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Stop by my blog, A Mama’s Rant and enter my Get your toddler to sleep with a little help from Johnson’s contest. I’m giving away $50 worth of Johnson’s baby products!

While setting up the contest, I learned that a leading sleep expert, Dr. Jodi A. Mindell, recommends that you use Johnson’s bedtime products (bath wash and lotion) followed by quiet activities like reading books is the best way get your child to go to sleep. You may also want to try some sleep-inducing snacks.

Here are some sleepy time book recommendations from a few of my favorite publishers.

Kane/Miller Book Publishers

Sophie’s Big Bed by Tina Burke. Even though she’s been sleeping in a big girl bed for years, my daughter really enjoyed this book. If you’re trying to transition your child from crib to bed, this is a wonderful book to read together. Also available in Spanish. (Baby/Preschool)

I Don’t Want to Go to Bed by Tony Ross. Why do I have to go to bed when I’m not tired and get up when I am? asked the Little Princess. Why indeed? Because the King and Queen know best, that’s why. Never mind about spiders and monsters, never mind another glass of water, it’s time to go to bed! But when the Little Princess finally goes and the King comes in to kiss her goodnight…she’s gone! Baby/Preschool.

Marc Just Couldn’t Sleep by Gabriela Keselman and illustrated by Noemi Villamuza. It’s bedtime, but Marc just can’t sleep. He’s scared. He’s worried. Mom to the rescue! One of the first things you learn as a parent is you can’t force anyone, particularly your own child, to fall asleep. If they just can’t sleep, they just can’t sleep. Marc’s resourceful and resilient mom know this, but, like the rest of us, tries anyway. Ages 4 to 8.

The Nights Of The World by Corinne Albaut and illustrated by Arno. Everyone closes their eyes the same way, but then what? An original way in which to discover other places and people and to learn about similarities and differences. Read about five children from five different regions of the world and learn how each child sleeps. Ages 4 to 8.

Continue Reading »

I read in the Denver Post that in Pennsylvania, the United Way of Lackawanna County’s "Success by 6" program and the Wayne County Children’s coalition are passing out copies of A Splendid Friend, Indeed by Suzanne Bloom as part of the statewide program, "One Book, Every One Child." The program began in 2006 to promote literacy to Pennsylvania preschoolers.

How about joining them? Their website offers a wonderful parent’s guide, including links, activities, crafts, and recipes for healthy snacks. My kind of website!

I checked out the book at my library. The goose character reminds me of my daughter Lucie, and I’m the grumpy polar bear trying to read, write and think. It’s a short, simple and rather sweet story.

How about making a polar bear shake to sip on while you read? I’ve been making these for Nathan all summer since I’ve been on a diet and have been making fruit, berry and protein smoothies for snacks and breakfast.

Nathan’s Polar Bear Shake

Ingredients:

1. 1/2 cup vanilla or plain yogurt (if using plain yogurt add 1 tsp. vanilla extract) OR 1/2 cup vanilla ice cream or vanilla frozen yogurt
2. 1/2 cup milk
3. 1 banana or 1/2 cup fresh or frozen peaches
4. 1 scoop whey or soy protein powder (You could use Ovaltine malt powder, vanilla instant breakfast, or skip altogether. Since Nathan’s not eating meat this summer - long story - any way I can protein into him is a good thing.)
5. 1 handful ice cubes (if using frozen peaches, use 1/2 a handful of ice cubes)

Directions:

1. Put ingredients together in blender and mix on highest speed until ice is crushed.
2. Serve in a tall glass with a spoon and a straw.

For more polar bear recipes, go to FamilyFun.com and check out their adorable Polar Bear Cubcakes - a perfect snack to go with your shake.

Or if you’re more into lemonade, check out Crazy Hip Blog Mama’s recipe for Raspberry Lemonade.

Everyday Nathan comes home from school and announces how many days are left in the school year. Now that the count is in the 30s, I’m beginning to get in a panic about summer break. What am I going to do with these kids all summer so their brains don’t atrophy and they forget to read, write and do math?

One strategy is that we’ve signed Nathan up for summer school even though we didn’t get a recommendation from his teachers to do so. He’s doing o.k. in school, but we know he can do better. Since the cost is reasonable, why not have him do a couple of hours of math and language arts every day? There will be still be plenty of time for golf, baseball, martial arts, and art camp. (Did I mention that Nathan is only happy if he’s constantly kept busy. He’s a kid who hates downtime.)

Aside from all these paid sport and camp activities, what else can parents do?

If you have a mom’s club in your area, see what activities they’re planning for older kids. There’s the rec center/YMCA and local museums and zoos, too (get a membership - it’s soooo worth it).

Academically speaking, you may want to start a book club with some friends who have kids your children’s age. Maybe get together at someone’s home for lunch and book discussion during the heat of the day. Or go to a park for a picnic and discuss the book. The little kids can color, play, or do a craft while the big kids read and discuss the book. With the new Harry Potter coming out this July, your book club could do a bunch of pre-release activities like reading the previous books, or getting together to watch the movies.

Sign up for and e-newsletter from Reading is Fundamental and check out their monthly family activity calendar for reading activity ideas.

Find out what kids movies are being released this summer or being shown at your local park. Are any of them based on books? Read away!

If you’re traveling this summer, have your kids write a travel journal. They can add pictures later or draw scenes right in their journal. Bring tape to add postcards, ticket stubs, etc. and lots of markers and crayons. It’s a fun way to document the trip, keep family memories and keep your kids writing.

And don’t forget cooking! Explore the world through cooking this summer. And hit the local farmers’ markets for fresh produce. It’s a fun way to support locally grown food.

What else? I’d love reader suggestions!

Easter has snuck up on us, and I’m trying to figure out when we’ll have time to decorate our eggs. Since my husband has a business dinner on Friday, I’ve invited a long time buddy of Nathan’s to come over with his mom and color eggs. It may be a recipe for disaster - two hyper first graders and a moody preschooler - but at least we’ll get it done.

I love hard boiled eggs, and so does Nathan. But with Lucie’s egg allergies and me trying to loose some weight, we’re limited to the number of “egg imbibers” in the household. There’s the usual egg salad sandwiches and deviled eggs. There’s my husband’s favorite recipe, too - mash up eggs with fork, put lots of butter, salt and pepper on top, heat in the microwave.

But what else can we do with all those eggs that are kid friendly? (For some grown up uses for hard boiled eggs - we’re talking pate here folks - check out About.com’s hard-boiled egg recipe list and Top 10 Ways to Use Up Hard-Boiled Eggs.) How about this fun idea?

Hard-Boiled Egg Mice from FamilyFun.com
Makes 2 mice.

With chive tails, radish ears, and olive eyes, hard-boiled eggs get transformed into whimsical critters (that like to be served wedges of cheese and some salt and pepper, please).

Ingredients:

1. 1 Egg
2. 1 Black olive
3. 1 Radish
4. 2 Fresh chives
5. 1 Tiny Swiss cheese wedge

Directions:

1. Place the egg in a small saucepan and cover with cold water. Bring to a boil over high heat. Boil for 1 minute, then turn off the heat. Cover the saucepan and let the egg sit in the hot water for 12 minutes.
2. Once the time is up, run the egg under cold water to cool. Then ask your child to roll the egg on all sides to crack the shell. Peel under running water.
3. Slice the egg in half lengthwise. Place the halves yolk side down on a plate. (Alternatively, you can slice off a bit of the bottom of a peeled, hard-boiled egg so it can sit flat on a plate.) Slice tiny black olive “eyes” and radish “ears.” Then make small slits in the egg halves for the eyes and ears and push in the olives and radishes. Add chive tails.
4. Serve the pair of egg mice with a wedge of Swiss cheese for a playful lunch.

Last week’s post about If You Give a Pig a Pancake got me thinking about all the If You Give books and the Mouse Cookies & More: A Treasury, which I just received in the mail from one of the monthly children’s book clubs.

Mouse Cookies & More: A Treasury is a great book to dance, sing, read, bake, and do art with! Not only does it combine several of Laurq Numberoff’s books, it also comes with a CD of songs, and has recipes and craft activities for kids. I was thrilled to see that the story, If You Give a Moose a Muffin, not only has instructions for making sock puppets, but comes with an eggless muffin recipe as well.

Chocolate Mud Muffins
12 muffins

1. 2 cups flour
2. 1 1/4 cup sugar
3. 1/3 cup cocoa
4. 1 tsp cinnamon
5. 1 1/4 tsp baking soda
6. 1/2 tsp salt
7. 1 1/4 cup buttermilk
8. 1/4 cup vegetable oil
9. 2 tsp vanilla

Moose Treats - Choose 1 or more of these to total one cup:

• chocolate chips
• chocolate-covered peanuts
• chocolate-covered peanut butter pieces

Instructions:

1. Turn on oven to 400 degrees F. Make sure rack is in center of oven. Generously spray or grease muffin cups and the top of a tin.
2. In a large bowl, with a fork or whisk, combine the flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt. In a medium bowl, mix buttermilk, oil, and vanilla. Add the wet mixture to teh dry mxture, then stir just until combined. in 2 or 3 strokes stir in moose treats. (Optional: hold back about 1/4 cup of moose treats to sprinkle on top.)
3. Divide the “mud” equally among muffin cups, then sprinkle the remaining treats on top, if you wish. (You can taste the batter - no eggs!) Bake about 25-30 minutes or until the tops are very well cooked.