the filling leaks, it’s t Read more:Kitchen
Video: A University View of Math 2007-03-17 19:41:56 How many of us have had the experience of calling tech support to find ourselves talking with someone overseas? I know I have, with increasing frequency. Even National Geographic reported last summer that not just tech support jobs, but science research jobs are headed away from the U.S.
In this video, professor Cliff Mass at the University
of Washington talks about the drop in math skills of incoming freshmen and why it’s been happening. It’s linked to a specific philosophy of math that came into vogue in the 80’s and has been used by the majority of states since. According to the Fordham Foundation study in 2005, my state is the ONLY one getting an A for math standards!
This is the third video I’ve posted on math education. It’s a serious, widespread problem that we, as parents, can impact through our educational choices and actions. The first two videos both recommend Singapore Math as a good program to either supplement your child’s educat
Recommend Site To A Friend
