This weekend it was sunny for the first time in days, so our family went out to search for a good outdoor place to take pictures of the kids.  I love it when people have outdoor photos for their Christmas cards and we had not had a good photo shoot of the kids in months.  My husband grabbed his camera, I dressed the kids, did both of their hair, my husband restyled my son’s hair, I grabbed an extra set of clothes and a blanket, was armed with snacks and juice boxes and ran out the door.  I had a place close to home in mind but my husband had a place further away in mind, so we went to his location after all he was the one driving.

We drove down a dirt road, found the right place, unloaded the kids next to the corn field and instantly the little guy decided he wanted to be whiny.  He didn’t want his coat taken off, the tears came on, so I put his coat back on him but he was still worked up and whiny.  My daughter was ready to take pictures but she hates smiling right now.  She has created this fake smile where she completely closes her eyes and holds her mouth in a smile that looks like she is trying to pee.   My husband snapped pictures while I wrangled the kids and tried to make them both smile while looking towards the camera.  If someone was listening to us you would have heard, “Smile Please! Look at Daddy! No a real smile! Open your eyes! Sit down! Look over here!  Singing If your happy and you know it! Gross, Don’t pick that up! Please walk, OK fine, I will carry you.”

I realized that I have not had a good picture of both kids looking at the camera at the same time in months.    One will be looking at the dog while the other will have a great smile.  Then one will have a great smile and the other one will be smiling or will turn their head.   Trying to get them both focused is enough to work up a sweat, now add walking to try to find the perfect location to the mix, and you will need a nap when you are done!

After one hour of hiking down the dirt path, and taking hundreds of pictures we ended up with about five decent shots of the kids together, none that we are ready to create a Christmas card out o,f but at least decent.   Last night I was trying to retrain my daughter who has a normally beautiful smile until the camera comes out, how to smile again.     “Please don’t close your eyes, Please smile like you are saying cheese, You can keep your head upright, Look at the camera, right here.”  Someday I am sure she will smile for the camera again,  of course by that time, her little brother will probably decide he prefers a fake smile.    Maybe I should just become a Photoshop pro, take a head from one pic and a head from another and create a perfect perfect picture, until then, our Christmas card may show two kids looking in opposite directions.  Good luck with your family photos.

As a professional mom people may wonder what else do I have to do all day besides cook and clean?  If you know me there are very few days I stay home and do nothing, we are always running, getting ready to go to the next place and trying to find new active learning experiences for my children.   This means that I don’t have all day to think about and prepare dinner.  I have learned many ways to help prepare a healthy dinner fast for my family without making boxed meals or prepared frozen foods.

#1- I plan my meals for the week and stick to them.  I sit down with a few of my recipe books, and I have a list of my favorite fast meals and plan the meals for a week, I then write down the recipe pages and recipe book next to them so I can quickly find them.  I try to pick out recipes that can be ready in less than 30 minutes and take as few pans as possible to cook in, to minimize clean up.  I write down each of the ingredients I need to buy to create this whole weeks of recipes and buy all of them at my weekly grocery store trip.

#2- When I get home from the grocery store I cut the fresh veggies and bag them or put them into storage containers so when I am ready to make a recipe I don’t have to clean and cut the veggies.  This also helps me to reach for a healthy snack when the veggies are cut up in the fridge.

#3- Another one of my favorite time saving tools is my vacuum sealer especially for meats.  I buy meat in bulk like a whole turkey breast or bulk hamburger meat and divide them into one pound packages.   Before I seal meats that need to be cut into bite size pieces like steak, chicken or turkey I cut them before I seal them, I throw in seasonings or marinade in the bag before I seal them, that way when I am ready to cook that meat all I do is defrost the package in the microwave and it is perfectly seasoned and recipe ready.

When it is a busy night where I have to get the kids out the door for swimming, gymnastics or to the park, I pick my daily recipe from the list, flip to the recipe book page, grab the pre-cut and cleaned veggies, pre-cut meat add rice, bread or pasta and can create a fast, home-made, stress free meal.

It is fall in Minnesota which means it is time to start winterizing the yard, the gardens, the pool and the house.    I live in a house built in the 1960’s that is not as energy efficient as new homes.  I try to save money and energy by sealing up the house.

One project that can save money by making your house more air tight is caulking around windows and doors. This summer I painted the house and caulked every crack and crevice in the exterior around windows, doors, siding, pipes, boxes on my house.  I went through 16 tubes of exterior caulk using a basic handheld caulk gun and I became pretty good at laying a good bead by the end of the project.  As I was working around the house I noticed that the old caulk had shrunk, cracked and become brittle in all areas, there were even some areas under replaced windows that never had caulk applied and were letting cold air right into my house.    Caulk is cheap repair to keep out bugs, water and $3 a tube is a cheap energy saving option, in comparison to heating and cooling costs.

We use a Touch Screen 7 Day Programmable Thermostat to turn the heat down a few degrees at night, since I am home during the day with the kids I can’t lower heat during the day.  Since we replaced the old fashioned dial thermostat with the programmable one the furnace runs less often and maintains a more consistent temperature.

Our windows were all replaced in the early 90’s so they are still not as energy efficient as modern windows, so I use 3M (Plastic) Insulator Kits on the interior of the windows. I apply the plastic over each of the bedroom windows, and over the large picture windows in my house to keep the cold out and keep more of the warm in.  If you have never put plastic on your windows before it is a fast project and it is very rewarding.  I usually do it on a cool day when you can feel the cold air leaking from the windows.   When I am done you can feel the increase in warmth in the room and can no longer feel any draft by the windows.

I use applying plastic as my reason to wash the interior of the windows.  Make sure you get the little finger prints off  before applying the plastic because once the plastic is on the windows those smears and smudges are sealed in till spring.    Make sure you fully close, lock and close the storm windows before putting on the plastic.  If you have mini blinds on the windows, cut a little hole and seal the mini blind wand outside of the window and seal it up with clear scotch tape so you can open and close blinds on sunny days.  I also close curtains and insulating window blinds to keep even more drafts out of the room especially at night and on really cold days.

Minnesota gets cold so little energy saving steps will  help save you money and keep you warmer this winter.

Dr. Vinay Goyal, MBBS, DRM, DNB,  gives the following suggestions to keep you healthy and avoid illnesses and H1N1.

1. Frequent hand washing

2. Hands off the face approach, resist all temptations to touch any part of face.

3. Gargle twice a day with warm salt water or use Listerine if you don’t like salt water.

4. Clean your nostrils at least once every day with warm salt water by using a Neti Pot or blowing the nose hard once a day and swabbing both nostrils with cotton buds dipped in warm salt water.   Neti pots and sinus rinse kits are available at drug stores.

5.  Boost your natural immunity with foods that are rich in Vitamin C like citrus fruits. If you have to supplement with Vitamin C tablets, make sure that it also has Zinc to boost absorption.

6. Drink as much of warm liquids like tea and coffee as you can.  Drinking warm liquids has the same effect as gargling, but they wash viruses from the throat into the stomach where they cannot survive.

This information was given to me in an e-mail forward that I thought made sense and was worth passing on.

I recently learned that a parent in my community had their child sexually assaulted by two family members. The first thing that popped into my head was that poor little kid!  They were somewhere where they should be safe, at their family’s house and with people who they should be safe with, her family. Still the unthinkable happened to them.   The second thought was how can I protect my children from that ever happening to them?   I only leave my children with family members right now.  I have had the nobody can touch your private parts conversation with them and made sure that I repeat always tell mom if someone touches you even if they say not to tell.  I also trust my gut, if something does not feel right about a person, I will not have my children around them.

I can’t get this poor families experience out of my head!  If that happened to my child I am afraid I would have charges against me for retaliation.  I am sure the family has years of therapy ahead of them.  I imagine what just happened to that family, the relationship in that extended family has to be destroyed.  Most importantly I wanted to make other people think about how they can protect their own children from a similar incest experience happening to their children.

Here are a few things I have read as ways to protect your children.  Don’t leave your children with teenage boy babysitters because they are hormonal and impulsive.   Make sure you trust your children if they ever mention that someone touched them or hurt them, as kids don’t make this type of thing up. Watch for signs of sexual abuse, watch for backwards progress in potty training or bathroom issues in boys and girls, watch for urinary tract infections in girls.   If your children don’t want to be close to someone, don’t push them, let them trust their comfort zone and be in tune with your own comfort zone.  Teach your children to scream and yell if someone hurts them or does something inappropriate to them. Teach your children to kick and fight to get away. Teach your children they can tell people No stop it and that they should not ever submit to people who are doing things that make them uncomfortable. Parents need to advocate and protect their children.

I hope the unthinkable never happens to my children, and I hope this poor child’s experience can protect the unthinkable from happening to anyone who reads this.  Please trust your gut!