I would agitate for better options on kids menus. On the occasions when we take long road trips or go out to restaurants, I am gobsmacked by the options available for children.
Generally it is along the lines of "deep fried unidentified meat stuff with chips" - the only variety being the "meat stuff". Occasionally they throw in "hot dogs" or spaghetti (ah, but no-one makes spaghetti like your mother!)
As parents, we have forced down our throats the obese children debate and offering healthy options for our children.
As someone who has been on a committee for tuckshops and after school care facilities, we have to comply with healthy choices to even get accreditation for licensing.
Yet out there in the "real world" it seems that the easy, cheap deep-fried option is the only one available to give your children.
I have taught my child to eat vegetables - at some junctures it is a struggle but she is a healthy 7 year old who loves her fruit and nowadays almost willingly eats the healthy options in front of her.
She has developed a fairly healthy aversion to plastic cheese, batter and overly oily or fatty options - thanks in part to the genetics (my hand up there) but also because it was not offered to readily or too often.
Her desire for a lot of the offerings by the fast food giants is generally limited to the advertising of fancy extras but is unfussed by the food. There have been moments where that option has been exercised, but generally we bypass the opportunity for them to profit too freely from us.
There are moments (such as long distance drives) when ffgs or roadside servos are the only food options. Although the M option does now offer a lower fat choice, the packaged tomato taste and the overly sugared drink has been found wanting - my child wants taste and freshness.
One trip I had to stop at dinnertime at a servo, and the prices were up there with fine dining for adult fare - with half price offerings for the children's menu of the usual variety. Even when I begged for half the chips to be removed in return for some salad it was apparently impossible - I would have to pay the full adult fare for salad or vegetables to be included.
So if I were an agitator, this is one of the changes I would agitate for... What would your soapbox be?
(This post was partly inspired by Mom-101: My Daughter the Communist - a mother (or rather, daughter) who has trouble with the catering offered at playdates...)
Monday, June 25, 2007
Sunday, June 24, 2007
(Al)most (A)mused
I was having a remarkable dream this morning - I can't really remember what it was about, except that one of the two special guests (either cats or doctors) was knocking on the door.
Unfortunately, it was 'Salina knocking on the door in real life, as she is completely incapable of tucking herself back into her own bed (on the up side, she no longer sees this as equating to needing to crawl in to my bed).
Taking advantage of the moment, I decided to make a pit stop on the way back to bed and buy myself an extra hour of sleeping in. The bedside clock said 5.45am but it was still pitch black outside.
I crawled back in, but it seemed my beloved V had used the moment wisely too, as he fits much more comfortably diagonally and no matter how craftily I tried to induce a change in his angle (and I did have the feet of ice to assist me here) all it really succeeded in doing was to banish all shreds of the dream I was trying to get back to.
So instead, I lay awake and started to whir - at least I whirred on other peoples problems, which is so much more satisfying than trying to find any of your own!
It is a glorious day in Paradise today, so it bodes well for some quality cycling time - which means that the option for physically exhausting 'Salina is open. Hooray - she was almost stir crazy yesterday.
We did attack another part of the kitchen "non-renovation" yesterday by removing a bench that contributed a little workspace in return for blocking access to about 3 times as much. 'Salina got involved too. We "indulged" her with the task of removing the screws from the main prop of the bench (that, and the fact she was the only one to be able to get into the space comfortably).
As is our wont, we were having a little banter about putting her to work, and V said "we don't really mean it, 'Salina, we're just paying each other out". Her reply: "You could pay me money."
Have you ever wondered about spam? I am thinking whoever put my latest entreaty together was either schizophrenic or a struggling sci-fi writer. A direct quote:
I wish they would.
I would request an explanation of them, but I fear they may determine that I am actually MORE interested in their discount pharmaceuticals than my current lack of response has convinced them of.
After reading the above, I wonder did the writer have anything to do with the chemicals they are offering - and therefore should they not be illegal?
'Salina is requesting my presence immediately (as only a 7 year old can do) but I had to share with you yesterday's other project.
The teacher may well say she has focus issues, but when she gets her teeth into something firmly she doesn't let go. She decided to make a mailbox for our holiday ideas and letters and urged us to contribute. She also made V 3 pieces of mail, me 7 pieces of mail and the whole family got 2. (I did contribute 2 for all of us as well).
It was extremely difficult to read the first as, although she is inspired and creative, she does suffer from bad spelling (mainly due to speed requirements and lack of due diligence).
My letter:
(She had already done the above edit - but when I read it I had to double check who it was from and I read it aloud v-e-r-y carefully!!
Last night's good use of the oven was gourmet pizzas! We roasted zucchini, eggplant, capsicum and garlic and then concocted pizzas with that, feta, olives, salami, mushrooms and mozzarella - delish!!! 'Salina had mini pizzas with ham, grated carrot, grated zucchini, feta and mozzarella and also was very, very impressed.
Unfortunately, it was 'Salina knocking on the door in real life, as she is completely incapable of tucking herself back into her own bed (on the up side, she no longer sees this as equating to needing to crawl in to my bed).
Taking advantage of the moment, I decided to make a pit stop on the way back to bed and buy myself an extra hour of sleeping in. The bedside clock said 5.45am but it was still pitch black outside.
I crawled back in, but it seemed my beloved V had used the moment wisely too, as he fits much more comfortably diagonally and no matter how craftily I tried to induce a change in his angle (and I did have the feet of ice to assist me here) all it really succeeded in doing was to banish all shreds of the dream I was trying to get back to.
So instead, I lay awake and started to whir - at least I whirred on other peoples problems, which is so much more satisfying than trying to find any of your own!
It is a glorious day in Paradise today, so it bodes well for some quality cycling time - which means that the option for physically exhausting 'Salina is open. Hooray - she was almost stir crazy yesterday.
We did attack another part of the kitchen "non-renovation" yesterday by removing a bench that contributed a little workspace in return for blocking access to about 3 times as much. 'Salina got involved too. We "indulged" her with the task of removing the screws from the main prop of the bench (that, and the fact she was the only one to be able to get into the space comfortably).
As is our wont, we were having a little banter about putting her to work, and V said "we don't really mean it, 'Salina, we're just paying each other out". Her reply: "You could pay me money."
Have you ever wondered about spam? I am thinking whoever put my latest entreaty together was either schizophrenic or a struggling sci-fi writer. A direct quote:
"What this was dragged the wandering traders to such a steel, but the background of my Dark Nebula within fifty years back. Only Periphery. My opinion the floor. I know? Twer he did not! I am not the orders no rate, tumult, roaring against: them and haven't the conversation by the finding it pretty soon in the problem, of metals on, the that the files and grinned back up here to join the Galactic ones of always; believed in a long as what I am sure. But, it was the City stroke the man: uses, of: the point. Of the belt and lieutenant you're right Ponyets, said half. I'll explain it."
I wish they would.
I would request an explanation of them, but I fear they may determine that I am actually MORE interested in their discount pharmaceuticals than my current lack of response has convinced them of.
After reading the above, I wonder did the writer have anything to do with the chemicals they are offering - and therefore should they not be illegal?
'Salina is requesting my presence immediately (as only a 7 year old can do) but I had to share with you yesterday's other project.
The teacher may well say she has focus issues, but when she gets her teeth into something firmly she doesn't let go. She decided to make a mailbox for our holiday ideas and letters and urged us to contribute. She also made V 3 pieces of mail, me 7 pieces of mail and the whole family got 2. (I did contribute 2 for all of us as well).
It was extremely difficult to read the first as, although she is inspired and creative, she does suffer from bad spelling (mainly due to speed requirements and lack of due diligence).
My letter:
To JeanieWoldWould you lick to cum to afisteFeast you can bring afrndfriend with you.Therthere will be musk and fun.
From
'Salina
(She had already done the above edit - but when I read it I had to double check who it was from and I read it aloud v-e-r-y carefully!!
Last night's good use of the oven was gourmet pizzas! We roasted zucchini, eggplant, capsicum and garlic and then concocted pizzas with that, feta, olives, salami, mushrooms and mozzarella - delish!!! 'Salina had mini pizzas with ham, grated carrot, grated zucchini, feta and mozzarella and also was very, very impressed.
Friday, June 22, 2007
Paradise Update
Apologies internet - life overflowed into that spare blog portion of life, and I am only now managing to crawl back into some semblance of resuming our regular programming.
Last week, I suddenly decided to do something about the "career" portion of my life. So I filled in a few forms and, what the heck, seeing as there are no real jobs for me in Paradise the world and I have agreed that I have to go back to my old ogress boss (that would be me) and work it smart this time.
Therefore I spent the week in study mode, doing a course and getting together my bits and bobs for a business plan, and hopefully by the end of the year I will have the money rolling in. Or at least nodding in my direction more often.
This week, as well as being studious and entrepreneurial, I have been extra chilly. Mobs of cold dwellers around the world may scoff and call me soft when I say that we only got a maximum of 11.4 degrees on Wednesday (52.5 farenheit for all you imperialists) but if I explain that we are used to being overjoyed at the balmy weather rather than feeling the chill through our bones and toes, we are more used to kicking off the sheets rather than hogging the doona, more accustomed to barefoot and sarong rather than gloves and overcoats - well, you could feel a little pity for us, couldn't you?
The house I live in is delightful - captures breezes, lets out nasty daytime heat - not ideal for living through the coldest day IN RECORDED HISTORY!!
We expect Winter to last until next week - goodness knows what we would do if it set in for a fortnight or more!!!
On top of the studious, entrepreneurial, chilly life this week, there was the addeddisadvantage advantage of too many blokes on the building site V having to work less strenuously this week - partly due to the size of the block they are working on (postage) and the willingness of the workforce (overly eager after a wet week) and partly due to another day or two of inclement weather.
The absolute upside of this is thatI didn't have to worry about any housework as there was a warm and willing body up to the stresses of house husbandry my honey got to catch up on some quality domestic duties.
And thus, one large "TO DO" item got struck from our list - we no longer have need of a large white kitchen device with which to fulfil all our gastronomical inclinations - cause we went and got one, baby!! Yessir - decision to move on action in the morning, gathered up in my lunch break to do hit raids on all the whitegoods sales, advised in the afternoon of a lot of money promised and a project in the offing, entered the kitchen an hour later to meet the electrician as he departed and WE NOW HAVE A STOVE!!!!
Only drawback was that we were limited in choice to the narrower options as we REALLY didn't want to do a full kitchen renovation and we had a certain gap to fill - and unfortunately the chosen narrower option was still a fraction of an inch too wide - so I got to see V in his DIY glory - and we still get to see the dishes in that cupboard in their glory until we get around to finding one thing, sawing something else and putting it all back together. The worst bit about that was that we could have looked at wider options if we knew we were going to chop the cupboard anyway!!!
(For those of you concerned with my other whitegoods drama - the Electrolux Eco valve is now home and in working order again also!)
V also got added bonus points this week. While discussion 'Salina's size after he had been browsing the sales (one of those domestic duties, isn't it!) he turned to me and said "You're an 8 aren't you?"
Oh sweet, sweet V - then he popped his own balloon by qualifying it "in shoes, I mean."
Last week of the school term, so finally got to catch up with 'Salina's teacher this morning.
Her opening words to us were "'Salina is an enigma" - well, we had to agree with that!
The good news is that she is just asstubborn and pigheaded independent within the classroom as she is at home - yay, its not just us!!
The bad news is that every one of her more challenging foibles I recognised - a few from her father, but most of them because I lived it!
When we emerged, 'Salina and her friend wanted to see the report. Looking down the list of "S" (satisfactory - as in she is not stellar scholastically - probably explained by the next set of parenthesis) and "B" (as in "not applying herself" - hands up if you are the genetic contributor to this little trait!). Friend said quite smugly that she got mainly excellent - ah yes, but are you an enigma, dear?
Just cooked some chocolate chip cookies - do you KNOW how nice it is to have the biscuit baking option back on the agenda?
Also created a larger than life "to do" list - school holidays have coincided with career options, budget constraints and requests from far flung family to know movements and schedules over the next 17 days - so can tick off the blog and move on.
(Oh, little side note - when I finally got back here to blogworld, my efficient bloglines account had 791 unread posts waiting for me - eek - some I have added cause I liked the look once may have gotten short shift in my catching up - and although I have looked in at my favourites and regulars I didn't get to comment many - apologies - am going to flick the newbies off the read for a little so that I can get through the next little while sanely...)
Some newbies who will stay in my reader, though (and not on my sidebar yet) are:
However, right now I am off to whip up a tuna mornay (baked food - woo hoo) and start off the school holidays!
Last week, I suddenly decided to do something about the "career" portion of my life. So I filled in a few forms and, what the heck, seeing as there are no real jobs for me in Paradise the world and I have agreed that I have to go back to my old ogress boss (that would be me) and work it smart this time.
Therefore I spent the week in study mode, doing a course and getting together my bits and bobs for a business plan, and hopefully by the end of the year I will have the money rolling in. Or at least nodding in my direction more often.
This week, as well as being studious and entrepreneurial, I have been extra chilly. Mobs of cold dwellers around the world may scoff and call me soft when I say that we only got a maximum of 11.4 degrees on Wednesday (52.5 farenheit for all you imperialists) but if I explain that we are used to being overjoyed at the balmy weather rather than feeling the chill through our bones and toes, we are more used to kicking off the sheets rather than hogging the doona, more accustomed to barefoot and sarong rather than gloves and overcoats - well, you could feel a little pity for us, couldn't you?
The house I live in is delightful - captures breezes, lets out nasty daytime heat - not ideal for living through the coldest day IN RECORDED HISTORY!!
We expect Winter to last until next week - goodness knows what we would do if it set in for a fortnight or more!!!
On top of the studious, entrepreneurial, chilly life this week, there was the added
The absolute upside of this is that
And thus, one large "TO DO" item got struck from our list - we no longer have need of a large white kitchen device with which to fulfil all our gastronomical inclinations - cause we went and got one, baby!! Yessir - decision to move on action in the morning, gathered up in my lunch break to do hit raids on all the whitegoods sales, advised in the afternoon of a lot of money promised and a project in the offing, entered the kitchen an hour later to meet the electrician as he departed and WE NOW HAVE A STOVE!!!!
Only drawback was that we were limited in choice to the narrower options as we REALLY didn't want to do a full kitchen renovation and we had a certain gap to fill - and unfortunately the chosen narrower option was still a fraction of an inch too wide - so I got to see V in his DIY glory - and we still get to see the dishes in that cupboard in their glory until we get around to finding one thing, sawing something else and putting it all back together. The worst bit about that was that we could have looked at wider options if we knew we were going to chop the cupboard anyway!!!
(For those of you concerned with my other whitegoods drama - the Electrolux Eco valve is now home and in working order again also!)
V also got added bonus points this week. While discussion 'Salina's size after he had been browsing the sales (one of those domestic duties, isn't it!) he turned to me and said "You're an 8 aren't you?"
Oh sweet, sweet V - then he popped his own balloon by qualifying it "in shoes, I mean."
Last week of the school term, so finally got to catch up with 'Salina's teacher this morning.
Her opening words to us were "'Salina is an enigma" - well, we had to agree with that!
The good news is that she is just as
The bad news is that every one of her more challenging foibles I recognised - a few from her father, but most of them because I lived it!
When we emerged, 'Salina and her friend wanted to see the report. Looking down the list of "S" (satisfactory - as in she is not stellar scholastically - probably explained by the next set of parenthesis) and "B" (as in "not applying herself" - hands up if you are the genetic contributor to this little trait!). Friend said quite smugly that she got mainly excellent - ah yes, but are you an enigma, dear?
Just cooked some chocolate chip cookies - do you KNOW how nice it is to have the biscuit baking option back on the agenda?
Also created a larger than life "to do" list - school holidays have coincided with career options, budget constraints and requests from far flung family to know movements and schedules over the next 17 days - so can tick off the blog and move on.
(Oh, little side note - when I finally got back here to blogworld, my efficient bloglines account had 791 unread posts waiting for me - eek - some I have added cause I liked the look once may have gotten short shift in my catching up - and although I have looked in at my favourites and regulars I didn't get to comment many - apologies - am going to flick the newbies off the read for a little so that I can get through the next little while sanely...)
Some newbies who will stay in my reader, though (and not on my sidebar yet) are:
- 3kidsnojob
- its all about T
- Mad Goat Lady
- The Queen of Shake Shake
- Queen of Spain
- Reject the Kool-Aid
- Smart Bitches Who Love Trashy Books
- So Sioux Me
- Two Dogs Blogging
- The Zen of Motherhood
However, right now I am off to whip up a tuna mornay (baked food - woo hoo) and start off the school holidays!
Thursday, June 14, 2007
Say that again
Heard on the news (while reporting on the devastation in Bangladesh due to global warming mudslides):
Macabre - on so many levels.
...the death toll now stands at 85, but is expected to rise into the hundreds as the army and police are brought in...
Macabre - on so many levels.
Choices in Motherhood
Babylune is holding a group writing project at the moment, so I thought I would add (one of) my mistakes in response to her call to "Tell us all about a parenting mistake you’ve made, what you’ve learned from it and how you’re trying to make sure it will never happen again."
I was going to be the perfect mother. I had conceived a child in a loving environment - fair enough, a bit hippy-dippy, but as I was of that cut of cloth I was not swayed by the judgement of others.
I was going to raise my child with love and the embrace of freedom, joy, total choice control over all aspects of her life and never feeling hemmed in. Oh, my child was going to be the poster-child for mothers who aspired to beneficence the world over.
Well, the first kybosh on that was that my partner in hippy-dippy-ness sort of hopped right over into extremely strange and our loving enviroment became one in which he skulked home - often very late, often very apologetic, often very broke - and more often into the storm of a banshee than not. The banshee behaviour was mine, and though we did struggle on for a bit, eventually it became in my daughter's and my best interests that I didn't have to resort to the banshee wail as regularly.
I was still fairly much your Earth Mother - just one bounded by the view of my ex's behaviour and how I wasn't quite that hippy-dippy.
The second kybosh was that my beautiful daughter became a toddler. You know, every mother has to learn that toddler's respond well to some stimuli and not so well to others - and it is possible that every mother feels overwhelmed by the minefield of working out what those stimuli are.
Instead of being a poster-child for beneficent mothers, she could have been used as propoganda for Toddlers Behaving Badly. Oh, maybe not quite Dr Phil quality, and not often - but against the backdrop of my own psychological dramas of ex spinning out of control and the eerie judgement I felt from the community in which I was attempting to hide myself (read 1950s style nuclear suburb), she was a red flashing light of toddler terror.
And it must have seemed to EVERY person in my surrounding world that things were not so peachy in my home, as EVERY person in my surrounding world had a suggestion or two - and as they could not comment on my personal values or my exes mental status, the target was my mothering skills.
I stuck to my guns on the whole raising my child with love and the embrace of freedom, joy, total choice control over all aspects of her life and never feeling hemmed in. My child kept throwing massive dummy spits. EVERY person in my surrounding world offered more suggestions.
Finally I had enough - one day I became Dictator Mum because I could not stand the behaviour of my child - and a miracle occurred.
Oh my goodness. It sounded so dirty, but boundaries actually worked.
Over the years I have still managed to raise my daughter with love. That part will never change.
She is free - to a degree - if she does well, she gets more freedom - if she acts up, freedom is more strictly defined.
Joy is actually found more in our lives now than then - and I am sure it is because we both have a lot more control.
I occasionally forget the choice lesson I learned all those years ago - then I am reminded that little children don't actually like too much choice - limited choice is good as it gives them power, total choice means they don't feel too safe.
I am sure that my daughter feels far more hemmed in than the poster-child I had first dreamed of when I was pregnant - but do you know what?
We are both much happier that way.
So I learned two lessons.
I learned about boundaries. I try to keep it in mind - sometimes I forget, sometimes I don't need to be as strict - but we are both comfortable with them. She is 7. I am sure that will change - for now, we are sweet.
And I learned that not ALL advice is bad - it is sometimes beneficial to listen to the wisdom of others paths. That doesn't mean that you have to accept every aspect of it - but you never know when you could learn. I still keep my ears open - and my eyes when cruising the net. A lot I let go by - but occasionally I will say "I might try that" - and some of those times I learn something valuable.
I was going to be the perfect mother. I had conceived a child in a loving environment - fair enough, a bit hippy-dippy, but as I was of that cut of cloth I was not swayed by the judgement of others.
I was going to raise my child with love and the embrace of freedom, joy, total choice control over all aspects of her life and never feeling hemmed in. Oh, my child was going to be the poster-child for mothers who aspired to beneficence the world over.
Well, the first kybosh on that was that my partner in hippy-dippy-ness sort of hopped right over into extremely strange and our loving enviroment became one in which he skulked home - often very late, often very apologetic, often very broke - and more often into the storm of a banshee than not. The banshee behaviour was mine, and though we did struggle on for a bit, eventually it became in my daughter's and my best interests that I didn't have to resort to the banshee wail as regularly.
I was still fairly much your Earth Mother - just one bounded by the view of my ex's behaviour and how I wasn't quite that hippy-dippy.
The second kybosh was that my beautiful daughter became a toddler. You know, every mother has to learn that toddler's respond well to some stimuli and not so well to others - and it is possible that every mother feels overwhelmed by the minefield of working out what those stimuli are.
Instead of being a poster-child for beneficent mothers, she could have been used as propoganda for Toddlers Behaving Badly. Oh, maybe not quite Dr Phil quality, and not often - but against the backdrop of my own psychological dramas of ex spinning out of control and the eerie judgement I felt from the community in which I was attempting to hide myself (read 1950s style nuclear suburb), she was a red flashing light of toddler terror.
And it must have seemed to EVERY person in my surrounding world that things were not so peachy in my home, as EVERY person in my surrounding world had a suggestion or two - and as they could not comment on my personal values or my exes mental status, the target was my mothering skills.
I stuck to my guns on the whole raising my child with love and the embrace of freedom, joy, total choice control over all aspects of her life and never feeling hemmed in. My child kept throwing massive dummy spits. EVERY person in my surrounding world offered more suggestions.
Finally I had enough - one day I became Dictator Mum because I could not stand the behaviour of my child - and a miracle occurred.
Oh my goodness. It sounded so dirty, but boundaries actually worked.
Over the years I have still managed to raise my daughter with love. That part will never change.
She is free - to a degree - if she does well, she gets more freedom - if she acts up, freedom is more strictly defined.
Joy is actually found more in our lives now than then - and I am sure it is because we both have a lot more control.
I occasionally forget the choice lesson I learned all those years ago - then I am reminded that little children don't actually like too much choice - limited choice is good as it gives them power, total choice means they don't feel too safe.
I am sure that my daughter feels far more hemmed in than the poster-child I had first dreamed of when I was pregnant - but do you know what?
We are both much happier that way.
So I learned two lessons.
I learned about boundaries. I try to keep it in mind - sometimes I forget, sometimes I don't need to be as strict - but we are both comfortable with them. She is 7. I am sure that will change - for now, we are sweet.
And I learned that not ALL advice is bad - it is sometimes beneficial to listen to the wisdom of others paths. That doesn't mean that you have to accept every aspect of it - but you never know when you could learn. I still keep my ears open - and my eyes when cruising the net. A lot I let go by - but occasionally I will say "I might try that" - and some of those times I learn something valuable.
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