Five on Friday: iPad edition
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| C loves hearing her name in this app — and even though she’s not typically a Sesame Street fan, she loves it! |
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| Miss C is all about calling Rachel. I kind of love Rachel, too. She’s rad. |
4. Thomas & Friends: Engine Activity Fun. We got this one ages ago, and it’s a wonderful (free!) app. Both of the kids love doing the puzzles (there are different levels of difficulty) and C especially loves the colouring section.
5. The Speck iGuy. I was singing this guy’s praises today over on Scratch or Sniff along with another writer, and he really is awesome.
We bought one about three weeks ago because I was worried about the iPad getting cracked or broken since the kids are always toting it around. We used to just have a stand for it, and there was no actual protection. This guy is basically nothing BUT padding, so I feel more comfortable having the kids carry the iPad around. If it tips forwards, backwards, or gets dropped, it’s most likely going to be just fine.*
*Which is good, because I like to watch Netflix on the iPad when I’m sewing. I can set it up right next to the machine and keep my eyes on a show without sewing over my fingers. #winning
Tell me: What are your favourite iPad apps or accessories for kids?
Spending time with your kids: quality versus quantity
My kids are at the babysitter’s today.
I have been working for the last six and a half hours, and I still have an hour to go before I leave to pick them up.
I went upstairs a minute ago to grab a glass of milk (yes, and two Oreos) and I caught sight of a familiar red snowsuit. I could see them, just barely, from the kitchen window. They were all playing outside in the sitter’s backyard, throwing snowballs at each other.
In that moment — clutching my Oreos, standing in a quiet house, getting a ton of work done, and NOT being out in the freezing cold pretending to enjoy myself — I was really, really happy with our decision to get childcare one day a week.
Of course, I immediately felt a little guilty for being so grateful.
Read more about these kinds of feeeeeeeeeeeelings in this week’s parenting column, if you’re so inclined?
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| Click to read my column on childcare, no childcare, and related feeeeeeelings |
xo
Make your own Cougar Town inspired EAT letters
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| View the full tutorial |
On a related note, I have no idea what Anthropologie is actually like. I suspect it will be the year 2042 before we get a store in this part of Canada. I think I’d love it there, though?
xo
When moms follow (mom)trends
Understatement of the century: I am not a trendy and/or stylish person.
I am a super basic dresser — jeans, striped tops and sweaters, and don’t forget the uncool winter boots that I wear eight months out of the year (replaced with flats or sandals* in the summer).
*Ugly “mom-sandals,” according to the trendy Little Sis
I get a ton of hand-me-downs from Little Sis’s bestie, so I’m not even sure if I have my own style or not, but I totally love them. Stripes! Stripes! More stripes!
So when crazy-patterned leggings started popping up here and there on my friends, I wondered (A) if this was a legit trend or a mom-trend, (B) if they would look ridiculous or not on me, and (C) if I was too damn old for them.
My friend had a home party where an Official Travelling Leggings Saleswoman (here, for locals) brought her inventory over and let us try them on. Well, if my friends were buying them, then I decided I didn’t care about (C). We could all band together and look like we were trying to be young. Solidarity!
I tried on one pair (below) and was immediately sold. I still wasn’t sure about (A) and (B), but they were OMG SO SOFT AND CUDDLY-COMFY that I knew I had to have them.
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| My Instagram followers dug this pair. Thanks, baes!** |
**Hilary Duff taught me what “bae” means. I had thought it was short for “babe,” but it’s apparently an anagram for Before Anyone Else. You’re welcome, Fellow Older People.
You seriously won’t believe how soft they are.
I also bought this pair. You know, because they’re … neutral-ish? IDK.
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| My second purchase |
Then I got sick for a million days, which means I have only worn them (well, the first pair) out of the house once. It went well. No one hissed at me or tried to capture me and send me back to the circus or anything.
Then, today, I got a Facebook notification that the two OTHER pairs of patterned leggings I’d ordered from a co-op were in. Suddenly it was LEGGINGS CENTRAL up in this joint …
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| These camo ones (well, they look just like this stock photo I found) |
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| … and these leopard print ones (NOTE: these are not my skinny legs … unfortunately) |
Darling Husband thinks this legging trend is totally insane. So does our four-year-old son, who immediately noticed when I wore the first pair and told me I looked silly. Thanks for the support, family.
But my friends are rocking them, and I love how they look, so I’m timidly jumping on the cray-cray leggings train. I definitely plan on wearing the first two pairs out in public, with flowy shirts or sweaters. I’m wearing the camo ones right now (SRSLY SO COMFY) and I think I’d wear them out of the house. Probably. Maybe.
Not so sure about wearing the leopard pair in public. I’m kind of afraid of this situation …
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| Photo credit |
xo
Attack of the 10-day virus
I’m afraid to type that I’m better now, for fear that it will … *looks over shoulder* … come back for me.
But I have to tell you about the last 10 days* …
*This post is totally not sponsored by Imodium, but they are welcome to send me free boxes of their life-affirming products because I could kiss them right now.
As a wife, I dread my husband getting sick because nobody likes a damn Man Cold.
As a mom, I dread the kids getting sick because it means surely I’ll be sick next.
As a self-employed person** with zero sick days and zero people to cover for me, I dread illnesses like … well, like the plague?
**Yes, I worked through the entire illness, with the exception of rescheduling two calls so they didn’t have to take place in MY BATHROOM. Where’s my medal?
So when D had an, um, stomach-related accident at cheerleading on Sunday, I was immediately like OH NO, WE ALL GONNA GET SICKKKKKK. It’s coming! I know it!
The next 10 days — yes, TEN ENTIRE DAYS — involved at least one of us being very, very ill. I won’t get into the gory details, or specifiy “who did what,” (ew) but just understand that there was throwing up, there were stomach cramps, there were fevers, and there was diarrhea. So, so, so much diarrhea.
(Related: why does my spellcheck want to spell it “diarrhoea”? What’s with the “O” Jeeves?)
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| My sickbed essentials: dry toast, SATC 2, and Betty & Veronica comics |
Darling Husband was the least sick, and I was definitely the most sick (as if it’s a competition?).
We don’t know exactly what we had, but a friend was diagnosed with the nasty H3N1 — which is apparently making the rounds — and we suspect that might have been it. But then other people say that it wasn’t the flu, it was more of a Novovirus, so … who knows? I’ll stick with calling it a stomach virus, because … oh God, it was just the worst in that general region.
The frustrating part was that the kids would be sick, feel fine for a day or two, and then suddenly be sick again. We would think they were past it, and then OH CRAP! SHE’S THROWING UP OVER THE EDGE OF THE GROCERY CART.
(The grocery store incident was all left to poor Darling Husband, as I was too sick to leave the house from Wednesday to … well, I haven’t left yet? But I could have today?)
I’m not sure if there is a point to this post, other than to write you a thorough shopping list of things to keep on hand in case you and your family contact Whatever It Was That We Had:
- Gatorade for the grown-ups (Orange tastes like watery melted freezies. It’s not good, but it works.)
- Pedialyte for the kids (Our kids would only drink it mixed with Gataorde, and called the concoation “Special Sick Juice.”)
- Salted soda crackers (all I ate for days — MyFitnessPal thought I was purposely starving myself)
- Individual bottles of ginger ale (for when you’re feeling well enough to quit the Gatorade)
- Pepto-Bismol (to be downed out of desperation)
- Imodium (let’s just say that WE DIDN’T HAVE ANY for one really terrible, dark night, and I will never again be WITHOUT IT IN MY HOUSE, just in case)
When you’re that sick, all you can do is wish that you felt like your normal self again. It seems like a distant memory, to be eating real food and sitting up without feeling dizzy and not wishing you could hit yourself over the head with a baseball bat to get away from it all.
Now that I’m newly-better, I must say that it feels AMAZING to be a real human again. Although that could also be the two celebratory “I’m-better!” cans of Diet Coke I downed this afternoon.
I think I might put on real clothes*** and actually leave the house tomorrow, and I can’t wait.
xo
*** Well, OF COURSE I meant leggings. What did you think I meant?
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Heather's Handmade Life 