Blog to Inspire finalist tout-est-des-roses is Sara Sophia, who blogs to share her joy, her everyday adventures and happy findings, things she loves and things that move her.
Eight years ago our first child was born,
a wee little man who came into the world
all shiny and new on the eve of Christmas.
I sat in the hospital [...]
Are you ready to write your resolutions? The New Year provides a good time for us to take stock, as so many of us do. Despite psychologists’ claims that New Year’s resolutions are doomed, I think we can beat the trend. Rather than putting myself in the 78% that blow off or otherwise fail to [...]
Blog to Inspire finalist Strocel is Amber, an all around crunchy granola mom to 4-year-old Hannah and 1-year-old Jacob. She is an engineer-turned-at home mom and an aspiring freelance writer.
The holiday season is approaching fast. Much faster than I like or would care to admit, frankly. You would think that one of these years I [...]
The week between Christmas and New Year tends to be family time without the frantic preparations of the week before. If parents are off work and looking for meaningful activities for the whole family, this is a great time for service projects and service learning.
Service projects encourage children to connect with people [...]
In my husband’s family, in rural England, Christmas Day must involve playing Pooh Sticks after Christmas lunch. This is the game Winnie-the-Pooh devised in The House at Pooh Corner (the game that author A. A. Milne created for his son Christopher Robin Milne).
The game of Pooh Sticks involves dropping sticks off a [...]
Last minute and you aren’t sure what you’ll use to wrap gifts?
Don’t reach for paper. All you need to create colorful holiday gift wrap is a cloth bag, a tea towel, or a play cloth. No more post-holiday bags of garbage. Reduce and reuse.
Sew a bag. Even last minute, [...]
During this midwinter season, many cultures light the darkness with festivals of light, religious celebrations, new year celebrations, and parties and gatherings of all kinds. Some of these celebrations have deep, deep roots, while others are new, soon-to-be traditions not even a generation long.
As an example of a festival of lights on [...]
My family lives next to a golf course full of mature pine trees. We gather pine cones frequently. Our flower beds and gardens are full of them—yet the pine cones keep coming. So, we do crafts and make decorations with pine cones.
Last year Nature Mom did the same. She and her [...]
The Food Renegade posted today on an FTC report on hearing about food marketing to children.
Conclusion of the report? Voluntary standards for advertisers.
I want to give the benefit of the doubt, but I’m just too cynical. As long as there is profit to be made from marketing sugar, fat, and salt—and [...]
One of the strongest senses evoking our emotional responses to holidays is smell. For this season in our house, pine and bay (evergreens) mix with spices like cinnamon and ginger. We have spiced pumpkin, spiced smoothies, spiced eggnog, spiced cookies, and spiced cider. There is a lot of cinnamon smell in our [...]