Yoga with my baby!

I love practicing yoga, and I love spending time with my kids.  So when my parents got Owen the ABCs of Yoga for Kids, I was very excited to try it.  My husband was a little doubtful that an extremely energetic (almost) 2 year old would be interested in trying yoga.  But then last Sunday, he saw the book and tried to copy the cover.  On the cover is a girl practicing a tree pose, and I helped him get his on version.  He has to lean against a wall for balance, but he can put his foot on his other leg properly & have prayer hands.  When Owen does this, he looks at me with a huge smile and says 'Yoga!'.  It's absolutely adorable.

He has done this tree pose many times, and we've done a couple of pages of poses at a time.  This is a well written book for an introduction to yoga for kids.  As the title indicates, the book lists the alphabet with different poses for each letter and a very good kid-friendly description.

Here is Owen with his downward facing dog:

Here he is as a cobra:

 

I'm still here and it's time for baby food!!

Long time, no write....

It's been a long time since I wrote, I'm really sorry - there has been a lot of things going on here.

The most exciting of everything is that we are under contract for a new house in State College.  The move will be by February, and we are extremely excited to try out small town living. 

We also had a wonderful Christmas holiday with our families.  I attached a picture of Scott, Owen & I at Hershey Park - we went with my sisters & families, and my mom.  We went to enjoy the lights and some of the kiddie rides.  Owen was overwhelmed and seemed to enjoy himself - Andrew slept most of the night!


Andrew is now 6 months old - and I'm amazed.  I don't know where the time went.  He is now a smiley, rolly poly baby with two little teeth.  These months have just flown by - I can't believe it.  I remember the day he was born, and the days since then...it is like Andrew was always a part of our family.



Now that he is 6 months old, we are entering a new stage in his/our lives.  Andrew is starting on food!  The recommendations have changed and our pediatrician is recommending to give him veggies, fruits or meats first, not cereal.  I made all of Owen's food - so I am planning on doing the same for Andrew.  We are told not to make our own carrots, because of the high nitrates.  I made him sweet potatoes, and he loved them.  We made green beans next.... and he HATES them.  He made the funniest faces.  We'll get through the bean stage, and onto other veggies that he likes more.  I simply cook the veggies without any seasoning and blend up in my hand blender.  In a couple months, we'll be able to introduce more seasonings so that Andrew will eventually be eating what we are eating, except pureed.  I use small cups from One Step Ahead, with screw on lids.  I found that these work a lot better than the ones that simply push on - those pop up in the freezer.  It's also very easy to freeze in ice cube trays, and then pop it out into a freezer bag.

A little Friday tex-mex!

Tonight, it was just me and the boys for dinner. I needed something easy, healthy and kid/adult friendly. So I decided that it sounded like a great night for quesadillas! Yumm! I want Owen to eat what we're eating - no short order cooks here!

Anyway, these quesadillas are awesome and so easy. I warm a packet of the pre-cooked chicken (that you find in the deli case), in a skillet, usually I chop it up finer so that it isn't too chunky - but that's just a personal preference. To that I add about a half a can of black beans and half a jar of salsa, and warm through. When heated, I add about a cup to 1&1/2 cups of low fat cheddar cheese. In another skillet sprayed with Pam, I place a large tortilla and then put the filling one side of the tortilla, folding the empty side on top. Flip it when it starts to brown. If it makes a mess- no worries, it still tastes great! I still make a mess sometimes. I dip it in a little low fat sour cream.

Owen loves it, I find it very kid friendly because he like all of the ingredients and can use his hands. He seems to like dipping his food too, I've noticed lots of kids like this!

Hope you had a good Friday too! Welcome weekend!

Too busy to workout?

This morning I woke up & I'm sore.....I did Les Mills Body Pump yesterday (a group strength-training class) and now I'm moving a little slow.  It's great - I love that sore feeling after a great workout.  Sometimes fitting in exercise is really tough for anyone - not just moms.  For someone that has 1000 things going on, and who doesn't - especially during the holidays, sometimes a quick go-to workout around the house is perfect.  Sometimes I do calf-raises when I do the dishes, or a curl my baby Andrew (a perfect built-in weight, plus he thinks it's hilarious), I've tried to do curls with Owen (a wiggly 27 pounder)...that was much harder!  Do squats while waiting for the water to boil for dinner...there are so many options  Run up & down the stairs an extra time.

How about this for a good at home workout that requires NO equipment-
20 push ups
50 jumping jacks
20 squats
10 burpees (start standing, drop to a squat with your hands on the ground, hop out to a plank position, hop back to the squat with your hands on the ground, hop up to standing)
20 Triceps dips
20 mountain climbers
20 lunges on each leg
50 crunches
20 bicycles
And repeat!!  You can do it a third time if you want.

Doesn't take long - but gets your heart beat up!!

I also found these cool FitDeck cards - the one shown below is Fit Deck Bodyweight cards.  This is such a great concept - there is a deck of cards with great exercises that you can shuffle and create your own workout.  There is are several options, including Prenatal, kettle bells and for the extreme athletes there is the Navy Seal exercises.  There are even cards for kids - which could be a cool idea for a quick before dinner workout!  I personally can't wait to get the Stroller & Park exercises for more exercises to do while I am out with the kids for our walk!

It's so important to get your 30-60 min of activity per day, even getting it in 5 minutes increments is good!

Sleep.....precious time!

I have lots of mommy 'must haves'.  What makes me healthy is a great night's sleep....haahaahaa - good joke, right?  Not with a 22 month old and 5 month old!  But it's great when they sleep soundly.  One of my favorite things that my kiddos got as a gift are the stuffed animal sound machines by Cloud B, Gentle Giraffe.  Owen has his giraffe with 4 different sounds and Andrew has a sheep also with 4 sounds on it.




 They always have it turned on when they go to sleep, and I'm convinced that it helps sooth them as the constant.  We always change up the lullabies that we play in the room - but the Cloud B Sound machines are always on.  They velcro onto the crib, so I don't have to worry about it being in the crib with Andrew - since he is too young to have things in the crib.  And Owen won't lay on it and keep turning it on.  He has figured out how to turn it on before he goes to sleep though.  :)   We take them with us on road trips when they are sleeping in unfamiliar cribs.  I have gotten this for people as baby shower gifts.

See....fast asleep!

Happy Holiday Reading!

In our house, we are always reading.  We always read before naptime & before bedtime.  There are books in just about every room - and we want to encourage our boys to love to read.  This is the first year the my 22 month old, Owen, will start to understand Christmas.  So, we are starting to read some Christmas books.  Here are some popular ones that I found through my searches and from what we have  I'm sure that there are tons that I missed.  I can't wait to get & read them all to Owen & Andrew.

1. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer


    2. Fisher Price Little People Christmastime Is Here!: Lift the Flap


    3. Llama Llama Holiday Drama


    4. 'T Was the Night Before Christmas


5. The Christmas Story


   6. How The Grinch Stole Christmas


    7. Snowmen At Night


    8. The Sweet Smell Of Christmas


    9. Who's coming to our house


    10. If you take a mouse to the movies  


    11.   Santa Mouse


12. Bear Stays Up

Back to the routinue....

While, this healthy mommy forgot her sneakers over Thanksgiving!  I even had workout clothes with me.  Yikes - I never, ever go away overnight without my running shoes.  Perhaps, my subconsicous was telling me to chill out.  So, I had a break from working out, but that made today that much harder.  I took the day off, to ease back into the work week.  And started my morning by bringing the boys with me to the 9am Stroller Strides class.  Wow - it felt awesome to workout again after a week, but it was tough.  Amazing how much your body slows after only a week.

Anyway, my Stroller Strides class was a great way to start the day.  Exercise always puts me in a good mood.  These classes are a great way to exercise with the kids in the stroller, meet other moms and have a built in playground for the kids.  The classes are an hour long, and broken up with some cardio & some strength training.  What's great is that the classes are great for mommas of all fitness levels because we are using resistance bands are weights.  This is a great fitness program and you can hang out with the kiddos and not have to worry about babysitting at a gym.

Well....I'm off to a good start to the week, hope you are too.