Here are 2 great cookbooks for kids I reviewed for Good Reads with Ronna on LA Parent’s website:
Honest Pretzels by Molly Katzen, featuring all delicious, healthy vegetarian dishes and adorable illustrations.
In the Kitchen with Kids: Every Day Recipes & Activities for Healthy Living by the Junior League, featuring everything kids love made the healthy way.
I highly recommend these two beautiful books for getting your children not only interested in cooking, but teaching them about healthy food choices.
Now on to traveling. If you are planning a trip to Germany, read Germany by Lonely Planet Books. I reviewed the book for Wandering Educators.
Here are links with some amazing animal photos worth checking out:
© 2010 by Debbie Glade, Smart Poodle Publishing. All rights reserved.
Click here to read last week’s comic.
I had a dog trainer come to my house today to help me train little Darwin, the “Play Biting Monster.” It turns out that I’m the one who got trained. After all, what the human does, results in how the dog behaves. My actions, hysteria (or lack thereof) directly resulted in what Darwin did. Essentially I got trained in how to calmly and lovingly) change his undesirable behavior. I learned how to teach him how to play with me, rather than nip at me. I’ve got to be consistent, and good puppy behavior won’t happen overnight. It takes time and discipline on my part.
Does this sound familiar?
It should.
I hate to compare canine “children” to human children, but there are similarities. The kind of pet we ultimately have depends mostly upon our diligence and discipline. The same holds true with our kids. Of course mother nature has something to do with it too – personalities and genetics are just what they are. But bad behavior is something that can be prevented or changed with the right consequences – both the child’s and and the parent’s.
We’ve also seen the quintessential brat having a fire-engine red temper tantrum at a store. The next time you see that, pay more attention to the parent than the child. You’ll see that the parent will be the one who needs to be trained to discipline his or her child effectively and consistently.
Undisciplined children (and puppies) make for the most unpleasant, unhappy and unproductive adults.
I’ll let you know how the rest of my training goes.
Journalist, Dallas Woodburn, from CA interviewed Rachel for her role in creating Lilly Badilly’s music and working for Smart Poodle Publishing. Thank you Dallas! The interview is in the actual October 2009 issue of Listen Magazine and not online. If you are not familiar with Listen Magazine, it is a venue for highlighting teens who pledge to be free of drugs and alcohol and who are contributing to the community in positive ways. The magazine includes feature stories about teens, articles about reaching goals and staying motivated and just making the right choices in life. What a great concept.
If your elementary age child is struggling with reading, try a fun, indirect approach!
clipart.peirceinternet.com
- Bake or cook something together and have your child read the recipe with you.
- Have your child read traffic and street signs for you while in the car.
- Pull out some old letters or cards you have and read them together.
- Buy a kid’s activity book and do some fun games together.
- Look for misspellings together in the newspaper or magazines.
- Write a silly poem together and then have your child read it to the family.
- Watch a movie you know your child will love and then do some research online or in the library on the actors or the subject of the movie.
- Get a hobby kit of some sort and read the directions together.
- Plan a trip and read with your child about where are going and what you’ll do there.
- Take out the comics section from the Sunday paper and read away.
I canned my first organic tomatoes of the season today. Actually I turned this batch into sauce. This harvest is amazing, despite the freezing temps we had here for many days. I was diligent about covering the plants with tarps at night, and it paid off.
The canning process includes:
- washing the tomatoes
- cutting an X in them
- blanching them so the skin peels off easily
- chopping them
- Preparing and cooking the sauce for hours
- sterilizing the Ball jars and lids
- sterilizing the pot
- putting the sauce in jars
- swirling a (non-metallic) spatula along the inside walls of the jar to get the air out
- wiping the the rims of the jars clean
- sealing them with new lids
- boiling 3 quarts of water
- putting the hot water in the canner
- placing the jars in the canner
- securing the lid
- setting the burner on high
- waiting and watching, wait, wait, wait
- when the pressure gets up to 11, lowering the heat
- releasing steam from the release lever as needed to keep the pressure at 11
- when 15 mintues have passed with the pressure steady at 11, turning off the burner and removing pot from the heat
- waiting a long time until pressure lowers and pot cools for a long while (I wait 2+ hours)
- removing lid and jars from pot
- you’re done! well not yet . . .
- cleaning up your big mess!
Darwin, my (53 day old) standard poodle puppy wanted to get in (literally) on the canning action
Abundance of varieties, sizes and colors!
Gotta give them a good rinse
Yum! You can see the water marks on the jars from the canner.
© 2010 by Debbie Glade, Smart Poodle Publishing. All rights reserved.
Click here to read last week’s comic.
