Money, Love, and Change

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After traveling last weekend, everyone was ready to take it easy.  We wanted to get out and enjoy nature this weekend, and were thinking about taking a short trip (less than 2 hours) to a state park.  However, on Friday evening, we pulled out our atlas, and found a nature center that was only 15 miles away!

We decided to head over there on Saturday morning, and had a lot of fun.  If it hadn’t been for the humidity, we would have stayed longer (our bassett hound is a trooper, but she doesn’t do well in high heat combined with humidity).  We plan on going back soon, since there is another trail that we can take the kid on.

While we were at the nature center, I picked up a brochure for a local self-sustaining farm.  We’re big on local and organic foods - come to find out, we’ve been living about 12 miles away from this farm, complete with a store, that sells in bulk!  I checked out this place over the weekend, and was really impressed.  The prices for the bulk food are really affordable, and some items that have been treats for our family, such as quinoa, are now going to become more of a staple.  I also like the idea of supporting a local establishment.

We also met up with some friends this weekend, and our kids had the chance to play together.  They get along really well, and it was nice catching up.  On Sunday, my husband met up with a friend to play disc golf.  He took the kid, so I got to sleep in.  It was awesome!

Other than groceries, we didn’t spend any money this weekend. We had a great time, though!  What about you?

If you’ve been following some of my previous posts, you know that a recent source of stress in our lives has been finding a program for the kid for the next school year.  It seems like some good karma has come our way, and we found something that is a great fit.

My kid is only 2, so we’re trying to find something that doesn’t last all day, but gives him the chance to interact with other kids.  We always go to the free story time at our local library (as well as visit the library at least once a week), so I was hoping for something for 2 other days.

We found a program at a local farm that is two mornings a week.  The kids get to bake, hang out with the animals, and play.  It’s also a parent-child program, so I get to moo with the cows too, which I haven’t done since I was a small child.  How cool is that?

To top it all off, it’s affordable, and our money will be supporting an organic self-sustaining farm.

It’s still going to stretch our budget, though.  I need to get serious about finding a good source of work-at-home income.   But for tonight, I’m just going to be thankful that we found something!

If you’ve got young kids, what do you think of a program like this?  I know that it’s not traditional, but our son loves to be outside and running around; I think it’s a great fit for us.

We’ve been putting aside $25 a month for Christmas.  I know that this doesn’t sound like a lot, but keep the following things in mind:

1.  My husband and I don’t buy each other gifts for Christmas.  Seriously.  If one of us wants or needs something, we discuss it and then plan appropriately.  Besides, with the birth of our son, we both get more joy watching him open presents.

2.  We don’t spend a lot on family.  In the past few years, we have sent framed pictures or photo books as gifts using gift certificates and other discounts.  I plan on using Boomertowne gift cards for family this year as well.

3.  My son (who this fund is primarily for) doesn’t need a lot of toys.  Last year, we spent $150 (toys and clothes) and he had a wonderful Christmas.  We figure that a similar amount will be good for this year, especially if we shop ahead of time (which we didn’t do last year).

Today we went shopping to get my husband the new Guitar Hero game (free after gift cards).  On the way home, we stopped at Toys R Us - I had heard that they were having a sale on Brio trains.  I was wrong - they were actually having a clearance sale!

For $60, we got our son a new train set with track, 2 extra sets of track, 2 stations (a conductor station and a repair shop), and 2 additional train cars.  This is going to be his “big gift” this year.  I’m really excited that we were able to get such a great deal, and we know that the kid loves trains already (he has a smaller Brio set).

The only thing I haven’t gotten ready is a good hiding spot for this year’s gifts!

Do you like Christmas shopping early?  Why or why not?

Warning:  Rant ahead…

I live in a smaller town.  There used to be an online mothers group, of which I was a member.  At some point, a bunch of the mothers decided to open another group in which you have to know another mom to get in.  The old group is now gone.

This is all fine with me.  I understand the safety issues involved with online forums, especially ones in which groups of children will be meeting together.  I know two of the mothers who are members of the new group, and I signed up for the new group at the end of March.

I am still not a member.  According to the site, you cannot access the forums until you attend one of their “events”.  Fine.  Whatever.  Tupperware and candle meetings are not my thing, but I figured that the kid and I could attend one of the kid events.

Here’s the catch:  You need to request a list of events.  I am not going to argue the point that e-mailing anyone who requests a list of events might not be the greatest idea in terms of safety.  However, a list of something should be sent upon request.  This is where my problem lies.  E-mails from three different accounts have not been acknowledged over the course of 3 months.

Keep in mind that all I want to do is enter the forums and ask for opinions on the local preschools.

What’s a mom to do?  I did google some of the area preschools to no avail.  Apparently the internets is still a big scary monster in this town.  There is one preschool that gets very high ratings online.  I recently happened to find out that there was a case of sexual abuse at this same preschool via an acquaintance.  Hmmmm…

Being that it is summertime, I don’t see the two moms that I do know on a regular basis.  Perhaps I need to hang out at the playgrounds in a creepy sort of way and try to find someone else I can use as a reference?

I have always stayed fairly well-networked on a professional level,  but this whole mom-networking thing makes me feel like I’m back in high school.  Until this point in time, I’ve been more closely associated with moms who are not in this area.  Perhaps I’ve missed out on the chance to join the local “exclusive” clique…

End of rant.  At this point, I’m just going to set up some appointments with the schools directly and go with my gut feeling.  It’s worked well so far!

We took our 2-year-old to Sesame Place on Wednesday.  Sesame Street is the only television show he watches, and since Sesame Place is relatively close (within 3 hours), we thought it would be a nice family outing.

Overall, I think this is a great place to take your younger kids.  The park is not huge, and it has a lot of water attractions that are geared towards little ones.  Since we went on a Wednesday, it was not crowded at all.  Characters from Sesame Place are outside during different times of the day, and you can take pictures with them for free.

Here is a breakdown of our costs:

$126 - 3 tickets; these are 2-day passes, and we got a AAA discount.  We plan on going again in the fall.

$13 - general parking; there is preferred parking, but it is not worth it.  It took us about 3 minutes to get from the park entrance to our car.

$30 - food;  this is the one area where we did not plan well.  We were going to pack a picnic lunch, but we had a family crisis to deal with the night before and didn’t have time.  That being said, for $30 we got 2 chicken salads, a kid’s meal with a take-home Elmo container and souveneir cup, a fruit cup, a banana, and a soda for my husband and I.  I was pleased with the healthy selections, at least.

$30 - souveneirs;  I know, I know.  We went a little crazy here, but I have to say that the items in the gift shops were not too overpriced.  We got the kid a Cookie Monster ball (this kid loves balls!), a miniature basketball hoop, stickers (his other passion!), and a tub of popcorn (with souveneir bucket).  The basketball hoop is well-made (it doesn’t have suction cups, but has a clip that fits well on doors and drawers).  We’re going to start a reward chart for potty training, which is why I got the stickers - there are 550 of them, so if he’s not potty-trained by then, I’m not sure what I will do!

$30 - gas and tolls

Total: about $250, and we can go back again once more this season.

It wasn’t the cheapest trip, but we had budgeted $300 for a summer trip this year.  When we go again, we’ll definitely pack a lunch.    Have you been to Sesame Place?  What did you think?

We had a blast today - my husband took the day off, and we took the kid to Sesame Place.  I’ll write more tomorrow, but I give this place three thumbs up if you have little ones!

Until I had a kid of my own, I never realized what a great resource craft stores could be for toys.  Not only do they have some great hands-on gifts and crafts for kids, but most of the larger craft store chains will print coupons in the Sunday paper for 40%-50% off  of a single regular priced item.

Here are just a couple of things I have found:

1.  Christmas gifts for my niece:  She is creative, and always loves the things we send - I have been able to purchase the large art kits (with pens, markers, crayons, etc.), little sewing kits, and some cool stuff from Crayola.

2.  Every Mother’s Day, I purchase 3 (for the gramas and great-grandma) of the clay kits to make a handprint of my son.  The ones I get are really nice - they have a 2-piece frame (one side for a picture, and one side for the clay imprint).  They are great bridal shower gifts.  After a 50% off coupon, they are under $10 each.

3.  Melissa and Doug toys - Melissa and Doug make a lot of natural wood toys.  I also am a big fan of their cardboard blocks.  Our local AC Moore store has quite a large selection of their toys.

4.  All things Crayola - With a 50% off coupon, I don’t feel so bad replacing broken crayons and dried up markers!

Do you have a good craft store/kid find that you would like to share?

We are regular visitors to our local library.  A month or so ago, I was a little surprised to see Dolly Parton’s smiling face on a brochure at the children’s desk.  After a moment of wondering how Dolly manages to look exactly the same as she did 25 years ago, curiosity got the best of me and I picked up the brochure.

Dolly, bless her soul, has started a program called the Imagination Library.  This program partners with local communities to provide free books (1 per month) for any child under the age of 5 who signs up.  Here is an excerpt from her website:

Here’s how it works:

A community must make the program accessible to all preschool children in their area. The community pays for the books and mailing, promotes the program, registers the children, and enters the information into the database.

From there The Dollywood Foundation takes over and manages the system to deliver the books to the home.

The books are already selected based on the age of the child - each kid receives 1 free book per month until the age of 5.  To see if your community participates, you can check out the affiliates link here.

We filled out the form on our brochure (our community does not allow online registration), and received a confirmation letter.  We are still waiting for our first book, but I wanted to share this information now so that others can sign up.  Happy reading!

It’s not quite 10am, and my 2-year-old son is down for a nap (he usually sleeps in the early afternoon).  He has a gym class at 10:30am, but won’t be going.  The one part of traveling that I don’t like is trying to get the kid back into a routine.

I follow 3 rules to help get my little one back on track:

1.  Let them sleep:  Most kids need to catch up on sleep after traveling, whether they like to admit it or not.  Between 8 and 9 am this morning, my son had a serious case of the yawns.  Factor in the 5 trips to time-out, and it’s not hard to figure out that he needs some more sleep.

2.  Don’t force them to do their normal activities right away:  Although we’ve already paid for the class, I just don’t see the benefit of making my son go to a class he isn’t going to enjoy.  There is no reason to make small kids attend their normal activities when tired.

3.  Change the eating/snack schedule to the times when your kids are hungry:  Breakfast this morning was 1/2 piece of toast.  Instead of pushing the issue, I just fixed him another slice when he was hungry again.  If I know my son, today will be filled with 5-6 snack times but no real meals.  It just takes him some time to adjust.  I do make sure that there aren’t a lot of special treats - his snacks are just like meals, only the portions are smaller.

Although there is some temptation to immediately return to the normal routine, there is usually 1-2 days where we just “go with the flow”.  Sleeping, eating, and activity schedules are not normal, but allowing for a period of adjustment makes life easier for everyone.

What do you like to do to help ease the transition?