Monthly Archives: March 2008

Doctors and Toys

Today at Candace’s 2 month check-up, Hasbro presented a solution to keeping kids busy at doctor’s appointments without spreading germs. They give coloring pages and pre-packaged crayons (4 in a pack) to each child that the child gets to take home. What a great idea!! Here’s why.

Less Likelihood of Germs

Sure germs are still around, but at least sick children will not be chewing on toys that well children will be playing with. Also, you don’t have to worry about whether the toys get cleaned often enough. I should point out that Hasbro has automatic hand sanitizer machines everywhere to help prevent the spread of germs. I really like them, even though both Peter and I have had our hair sprayed from standing (or sitting in my case) underneath one.

More Personal

There is something more personal about the nurse personally handing the coloring pages to each child. This is especially true if the nurse is giving them to the siblings of the child being seen because the siblings don’t feel ignored. Plus each child gets to make his/her own creation (even if it is a printed coloring page). And, best of all, he/she gets to take it home to show off to siblings or other family members!

Quiet Activity

Coloring kept my kids’ attention for about 20 minutes. They sat quietly and colored and compared their crayons and pictures. After awhile they began to pretend their crayons were people, but at least they were playing with un-contaminated “toys,” and even then, they were quite quiet. And maybe, since they get to take the pages home with them, they’ll decide to have more quiet coloring time in the car on the way home.

Less Chaos

With toys in the room, children are likely to argue over who gets the “coolest toy.” This is not as much of a problem when they all have identical coloring pages and even all had the exact same color crayons (yes, I know this is also a bit boring because they only had 4 colors to work with). Also, as parents of small toddlers are leaving, they don’t have to convince the child that he/she really wants to leave the toys in the room. They just take the coloring pages and crayons with them!

Good for Everyone

Pediatric offices see patients ranging in age between newborn through teenager. It is difficult to provide toys that work for all age groups. For some reason, coloring works for them all (except infants, of course)! I still enjoy coloring, and I’m…….uh….well, I’m an adult! 🙂 Too bad coloring pages weren’t available for me at the doctor’s office as a child. It would have been neat to come home and show off my artwork.

Have you caught on to the fact that I like being able to take home the coloring pages and crayons? Maybe it is because I like pictures plastered all over the refrigerator. Or maybe I just like seeing a full-length crayon with the wrapper still on it in the kids crayon box from time to time. Regardless of the reason, I am hooked on this activity at the doctor’s office…as long as my young toddler doesn’t leave her artwork (almost) permanently on the walls!

Bethany Too

We are pretty sure Bethany is allergic to cinnamon. I must admit that this idea boggled me a bit because she has had cinnamon before on occasion and has never had this reaction. Than I remembered that Phillip had drank milk before we knew he was allergic. Supposedly it can take your body a little bit to build the antibodies and react to the allergen.

After a bit of research this morning, I have learned some about the different types of cinnamon. It is very possible that Bethany is only allergic to one type of cinnamon, but because it is very hard to know which type was used in recipes, we will just stay away from all of it. This could be tricky because many times cinnamon is included on the ingredient list as “spices.” We will have to be very careful and always have benedryl on hand for her.

Due to our past experiences with food allergies, we did not rush her to the hospital or call the doctor.We just gave her benadryl and watched to make sure it worked and that no breathing problems developed. But we do intend to tell her doctor for future reference.

These pictures were taken right after we gave her the Benadryl. Click on them to get a bigger picture.

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Happy 8th, Anna!

Anna turned 8 last month! She made all the choices regarding her birthday, and here is what we did.

Her favorite birthday gift was the one God gave her – snow. It snowed a good 4 inches that day. So, while I made supper, Luke took the three oldest kids sledding at a nearby park.

For supper we had homemade pepperoni pizza. She specifically chose homemade because she likes mommy’s sauce (had to include that little tidbit!). Then we loaded up and headed to the mall.

Anna, being very sweet and generous, decided to spend some of her money on her mom and dad, and bought us a beautiful green, blue, and gold star. We felt very special to have her spend her own birthday money on us. After being convinced that she should spend some of the money on herself,she bought an Ariel toy for herself at Claire’s.

After the mall, we made a quick trip to Wal-Mart and let her pick out one candy item for herself and one drink of her choice to share with the family. She chose a sucker that looks like a baby bottle that also included other candy inside the bottle and root beer to drink.

When we got home, she got to stay up later than the other kids and enjoy a root beer float! I think she had a blast!!

Take a peek at a few pictures. She is at that age where I have to sneak up on her if I want a shot that isn’t silly! She doesn’t have a bit of personality, does she? 🙂

I’m just now posting this because I’ve had difficulty getting pictures on my blog at the correct size. I finally settled with just putting up thumbnails.

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Sports and Computer Games

This morning Peter was telling Luke and me about how he wanted to play every type of sport there is including football, baseball, and golf. Then he said, “And I’ll leave my wife home to take care of the kids.”

Yesterday, when I walked into the boys’ room, they were playing a computer game called Deimos Rising. It didn’t take me long to discover that they weren’t actually playing. They were watching the demo and pushing buttons to pretend they were playing. When asked why they didn’t play the game, they responded with, “We can get farther this way.”

Visiting China

We had been looking forward to the China Care dinner for a week when our van broke down. Since we were looking forward to it and because of the benefit to others if we went, we decided to walk the 2 miles to the dinner. It was a fun adventure! Believe it or not, it was not a bit stressful walking that far in downtown Providence with 5 children! We had 2 of them in a double stroller, 1 in a backpack, and 2 walking (switching out who walked and who rode to an extent). I think we all thoroughly enjoyed the time together as we walked!

About a fourth of the way there, I realized that Peter was a bit confused about where we were walking to. He pointed to a brick wall and excitedly said, “Hey! Is that the Great Wall of China?!” Apparently he thought we were walking to China and either thought we had walked a long way or that China was very close!! (The second assumption would make sense since we are meeting so many people from China and learning their language.) 🙂

By the way, our van is running and sitting in our driveway right now. And the most amazing part is that we drove this 24 hour van for a year and a half before we had a bit of trouble out of it! God is SO good to us!!! He even provided a mechanic through our pastor to help us get a good deal on getting it fixed! Thank you, Lord! 🙂

Why don’t you take a minute to thank God for at least one thing he has given you? You may find it hard to stop once you’ve started. Don’t worry. God is in no hurry to have you stop praising Him! You may even find a blessing or two in disguise!

Blog Party!

There is a blog party going on for moms at 5 Minutes for Mom. This is a great way to get more traffic to your blog and make friends with other bloggers. And, hey, if you win a cool prize in that process, that’s even better! To find out how to get in on this party, click here.

For those visitors who may be wondering a bit about me, I am a Christian homeschooling mom of 5 children, ranging in age from 2 months to 8 years. I like to read, play around on the computer, play board games, talk, write/type, spend time with my family, and many other things that I can’t think of right now. 🙂 If you would like to know a little more about me, take a look at this post from last February.

Have fun browsing and enjoy the party!


Mom Can’t Use a Hammer!

The other day I was trying to hang a shelf but was having trouble finding a stud in the wall to anchor it. I decided to try to hang it on a different wall that seemed to be made of sturdier material. The only problem was that every time I got the nail to a certain point, it would bend. After bending 5 nails, I realized I was nailing into a chimney that was plaster/wood with brick underneath.

Phillip was watching almost the whole time and handed me nail after nail to try again. He definitely got an opinion of his mom and her skill using a hammer! When we got downstairs, he said with a laugh, “Mom can’t hammer a nail in the wall without bending it. She should have gotten Dad to do it.” So much for impressing the 4 year old, huh? But, hey, at least I was right about one thing. The second wall was made of sturdier material!