Toy Safety 101

Toys are designed to be fun for kids, right? Well, not if they choke on them! (Captain Obvious told me to write that!)

Babies and young toddlers have narrow airways, and still a tendency to put just about everything into their mouth. This puts them at an especially high risk of choking.

Here are some safety tips to help prevent your child from choking on a toy:

• Follow the age recommendations on toy packaging. These guidelines are developed, in part, based on safety concerns.
• Be especially careful to keep balloons and broken balloon fragments away from small children. More children suffocate on uninflated balloons and balloon fragments than on any other type of toy.
• Inspect toys regularly. If a small part breaks off a toy, throw the toy away.
• Keep marbles, broken crayons, small balls, small magnetic letters, and other small magnets, beads, toys with small parts, and stuff toys that can be squeezed to fit entirely in a child's mouth off the floor and out of the reach of infants and young children.
• Teach older kids to keep hazardous toys away from younger siblings, including toys with batteries that could fall out.
• Make sure the eyes and noses of stuffed animals are firmly secured.
• don't give vending machine toys to young children. These toys often don't meet required safety regulations.

Have any safety tips you would like to share? Please comment below and pass along your toy safety wisdom.

IcyBag Surprise Giveaway Winners

Thank you to everyone who entered the IcyBag surprise giveaway. We loved all of your comments and are glad you like the IcyBag as much as we do.

Now on to the winners...

Congratulations Misty, who said,
"The tethered storage pouch for the ice pack is my favorite feature. Thanks so much for the opportunity."

and

Congratulations Ginnbelle, who said,
"The icy bag would be great for keeping makeup cool, aloe cool for those hot NC sunburns, or even drinks. Great invention!"

Misty and Ginnbelle, please contact us at info@housescouchesandbabies.com to claim your IcyBag.

Stay tuned for many more fun giveaways coming very soon!

Double Points at My Coke Rewards

As you may notice, we like to give away stuff. That is partially because I like to get free stuff. I am the small percentage of people that actually takes advantage of mail-in rebates because I am one never to pass up free money. Plus, I like to make a company put their money where their mouth is!

So, since my husband is a diet coke junkie (he was a Coca-Cola junkie when I met him, but introduced him to the diet version so that he didn't waste his calories on soda), I decided to join the My Coke Rewards program because you can collect points to redeem more soda...seems pretty logical to me.

Anyway, MyCokeRewards.com is offering double points for all 12-packs on Wednesday, June 25. So if you are a member, be sure to enter your points that day. Or if you are interested in earning free Coke products, enroll and enter your codes on June 25.

I know, I am a geek. But come on, didn't you already know that by now?

Good Foods for Great Skin

Food - most people are worried about what it will do to your figure. Some people are more concerned with how food will affect their health. But what about the body's largest organ, skin?

The food you eat greatly impacts the health and glow of your skin. So here are 10 foods that are great for your skin...

1. Avocado: This creamy, green fruit (yes, it is considered a fruit!) is abundant in essential oils and B-complex vitamins that nourish your skin on the inside as well as the outside.
2. Mangoes: This sweet treat provides 80% of your daily vitamin A requirements, which maintains and repairs skin cells.
3. Almonds: This nut provides 150% of your daily vitamin E requirements, which has rich oils that moisturize dry skin, while its antioxidants protect against skin damage and premature aging of facial tissue.
4. Cottage Cheese: This dairy delight has Selenium, an essential mineral, which when teamed up with vitamin E acts as a powerful free radical-fighting antioxidant duo. Plus, Selenium has been touted to protect against skin cancer and even fight dandruff.
5. Acerola Cherries: One single Acerola cherry supplies 100% of your daily allowance for vitamin C, which fights against skin damage and wrinkles, and helps in the production of collagen. (Keep in mind, this only applies to this type of cherry.)
6. Oysters: This treasure from the sea is a rich source of zinc which can help fight acne.
7. Baked Potatoes: One baked potato eaten with the skin supplies 75% of your daily need for copper, which works hand-in-hand with vitamin C and zinc to produce the elastin fibers that support skin structure.
8. Mushrooms: Rich in riboflavin, mushrooms can improve skin blemishes caused by rosacea.
9. Flaxseed Oil: A great source of Omega-3 fatty acids, which hydrates the skin and can help prevent acne.
10. Wheat Germ: A great source of biotin, a B vitamin that is crucial to skin health, which is so important to healthy skin that a mild deficiency can actually cause dermatitis

Have fun taking care of your skin!

Information courtesy of lifescript.com

Fun Fact for Your Child

With the summer heat, I am sure your child is loving every ounce of ice cream s/he gets to intake. But does your child know what ice cream is made of?

Here is a simple fun fact to help educate your child on what they are eating.

Fun Fact:
Ice cream is made from whipped-up milk with sugar added.

(Ideally, that is what ice cream should be made from, but if you look on the carton of ice cream these days, there seems to be many more ingredients.)

When Your Child Won't Participate

My 3-year old is involved in several activities this summer. He has swimming lessons on Monday and Wednesday, play camp on Tuesday and Thursday mornings and pee wee baseball on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons.

He loves his swimming lessons and play camp, too. But, as he says, "I can't like baseball!" He has had a total of 3 baseball practices and his interest has decreased each time since his first practice. Yesterday he sat on the side of the field crying while the rest of the kids were learning about the positions and attempting to throw to first base (come on, they are only three...although some of them look like they are five!). It was about 95 degrees out, my 7-month old daughter was in the stroller, and I thought I was going to lose my mind. He finally was talked into batting when I told him we could go to the playground at this same park after practice was over.

I gave him two options: either he played on the field with his team or he watched his team play, but he had to stay with his team. I don't want him quitting...but then again, he is only three. If he isn't interested, maybe I really shouldn't force it.

Help!!! What should I do???

Keep Things Cool This Summer with the IcyBag Surprise Giveaway

It's official, I am melting in this sweltering heat! But I haven't lost all hope. I found something that can at least keep important items from melting...the IcyBag.

The IcyBag is a perfect bag to can keep makeup, medicine, sunscreen or snacks (just to name a few things) cool. The IcyBag is fully insulated and comes with a freezer gel pack so that its contents won't melt. And it's small enough to fit inside your baby or beach bag. It is perfect for beach days, golfing and family day trips. It comes in three different color options, including all black (shown below), which would be a great gift even for the macho-est man in your life.

And have no fear, the freezer gel pack is only 3 ounces so it is approved to carry on to an airplane. (How do I know this? I contacted the maker of the IcyBag and they responded within minutes to let me know it was safe to carry on. Now that is customer service!)

And lucky, lucky you! Thanks to the maker of the IcyBag, (2) lucky Houses, Couches and Babies readers will win an IcyBag.

Here's how to enter:

• Check out the IcyBag website and post a comment right here telling us what feature you like best about the IcyBag.
• In your comment, please be sure to include your name (or blogger name) as well as your city/state/country (anonymous comments will not be accepted; obviously because we won't know who you are!)
• Post your comment by midnight PST on Monday, June 23rd.

The winner will be announced sometime shortly after June 23rd, so please keep checking back to see if you are a winner!

Good Luck!

Don't Let Bad Habits Ruin your Marriage

Let me start off by saying that I am not a relationship expert. However, I came across an article that talked about bad habits that can ruin your marriage that made me think. Here are the top 10 ideas that can destroy a marriage:

1. Not having sex
2. Letting yourself go
3. Spending too much time with the in-laws (which includes telling them private information)
4. Spending too much time with work, friends, hobbies
5. Not consulting your partner about purchases
6. Forgetting the smaller gestures
7. Criticizing and nagging endlessly
8. Always playing the victim
9. Sweating the small stuff
10. Not fighting fair
    

Having said all these, let's turn them into positive ideas on how to keep a marriage healthy and happy. (You know, how you felt on your wedding day!)

1. Have Sex!
2. Don't let yourself go...put a little extra effort to look attractive for your spouse (he or she will most likely do the same in return!)
3. Don't spend too much time with the in-laws...you have your own family now!
4. Don't spend too much time with work, friends, and hobbies because your spouse is bound to feel unimportant in your life. This means get your priorities straight...your spouse comes first!
5. Talk to your spouse about money. Come to some sort of agreement on what purchases your need to consult with each other on and those you can make on your own. And while you are at it, talk about how money will be handled and who will be paying the bills - well, at least the activity of making the payment!
6. Make small gestures like a hug and kiss when you walk in the door, holding his/her hand when sitting next to each other, or saying thank you when your spouse does something for you.
7. Don't criticize or nag your spouse - remember, you chose your spouse for better or worse and should have known this about him/her when you tied the knot. And remember, nagging often leads to tuning out anyway.
8. Don't always play the victim. Take responsibility for a bad behavior. The sooner take responsibility, the sooner you can move on and be happy with one another.
9. Don't sweat the small stuff. I know, easier said than done, but him leaving the toilet seat up every now and again isn't going to kill you. Just remember, you have annoying habits and forget to do things every now and again, too! Lots of things are going to go wrong in a marriage, so you really have to figure out what is worth getting upset over.
10. Fight fair. Arguing in a marriage is inevitable, but just make sure you have good intentions when you are arguing with your spouse.

Did I miss anything? What do you think it takes to keep a marriage happy and healthy?

Click here to see the entire article.

Sunscreen: Should it Stay or Should it Go

I have been pretty good about using sunscreen on my son all-year round if he is going outside. And especially now that the summer heat is here (and he wants to go outside now more than ever!), it's time to find out if that bottle of sunscreen in your medicine cabinet is still good.

There's not always an expiration date on a bottle of sunscreen. If you have a bottle that's not printed with an expiration date, assume it will last for at least three years. The clue to this is the very fact that many sunscreens don't bear expiration dates — the FDA doesn't require it of products that are stable for at least three years and don't have dosage limits.

So, if you are like me and still have a bottle of sunscreen from your honeymoon five years ago, you should probably toss it. (Unless, of course, you are keeping it for sentimental value!)

But here is something I have also heard time and time again from doctors on talk shows...we don't put nearly enough sunscreen on at one sitting. Instead of spreading a thin layer of sunscreen on, we should be coating our skin with it.

Happy Summer!

Image courtesy of www.girlhealth.gov

Toy Story Mania

One of the perks of living in Southern California is being able to visit Disneyland. We actually have annual passes because my husband and I enjoy taking the kids there so much.

And a benefit of being an annual pass holder is the ability to check out attractions before they open to the general public. We were selected to go today (and only today) to check out the newest attraction, Toy Story Mania. (BTW, my son was Buzz Lightyear for Halloween this past year, just to give you an idea how much he loves Toy Story.)

Since it was a week day, my husband wasn't able to come along. But no biggie for me, I have taken both kids to Disneyland by myself, and I can surely do this again.

Unfortunately, it wasn't as easy as I remembered. We got into California Adventure and headed straight for Toy Story Mania (which is at the complete opposite end of the park...oh goody!). My three year old son was surprisingly calm holding my hand in line while my 7 month old was snugly attached to me via the Baby Bjorn.

We were in line for about 20 minutes when we hear over the loud speaker "We are sorry to inform you that we are having some technical difficulties. We don't know when the issues will be resolved. You are more than welcome to stay in line and wait or go and enjoy other attractions at this time." (Now I know why they have sneak peeks for annual pass holders, we are the guinea pigs!) So my son and daughter waited for another 25 minutes in line when my son suddenly heard that another family was going to get out of line and go to the Monsters Inc. attraction. At that moment, I knew where we were headed.

Once we walked all the way back to the other side of the park to Monsters Inc., we waited in line for about 15 minutes until we heard, "We are sorry to inform you that we are having some technical difficulties. We anticipate it taking at least 20 minutes, possibly 40, to fix the problem. You are more than welcome to stay in line and wait or go and enjoy other attractions at this time."

Are you kidding me!!! We had now been at the park for 2 hours and had yet to go on a ride. But we decided to wait it out and luckily got on Monsters Inc. after 15-20 minutes of waiting.

We then headed back to Toy Story Mania, and what do you know, it was running again! We got in line, waited for about 40 minutes (passing several Disneyland line monitors) until we finally were almost on the ride. The line monitor who tells you what vehicle to sit in looks at my daughter in the Baby Bjorn and says, " She can't stay in that. She is going to have to sit on her own."

"You are joking, right?" I asked. He wasn't.

They made my 7 month old sit in between my 3 year old and I, and she actually did pretty well. She had no idea what was going on, and of course, I was just worried about her staying in one place. My son seemed to like the ride, although, he had a tough time with the blaster. And I couldn't help him with it much because I was trying to keep my daughter from banging her head against the hard seat back.

My overall impression of the ride...it was alright. I think I was expecting a lot more. The entire ride is just one screen after another your vehicle pulls up to. Perhaps if I had time to actually focus on the ride, I might have enjoyed it more. Perhaps if someone had told me before I waited in line for 40 minutes that my 7 month old would have to sit next to me, I would have enjoyed it more. But hey, these are all lessons learned that I am now passing on to you.

If your child likes Toy Story even just a little bit, then he/she would like this ride. Here are my pieces of advice if you want to go on this ride:

• Expect to wait quite a while to get on this ride (I didn't see any Fast Pass line either)
• DO NOT bring your baby on the ride with you
• DO bring snacks for your kids while you are in line (but not too much liquid because then they might have to go the bathroom right as you get to the front of the line)
• Smile! You are at Disney's California Adventure...the second happiest place on earth!

Images courtesy of Disneyland.com

What a Headache!

Headaches are such a pain...literally! But how can you prevent them?

Researchers believe the tension-type headaches are most likely caused by changes among certain brain chemicals.

Here are some factors that may trigger these brain chemical changes:

• stress
• depression
• anxiety
• lack of sleep or changes in sleep routine
• skipping meals
• poor posture
• working in an awkward postion or holding one position for a long time
• lack of exercise
• hormonal changes
• overuse of headache medication

(or as I like to say...life!) So, what can we do about these triggers?

Here are some ways to prevent tension headaches:

• avoid excess caffeine
• eat healthy foods; don't skip meals, especially breakfast
• stay physically active; even just taking a walk could help the way you feel
• follow a regular sleep schedule
• reduce stress by planning ahead and organizing your day
• learn a relaxation technique (ex. deep breathing)
• improve your posture

And if all else fails, a couple glasses of wine (or your favorite beverage) may be the cure. But, then again, that may give you another type of headache!!!

Information provided by Mayo Clinic Health Solutions

Surprise Giveaway Winner: Starbucks Gift Card for your Father's Day Gift Ideas!

Thank you so much to everyone who entered the Father's Day Gift Idea Giveaway. Your ideas were creative and heartwarming. The fathers in your lives are certainly going to be pleased this Father's Day!

Now, on to the winner.

Congratulations to Katie S. who said:
"This year finances are a bit a tight because my husband has been gracious enough to let me stay home from work to raise our two kids. But I want him to know how special he is, so the kids are going to make daddy something special from Color Me Mine and I am not going to nag him for an entire day (which believe me, is very tough)."

Katie S., please contact us at info@housescouchesandbabies.com to claim your Starbucks gift card!

Oh, and for those of you out there who haven't figured out what to get dear old dad, please be sure to check out all the comments from the giveaway. The ideas should provide you with some great inspiration!

Honey: Should it Stay or Should it Go?

Have you ever thought about how long that honey bear has been sitting in your cupboard? Probably years, right? Well, when are you supposed to get rid of honey?

There is actually an old story about honey being found in the tomb of an ancient Egyptian king, as good as new ... and it's actually true. A jar of honey stored at a pretty consistent temperature can last for centuries.

Something in the makeup of honey prevents mold growth. If it's been in and out of different temperatures, it could darken or crystallize or lose its flavor, but it never technically rots or spoils.

So unless it tastes or looks funky, your honey is fine!

Surprise Giveaway: Starbucks Gift Card for your Father's Day Gift Ideas!

Father's Day is less than 2 weeks away...Do you have a great gift idea for dear old dad? Please share it! Your great gift idea could earn you a $50 Starbucks gift card!

Here's what you need to do...

• Post a comment sharing your Father's Day gift idea...remember creativity and thoughtfulness counts!


• All comments must be received by 12 noon PST on Friday, June 6 to be eligible. No anonymous comments will be accepted.

We will post the winner and their Father's Day gift idea shortly after the contest closes (so that you have enough time to perhaps recreate the gift for that special dad in your life). Please keep checking back because the winner will not be contacted!

Good luck!

Tip for Introducing Baby Foods

Transitioning a baby from exclusively milk to baby food can be fun and exciting, and yet a chore at the same time. Here is a quick tip I learned from my pediatrician that worked like a charm for my 3-year old and so far is going well for my 6 month old.

Most doctors will encourage you to start with rice cereal first. (Bonus tip: if your baby becomes constipated from rice cereal, which many babies do, you can also feed him/her oatmeal - in the baby section at the grocery store - and this seems to help your baby go!)

When you start introducing foods other than cereal, start with green vegetables first. As much as you are going to be tempted and excited to feed your baby applesauce and pears, save that until they have firmly established a palette for veggies (green vegetables, in particular). Obviously, 99.9% of us would say that fruits taste better than vegetables. But a baby doesn't know that. If you start with fruit first, you may never get your baby to like vegetables, and you will have an uphill battle the rest of his/her life.

So there's my feeding tip...please share your tips, too!

Wanna Be an Anonymous Mom?

Finally a place where you can share your thoughts and not have mommy guilt. (Well, you can do that here at HC&B, too, but this is a site completely devoted to your anonymity.)

No judgements, no advice, no husbands, children or even your own mother finding you. Simply your own place to let it all hang out!

Share your storyhttp://www.anonymousmom.com/