Easter is coming up which got me thinking about how I am going to keep my kids occupied this year.
The easiest of kid crafts involves scissors, construction paper, crayons and a bit of tape or blue. It is most fun to theme the craft holiday or special event that is coming up which at the date of writing this would be Easter. You can also purchase crafts kits for kids that involve weaving, sewing, rug hooking, quilting, wood-working, embroidery, and much more.
A great Easter kids craft for Easter is to make bunny headgear. All you need to do is to buy several headbands and then have your children cut out the Easter rabbit ears out of stiff cardboard.
Another good Easter project is to decorate hard boiled eggs. You can decorate them so they look like lambs by adding cotton batten. You can also decorate them so the look likes Easter Chicks. You can also make an egg creature or egg people.
I really enjoy making things with my kids for Halloween. Halloween is a favourite holiday. Good crafts are pumpkin and squash carving. You can crate scary faces and construct bats, ghosts and other spooky creatures out of paper and fabric.
It’s also a lot of fun to create your own Christmas tree decorations. If the children are old enough to handle sharp objects you can buy Styrofoam balls, pins and collared beads and have the children stick these beaded pins into the ball. Cover the ball entirely and you have a very attractive Christmas decoration (and personalized gift.
I also roll glass or aluminum balls in glitter or sequins. First trace out the design I want on the side of the ball in glue. Then after creating Christmas themed shapes in glue on the side of the ornament. Traditional Christmas kids crafts also include decorating the Christmas stocking with glitter Older children can be taught to embroider on Christmas stockings using needle and thereads.
There are several kinds of Mother’s day and Valentine’s day kids crafts, but I like dying flowers with my kids for either of these projects. All you do is take a flower (a pure white flower produces the most extreme results), cut off the end of the stems and soak the bottom of the stem in a jar of food coloring. The flowers will soak up the food coloring and tint the petals the color of the food dye. This takes about a day.
Homemade bookmarks and cards also make great Mother’s day and Valentine’s Day kid crafts. Photographs of the kids, pasted on the front of the homemade card personalize this homemade and heartfelt gift.
You can also purchase kids craft kits intended to create everything from felt projects, embroidery, tapestries, baskets, knitted creations, woven fabric, wood projects and dangling mobiles.
I was trying to figure out how my child knows so much about the bible lately and it turns out her teacher has been using the Animated Kids Bible in the Classroom. Basically the kids watch a DVD inserted into a player and it is projected right in the classroom.
This works well because most kids, whether they are five or fifteen years old seem to be hypnotized by any type of television or movie screen. Audio visual aids make them as quiet as the television odes at home. Guess the teacher figured out that kids are likely to be very attentive to any type of subject matter once animation is involved.
The use of sophisticated animation is already being used to teach future doctors biology and human anatomy but of course it also has other applications when it comes to helping simplify concepts and also repeating those concepts through the use of a playback function on the DVD player. I notice that my kids watch the same thing again and again and don’t mind rewinding. This is of course the rote way to learn.
Some animators and teachers are now referring to learning materials that bridge the gap between entertainment and education as “edutainment.” My kids are watching this new Animated Kid’s Bible series at school definitely falls into this new and unique category of digital media. This is because children (and adults too!) are so enraptured with the novelty of 3D CGI (three dimensional computer generated images. My kids told me that there is nothing that looks so real and they are right!
This type of animation is so detailed and so refined that many people watching the Kid’s Animated Bible will find themselves transported to an alternate world where they can watch the creation of women from Adam’s Rib, Moses come down the mountain and smash the tablets and the seven plagues of Egypt and also The Birth of Christ.
Some educators are reluctant to use animations as teaching tools but it is because they have yet to realize the medium’s full potential to help children retain what they are watching and learning. The idea is to convince students that watching this video is not just an escape route from reality but rather a story that they will be quizzed on after the presentation.
It is handy for a DVD to be paused, replayed or played forward. This allows the teacher to create on the spot quizzes about what might happen next. The pause functions also allow students to take notes while they are watching the stories being told in the Kid’s Animation Bible. The secret is to let your student’s know that even though they are watching an incredible piece of 3D animation that they are still supposed to be learning and retaining everything that are being taught.
Sunday school teachings were never easier!
You have probably heard about the traditional remedy of spooning yogurt into the vagina to cure yeast infections. It seems so messy. Yet so many women get yeast infections during pregnancy, after sex and just from being too busy and suffering stress. We need to deal with it somehow and without taking antibiotics.
Thankfully a solution has been found for this in the form of vaginal acidophilus inserts. These look a lot like the bullet shaped anti-fungal medications that you are usually prescribed for these conditions.
These tablets, which you can buy in health food stores, should be kept in the refrigerator as they contain friendly bacteria that can help cure your infection.
You can insert them manually with your fingers. Many come as a kit complete with a plunger style insertion device. If you have had lots of yeast infections then you will know what this implement looks like as antifungal medications are also often applied this way s well.
The insertion of these medicines can help greatly soothe the pain and irritation of the infection and help repopulate the vagina with the bacteria it needs to be healthy.
Lactobacillus acidophilus is a bacterium present in both the vaginal, and gastrointestinal tract; it is important in controlling vaginal pH and maintaining a healthy balance in the vaginal ecosystem.
It is not enough to just eat these helpful bacteria. You also need to also have the vagina make contact with it.
Age, infections, antibiotic use, douching, and many other factors can interfere with lactobacilli, upsetting the delicate balance and predisposing women to overgrowth of yeast and “bad” bacteria.
There have been several studies showing that regular ingestion of acidophilus, specifically in the form of yogurt with “active cultures,” decreases vaginal yeast and bacterial infections.
Acidophilus is also available in supplement form through capsules and powders. The powdered form, which is mixed with water, is the most effective but also the least tasty.
Give me an eight-ounce container of low-fat yogurt any day! But read the label: Not all brands of yogurt contain live and active cultures of lactobacillus acidophilus.
You should also not eat yogurts that have a lot of sugary fruits or flavorings in them. This is on the bad list of foods.
The truth is that eating the yogurt and also employing the supplements goes a long way towards reinforcing the positive bacteria in your gut so that it can thrive again and improve digestion.
When you look for yogurt or yogurt supplements look for the term probiotic on the label. The term “probiotic” is used to describe organisms that are used medicinally, including bacteria such as Lactobacillus acidophilus and yeast such as Saccharomyces boulardii
Acidophilus does have other health benefits. It helps prevent infection with some intestinal bugs, and seems to slightly improve general immune system function. This of course is of great use to people who have been taking the antibiotics for years and finding their immune systems compromised.
BV stands for bacterial vaginosis which is one of the most irritating condition known to women and of course if you have PMS, menustrating or just given birth you are probably suffering from it.
When most people first hear that herbal and natural remedies are available to treat B. V., they are pretty skeptical. The first thing they think is that there is no way a folk remedy can get them out of pain and that it is just an outrageous idea.
This is because we have been trained to believe.that herbs or home remedies can take forever to become active in our systems.
I have what is called a 3 Step Attack Plan for getting you out of immediate pain.
This 3 Step Attack Plan that battles the evils of bacterial vaginosis consists of –
STEP 1 - Rinsing out the vagina daily with a hydrogen peroxide douche
STEP 2 - Taking at least 1000 mcg of Folic Acid a day
STEP 3 - Taking vaginal acidophilus supplements
I guarantee you that if you follow this three step plan you will experience immediate relief from itching, discharge and pain.
Most of us already have 3% antiseptic hydrogen peroxide in our cupboards. We use it to treat cuts and scrapes and prevent infection.
The recipe douche that is going to immediately help relieve the itchiness, wetness and fishy smell is –
• 1/4 cup of 3% antiseptic hydrogen peroxide
• two cups distilled water
Why use distilled water? There is theory that ordinary tap water can encourage the growth of anaerobic organisms so distilled water is best. It’s been boiled; it’s pure and is devoid of microorganism.
Douche once daily with this mixture until your symptoms disappear. For extra effectiveness douche twice. Keep douching after the symptoms appear for extra effectiveness.
Don’t like the idea of douching with hydrogen peroxide. There is a substitute douche that works just as well but it is slightly more expensive than the hydrogen peroxide douche.
A daily vaginal douche with a 0.4% solution of tea tree oil in on quart of water can also be effective.
The recipe is
• 1 teaspoon of tea tree oil
• 2 cups of water
Douche daily until symptoms are completely gone.
The recipe is
• 1 teaspoon of tea tree oil
• 2 cups of water
Douche daily until symptoms are completely gone.
When you treat these infections you end up taking a lot of antibiotics too.
Antibiotic use depletes your body of vitamins and in some cases actually retards your digestive system’s ability to absorb nutrients.
The solution is to fortify with folic acid. Folic acid is a form of a water-soluble B vitamin. Folate occurs naturally in food and folic acid is the synthetic form of this vitamin. We don’t retain it in our body so it is easily destroyed by medications. In food it is foundin cereals, okra, asparagus, fruits, vegetables, yeast, mushrooms, tomato juice and oranges.
