She called me in yesterday to show me the cat in her closet.

As I type, my four year old is purposely isolated in her room.

That sentence seems really weird for me. How is it respectful to force my child to be in her room alone every day for an hour? How is that gentle? Well, I’ve figured out some ways to make it so.

We first tried out “Quiet Time” back in January. With a combination of preschool every day and Peanut’s severe hatred of being alone in her room, we stopped shortly after. But when the semester ended, which meant that we were all together for 24 hours a day, things got stressful pretty quickly. Peanut’s preschool was only 2.5 hours four days a week, but it’s still a break. Just a bit of time for Peanut to be away from little sister all over her and me to be away from having two kids all over me. Time for me to accomplish something like loading the dishwasher without two little “helpers” (which I’m completely grateful to have, but jeeze chores take longer with “help”!). Just time for a little bit of alone.

So when I was reading this guest post on Free Range Kids (great site and great book, by the way!), it occurred to me that I should try again. A quick summary is that every day, her children go to their rooms for one hour and she is left alone to do what she wishes. And not only is it good for her, but it’s good for her kids too! This sounded like a dream! When your child stops napping, it makes life both easier and harder. Yes there’s less timing around naps, but man everyone is grumpy by day’s end. Most definitely including me. A little break in the middle of the day sounded devine!

So, I decided to make it so. And thus far, it’s been going great. There have been a few key things that I did in order to make this gentle and respectful and honestly, it couldn’t be going better.

1. Be matter of fact. Quiet time must be announced very matter of factly. Quiet time doesn’t start while you’re upset or in a “being sent to your room” fashion. It’s simply time for quiet time so it starts. When my daughter comes out of quiet time (for a variety of reasons), I just tell her I’m pausing the timer (I use the timer on my iPhone) and she does what she needs to (e.g. goes to the bathroom) and tells me when she’s going back into her room. Handling it in a matter of fact way has turned this from something to get emotional about (either angry or sad that she’s going into quiet time) into something we just do.

2. Use a specific time. I have an alarm that goes off on my phone every day at 1PM (except Sundays, where we eat lunch at my in-laws’ at 1PM, so it goes off at 11AM in order to do quiet time before we leave). Quiet time is always one hour long. There’s no arguing either of these times. When the timer goes off, it goes off.

3. Be flexible. Just like I said in number one, I don’t get upset when she leaves her room. I just pause the timer (because otherwise she’d sit on the toilet for 20 minutes just to be outside of her room, because somehow that’s better) and start it up again when she’s done. She still leaves her room plenty, but she still gets her hour in and she understands that she is going to get her hour no matter how many times she goes potty or needs a drink or needs to tell me just one thing. I have started a rule that if she comes out purely to ask how much longer quiet time is that she gets 5 minutes added (because she started coming out every 2-3 minutes to ask), but since imposing the rule, all I have to do is remind her. She’s never actually had the 5 minutes added. Also, if we’re out and about when the alarm rings, Peanut knows that we’ll do quiet time when we get home.

4. Focus on my needs. Peanut is 4. Sure, that’s not really that old, but it is old enough for her to understand that I have needs. I’ve explained to her (and re-explained when she wants to hear about it again) that mama needs quiet time too. I’ve told her that it makes me a happier person and a nicer mama when I get a little break. She seems to understand this and it negates her arguments when she tries to tell me that she’s happy so she doesn’t need quiet time. I just tell her mama still needs it and she understands.

I plan on continuing with “quiet time” for the foreseeable future. Once Twig stops napping (crossing my fingers that it’s not any time soon!), she’ll get quiet time too. I also think this is a great way to get Peanut used to her school’s “nap time” (during which the children aren’t forced to nap, but must lay quietly with the lights off on their cots) that she’ll have to start doing again in the fall. It will mean that she doesn’t get quiet time at home when we start that, but we’ll all be getting breaks from each other while I’m in class anyway. So if this sounds like something you’d like to do, give it a try. Remember you can be a separate person while still being respectful to your child. And remember that it’s good for both of you to get some alone time.

This last month just flew by! We’ve been having a ton of fun being out of school and getting on each other’s nerves a bit, but still it’s great. Mother’s Day was this month and you guys made me a block tower and a card (on which Peanut wrote “I love you” about 50 times). We also spent almost every day this month confirming that we’re not going to the ocean quite yet (we leave at the end of June!). It’s been just grand.

Twig, you are just so amusing now. If I ask you if you want something (like food, for instance) and you really, really want it, you say “Yeah!” It sounds more like “Ah!” though and it’s super cute. You also started saying duck, in the context of playing Duck, Duck, Goose of course! Peanut has been begging to play pretty much since you were born and we decided a couple of weeks ago that you may kind of grasp the concept now. And you do! Well, for the most part. You were initially just amused that you could smack us on the head as hard as you could and yell “da!” Pretty soon though, you figured out the best part of Duck, Duck, Goose is that you get to run away from people! Now you almost always goose on the first person you come to (usually still yelling “da!”) and run away squealing. This has developed into loving to run and chase or run away from your sister all the time.

Really, you love to mimic Peanut in general. Is Peanut leaning against the couch? You must lean against the couch. Is Peanut dancing? You must dance. Peanut is playing babies? You must play babies (to be fair though, you quite enjoy playing babies without Peanut too). Quiet time (a mandatory hour of time where Peanut has alone time in her room every day), when it doesn’t coincide with your nap, is about your least favorite time of the day. What are you supposed to do without your big sister to mimic? Really, it works in my favor the majority of the time though. If you’re both outside and I need you to come in, all I have to do is convince Peanut to come inside. 90% of the time you’ll follow her. It can also work against my favor though when Peanut decides to do something really foolish (like trying to walk on the side of the railing the stairs are on), you’ll immediately decide you need to do it too. Then when she stops, you decide you need to keep working on mastering that new skill. Blerg.

Peanut, you’re pretty hilarious too. Lately you love to tell me how much prettier you are than me. If I’m putting on make-up (a rare occurrence out of laziness), you tell me about how you don’t need make-up because you are so much prettier than me. Or if someone gives me a compliment you immediately tell them that you’re prettier than me. I don’t feel offended by it. Honestly, I love how candid kids are at this age.

You’re also telling me lately all of the stuff you want to be when you grow up. For a while, it changed as often as you change your underpants (which is daily, thank you very much). Monday-bus driver, Tuesday-chef, Wednesday-lady at the recycling center that scoops compost into the truck, etc. Now though, it’s the same thing every day–astronaut. Your daddy couldn’t be more pleased. He’s mostly pleased because it means that you need to be an engineer, which he thinks is the only logical college degree. I pointedly bring up that I am not going to school to become an engineer. He’s a jerk like that (don’t worry, it’s in a funny way).

And again, I’m amazed with your memory. When we were trying to sell our van, we had to take it to Salt Lake for a company to look at it. Right when we got into the van, you asked me about the movie with the blue dog. You see, a month or two before this, we were looking through our few DVDs and you asked to watch a Blues Clues one. I told you we couldn’t because we had gotten the case out of the car, but had forgotten the actual DVD in the van’s player. You remembered from that long ago! And then when we did sell the van a week later, you were adamant that we get the DVD out of the player. Apparently it’s a good one! You’re also getting really good at reading your calendar. Every morning when you wake up you cross off yesterday (often before I’m even out of bed) with a big black marker. Then you tell me what date it is and, when asked, you’ll scan up to figure out what day of the week. You also enjoy that I put what’s happening on that day (and get pretty frustrated when I forget) so that you know what’s coming up. We drew on a car for when we leave for the beach and you love looking at it.

Until next month,

Mama

We had to euthanize our cat Darwin.

He was the pet that started the whole naming after scientists trend. He was the first kitty that we picked out before deciding that we needed to go back and get one of his brothers. He was my foot warmer. The cat that was always coming to greet me when I got home. It still hurts to look back at old pictures of him.

It all started a year ago, when he started acting weird. He was hiding around the house and pulsing his tail. Pretty quickly we realized he was peeing a little and then immediately after that we started finding blood. We took him to the vet and of course he had a urinary tract infection. We got medication and thought we were done. But it didn’t go away. We tried about three different antibiotics that round and it still didn’t go away.

The vet sent us to a specialist in Salt Lake, who said there were a few possibilities. Two of which would need surgery and the other two would mean lifelong battling and medication, with good days and bad days. The most likely possibility was that it was an irregularity in his bladder from not closing properly when he was born (because when you’re in the womb, your umbilical cord attaches to your bladder). It would cost $400 for the ultrasound to confirm and then $2000 to do the actual surgery. We had a tough decision on our hands. Do we save our cat and go back into credit card debt? Of course we didn’t have that much money laying around. At that point we had already exhausted our emergency fund from his previous treatment. We decided that, in our case, it was selfish to try to keep him just to avoid the pain of having him gone. There was a large chance that he would be battling painful urinary tract infections for the rest of his life. So we put him down.

We weren’t planning on getting another cat. I had actually specifically said that I wasn’t ready. But when my father heard that we were one cat owners, he thought maybe we could help. They have 5 cats I think, and one of them was being bullied severely. The only cat in the house with claws kept attacking her. So he asked if we may want to give her a new home and we said we’d try her out. She hid, literally under our kitchen (through a whole she found in the basement), for the first week that she was here. We were actually wondering if she had somehow gotten out of the house because we did not see her. Eventually my husband saw her one night and then I saw her and lured her out with food. It took her a long time to warm up to us, but now she’s part of the family. Albiet a still skiddish part.

She loves to sleep on my legs at night and waits for me to go to bed in order to do so. The problem is that she expects to be pet first and will meow in order to tell me so. She’s skiddish though and her version of rubbing up against your legs is to walk back and forth just a fingertip’s distance away, still expecting to be pet. And meowing in order to be pet. So I have to make sure I catch her before I go into the bedroom (a feat within itself) so that she doesn’t wake Twig with her meowing.

She loves to lounge around all day on my bed or on the couch. She’s made good friends with Newton, as you can see. I don’t think they’ll ever be as close as he and Darwin were, but they’re still close. We were really lucky to get an older cat that tolerates the girls. If she’s getting overwhelmed, she just runs away. Usually, given her skiddish-ness, she doesn’t let them get close enough anyway. She does occasionally let them pet her though and she’s even been known to rub up against Twig’s feet while she’s nursing.

I still miss Darwin and it still hurts to think of him, but I’m happy that we were given the opportunity to save Kelvin from a bad situation. So there’s our update in pet-land!

This post contains affiliate links for your convenience. All thoughts are my own. 

Lately I’ve been feeling like I’m a really horrible mother.

I don’t say this to gain sympathy from you. Trust me, words on consolation are far from what I need right now. I’m just giving you perspective to where I’m at right now.

Half the time I can’t stand my kids. This is where I want to be in life and I want to be at home watching my children grow. I want to be that directly involved. I’m happy to be done with school for the summer and get some time with them without homework looming over my head, but it also opens a whole new can of worms. We’re together all day every day. I know I’m a stay at home mom in most senses of the term, but not in that piece that pulls it all together. In going to school, even online, I always have another goal and a specific purpose to get away. It makes life more stressful because there’s more on my plate, but it also gives me a small respite of time to be an adult.

Now that we’ve been out for nearly a month, both myself and Peanut, we’re getting on each other’s nerves. And Twig too. It’s a hard age, for me at least, when they’re so mobile and yet so emotionally immature. And needy.

I yell, a lot. I don’t want to, but it somehow keeps happening. I used to be upset at myself for yelling at Peanut once a week, but now it’s nearly a daily occurrence. I do stop at the point of being physical anywhere beyond taking her in her room and not-very-nicely dropping her onto her bed, so I guess that’s something. And I’m working on not yelling, so I guess that’s something too.

I just spend so much of my day waiting for it to be over. For that little bit of me time after they go to bed, which often extends beyond what it should and surely effects my mood in the morning from the lack of sleep. I don’t particularly like getting down on the ground and playing with the girls. I get really tired of the endless imaginative games after only a few minutes. I often feel stretched to my limit at what should ordinarily be every day tasks. This shouldn’t be how I feel.

These feelings are part of the reason I’m so excited about the Mindful Parenting eBundle I shared with you all last week. I’m hoping to use these resources to get back my perspective. Like the eBooks Mindset for Moms and Nurturing Creativity: A Guide for Busy Moms. I really, really need this right now. I need to remind myself that there are glorious things happening in my everyday life. I need to remember how to appreciate my children at the ages they’re at right now. I need to get myself into a good mindset before I start school in the fall. I hope you’ll join me in ordering this eBundle for not only these wonderful resources, but all of the other ones too. It’s really a great value and I’m excited to start reading and get myself back on track.

When I was pregnant with Lily during the winter months, my friends teased me about being the “germ Police.” I was in my second trimester of pregnancy right in the middle of cold and flu season. I knew that if I got sick, I could endanger my unborn baby.

Some people believe that coughs and colds during the winter are inevitable, but during my pregnancy, I was unwilling to concede that I was going to spend most of the winter with stopped-up noses and sore throats. I did a little research and developed a strategy to boost our immune systems and avoid viruses.

Get plenty of rest
I learned that people who get less than seven hours of sleep each night are much more likely to get sick than those who get adequate rest. I was careful to tuck myself (and my husband!) into bed on time, and we made rest a priority. Last winter, I opted out of my book club just because it kept me up too late. At that time, staying healthy was more important to me than extra activities.

Avoid sugars
In my research, I also found studies that indicated that sugar suppresses the immune response of the body. I already knew that too much sugar was bad for me, but after I read the study, I was really motivated to eliminate all sugar from our diets. This decision did not make me popular with my husband, but I knew it was for the best.

Get plenty of Vitamins D and C
I found plenty of research to support the fact that a diet high in Vitamins C and D helps keep the immune system in top form. I loaded my plate with green vegetables, and had fruit smoothies several times a week. I also incorporated plenty of fish in my diet. We took multivitamins every day to make sure that our bodies were fully capable of fighting viruses.

Rest and hydrate at the first sign of illness.
We had a few sore throats and sniffy noses, but at the first signs of illness, I made sure that we went right to bed and drank plenty of fluids. We never got very sick at all with this strategy. After just a day or two or rest and hydration, we felt much better and were able to continue with our everyday activities.

Wash your hands and be careful.
I really wasn’t a the “germ Police,” but I was very careful about avoiding exposure to people who I knew were sick. Even my mom was uninvited to my house when I found out that she’d had a bad cold two days before. I was kind but very firm when I asked if we could reschedule our visit. I didn’t go overboard with hand washing and hand sanitizer, but we always washed before meals and tried to keep our hands away from my face.

I feel that I was very successful with my strategy for avoiding illness last winter. My husband ended up with a slight cold, and most of the winter, we felt better than we ever have. Make sure to consult with your doctor before making any major changes. I was able to talk to my doctor about everything- nutrition, swaddling, cord blood options and more! It was so nice to get through winter without weeks of illness!

Katie Moore has written and submitted this article. Katie is an active blogger who discusses the topics of, motherhood, children, fitness, health and all other things Mommy. She enjoys writing, blogging, and meeting new people! To connect with Katie contact her via her blog, Moore From Katie or her twitter, @moorekm26

Northern Utah Summer Bucket List

Welcome to the Mindful Parenting eBundle Sale, organized by Jennifer from Hybrid Rasta Mama, Lauren from Hobo Mama, and Laura from Authentic Parenting!

The Mindful Parenting eBundle is 22 titles by esteemed parenting authors. This is a handpicked selection of e-books, workshops, e-magazines, and audio, with themes such as creativity and play, peaceful guidance, mindfulness for mothers, children and food, self-care and relaxation, and more.

That’s a total value of $274 USD for the humble price of $24.95 USD!

Are you as excited as I am?

Let me share the list of contributors:

1. Parenting for Social Change by Teresa Graham Brett
2. A Unique 7-Step Parenting Tool: Sleep talking by Marcy Axness
3. Relaxation Meditation, audio by Amy Phoenix of Presence Parenting
4. Newbie’s Guide to Positive Parenting by Rebecca Eanes of Positive Parents
5. Issue three of the Play Grow Learn magazine by Christie Burnett of Childhood 101
6. Getting Back on Track! Why We Explode and What We Can Do About it, audio by Genevieve Simperingham of Peaceful Parent Institute
7. Stress Relief for parents, audio by Genevieve Simperingham of Peaceful Parent Institute
8. Creative Play Workshop, email course by Gina Kimmel of Connecting Family and Seoul and Katherine Lockett of Creative Playhouse
9. Mindset for Moms by Jamie Martin
10. Moods of Motherhood by Lucy Pearce of Dreaming Aloud
11. 42 Rules for Divorcing with Kids by Melinda Roberts
12. Mommy Overwhelm by Laura Schuerwegen of Authentic Parenting
13. Nurturing Creativity, Guide for Busy Parents by Renee Tougas of Tougas Café
14. The Playful Family by Shawn Ledington Fink
15. Poetry of a Hobo Mama by Lauren Wayne of Hobo Mama
16. Encouraging Words for Kids by Kelly Bartlett of Parenting From Scratch
17. Raising a Creative Kid by Jillian Riley of A Mom With a Lesson Plan
18. Children and Food by Tara Wagner of The Organic Sister
19. Coming of Age, audio by DeAnna L’Am
20. The Parenting Primer, A Guide to Positive Parenting in the First Six Years by Michelle Carchrae of The Parent Vortex
21. API Live! Teleseminar Series: “8 Principles of Attachment Parenting” by Attachment Parenting International

Plus a lovely freebie by Jennifer Saleem of Hybrid Rasta Mama: The Mindful Mothering Challenge.

This bundle is available only from MAY 28 to JUNE 10.

After that, these products will never be sold together again at this price!

Find out everything about the sale at Mindful Nurturing.

How I Clean Practically My Whole House with Baking Soda and Vinegar

First start off by getting a spray bottle and filling it about 1/3 of the way with vinegar and the rest with water. Whenever I refer to using vinegar (unless specifically stated otherwise), I mean this spray bottle of diluted vinegar.

Bathtub: wet whole bathtub with water, sprinkle liberal amounts of baking soda on tub, scrub with scrub brush or rough sponge, let sit for at least five minutes before washing away with water.

Carpet deodorant: sprinkle carpet with baking soda, let sit for a few minutes, vacuum carpet as per usual.

Counters/tables/other surfaces: spray counter with vinegar, wipe down with dishcloth (using extra elbow grease where necessary). For stuck on stuff, spray liberal amounts of vinegar and let sit for a moment before wiping.

Dusting: wipe majority of dust away with a duster or sock, spray with vinegar, wipe with dishcloth.

Mirrors/windows: spray with vinegar and wipe off with paper towels until no streaks remain. If there’s anything gucky that won’t come off with the first spray, repeat. If it’s really stuck, spray and let it sit a minute before wiping off. If that still doesn’t work, break out the Magic Clean Eraser or similar product (hey, I did say practically!).

Mopping: plug up a sink, put a few handfuls of baking soda in the sink, pour about equal part undiluted vinegar into the sink, add some water (it’s not an exact science), use dishcloths (or a mop if you don’t feel like crawling on the floor) to wipe pre-swept/vacuumed floor.

Pee neutralizer (e.g. cat pee on couch, dog pee on carpet): spray on liberal amounts of vinegar and allow to dry. Repeat if necessary.

Polishing chrome (faucets and the like): make a paste from baking soda by either mixing water and baking soda or using a dishcloth you’ve already wiped baking soda up with, rub baking soda all over chrome (using some elbow grease if you really want it to shine), rinse with water.

Sanitizing: spray with vinegar (great sanitizer!) and wipe away with paper towels. Discard paper towels immediately.

Sinks (general cleaning): spray with vinegar and wipe away with dishcloth, repeating if necessary, rinse any gunk off with water. For stuck on stuff, spray on a lot of vinegar, let sit for a minute or so, then wipe away.

Soap grime: sprinkle on baking soda, spray vinegar on top, wait until bubbling ceases, wipe away.

Toilet: spray the whole toilet bowl with vinegar, sprinkle toilet bowl with baking soda (focusing on the particularly gross parts), spray with vinegar again (focusing on the particularly gross parts) until you see most of the baking soda reacting, wait 5-10 minutes and then scrub with a toilet brush. Spray vinegar on a paper towel and use that to wipe off the outside of the toilet.

If I’ve left out on anything or you have your own ways of cleaning that I may want to try, please leave a comment about it below! Until then, happy green cleaning!