Journal

• September 05, 2019 Healthier Kid-Friendly Pumpkin Bread
  My oldest started Kindergarten this year, much to my joy and sadness.  The school requires we pack a snack and lunch for the kids each day and it's been my goal to make sure he tummy is full of healthy food to keep his energy up and his brain ready for all the new information he is ingesting.  One food my boy will never turn down is a slice of quick bread, so I have been making different breads over the weeks.  We love to keep the sugar as low as possible while still being something they will desire, hide some vegetables in it and pack in protein.  This bread has become one of his favorites, even reached for over his beloved banana bread.  
• March 14, 2019 Spring Songs for Children
  The air has a hint of warmth, rainy days are common, and our daffodils are shooting up which means Spring is on its way.  The official first day of Spring is next week, March 20th so we've been transitioning our home for the change of season:  Spring Flower Fairies on the nature table, Spring books in the basket, and new window decorations.  We are also celebrating the change of seasons with a new playlist for the children.  We have been listening to this playlist for the last week and the new Spring music has been such a treat.  This gentle playlist is filled with some of my little one's favorite musicians.
• January 22, 2019 Our Winter Books
  We adored our Christmas books during the holiday season but once they have been put away, we pull out several Winter books that remind us of all the joy that truly can be found during these cold months.  We find ourselves cuddled close together more in Winter, reading the day away.  It often seems these books spark imaginations and we will change our nature table to suit the theme of them, often pulling in characters from the books.  What were once peg people are now snow children, the wooden pond is flipped to show it has iced over, and some of our wooden animals go to hibernate in makeshift caves and burrows.
• January 17, 2019 Our Tips for Transitioning from Naps to a Period of Rest
  The switch from naps to rest can look different for every child.  Some children decide to stop napping on their own, while others seem to need parental guidance to move away from naps and towards a rest-time.  When Fox turned 4, he began having a hard time falling asleep at night.  The nightly struggle between parent and child for rest and sleep lasted for hours, beginning around 8pm and with him finally sleeping somewhere between 9:30 and 10:30pm.  As you can imagine, this left my husband and I with very little evening of our own, one using the time to work and the other trying to get him to sleep.  It also seemed to leave Fox in a chronic sour mood.  He was not getting enough solid sleep at night, which meant he would crash hard for nap and be wired at night.  We first tried shortening his nap but it seemed any amount of day sleep would keep him up at night.  So, we made the decision to halt naps completely and move to a time of rest.  The transition was difficult in the beginning, Fox would beg to sleep so it really took quite a bit of guidance on my part to keep him awake.  But, once his body fell into the routine, magic happened.