“Ok, first I score 6 in this game, then head on over to play rehearsal, tomorrow I have Spanish and softball, and in my spare time, I’ll find a cure for cancer.”
Stream this episode by pressing the play button above!
Happy New Year everyone, even though the year is a month old.
Well, it’s official, we are insanely crazy busy, not only with work, but we may have over-committed our daughter to a series of activities that still haven’t fully ramped up yet. She’s currently playing basketball and just started rehearsal for a city run production of The Little Mermaid Jr, in which she landed the major part of Flounder! We didn’t realize that rehearsal would be 3 evenings a week until we signed her up. Additionally, I’ll be coaching her softball team, which starts in a month or so, and she’s also getting back into Girl Scouts and has Spanish one day a week after school!!
Obviously we may learn our lesson and back off in the coming years from doing this to ourselves again, but one side effect of this is finding it difficult to get the family to sit down for a healthy dinner together. We’re often slamming down whatever we can find in the house, and this can lead to many negative side effects, diet being one of them. However, her activity level should be just fine with all the sports and dancing going on in her life, not to mention PE at school.
But, this ties into our Parenting News of the week.
Parenting News
Obese Kids May Face Immediate Health Woes, Study Finds
Text from article:
Obese children — already known to be at higher risk for heart disease and other ills in adulthood — may also experience more immediate problems, including asthma, learning disabilities and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, according to a new study.
For the study, Halfon (the author) used weight and other health-related data from the 2007 U.S. National Survey of Children’s Health on nearly 43,300 kids aged 10 to 17.
Childhood obesity has tripled in the past 30 years in the United States, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. About 12.5 million children and teens (17 percent) are obese. Other childhood-onset health conditions such as attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), asthma and learning disabilities have increased during the same period, suggesting some common links.
The study, published online, will appear in the January/February print issue of the journal Academic Pediatrics.
Compared to normal-weight children, obese kids were more than twice as likely to have health considered poor, fair or good, versus very good or excellent,
The obese children were also more likely to have activity restrictions, to repeat grades, to miss school, to internalize problems, to have behavioral conditions such as ADHD or conduct disorder, or learning disabilities.
Problems with muscles, bones and joints were also more common, as were asthma, allergies, headache and ear infections.
Overall, the obese children were almost twice as likely to have three or more mental health, developmental or physical health problems as normal-weight youngsters.
Website of the Current Episode
In line with the depressing news of skyrocketing childhood obesity, there was a product unveiled at the Consumer Electronics Show this month in Vegas. It’s called the “Ibitz” and it’s essentially similar to the “Fitbit” that adults use today. Essentially it’s a pedometer for your kids, but it’s tied to an iOS or Android app, or you can download the activity to your computer, but it turns fitness into a game for your kids. An example is that Johnny has to do 5,000 steps for the day before he gets to watch TV. You can imaging the games and challenges set up.
The app is where it actually may motivate kids. There is a virtual pet whose own health depends on the activity of the child. So, your child needs to do x amount of steps in order for the virtual pet to stay healthy. I’m not sure if the virtual pet dies, I would think not, but the app will chime through the app to remind them that they need to take the dog for a walk or play some basketball. There’s also a parent app so you can monitor the daily pattern of your child’s activity.
It’s small, and there are 9 colors to choose from, so your kid can get the color he or she wants. It’s currently available for pre-order on indiegogo.com, which is similar to kickstarter. Currently they just passed their funding goal of $70,000 and there are only 7 days left to pre-order. Prices start at $40 for a single unit for your child, and go up from there. They even have packages with 2 or more devices to track the fitness of your entire family.
Involve Your Kids (in lieu of parent winner/loser)
Are you ready for some football….stuff to do?
Wow, the Giants won the World Series again, that’s 2 in 3 years, and the 49ers are in the Super Bowl. We’re getting spoiled here in the Bay Area! We want to hear your plans about the Super Bowl, what are you serving? How are your kids involved?
Well, here are some ideas that I’ve come up with on how to involve your kids with your preparation for the Super Bowl and activities during the game:
Make food that honors each city
No matter who you are rooting for, you could prep some food that honors both cities.
For Baltimore, maybe there’s not too much, but perhaps crab cakes or other crab-related dishes such as Pit Beef served on Kaiser rolls, or Berger cookies, which are vanilla shortbread covered with a fudge ganache
For San Francisco, there may be a bit more to choose from, like sourdough bread bowls filled with clam chowder, Chinese Food, all sorts of seafood, including cioppino and crab louie, Italian food is huge in the City and Chicken Tetrazinni was first made here as well as the first martini in the late 1800s in the Occidental hotel! Also Ghiradelli chocolate and Its-it for desert?
Since the Super Bowl is being hosted by New Orleans, you could also serve all sorts of delectable dishes from the Big Easy, including gumbo, Étouffée, beignets, etc.
Make football-themed foods
- Football shaped cookies with icing laces
- A football field cake, topped with green frosting and the line markings.
- Rice Krispies Treats footballs
- Keebler Fudge Sticks goal posts
- While you’re cooking and setting up for the party, why not play some Jazz to get in the N’Owlans mood?
There are more amazing ideas at https://pinterest.com/planetfassa/superbowl/ and
Games and activities
- 100 number Score grid – only need luck. $1 per square or whatever you want
- Rate the commercials
- Decorate or color football helmets
- Have your kids create and act out their own commercials
- Fruit snack football – toss fruit snacks into cups marked with point values
- Cheez-it stack ups
Some of these kids games and LOTS MORE can be found at http://www.snackpicks.com/en_US/holidays-and-occasions/football-party/kids-football-party-ideas.html
Wrapup
Contact Info: You can visit our website at www.kidsarehard.wordpress.com where we have our contact information, show notes, including links that we shared with you today. You can email us at kidsarehard@gmail.com, and if you want something played on air, just send an mp3 attachment to that email address!
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And remember everyone, Always kiss your children goodnight – even if they’re already asleep.
Chad and Trish
Kids Are Hard! 