Perfect Pumpkin Pie

1 (15 ounce) canned pumpkin
1 (14 ounce) can sweetened condensed milk
2 large eggs, beaten
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 teaspoons McCormick Pumpkin Pie Spice
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 (9 inch) unbaked pie crust (you can use graham cracker crust if you prefer)

Directions

Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.

In a medium saucepan, combine pumpkin, cinnamon and pumpkin pie spice over low heat. Stir until the ingredients are well mixed and mixture is warm.
Transfer mixture into another bowl and allow to cool.
Add sweetened condensed milk and eggs to cooled pumpkin mixture and stir until smooth.
Pour into crust.
Bake 15 minutes.
Reduce oven temperature to 350 degrees F and continue baking 35 to 40 minutes or until knife inserted 1 inch from crust comes out clean.
Cool on top of oven to prevent the pie from cooling too fast, causing the crust to crack

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It started with a trip to the grocery store. While I waited for the cashier to ring up my items, a mother behind me was delivering a soliloquy (only she didn't recognize it as such!).

"Suzy, you're not going to take that home."
"Suzy, you can carry that around but I'm not buying that."
"Suzy, you've been naughty. Why should I buy that for you?"
"Suzy, put that away. I'm not paying for it."
"Suzy, everyone is looking at how much trouble you're causing."

And on and on and on...

I was so thankful when the cashier gave me my total. I was tired of this woman blathering on and I don't have to live with her! Poor Suzy. She is being trained to ignore her Mother. The more Mom talks, the less she hears.

Mom needs to learn rule number one:

Less Talk, More Action

Remember the Peanuts cartoons? When one of the adults spoke, all the kids heard was "wonkwonkwonkwonk". The more you lecture, threaten, warn, count to 3, etc... the less your child listens. Stop diluting your effectiveness as a parent with these non-actions. Use natural consequences as often as possible, and deliver the consequence calmly and swiftly. For example:

If your two year old won't stop running into the street, clearly explain to her that if she does it, she will be taken inside for the day. Then, when she does it (and she will, of course, cute little Scientist that she is!), calmly and without fanfare, escort her inside. Don't give her warnings or "another chance".

Toddlers and young kids don't understand an abstract concept like getting hit by a car... something they've never seen, felt or tasted. So talking about it until you're blue in the face is unlikely to do any good.

But what they DO understand is cause and effect. "If I do "X", then Mommy does "X"....EVERY TIME. Even young babies learn this. Ever noticed how excited your baby gets right before you feed him? He's learned that when you hold him a certain way, food is forthcoming. Our kids are smarter than we think sometimes.

Another example: Two siblings are fighting about a toy. Don't waste your time trying to figure out who is in the wrong, it's virtually impossible and just encourages tattling. The children will learn how to work out their own negotiations if involving the parent means unpleasantness. The toy is put up for a period of time. End of story. Toy squabbles will dramatically decrease almost magically!


Let Your Yes Mean Yes and Your No Mean No

Do what you say you will do. If you tell your child that acting up in the grocery store means no cookie from the bakery at the end of the trip, MEAN it. I'll never forget the look on my 2 year old daughter's face as she watched her brothers eat huge chocolate chip cookies while she went empty handed! Few things impress a young child more than you holding to your words, calmly and without a lot of emotion (that just makes you look like an idiot). Children don't respect you if you are always swinging back and forth like a pendulum. Decide what's important to you and expect those limits to be respected.

This rule makes parenting so much easier because your kids will stop testing you so much, which is just their way of saying "Do you really mean it?".

The flip side of this is that when you promise something positive, you had better make good on it! If you do this, your children will learn that you mean what you say.

{Originally posted on SaltLakeCityMommies}

My husband, Adam, left this morning for a conference in Houston, TX.  He's gone to conferences before, but this is the first one since Rowan was born.  I always have had a lot of respect for single parents, when he's gone that respect just grows and grows.  Each conference he's gone to has presented me with new and different challenges as a parent.  The first conference Kara was just a year old and she got her first big illness.  I was unable to get much sleep or food.  All she wanted was to lay on my lap and be held.  Going to the bathroom was an adventure: have you ever tried to hitch your pants up when your child is strapped to you and throwing up at the same time?  Other conferences I've had the joys of explaining to Kara why her dad isn't there and why he wasn't going to be home for x days.   I got quite skilled at keeping her distracted from his absence.  This time though I am presented with 2 new challenges.  The first being that I now have two children, one that is awake frequently during the night and needs much of my attention (and body).  The second is one I had not thought of before.

How do you express emotions around your children?  Prior to Kara when Adam would go to a conference I would have cried a bit, gone home, eaten junk food and watched TV, read some books, done a puzzle and stayed up way past my bedtime.  Now I know better than to spend my time watching TV, staying up late and eating junk food.  I'm sure I'll read plenty of books and may do some puzzles. Granted the books may not be more complicated than naming dinosaurs and the puzzles will have less than 50 pieces.  But what to do about the desire to cry?  Do I show Kara how sad I am that her dad has left?  Do I let her see how worried I am about how our time alone will go and his safety?  Or do I keep a stiff upper lip and keep on going as if nothing has changed?  If I don't express my emotions, in a healthy way that is, am I teaching Kara to not acknowledge her own emotions?  Does that teach her to be a stoic and afraid of emotions?  If I show her the tears does that then lead her to fear and worry when she shouldn't have that burden?  Will she feel she needs to take care of me since I am sad?  This also leads me to examine how we deal with Kara's tantrums and other outbursts of emotion.  Right now we ask her to calm down and say that once she is calm we can talk about what is bothering her. But does that teach her that she shouldn't express the emotion?  Would it be better to say "wow, you are really sad/angry/upset.  Let's take a moment to be that way, then we can calm down and talk about what has made you feel that way"?  We do try to acknowledge the emotion by saying "you sound really sad", but is that enough?  Do we need to give her more space to feel and express the emotion?  I want to raise children that are not afraid of their emotions and can express them in a healthy way.  I don't want them learning to stuff their feelings down or to think that it's not ok to let others know how they are feeling.  Emotions can be powerful and influence our thinking more than we often realize or admit.  To have a healthy relationship with emotions would allow them to recognize, feel, and then move on past the emotions so they do not influence their decisions excessively.  The question is- how to achieve that.

Submitted by Heidi-rose Creuzinger, member of NorthMetroDCMommies.  Heidi-rose blogs at Terror at 3 Feet & Rising.

So, I need to talk to you about something very important. And yes, it has everything to do with books. I need to know how you're reading these days. Are you reading hard copies of your books - as you always have and always will? Hardbacks. Paperbacks. Mass Market copies that fit in the smallest bags you own?

Or have you gone to the technological side and got yourself a Nook or a Kindle? Any sort of eReader at all?

I can't decide. I love my books. But believe me, I'd have a lot more space in various rooms of my home if I had less of them. And I'd never have to leave my house to buy the latest title that sparks my interest. AND I could carry more than one book at a time with me when I travel (not that that's frequent or anything - but still) and switch it around if I wanted to without worrying.

And no more tearing ads out of magazines to create bookmarks. That would be nice. You know the kind? The little tear outs that are in every magazine? Oh, and magazines! I could subscribe to more and not worry about how quickly I read them and whether or not I'll be able to recycle all those pages well enough to feel a little bit greener.

But I would totally miss the page by page feel. I would totally miss how a book feels in my hands. The weight of it. The smell of it, even. I would miss living in the bookstore like I normally do. More than once a month we head there to take our daughter to play with the trains at Barnes and Noble.

But see, there's another concern. Kindle or Nook? I live off Barnes and Noble, ALWAYS. But I am saving the Amazon giftcards that I have been getting through Swagbucks so I can buy one [a Kindle] for practically nothing. Sort of.

So what do I do? What did you do?

Fill me in on why you switched to an eReader, or why you think you never will. And I'll just keep reading. And reading. And - well - you get the idea!

Happy Reading -- however you do it!

Originally posted on the TriangleMommies blog on 5/7/11
Andrea is a SAHM who blogs about her everyday life, motherhood and more over at http://goodgirlgoneredneck.blogspot.com

Photo by: jspatchwork

Cheddar'd Summer Squash

Ingredients:
4 small yellow squash and/or
zucchini trimmed & cut in 1/2
lengthwise.
1/4 cup chopped green onion
nonstick cooking spray
1/8 tsp salt
ground pepper
2oz shredded sharp cheddar
cheese

Cooking Instructions:
1.preheat oven to 400. Arrange squash cut side up in 3 quart baking dish.
2.lightly coat squash with cooking spray. Sprinkle green onion,salt & pepper evenly.
3.top with cheese
4.Bake uncovered for 20 minutes or until squash is just tender and cheese is bubbly.


Submitted to The Mommies Network recipe database by "christy."

As last summer approached, I remember reading posts on UnionCountyMommies (UCM) about upcoming travel plans, family vacations, free movie viewings, and securing memberships to the local water park. But one fellow mommy’s plans really stood out because they were so different from the rest. She was raising money to cover the expenses of a hosting a child from Belarus for six weeks.

And this year, around the same time, I saw similar posts go up again…she was planning, fundraising, and even longing to bring back that same little girl. It was clear her family had had an amazing experience, one that was worth far more than the time, effort, and money they had put into it. I was so moved by her desire to help in this way, and I wanted to get more information about the program. I wanted to learn more about children and let others know how they too, can get involved.

So I was thrilled when UCM member, Heather Efird, graciously agreed to take time out of her busy life and answer all of my questions! The program goes by the name ABRO, which Heather explained stands for American Belarussian Relief Organization. It is a national, non-profit organization whose focus is to improve the quality of life, and the health, of children living in and around areas of Belarus affected by the Chernobyl disaster in April of 1986.

The first group to come over, in 1989, consisted of thirteen children. Today, more than 300 children, ages seven to seventeen, come over each summer. Their time in the United States helps lower the levels of radiation in their bodies, boost their immune systems, and provides an opportunity to receive medical and dental care that they truly need.

The cost just to bring their host child, Alina, back this year was about $2000 she says, money that is to be raised completely by the host family. The Efirds have been able to raise the necessary fees through fundraisers with Yankee Candle, Tupperware, selling poinsettias at Christmas, and car wash tickets through Autobell, as well as soliciting donations.

The host family is also responsible for the costs of day to day living, including clothing, food, and medical appointments, just as if the child was part of the family. And it’s clear that’s exactly what Alina has become to the Efirds. In fact, Heather often refers to Alina as her daughter.

Heather says last summer Alina went to lots of baseball games that her son, Blake, was playing in. They also took her to the mountains, a local animal park called Lazy 5 Ranch, and to the beach in Oak Island, NC. Alina also attended a weekly bible study that was taught in Russian. I asked her to tell me about a favorite memory, but she couldn’t pick just one! “She comes from a low income family and lost her father two years ago. Every day was like Christmas to her while she was with us last summer.” Heather said.

Host families are still needed in order to bring more children here each summer. Heather says, “This is a life changing experience for all that are involved but it's not easy. These children speak little to no English so communication is a big hurdle. No matter how difficult the situation is...the LOVE in that child's eyes makes it all worth it.” The Efirds have been able to call Alina a few times since she left last summer, but say the best way to keep in touch is through a translator and an email address provided by ABRO.

Since this is their second year hosting through the program, I asked Heather what it was exactly that made her family want to sign up again. Thoughtfully, she said, “When we first got involved with the program I kept thinking about how much we would change this child's life forever. The thing that she will never realize is how much she has changed OUR family. I never knew how this would affect my life forever.”

As Alina’s travel date gets closer and closer, I can’t help but imagine what a wonderful reunion it will be for all of them!!

For more information on how to help with donations or to become a host family, please visit http://www.abro.org/

Originally posted by Heather from UnionCountyMommies.com on The Mommies Network National Blog, 5/26/11