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This Little Blog of Mine

This Little Blog of Mine

Monthly Archives: July 2013

This is my life…

29 Monday Jul 2013

Posted by Momma J in life, Quick Snippets

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Sometimes I have a glimpse of myself as an almost “cool” like person. I was having one of those moments yesterday. I’d come home from a fun trip to the beach that included a limo ride and wine tasting, and was about to head off to a family event, which was going to be followed by a photo shoot near the Griffith Observatory. I was doing laundry and thinking about what a nice week I’d had and what I would wear for the day, when I realized I hadn’t gone over our family schedule for the next week. In a rash decision, I decided to do housework and go over the schedule with everyone at the same time (multi-tasking-win!), and without thinking I ran out the front door with a handful of underwear. Little T was in the front yard on his bike with a Darth Vader mask on, of course. I waved my underwear filled hand in the air to get their attention and started shouting, “family meeting, family meeting”!!! As I was shouting, a neighbor walked by and looked at miniature Darth Vader on his bicycle, and my shouting self with a handful of panties. It looked kind of like this:

mothermoment

So, I think I’ll just accept that I’m not ever going to be that cool mom. I’m going to be the mom that runs around with underwear in her hand and shouts dorky things about family meetings to her children. Little T, on the other hand, totally rocked that Darth Vader mask. I think there is hope for him.

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Road Trips and Car Rides with Toddlers

28 Sunday Jul 2013

Posted by Momma J in life, The Adventures of Little T, The Family, The Travels

≈ 2 Comments

We just arrived home from our week long vacation. We’re still settling in and getting back into our routine, but I wanted to share how Little T survived the 14+ hours we spent traveling in our car.

I’d spent a long time searching for strategies and suggestions online. I found a few good ideas, like the Car Ride Bingo, but most of them I just recycled from my days teaching kindergarten. I hope this helps for any soon to be tiny travelers~

The first thing I did, was grab a bunch of big envelopes from the garage. These are pretty cheap to purchase if you don’t have any on hand. Toddlers have short attention spans, so I made ten envelopes filled with different games, then stored them all in this Sprouts bag so I could easily grab a folder during the car ride. I know it isn’t pretty, but I’m busy and wanted them to be functional and easy, so I used a giant sharpee and wrote the names of the games in big letters on the top of the envelope. This made it easy breezy to sort through them.

Road Trips and Car Rides with Toddlers

Each envelope had a different activity that were a mix of things for different moods and temperaments. If he was calm, we’d read him a book, if he was hyper we’d pull out the manipulatives, etc. Here’s the game list:

1. Car Bingo
2. Doctor
3. Magazine game
4. Books
5. New Movie (5$ Elmo alphabet movie from Target)
6. Find the colors
7. Guess the letter
8. Manipulatives
9. Map

And here’s a run down of the games:

Group Games:

1. Car Bingo:make a bingo sheet and search for the cars you see on the road.

2. Guess the letter: Write the letters A, B, and C on flash cards. Fold them in half and place them in the envelope. When it’s time to play, pull a folded card out of the envelope and have everyone guess which letter it is. The person who is right, wins.

Keep those hands busy games:

1. Find the color: twist up a bunch of colored pipe cleaners. Give it to them, and ask them to give you a certain color. They will tune up their fine motor skills as the have to twist and turn the pipe cleaners to get the right color out.

Road Trips and Car Rides with Toddlers

Manipulatives:
We’ve been collecting cheap little things to keep his hands busy in the car. We have to supervise when he plays with these, but Little T loves it when we pull one out. In our bag we have bubble wrap for him to pop (need adult next to him for this), a twisty man, a little fan, a squishy baseball, party blowers, bird whistle, a rhino balloon, harmonica, and a few other things for him to play with.

Road Trips and Car Rides with Toddlers

More Mellow Activities:

1) Doctor: I grabbed some coloring pages and told Little T that we were going to play doctor. We had him clean off Belle with a dry towel or tissue, then pretend to put medicine on her with a q-tip, then put on a band aide. This was one of his favorite games.

Road Trips and Car Rides with Toddlers

2) Magazine: Use a kids magazine and go through it ahead of time. Make a list of things for your toddler to find as they go through the magazine. Tell them what they need to find, and once they have found it move on to the next object. To simplify this, I wrote the list on the folder with a sharpee.

Road Trips and Car Rides with Toddlers

Map: Print out a google road map with directions to where you are going. Circle towns that you will go through, and mark it with stickers as you pass through the town. I taped the map to the outside of the folder.

Road Trips and Car Rides with Toddlers

When you need a break:

1) New Movie: we have a DVD player that we use for wind down and quiet time. Purchase a 5$ movie or borrow one from a friend. We bought Elmo’s alphabet jungle. We also have a few favorites on hand, but this was a nice short movie to pull out and surprise him with.

2) A New Book: We mingled a few new 1$ books we found, along with some of his favorites. I bought some really simple books and read him the story, then I had him “read” the story back to me. We also just let him look through the books.

The other thing we did was pack a travel snack box. When he was hungry, he loved being able to choose what he wanted from this box. We threw in Kind Bars, apple sauce, oranges, instant oatmeal (we stop and get hot water from the gas station to make this when we travel) apple juice, and fruit bars.

Road Trips and Car Rides with Toddlers

I think the most important thing to remember is that kids have short attention spans. Little T loved all these games, but we switched around a lot. We also adapted the games a to make them a little different on the way back. Overall though, they were a really big success and didn’t take up a lot of space in the car. He started asking to play games first thing when we got in the car, so I think he really enjoyed it. We’re going to keep some in the car for good.

Happy car traveling friends. Let me know if you have any travel ideas that you think Little T would also like. We’re taking another long trip this summer and have a plane (ack) trip coming up. Definitely open to ideas. 🙂

The Sticky Hands Show

24 Wednesday Jul 2013

Posted by Momma J in All Others

≈ 1 Comment

Little T has started to give impromptu talent show performances. This particular show was called “the sticky hands show”. The inspiration behind this performance were his….sticky hands, of course! Watch for the dramatic finish. 😉

Our day at the OC Fair

23 Tuesday Jul 2013

Posted by Momma J in The Family, The Travels, vegan

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

oc fair, vegan fair food, vegan lifestyle

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Last week we made the drive to the OC Fair. Grandma K and I surprised Little T by picking him up from daycare early, and telling him we had someplace special to go. When we got to the fair he gave us both an enthusiastic round of applause, which always feels good…even if it is coming from a two year old. 😉

Now lets get down to business, and by that I mean-lets talk food. For lunch, we had Vegan Dogs from the Pinks food truck. Mine had all the fixings, but Little T has a delicate palette and opted for a more conservative soy dog.

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Later….okay, so five minutes later-we had a glass of champagne and berries from Terries Berries.

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Once we were fed, we stopped to visit the butterflies.

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And then we left to try a few rides. Little T is still talking about his bravery on the dangerous motorcycle ride. Please excuse the mis-matched clothes. Little T had a wardrobe malfunction. It happens to the best of us, Little T.

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We also got to visit some really cool displays and exhibits:

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After the fair, we stopped at Native Foods and had a strawberry parfait, peanut butter parfait, and a cupcake:

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And we made a final stop at Mitsuwa Market, for some grocery items that I can’t ever find at other grocery stores:

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It was a great day, I love going to the fair. Little T also had a great time and there were lots of food choices for us. According to Little T, it was also a day full of thrills, bravery, and danger, seeing how he rode that scary motorcycle and all. 😉

The Trayvon Conversation

21 Sunday Jul 2013

Posted by Momma J in All Others

≈ 1 Comment

I’ve had a few people who are close to me ask how Big T and I feel about Trayvon Martin, so I thought I’d over-share and write about it here. I want to preface this post by saying I’m not writing to start a debate or an argument. If you are looking for a debate, this isn’t a good place for it because I’m about to partake in a game of hide and go seek with Little T, and will be too busy to respond. I’m simply sharing my perspective as a mother who worries about her little boy. Her little boy who adores Snow White, singing, dancing, laughing, and who happens to have a different skin color than mine. I wish I could say that it doesn’t matter what the color of his skin is, but that wouldn’t be true.

The thing is, one day our baby boy is going to grow up into a teenager, and we’re going to need to have a conversation with him that we never needed to have when we were growing up. When he’s walking around without us- like teenagers and kids often do, our sweet, funny, and polite little boy may not seem sweet to others who haven’t met him. Even at this age, we’ve had friends comment about how tough he looks when he isn’t smiling. They don’t mean it in a rude way, but the thing is that Little T isn’t trying to look tough. He just isn’t smiling. He’s probably thinking deeply about the difference between play dough and mashed potatoes. The last thing on his mind is “toughness”.

One day we are going to need to teach Little T to go out of his way to not “look intimidating”. We’re going to tell him not to walk with his hands in his pockets, and not to wear a hoodie (even though mommie and daddy wear one when they walk and it’s cold). He’s going to have to learn ways that he can keep himself safe.

The same way that I don’t have the freedom to feel safe when I walk to my car alone at night, Little T won’t have the freedom to feel safe when he walks down the street alone. It’s a sad truth, that I hope will change someday.

Here’s where I need a little help. What do I tell Little T to do if an adult in plain clothes starts chasing him down the street in his own neighborhood at night? Pre-Trayvon Martin, I would have told him to defend himself. I would have told him to do everything he could to survive because the idea of anything happening to Little T is unbearable. What should I tell him to do? To stop and let a strange-grown man tackle him onto the ground? Trayvon didn’t do anything that I wouldn’t have done in the same situation.

That’s why the whole thing makes me worried for my little boy. One day, I’m going to need to look up street strategies for him, and hope that some crazed vigilante doesn’t decide he’s too intimidating to be walking through his neighborhood. In the meantime, I’m hoping that the tragedy for Trayvon and his family, will make it safer for all the Little T’s out there. Hopefully someday, there wont be a need for that conversation.

Thanks for listening, friends.

~Jenna

Toddler Car Game Tutorial

16 Tuesday Jul 2013

Posted by Momma J in All Others

≈ 2 Comments

It seems like road trips are a part of little T’s destiny. Its a challenge to keep a toddler strapped into a seat for five minutes, let alone five hours. We’ve had to come up with games and activities that will keep his busy toddler mind occupied. Here’s a tutorial for one of our favorites.

Little T’s Car Drive Bingo

Supplies needed:

1 bingo card with different colored cars. There are lots online for free, but I purchased mine from Etsy for two dollars here. I also laminated it at Lakeshore Learning for extra protection, but you can also just print out a bunch of sheets and cross the cards off as you go.

1 package Sticky Back Velcro
1 sheet card stock
1 pack of favorite stickers

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First, cut the Velcro to the correct size, and then attach one side to the bingo cards.

Next, put the stickers on the card stock, then cut them into little squares.

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Put the other half of the Velcro onto the backs of the stickers/card stock.

Find a cute little envelope to put the stickers in, and voila! Road Trip Bingo!

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With the extra Velcro, you can make yourself a mustache.

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To play, give your toddler the card while they are sitting in the car. Ask him/her to find all of the cars that match. We keep it simple and just have him find a red car, blur car, green car, etc. When they find the car, give them a round of applause and hand them their favorite velcro’d sticker to attach to the bingo sheet. Happy driving for all!

A Mini House Tour

15 Monday Jul 2013

Posted by Momma J in All Others

≈ 1 Comment

I love our little home. I wish I could describe it, but I don’t know what I would say? I can tell you that Trevor and I are pretty simple, in that we don’t feel like we need a lot of things to be happy. Most of the decor in our home has some sort of special meaning or connection to us. They’re things that make us smile.

Living room, with a piano for playing. When I moved away from home for the first time, I used to rent a piano for my apartment. I finally was able to purchase one from a piano shop that was going out of business. I used to play Mozart, but now it’s mostly the theme song from the Pirates of the Carribbean. 😉

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A friend who is an artist and knows me well, created this painting as a gift for me. This painting is bright and cheerful and happy, but doesn’t let anyone take advantage of their kindness and happiness.

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J gave this framed Beatles quote to me, and I love it so much. It was also the last song they played at my wedding. It’s sitting in front of The Hungry Caterpillar~because of Little T and my love for children’s literature.

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Above our old t.v., we keep cards from friends and family.

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The kitty card holders were a gift from my Mom. One for each cat that lived in our house.

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And on the other side of the living room, are the dishes for entertaining. Next to them are Big T’s wedding vows in a frame.

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This poor succulent had started to wilt, but is doing much better now. We love succulents and have a garden of them. You can’t see it in this picture, but on the other side of the wall is another plant that my teacher/friend, Der, gave to me when my Grandmother passed away.  I can’t tell you how comforting that plant is, and I think of my Grandma from Oklahoma every time I walk by it. 20130715-103744.jpg

That’s the living room. Next home tour, I’ll show you my gnome collection. It is amazinggggg. 😉

OC Fair Discounts, Deals and Veggie Options

12 Friday Jul 2013

Posted by Momma J in The Adventures of Little T, The Family, The Travels

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

oc fair, oc fair discounts, vegan fair food, vegetarian fair food

Hello everyone, just wanted to post this info for anyone planning on attending the OC Fair. They have a lot of promotions going on that will help you have a great time and save. We’re planning on going next week.

First off, for my vegan/vegetarian readers, I wrote the OC fair to see what offerings they might have. I didn’t expect a response, but they actually sent me this info, so yay!

  • The Spud Shack offers baked potatoes with veggie toppings along with grilled corn, veggie kabobs and grilled peppers.
  •  There is a Hawaiian Bowls place that offers a veggie/tofu bowl
  • Terries Berrie’s has really fresh fruit and berry bowls, dipped in chocolate or not
  •  There is pizza for non vegans. A veggie dog at Pink’s Hot Dogs.
  •  Tasti Chips is fresh made potato chips. Most of the desserts are vegetarian friendly even if not too healthy such as funnel cakes, churros, etc.
  •  Most booths you can take a look and be surprised to find a healthier option. Vegans will have it harder than vegetarians. We do allow you to bring food into the Fair if you’re on a strict diet, however

Now for discounts:

OC Fair Super Pass: offers passholder admission all 23 days of the 2013 OC Fair plus express entry at all gates, 2-for-1 tickets for select Pacific Amphitheatre concerts, 20 percent discount on tickets to select events in The Hangar and the Action Sports Arena, and a carnival savings book. The 2013 Super Pass prices are General $35, Senior (60+) $30 and Youth (6-12) $25 and is available for purchase online at ocfair.com/superpass through July 5, from the on-site Box Office at the Pacific Amphitheatre or at any Fair gate during Fair hours.

Opening Hour: Free admission and parking for everyone during the first hour on the first day of the 2013 OC Fair (Friday, July 12, Noon-1 p.m.) Parking lots open approximately an hour before the Fair gates.

Kids Day: Every Thursday, children 12 and younger are free all day.

Seniors Day: Every Friday, guests 60 and older receive $2 off a senior admission ticket and free Ferris wheel and merry-go-round rides all day.

Every Saturday and Sunday, early birds can save with the Rise & Shine promotion, featuring $3 admission from 10-11 a.m. on weekends.

Every day, Active-Duty U.S. Military and Veterans receive free Fair admission (with ID).

Fairgoers who want to give back to the community while also saving on admission can participate in the We Care Wednesday weekly donation drives, which offer free admission and one free carnival ride with the proper donation. Donation requirements change weekly:

  • July 17 (Noon- 4 p.m.) – Food Drive (5 cans of food)
  • July 24 (Noon-4 p.m.) – Children’s Book Drive (1 new children’s book or 3 gently used children books.)
  • July 31 (Noon-4 p.m.) – Clothing Drive (5 clothing items)
  • August 7 (Noon- 4 p.m.)- School Supply Drive (1 new school supply item valued at $5 or more.)

Foodies looking to save a little dough and still fill their stomachs can take advantage of the $2 Taste of Fair Food promotion every Friday from Noon-4 p.m. when most Fair vendors offer $2 tastes of some of your favorite Fair foods.

Thrill seekers can save in both the main carnival and Kiddie Carnival with the $2 Rides & $2 Games on Fridays from Noon-4 p.m. or $30 Unlimited Ride Wristbands on Wednesdays and Thursdays (sold until 5 p.m. and valid until 8 p.m.)

Little bookworms can receive three free carnival rides though the Read and Ride program, where children ages 5-11 submit book reports for free carnival tickets. The required book report form is available online at ocfair.com. 

Hope that helps! Have a great time at the fair! 🙂

ABC OC at the Pacific Club

11 Thursday Jul 2013

Posted by Momma J in Photography

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Every once in a while, I make the trek out to Newport to network with these fabulous ladies and gentlemen in the wedding industry.

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I wasn’t sure if they’d have any food for me, so I stopped at Native Foods to grab a salad before hand. I was sad that they didn’t have my favorite salad anymore, and took shameless selfies of my “not impressed” face. I was there by myself, so it wasn’t like I had anything better to do. :p

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The chopped salad turned out to be really tasty though. Still not as good as the chimichurri, but if works. 🙂

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I hate to ask you this, but…..

10 Wednesday Jul 2013

Posted by Momma J in Photography

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Would you mind sending a vote our way? Circle of Mom’s helps me connect with other blogger momma’s, it’s a really great website. If you feel we should be listed as a top photographer mom blog, please take a second to click the link and send a vote my way. 🙂 Thanks friends!

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