Lately, my little guy has gotten into the habit of watching a bit too much TV now that the weather has turned cold. Since I am not big on making rules that will only empower the object in question (TV) I decided to bring a small table into our family room and give him alternative things to do. So far it is working like a charm! This coupled with morning hikes in the woods near our home is going to be a great way to keep him active and engaged before he goes to his afternoon therapy sessions.

This week he has been playing with Tegu Magnetic Wood Blocks. They are a bit easier for him to manage than our Citi Blocks or our Marble Run and yet they are still fun enough to engage my oldest boy too. My little guy likes them because the magnets help him to build structures and not have them fall over. He can easily spend an hour or two making different versions of “dinosaur homes” or houses for his moonstones (moms crystals). They definitely support open-ended and unscripted play, which is the best kind.

The wood is sustainably harvested making this an eco friendly toy as well. They have no lead, no plastic, and they are finished with a water-based lacquer. You get long planks, short, planks, and cubes and they are all magnetic so you can build structures that defy gravity. The discovery set has 26 blocks, which is perfect for my 4 year old. A bit more would be ideal for my older son though, and they do have bigger sets and add-on sets. The cost is prohibitive IMO though. A 52 piece Tegu Set costs $100. They are very high quality and the company behind the product seems solid so I think they are worth it but perhaps a bit unrealistic for the average green family. I think we will be more likely to stick with Citi Blocks or second hand blocks we find locally even if this set is very lovely.

“A Friday ritual. A single photo – no words – capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. “   Soulemama

Last week I grabbed The Explosive Child from my local library book shelf. I was browsing the parenting titles looking for a specific book on bullies and this one just jumped out at me. I guess the universe provides what you need. As I picked it up I was hesitant because I don’t like books with Dr. Phil-esque advice about finding their currency and punishing your kids until they shape up. But I read through the first chapter, aptly named The Waffle Episode. I knew I would take the book home after I quickly acknowledged that yes, the waffle episode or similar, was something that is very familiar to me.

The book addresses how to understand and approach parenting easily frustrated or chronically inflexible children. Some outsiders may see a child like that and call them bratty, tyrannical, a little monster, or something similar but what this book addresses is that some kids are “explosive” not by choice or because of bad parenting but because they are mentally incapable of handling frustration. Frustration tolerance and flexibility are skills that we learn as we develop and some kids have a delay or handicap where these skills are concerned, just like a child might have a learning disability. Calling a child a brat insinuates that they are deliberately being antagonistic or willful. With these children there is nothing deliberate about their behavior. They know what you expect of them and they know when they are doing right or wrong but when they get frustrated they don’t have the skills to stay calm or think rationally… they just implode.

Common advice from therapists who deal with these children is to use a punishment and rewards system. But Dr. Greene’s advice in this book is to not go down that path because it doesn’t work for these children. As he says, they are black and white children living in a grey world. They know what you expect of them and they would love to have the rewards and avoid the punishments but they are chronically incapable of meeting your expectations when they don’t have the skills to handle frustration. A rewards and punishment system is just giving them ammunition of sorts… a whole lot MORE to be frustrated about. Conventional parenting ideas usually revolve around the idea that children will do well if they want to. Dr. Green’s believes “children will do well if they can”. LOVE it.

So what do you do with an explosive child? Well, there are three paths outlined in the book that parents can take… Plan A, Plan B, and Plan C. Plan A is an authoritarian “my way or the highway” approach. Plan C is a very passive “whatever you want, I give up” approach. Plan B involves negotiating and resolving conflict together with mutually beneficial solutions. It involves modeling for them the EXACT behaviors and skills they haven’t mastered yet. You teach them how to deal with frustration without explosions and how to see “options” in their black and white mindset. You also have to understand that it is a disability and that you cannot take things too personally. When your child screams “I HATE you!” they are acting on impulse and didn’t know a better way to say… “Mom I am really upset right now about something mean someone said to me at school today and you lecturing me about my messy room was the last straw.”

It is a wonderful book that gives solid advice and stays focused on “helping” the children not punishing them for something they can’t control. It also shows clearly how the parental reaction can be water that douses the fire or an accelerant that ignites it even further.

I recommend it to all moms struggling with explosions, including children who have an ODD (Oppositional Defiant Disorder) diagnosis.

No doubt you are catching on to the fact that the “beauty industry” is actually code for “toxic crap you don’t need”. Never in a million years would you think women would willingly line up to slather noxious chemicals all over their face but guess what? They do! But we can green up our beauty routines and make them more natural and safe too. Here are some tips for greening up your beauty regime.

1. Read the ingredients. Look closely at the ingredients in your cleanser, shampoo, hair gel, make-up, and so forth. Look them up in the cosmetics database and read first hand about what you are actually putting on your skin. If you find a lot of suspicious chemical names, look for alternatives. All sorts of toxic substances have been identified in conventional makeup and other beauty aids but there are companies making alternative products. The more people that purchase better products the louder our collective voice becomes against toxics.

2. Keep it simple. It’s amazing what you can accomplish with just lemon juice, for example. You don’t need an abundance of elaborate, complicated beauty aids.

3. Use natural products, such as lemons, honey, oatmeal, avocado, and yogurt on your hair or skin. The beauty tricks of long ago still work! For more info on that check out Beauty Secrets of the Bible. Its not a religious book is just gives us insight into Biblical women and what they used for beauty. They were just as concerned about it as modern women can be.

4. Use baking soda instead of shampoo. It makes a wonderful cleanser for your hair. Mix about a teaspoon of baking soda per cup of warm water, and pour over your head while in the shower. Work it in to your scalp and rinse.

5. Use an apple cider vinegar (ACV) solution as a rinse following the baking soda wash. Mix a tablespoon of ACV into 2 cups of warm water and pour over your head and hair. Rinse with as cool a water temperature as you can handle.

6. Look for natural make-up. Many top cosmetic manufacturers specialize in more natural formulations. Avoid make-up that has aluminum, phthalates, formaldehyde, fragrance, and parabens.

7. Combine cooked oatmeal with mashed bananas and spread on damp hair to treat dry scalp and dandruff.

8. Cut out beauty products with petroleum-based ingredients. Some ingredients to look for include parraffin, Propylene Glycol, and Isopropyl Alcohol.

9. Look for the “not tested on animals” label to assure you are not supporting the harmful and cruel practice of animal cosmetic testing. Human beauty is NOT worth animal suffering.

10. Use reusable products rather than disposable ones in your beauty routine. Examples of common disposable beauty items are: razors, pre-packaged, single-use hair treatments, and cotton balls.

The two BEST books on this subject happen to be written by the same person, Julie Gabriel. The first is the Green Beauty Guide. That link takes you to my review. The second is fairly new, Green Beauty Recipes, and I have LOVED puring over the recipes. My daughter is ecstatic to make some of these and I feel good about letting her go wild with it because they are safe and natural. Carrot Cake Cleansing Cream, Milk and Olive Facial Toner, Breakfast Yogurt Scrub, Pumpkin Mask, Natural Clay Deodorant… its fun, practical, and informational.

Enjoy!

Above: My daughter is playing with her Spellmaster by Tag Toys

Is Christmas on the brain yet? Every year parents hear about toy recalls and the latest toys to have failed safety inspections and expectations. Tighter regulations passed but that ultimately ended up meaning we had fewer options and the huge corporations making the toys typically recalled got free passes to go about business as usual. Cause you know… safety legislation is too tedious for mega corporations to deal with. From lead paint recalls to small parts that pose a choking hazard, we have to be careful when buying children’s Christmas presents. Here are some tips for buying safe toys:

1. Go for toys that are free of toxic chemicals. Many plastic toys contain or are made from PVC, a potentially harmful form of plastic. PVC contains dioxin, which is a toxic chemical implicated in breast and other cancers. Many action figures and other small figurines are made from PVC – in fact, they are often simply called “PVC figures.”

2. Avoid plastic altogether. If all the acronyms and chemical names overwhelm you, or if you just don’t trust plastic, avoid it. Wood, bamboo, cloth, porcelain, and glass are safer toy materials. Checker and chess sets, unpainted wooden cars, trains, marble runs, doll houses, and baby toys are just some of the many wooden options available. You can always paint these items yourself with safe paint. Dominoes and other games with pieces made from porcelain are virtually unbreakable. Glass marbles and other sturdy glass items make good toys as well. You can get MANY of these items second hand too, making them a double green whammy purchase.

3. Look for toys that are made in America or Europe. If you want eco-friendly, organic, safe toys, they will come from the USA or Europe. Toys made in China may or may not be okay, but your best bet for eco-friendly, organic toys are not manufactured in China. That means German made Haba may be preferable to Melissa and Doug.

4. Look for locally made toys. Many communities hold fairs and festivals where craftspeople sell their creations. Handmade, wooden toys and safe, lead-free ceramics and jewelry are common at these fairs. Many of these vendors also have sites online. Etsy is an online marketplace for the same folks.

5. Stay away from small, detachable parts. The sewn-on eyes and plastic noses of stuffed animals could be swallowed by small children or babies, and pose a choking hazard. Any toy that has small parts that may come loose is not necessarily safe.

6. Quiet toys are better for your children’s health. Noisy, loud toys can damage hearing, and grown-ups can find them very annoying! Some sources say that there are children’s toys capable of producing sounds as loud as a jet plane, and toys with sirens, horns, and sound-emitting battery toys can all damage hearing in children and babies. If it bothers your ears, it’s not good for your kids. And is a toy that does all the work for the child the best toy for their brain development? No. Their mental health will benefit from simple toys without bells and whistles.

7. Sturdiness is paramount. If a toy is going to be ridden or sat upon, make sure it’s stable. Also note the shape – does the seat back rise in the back to provide support? Could clothing or skin get pinched easily between moving parts?

8. Research the safety tests. There are various governmental agencies that monitor toy safety. The United States Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) can be searched online for toy recalls and other safety information. But in my mind stay away from mega corporations like Mattel and Fisher Price and you are already half way there.

Check out the Green Christmas Gift Guide for some recommendations if you opt to buy… just remember that second hand and handmade are greener all around if you can swing it. BUT you may not find my #1 top pick for Christmas in second hand stores because I doubt people give these up after they purchase… the Wildcraft Herbal Board Game. We heart this game!