Bunny to Color

Love this little picture for the

kiddies to color.

Oh we're having an Easter Extravaganza on Saturday at a farm up North of Los Angeles. I remember going on Easter Egg hunts with my sister as a kid and having all the older kids find all the eggs and candy before we could get to them! Nice photo op anyways...


- LT

Yes I'm an Alpha Mom...And I'm tired.

Found this tidbit on the front page of the business section today in USA Today. Interesting new label for us 'modern moms'. Don't you find that businesses are always trying to put new labels on people. It drives me slightly nuts. Yes, I'm an Alpha Mom according to this article...but I'm also a tired Mom. Do they have a category for that too? Tired Mom's buy a lot too. Maybe I'll write a book on that!

Alpha Moms are educated, tech-savvy, Type A moms with a common goal: mommy excellence. She is a multitasker. She is kidcentric. She is hands-on. She may or may not work outside the home, but at home, she views motherhood as a job that can be mastered with diligent research. An Alpha Mom typically has money to spend, and — key for marketers — she is, as the label implies, a leader of the pack who influences how other moms spend. She's also wired — online 87 minutes a day, estimates ComScore Networks, an Internet market research specialist — and she spends a hefty 7% more than the typical Internet user. The impact of her purchases or what she touts can spread on the Internet far beyond her e-mail list or blog. If your product or service passes the Alpha Mom test, it's gold. That's why the nation's biggest marketers, from Procter & Gamble to General Motors to Nintendo, are focusing on this remix of the modern mom.

Here's the rest of the article.

What kind of Mom are you?
- LT

Pax Joins the Media Circus

While I think it's great that Angelina Jolie is helping another orphan from a 3rd world country, I can't help but wonder what Pax's life will be like in America in the current media circus that surround the life of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt. Is that particular reality going to be better for him than growing up in his home country? Only time will tell.

I sincerely hope he doesn't go the 'entitled/priveledged route' of so many disturbing offspring of celebrities today like Nicole Richie, Paris Hilton and Brandon Davis. Pax is the name of Ang's new child in case you didn't know and were in a media fog for the past two weeks! He's a cute one. Thought this was an interesting survey from USA Today. - LT

Top 20 names of 2006

I'm through with having kidlets - but nonetheless - I love me a good list of baby names. I can't help but check to see if my kids' names or on there or mine or my husbands. It's just fun to do. - LT

Girl Names 2006
1 Emma
2 Madison
3 Ava
4 Emily
5 Isabella
6 Kaitlyn
7 Sophia
8 Olivia
9 Abigail
10 Hailey
11 Hannah
12 Sarah
13 Madeline
14 Lily
15 Ella
16 Alyssa
17 Riley
18 Chloe
19 Lauren
20 Grace


Boy Names 2006
1 Aiden
2 Jacob
3 Ethan
4 Ryan
5 Matthew
6 Jack
7 Noah
8 Nicholas
9 Joshua
10 Logan
11 Andrew
12 Michael
13 Caden
14 Dylan
15 Tyler
16 Connor
17 Jackson
18 Caleb
19 Jayden
20 Alexander

Sponge Painted Easter Eggs

My kids love making Easter Eggs. I found this design that actually says for 7 yrs. and up - but it looks simple enough that my 3 yr. old could handle it. We'll see....

This project is rated VERY EASY to do.

What You Need

Hard boiled eggs
Acrylic craft paints in the colors of your choice
Household sponge
Paper towel
Small bowl of water
Egg holder or empty egg carton

What You Do
1. Soak a household sponge in water, then ring it out completely. Cut the sponge into several different pieces, enough so that you have one for each color.
2. Using a paper plate as a palette, squeeze out small amounts of several different colors of paint.
3. Place an empty egg carton upside down so that you can rest your eggs on it to dry once painted.
4. Hold an egg in your fingers, and with your other hand, dab a sponge into desired paint color.
5. Dab the sponge onto a piece of paper towel. The object is to remove the excess paint, but not completely dry it out.
6. Now dab the sponge directly onto your egg, using any type of random pattern you like. Paint as much of the egg as you can and place it down to dry.
7. Repeat steps four to six for each egg, using different colors.
8. For a colored background with white sponge marks, simply paint the egg a solid color with a paint brush or with one of your sponges. When dry, sponge on a pattern with white paint.
9. When one side has dried, complete the other side and allow that to dry as well.
Place eggs into an egg holder, or fill a bowl with Easter grass and arrange the eggs atop the grass.

Helpful hints:
1. To make pastel paints from primary colors, simply add enough white paint until you have reached the shade you want.
2. Use a pair of scissors to round the edge of the sponges. Square edge can make your design look choppy, whereas a rounded edge looks softer.
3. Instead of painting the eggs a solid color, you can always dye them with traditional methods, then sponge paint them with white. This is an easy alternative if you don’t have several different paint colors on hand.
4. Get creative! Make different shapes by cutting hearts or letters from the sponges. Dollar stores will sometimes have shaped sponges in the kid’s bath section.
5. When boiling eggs, start the flame at medium high rather than on high. You will have less cracked eggs this way as they are not bouncing around in the pot as they would at a fast rolling boil.

We'll periodically post Easter Crafts leading up to Easter. Let us know if you've got one you want us to post!
- LT

Easter Picture to Color

Here's a download of an Easter Picture to color and send to the grandparents!

Easter Download.

- LT

Mommy Test

This little "tale" was emailed to me today and I thought it would be good for a grin...or two.

I was out walking with my 4 year old daughter. She picked up something
off the ground and started to put it in her mouth. I took the item
away from her and I asked her not to do that. "Why?" my daughter
asked. "Because it's been on the ground, you don't know where it's
been, it's dirty and probably has germs" I replied. At this point, my
daughter looked at me with total admiration and asked, "Mommy, how do
you know all this stuff? You are so smart." I was thinking quickly.
"All moms know this stuff. It's on the Mommy Test. You have to know
it, or they don't let you be a Mommy." We walked along in silence for
2 or 3 minutes, but she was evidently pondering this new information.
"OH...I get it!" she beamed, "So if you don't pass the test you have
to be the daddy." "Exactly" I replied back with a big smile on my
face.

-SBH

What should I get?

Thought this was a funny one. What should I get....a dog?











....or kids?

If you've got 5 seconds...

Women’s shelters in the U.S. go through thousands of tampons and pads monthly, and, while agencies generally assist with everyday necessities such as toilet paper, diapers, and clothing, this most basic need is often overlooked.  You and I may take our monthly trips down the feminine care aisle for granted, but, for women in shelters, a box of  tampons is five dollars they can’t spare. Here’s some good news: you can help us contribute to rectifying this situation by

clicking here.

For each virtual donation, Seventh Generation will send a pack of organic cotton tampons or chlorine-free pads to a shelter in your state.

This seemed like a good thing to do!
- LT

water bottles.....

This will make you think twice about buying bottled water..... I switched back to tap after some salesman pitched me a purification system, ran some "test" and showed me my tap water was actually cleaner then my bottled water. I DIDN't get the purification system but at least I can save money on water! I bought one of those reusuable water bottles made out of that "good" plastic.

From the San Francisco Chronicle- Sunday, February 18, 2007

San Franciscans and other Bay Area residents enjoy some of the nation's
highest quality drinking water, with pristine Sierra snowmelt from the Hetch
Hetchy reservoir as our primary source. Every year, our water is tested more
than 100,000 times to ensure that it meets or exceeds every standard for
safe drinking water. And yet we still buy bottled water. Why?

Maybe it's because we think bottled water is cleaner and somehow better, but
that's not true. The federal standards for tap water are higher than those
for bottled water.

The Environmental Law Foundation has sued eight bottlers for using words
such as "pure" to market water that contains bacteria, arsenic and chlorine.
Bottled water is no bargain either: It costs 240 to 10,000 times more than
tap water. For the price of one bottle of Evian, a San Franciscan can
receive 1,000 gallons of tap water. Forty percent of bottled water should be
labeled bottled tap water because that is exactly what it is. But even that
doesn't dampen the demand.

Clearly, the popularity of bottled water is the result of huge marketing
efforts. The global consumption of bottled water reached 41 billion gallons
in 2004, up 57 percent in just five years. Even in areas where tap water is
clean and safe to drink, such as in San Francisco, demand for bottled water
is increasing -- producing unnecessary garbage and consuming vast quantities
of energy. So what is the real cost of bottled water?

Most of the price of a bottle of water goes for its bottling, packaging,
shipping, marketing, retailing and profit. Transporting bottled water by
boat, truck and train involves burning massive quantities of fossil fuels.
More than 5 trillion gallons of bottled water is shipped internationally
each year. Here in San Francisco, we can buy water from Fiji (5,455 miles
away) or Norway (5,194 miles away) and many other faraway places to satisfy
our demand for the chic and exotic. These are truly the Hummers of our
bottled-water generation. As further proof that the bottle is worth more
than the water in it, starting in 2007, the state of California will give 5
cents for recycling a small water bottle and 10 cents for a large one.

Just supplying Americans with *plastic* water *bottles* for one year
consumes more than 47 million gallons of oil, enough to take 100,000 cars
off the road and 1 billion pounds of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere,
according to the Container Recycling Institute. In contrast, San Francisco
tap water is distributed through an existing zero-carbon infrastructure:
plumbing and gravity. Our water generates clean energy on its way to our tap
-- powering our streetcars, fire stations, the airport and schools.

More than 1 billion *plastic* water *bottles* end up in the California's
trash each year, taking up valuable landfill space, leaking toxic additives,
such as phthalates, into the groundwater and taking 1,000 years to
biodegrade. That means bottled water may be harming our future water supply.

The rapid growth in the bottled water industry means that water extraction
is concentrated in communities where bottling plants are located. This can
have a huge strain on the surrounding eco-system. Near Mount Shasta, the
world's largest food company, Nestle, is proposing to extract billions of
gallons of spring water, which could have devastating impacts on the McCloud
River.

So it is clear that bottled water directly adds to environmental
degradation, global warming and a large amount of unnecessary waste and
litter. All this for a product that is often inferior to San Francisco's tap
water. Luckily, there are better, less expensive alternatives:

-- In the office, use a water dispenser that taps into tap water. The only
difference your company will notice is that you're saving a lot of money.

-- At home and in your car, switch to a stainless steel water bottle and use
it for the rest of your life knowing that you are drinking some of the
nation's best water and making the planet a better place.


*Jared Blumenfeld is the director of the San Francisco Department of the
Environment. Susan Leal is the general manager of the San Francisco Public
Utilities Commission.*

More by Jared Blumenfeld: http://www.sfgate.com:80/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2007/01/19/BUGBONL7VI1.DTL

interesting fact:
The leading bottled water brand in the United States is PepsiCo's Aquafina, followed by Coke's Dasani. Each does more than $1 billion in annual sales, according to Beverage Marketing Corp.
Both Aquafina and Dasani, as well as many other bottled-water brands sold in stores and supermarkets, are what the FDA calls purified water. Purified water comes from the same municipal pipes that everyone else's water comes from.
The difference is that purified water undergoes any of a variety of filtration treatments to remove chlorine and most dissolved solids.
"It's municipal-source water that's been purified," explained Hemphill at Beverage Marketing Corp.

In other words, tap water

more info on water bottles...
http://www.consrv.ca.gov/index/news/2003%20News%20Releases/NR2003-13_Water_Bottle_Crisis.htm

-SBH