Photographing my 4-year-old: sometimes it’s a workout

While my older daughter creates outfits and poses for me, trying to get a picture of my younger daughter isn’t quite as easy. It looks something like this…

My daughter playing fashion designer with some scarves.

Feeding the Kids

My kids are good eaters. Even the little one who we call “picky” is really just a lot more picky than her sister, but she is still a lot less picky than most other kids we know. I mean, she loves kale! And even she is getting better every day when it comes to eating. It could be that we just got lucky or it could be our philosophy on feeding them, or a little of both. But this is how feeding the kids works in our house.

They eat what we eat. A lot of the parents I know, maybe most, make separate meals for their kids. Each night for dinner, they make a “grownup meal” for themselves and they also make a “kid meal.” The kid meal usually consists of typical “kid food” – chicken fingers, macaroni and cheese, grilled cheese – the stuff you see on restaurant kid menus – and maybe a simple veggie or fruit on the side.

We don’t do this. Never have. From the time they started eating table food, they ate what I made for us.

Enjoying some grilled chicken and squash.

They have to try everything. Not just once. Every time I make it. Tastes change. They aren’t allowed to say, “I don’t like this.” Okay, so they’re allowed to say it, but it’s not considered a permanent state. The next time I make that particular food, they have to try it again. One bite. If they still say they don’t like it, they don’t have to eat any more of it at that meal. But they will have to try it again the next time I make it. The rule is that they have to try at least one bite of every thing on their plate. And, yes, there are definitely foods they have claimed to not like at one time that they now eat. Just the other night, we made my 4-year-old try one bite of the grilled onion on her plate after she once again said she doesn’t like onions.  She ended up eating every bit of it on her plate, all on her own.

No being sneaky. I absolutely do not believe in that whole “sneaky chef” thing – sneaking healthy foods into other stuff you know your kids will eat. I firmly believe it is important to educate our kids about food and healthy eating so they can learn to make good choices both now and as they get older.

Now, I do put vegetables into things as I often as I can, but they are not hidden. For example, my kids love macaroni and cheese with vegetables in it – spinach and broccoli are their favorites. My older daughter is actually disappointed if there are not vegetables in her macaroni and cheese.

Don’t deny them treats. After eating spinach omelets for breakfast, grilled chicken and veggies for lunch, carrots and celery for snacks, and kale at dinner, my kids are absolutely allowed to have a piece of chocolate or some ice cream as a treat.  I like to have “treats,” especially when I spend most of my time making sure I eat healthy. So should they.  They’re kids. Teach them good habits, but also let them be kids and enjoy. It’s also part of learning about food and learning to make good decisions. They are learning that as long as you are eating healthy most of the time, it is also okay to sometimes have the things you enjoy that aren’t as good for you. They are learning about moderation.

The week before Easter, my 8-year-old told me that she decided she didn’t want to have any “treats” at all that week because she knew she was going to get a lot of a treats that weekend. Completely her idea. And she did it. That’s my 8-year-old making a responsible decision about her own eating because she has learned about food and healthy eating. That’s also why I don’t buy the whole “sneaky chef” thing. Education is too important.

It’s important to let them be kids, too!

Home vs. Away. These are our general habits for feeding the kids in our every day life. When we are not at home, the rules change a bit. If we are at someone else’s house where all the kids are eating chicken fingers and french fries, my kids have chicken fingers and french fries if they want. Although, I think my older daughter often prefers the grownup food. At home, we only drink water. If we are with other kids, they can drink what everyone else is drinking if they want. We don’t deny them these things when they see other kids eating them. When we are with other kids, these are their decisions to make. Although, I am happy to say, I see my older daughter more and more choosing to stick with the healthier option.

I once worked with someone who ate a LOT of pop tarts. She said it was because her parents wouldn’t allow her to have them when she was a kid and she always saw her friends eating them. Now that it was up to her, she ate them all the time. I don’t want that. So I don’t deny them anything in moderation and educate them to make healthier decisions on their own.

Again, maybe we just got really lucky, but of course, I like to think that our parenting strategies had at least a little to do with our kids’ good eating habits.

Better Bread

I was doing my weekly online grocery order last week on Peapod when I noticed Food For Life Ezekiel bread. I remembered talking to a nutritionist once who said that if you were going to eat bread, it should absolutely be Ezekiel bread. She said that you buy it frozen because it is made without preservatives. It is also flourless, made instead with sprouted grains so it has a lower glycemic index than other bread. It sounded intriguing since I have become more and more of a natural whole foods eater over the past couple years. But, I blew it off at the time because it sounded a little strange and also like a bit of a pain to deal with bread that would quickly spoil if not frozen.

When I noticed it online last week, I thought again about the nutritionist’s advice, especially since I have been moving more and more toward an entirely whole foods diet and adding many new things into my diet lately that I now love. I decided to give the bread a try.

Again, this bread is flourless. Instead, it is made with “sprouted grains” – whole wheat, malted barley, whole millet, whole barley, whole lentils, whole soybeans, and whole spelt. The only other ingredients are water, yeast, sea salt and organic wheat gluten. According to the Food For Life website, when these grains are combined “a complete protein is created that closely parallels the protein found in milk and eggs. In fact, the protein quality is so high, that it is 84.3% as efficient as the highest recognized source of protein, containing all 9 essential amino acids.” Pretty cool.

But how does it taste? Well..good! It is not as soft as white bread, of course. But it is not as coarse as some of the hearty wheat breads out there. In fact, I liked it much better than any wheat bread I have had. It is a thin-sliced bread though, so if you like thick bread (which I don’t), this might be too thin for you. It is actually perfect for me. I think the texture is just right. As for the taste, it simply tastes like a multi-grain bread. It’s quite good.

I also LOVE that it is completely preservative-free. That’s pretty awesome! One of the things that stopped me from trying it before was worrying about losing the convenience of sliced bread since this has to stay in the freezer to prevent spoiling. Well, the day I first bought it, I took a few slices out of the bag (the frozen slices actually break apart very easily) and put them in the fridge so they would be defrosted to make lunch the next morning. No problem at all. Easy. Well…the next night, I forgot to take some out. So there I am ready to make my daughter’s lunch in the morning, and I have frozen bread. Guess what? No problem. I put two frozen slices in the toaster on low and pushed the “warm” button on my toaster. In one minute, I had defrosted bread. I’m glad I discovered this so quickly because now I don’t even worry about defrosting it ahead of time.

And, my 8-year-old didn’t notice any change in the bread form the normal wheat or mutli-grain bread we used to use.

One popular breakfast in my house is wheat mini bagels with peanut butter. But once the bag of bagels we have is gone, I think we will switch to slices of toasted Ezekiel instead of bagels. I seriously love this bread – both the lack of flour and the lack of preservatives. They do also make English muffins, but I have not seen them in my store yet. And pasta too, which I’d be interested in trying if I can find it.

If you’re trying to add more natural whole foods to your diet, give it a try. I wish I did it a few years ago when I was first told about it instead of being scared of the frozen bread. How silly. It’s the non-frozen preservative-filled bread that can sit in my cabinet for a couple weeks that I should have been scared of.

Happy Birthday, Dr. Seuss!

Stop Stealing Dreams

I wrote a blog post back in October titled Beyond Reading, Writing and Arithmetic. It was inspired by an experience with my 7-year-old daughter and what I viewed as a simple example of how our education system is failing both our children and, as a result, our society and its future.

I wondered near the end of that blog post if I was making too big of a deal out of the experience. I know now that the answer is actually that I didn’t make big enough of a deal out of it. Probably because I was brought up in the same system that taught me simply to fall in line. Don’t make too much noise. Now our kids are being taught to do the same. It’s a broken system that needs to be changed. The first step is to question it.

If you care about education at all, or the future of your children, or the future of our society, you must read this “manifesto” by Seth Godin titled Stop Stealing Dreams. Read it. Comment on it. Share it. Discuss it.

And here is Seth’s blog.

My Daughter’s Wish

You have to love the moments that make you think you might just be getting this whole parenting thing right.

Let The Lorax Speak for the Trees!

We are big fans of the Dr. Seuss books in our house. We love them not only for the whimsical language and images, but also for the messages that many of them convey through the whimsy.

The Lorax is one of those books. Watching the trailer for the movie and reading the story description on the official movie website, it is disappointing that it seems to completely miss the point. The Lorax is a story about understanding and appreciating the value of our environment and how it is important that we each take it upon ourselves to care because it can make all the difference for the future. The movie website describes the movie as “the journey of a 12-year-old as he searches for the one thing that will enable him to win the affection of the girl of his dreams.” You remember that part of the book, right? They have absolutely missed the point. And watching the trailer gives me no hope that they remained true to the book at all.

I thought they did a wonderful job with the Horton Hears a Who movie. It was beautiful, AND they stayed true to the story. So far, I am not seeing that here at all.

Anyway, I became aware of all of this through the efforts of a 4th grade class in Massachusetts. They were excited about The Lorax movie because they love the book and its message. They were highly disappointed to learn that in the promotion of the movie, there is absolutely no mention of the true message of the book and that the movie producers and promoters were not taking this opportunity to promote the message of the book. They even came up with ideas like handing out seeds to school children to help promote both the movie AND protecting our environment. These are some smart kids. And I imagine their teacher must be pretty special too.

They started a petition on change.org to try to get the movie producers and promoters to stay true to the message of the Dr. Seuss book and encourage environmental awareness and activism, and not just try to make money. Ummm…that is sort of the whole point of the book, after all.

The Sunflower Sword

This is a really cute kids’ book that tells a good story about the surprising results of kindness over violence. We borrowed it from the library, but i think it’s one I might like to add to our personal collection.

‘Tis the Season for Lying?

It’s happening.  My 7-year-old comes home from school this week and asks, “Mom, is Santa real?” Apparently, the kids at school are starting to talk. Some kids are telling all the other kids that Santa is not real and that it’s really just your parents.

I’m torn. I don’t want her to lose the sense of magic that comes along with believing in Santa. We get so little time to be kids and believe in magic and in the impossible before we have to face reality, I want that to last as long as possible for my kids. But I don’t want to straight up lie to her at this point either. She’s too old for that too. Especially since one of the big things I stress with my kids is that lying is a big NO…that whatever you do, lying about it is going to make it ten times worse. It’s important to me that my kids know that whatever happens, the most important thing is to be honest about it so we can talk about it and work through it.

So…how can I possibly lie to her?

I mean, I also try to teach them common sense. It’s okay to not tell the whole truth if you are planning a nice surprise for someone. That’s a good thing that the person will know about soon and will make them happy. It’s okay to tell your 3-year-old sister that the doctor checked her out too while she was asleep in the stroller during your appointment so she stops crying that she needs a checkup too (my 3-year-old LOVES going to the doctor for some reason). No harm done, happy little sister. And even in these situations, I kind of feel bad okaying lying since I’m so seriously against it the majority of the time. But, life isn’t all black and white, and you also need to teach your kids how to handle the grey areas, right? So…does Santa fall into this area of exception? A harmless little lie to make our kids happy…

So far since her direct questions started this week, I haven’t outright lied to her. I have been answering all of her questions with my own questions for her. I figure until I make a decision, I can just get her to form her own opinions.

Conversations have gone like this…

“Is Santa real?” “Well, what do you think?”

“Kids at school say he isn’t real.” “Well, why do they think that?”

“They say it’s just your parents pretending to be Santa.” “Well, how do they think their parents get all those presents?”

This has been my solution while I make a decision. Don’t outright lie….let her think what she wants. Let her figure it out or not. Let her decide what she believes. I mean, that in itself is another life lesson, right? Make up your own mind, decide for yourself what you believe in.

I’m definitely not going to lie to her at this point. I am definitely not going to look her in the eyes and say “Yes, Santa is real.” I value trust between us too much for that. And, honestly, I don’t want her at school adamantly standing up for the reality of a Santa that isn’t…based on lies we told her. But I also can’t imagine looking her in the eye and just outright crushing the magic of Santa for her. Not yet. And, yes, maybe part of me isn’t looking forward to admitting to her that we lied in the first place.

So I’m going to keep on guiding her to make up her own mind…telling myself that I’m not lying and am using the situation to teach her another valuable life skill in helping her figure it out on her own. The fact that she needs to figure it out based on lies I already told her…let’s just call that a grey area. A grey area all dressed up in a red suit and a white beard. Ho ho ho.