Take a walk

It's amazing how lifes pace seems to slow down when one uses the feet. Many areas and subdivisions have walking paths. Explore these as a family. Take a bag along to collect stones, leaves, flowers, or creepy crawlies. Literally, stop and smell the roses. Consider visiting a Nature Center, the  Arboretum or Botanical Gardens. A walk in the city can be just as refreshing. Visit the Plaza in your city and window shop.

Read a book

Reading a chapter book together as a family is a great shared experience at the same time as a great way to improve listening skills. Our family has fond memories of reading through The Chronicles of Narnia as well as The Little House on the Prairie series. Peruse The Read Aloud Handbook by Jim Trelease for book suggestions as well as a primer on the benefits of reading aloud. If you want to check out a locally placed adventure, try The Amazing Museum Adventure of Thomas Maxim Moore by Jane Bishop, a book about one boys adventures in our very own Toy and Miniature Museum. Older children might enjoy After the Dancing Days by Margaret Rostkowski about one girls coming to terms with the aftermath of World War I. 

Bake someone happy

Dig out the cookbooks and gather the kids around the table. Let each child choose a recipe and prepare it together as a family. Whether it is chocolate chip cookies or chicken pot pies that you whip up, youre sure to enjoy food, fellowship, and fun with your kids.

Play a game

Dust off Monopoly or invest in a new game. (Our family favorite is Blokus.) Try a different game each night that you would normally be watching a show. Set yourselves up in tournament play and have a big celebration at the end of the week.

Explore your City

Now that winter is receding into the past, its a great time to get out and about. Visit the Zoo or the local botanical gardens. Catch a local baseball game. Tour one of our fine local museums. Use your freer time to see all that your City has to offer you in the way of art, entertainment and culture. 

Plant a garden

Children love to garden and youll find digging in the dirt to be very therapeutic. Check out some library books on the subject and plan a garden. You dont need a lot of space, even some potted plants on the back deck will do. The sun, air, and dirt will be good for your souls. I love visiting SavvyGardener.com. Youll find all sorts of garden tips tailor made for your city once you start researching.

Visit with the neighbors

We live in a culture that is increasingly private. New homes no longer feature front porches, the entertainment of years gone by. They seem to have disappeared from our architecture right around the same time that TV became popular. Hmmm.. Grab a lawn chair and a glass of iced tea and sit out front. Supply the kids with bubbles or sidewalk chalk and draw your neighbors outside. The kids will enjoy playing with their buddies and you can catch up with their parents. You may find that you have more in common than you thought.

Ride a bike

Equip yourself and the kids with proper safety equipment and hit the road. Youll appreciate the wind in your face and the cardio-vascular workout for your heart. Your family will enjoy the time spent together as well as the road races. Dont forget to check out the local bike trails! For an extensive list of bike trails, visit your cities community website. 

Build a fort

A dad we know salvaged multiple appliance boxes and crafted a huge castle, complete with a working drawbridge. What a fun way to spend time with the kids and let them exercise their imaginations! My husband has performed cardboard art as well, his creative juices producing a huge pirate ship. But, you dont have to go to great lengths to make a fun hideaway a few chairs and blankets will do. The important part is to join your children in creativity and role playing.

Visit a local farm or park you have never been to

There is bound to be some unique outdoor spot just waiting for you and your kiddos to explore. Have you visited your local CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) farm, or dairy farm? How about the parks in the next town over?  Wherever you go, pack a picnic dinner and relax. Breathe in the fresh air. Laugh with your children. Fly kites. Fling a Frisbee. Run races. Be a kid again.

Savor the moments, they pass quickly. Youll find that a life without TV really is worth living. Youll reconnect as a family. Youll discover new amusements that you hadnt thought about. 

These great books might help your kids understand why youve decided to take a break from the television for a while:

The Berenstain Bears and Too Much TV By Stan Berenstain & Jan Berenstain

The Berenstain Bears and the Trouble with Commercials By Stan Berenstain & Jan Berenstain

Arthur's TV Trouble by Marc Brown

365 TV-Free Activities You Can Do With Your Child by Steven & Ruth Bennett

What is nature-deficit disorder?

It's the cumulative effect of withdrawing nature from children's experiences, but not just individual children. Families too can show the symptoms -- increased feelings of stress, trouble paying attention, feelings of not being rooted in the world. 

Scientific research suggests children who are given early and ongoing positive exposure to nature thrive in intellectual, spiritual and physical ways that their "shut-in" peers do not. By reducing stress, sharpening concentration, and promoting creative problem solving, "nature-play" is also emerging as a promising therapy for attention-deficit disorder and other childhood maladies.

There is the "biophilia"hypothesis (“the connections that human beings subconsciously seek with the rest of life”), which in some quarters is controversial, but that suggests we are still hunters and gatherers and biologically we have not changed. That hypothesis says there is something in us that needs natural forms, that needs association with nature in ways that we don't fully understand. I think we instinctively understand that there is something about being in nature that you cannot get on a soccer field or in front of the discovery channel.

Many times children are kept shut up "safe" inside their homes sitting in front of the Media because Parents are paranoid.  It's not good for human beings to live with fear all the time. In this society we are increasingly living in fear, whether it's of terrorism or "stranger danger" -- and statistically, most of that fear is not warranted. Child abductions by strangers are, in fact, rare, and criminologists and others report that the number of them may have decreased in recent years. A 1988 report by the National Incidence Study on Missing, Abducted, Runaway and Throwaway Children in America, stated that there were between 200 and 300 children abducted by strangers in 1988. The most recent such National Incidence Study, found 115 children kidnapped by strangers in 1999. A relatively few child abductions are amplified into the appearance of an epidemic through nonstop coverage by the media!  

In the essay "An introduction to Waldorf Education" Steiner wrote in 1919, he states, "Of prime importance for the cultivation of the child's feeling-life is that the child develops a relationship to the world in a way such as that which develops when we are inclined towards fantasy."  But if your child is in a Waldorf school, you know the "Fantasy" in waldorf education , is not the fantasy that is found in Disney movies, rather, it is the organic process of leading a child down a path where they expand their imagination into other realms through fairy tales and imaginative play.

In addition, Waldorf educators have seen a direct link between the astral body and the watching of television.  The child is driven by the imagination and fantasy during these early years (7-14) and starting at around the age of 14, the astral body is said to be driven into the physical body, which creates the onset of puberty.  Television, because of the lack of imagination involved, the scenes and topics covered has brought on the astral stage of the body at an early age, which is one of the reasons why television is banned from Waldorf Schools.

Many studies show that television hinders this process in young children.  A study done in 2007 by the British Psychological Society found that television affects the brain in many ways that would weaken the imagination in children.    One of the television "effects" that translates to a weakening of imagination is called "Jump Cuts".  A "jump cut" is a cut from a medium-to-medium shot or from a wide-to-wide shot. In the first shot, the subject is in one location, and when you cut to the second shot the subject is in another position … The effect is that they instantaneously jumped from one position to another. Not only is this creepy and unnatural but ultimately it fractures attention spans.  Because of this, the brain is trained to reward itself with dopamine for being able to cope with this fractured attention span, translating to them becoming addicted to functioning with this fractured attention span.  Other results of this addiction stem from the "over-scheduling" of children who are enrolled in mounds of after school programs and the ever presence of multi-tasking happening in their lives.  Imagination is of course naturally lost when our mind can not simply focus.

Some might argue that Television and computer games are "Educational", but neuroscientists have performed brain scans and found that television and interactive media games do NOT stimulate intellectual areas of the brain!

Steiner said, " From birth to about the sixth year, the human being naturally gives himself up to everything immediately surrounding him in the human environment, and thus, through the imitative instinct, gives form to his own nascent powers."  If television had been around when Steiner said this, I believe he would have spoke of the effects of television here!  He went on to say, "From this period on, the child's soul becomes open to take in consciously what the educator and teacher give, which affects the child as a result of the teacher's natural authority."  With that said, what do you think happens when the Television is the educator?  During this time in a child's like he is imitating everything that surrounds him, therefore everything and everybody becomes a "teacher".  Many parents have been embarrassed by something their child says or does, saying "I don't know where they picked that up from, this is so strange!?"  When obviously, if you are allowing your child to watch television you are opening up your child to many things that ultimately you don't want them exposed to or imitating.

Television as well as video, DVDs, computers, and electronic games all have a very powerful effect on children.  It can take several days for the effects of one single video to wear off, and if they are watching everyday, the effects may not wear off at all.  You might notice that many children now speak in 'cartoon voices', make 'sound effects' to accompany their jerky movement (punching, kicking) and obsessively repeat lines from movies or shows that they have scene over and over again.  This is now regarded as "normal" childish behavior, when in reality it is coming from the Media not from the children themselves.

Steiner said in the book Spiritual Ground for Education,  "What is learned more slowly at any given age is more surely and healthily absorbed by the organism, then what is crammed into it."  This is why when we give a lesson in Waldorf School we allow the child time to reflect, often giving the same lesson twice.  Often times the child is sent home to sleep and reflect and form mental pictures from the lesson, and then when they come back the next day it has been digested, and then the lesson can begin to really sink in to a child's being.  That said, another concern about television watching is that it could hinder the child's ability to reflect on and digest the lessons they were taught during the day.  If children are watching television or playing video games during this learning process, these media devices may just over-ride the lesson.  The child would then instead of creating it's own images of that days lesson, be filled with images of the television or media that was watched.  Once again, his own imagination depressed.  This would then tie into a child's inability to concentrate or understand the lesson the following day, as they were not able to properly digest it.

There are so many studies that are showing the negative effects of Television and Media, such as obesity, autism, onset of early puberty, and even diabetes.  Steiner believed that health of the body was greatly affected by how it learned and how a person learned was also greatly effected by their own health.  That said, and knowing what we know today about the health effects of Media on the body, we can only assume that Steiner would not approve the use of television and other media outlets as a way of teaching or educating.

Chickens living in your own backyard means Fresh Organic Eggs daily!
Have you gone to the store recently and noticed the price of Organic Eggs through the roof.  It is hard these days to afford buying quality Organic Eggs, without breaking the budget.  Rather than giving up Organic Eggs for the factory farmed un-Organic and less healthy eggs because of price, build your own backyard Chicken Coop, it is easy AND affordable!  Best of all, once you start getting your own eggs from your backyard daily, you can make lots of recipes with your "free" eggs, essentially saving you money when you grocery shopping!  All you need is a large enough open plot to house your chickens with enough space for them to roam freely, which is the only humane way to keep chickens.  At our home, we have a 10 by 10 foot space that includes the chicken coop, nesting  boxes and perching decks.  During the morning, we let them out to roam along our sloping backyard, and then put them back in the coop when we leave during the day.

Where to start

Find a space to build the coop, and get started.  All you need is to build a well ventilated house that has nesting boxes for laying eggs and space to perch and rest at night.  Remember that the coop must be well protected with chicken wire or other fencing to protect against predators at night.  Go to your local Hardware store and chances are you will find everything you need.  Next you need to acquire the birds.  You can find birds at your local farm, and it is a good idea to buy chickens at around 18 weeks old because they are ready to start laying!  You can also look in poultry  magazines (backyard poultry magazine) for more ideas and information on getting birds.  Start out with just 3 or 4 hens to see how you like it, and then you can increase your flock as you get used to having them around.  We currently have 8 chickens and we get around 8 eggs a day from our chickens.  It is important to keep in mind that healthy free-range chickens with live around 10 years old, but they stop laying eggs around 5 years old.  Feeding your chickens organic grain in addition to allowing them to forage for greens and insects is the best way to go.  You can also feed them foods from your kitchen composter, such as grains, rice, discarded greens and veggies.  

You must supply your chickens with fresh water daily to keep them happy, healthy and alive.  Gather up your chickens poop and compost it to later add to your garden!  Have your kids be in charge of the coop; feeding them, watering them, collecting the eggs; this teaches them responsibility and helps them to learn about taking care of animals, and best of all gets them counting, adding (and subtracting when they drop an egg) daily!  Go to your local city's website to find out laws about having an urban chicken coop.

Resources:

Backyard Chicken Forum

US state laws regarding chickens

Mother Earth News, "How to raise chickens in your backyard!"

If you turn your nose up at tap water as you reach for your supposedly fresh bottle of water, you might want to reconsider.  The EWG (Environmental Working Group) recently did a study on 10 of the most popular bottled water brands for pollutants; such as fertilizer residue,  industrial chemicals, certain carcinogens, arsenic, and even radioactive isotopes, and found that the levels of contaminants were at the same level as those from tap water.  In fact, resources say that your tap water may even be cleaner than bottled water, because it is more carefully regulated and monitored.  So,  the safest route would be to filter your existing tap water and the most eco-friendly as you won't be contributing the landfill with all those plastic bottles.  Remember to always place your filtered water into a stainless steel or glass container, because drinking water out of plastic can be harmful to your health.  Read this article on drinking water out of plastic bottles, 

Bottled Water in your car, very dangerous!!!

Also, if you are addicted to sparkling or mineral water, and are interested in an alternative, I found the best.  The Company Soda Club offers a "several home carbonation system" for making your own sparkling water.  It is amazing, you just filter your tap water, pour it in one of the Soda Clubs bottles, place the bottle into the "Penguin" (which is the home carbonation system I chose, that injects the water with CO2), close up the "Penguin" and press the lever down until you hear a squeaking sound, usually about 5 seconds.  Open it up, pull out your bottle ( glass bottles come with the Penguin), and be on your way.  It is amazing!  It tastes great, the bottles come with a nice screw top, and you can take them with you, and make as much sparkling water as you wish.  We even take ours when we go on trips because it travels so easily!  It is great for the environment as you will never have to buy all those stinking bottles, and recycle them all as well.  It's a win-win situation, and now that we all know that tap water is of the same quality as bottled water, you won't have to worry about the water quality because it will be your own filtered water from your home.  Check them out at SodaClub.com.  

The Penguin is the first and only drinks maker with glass carafes; It's an eye catcher in every kitchen and dining room. Among the Penguin features are: customized carbonation level, easy to clean, automatic access gas release mechanism and minimal space usage on counter tops.  

Starter Package, $199.99 (plus s/h)

	Penguin Sparkling Water & Soda Machine
	2, 60-liter Carbonators (under license) makes approx. 120 carafes of sparkling water
	MyWater Variety 3-pack
	2 Penguin Glass Carafes

Replace Paper Towels with SKOY Earth friendly towels

Lunch without Plastic

Great Green Toys

Want to start introducing energy saving habit and earth conscious choices to your children but don't know where to start? Here are some tips to guide your little ones into “eco-children” from infant through high school making it easier to raise your kids consciously starting today!

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How my husband and I turned our white boring river cabin into a rustic, warm and “old world” healthy space! Interested in transforming your home into a healthy earth friendly work of art. Read this article about how my husband and I used Natural Earth Plaster to spruce up our River Cabin!

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When I first heard this statement, I simply didn't believe it. Well, thats not entirely true, I have spoken to many Republicans that say to me, "Global Warming...(pause, sigh) that is just a ploy for the environmentalists' to fatten thier pocketbooks to quote, save the trees!"

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