After all the numerous toy recalls this year I reached a boiling point a few weeks ago and started to clean out all the kids’ toys. We own lots of Elmo, Dora, and Thomas, all kinds of stuff that has just narrowly missed being recalled, and since we have many generous relatives we have TONS of toys in general. I am not, as a rule, anti-plastic — Legos are the greatest toy ever, in my opinion — but I started to realize that I am in control of all the beeping, singing, flashing, wailing, and mooing toys in my house, and if they are driving me nuts, I can in fact put them into forced retirement.
So I sorted through four years’ worth of big plastic baby toys and ended up with a few huge trashbags of toys to donate (still working on WHERE to donate them, but at least they’re out of the way). Now we’re left with things like blocks and duplos, stacking cups, pretend food, and bouncy balls, none of which sing “Let’s go riding in my car, it’s nice and BLUUUUE…” when held.
And now, with the holidays coming up, I am on a quest to add only non-obnoxious toys to our recently decluttered collection. In my search for non-obnoxious toys, I found many amazing websites with gorgeous old-fashioned toys. So, for my own reference as well as yours, here are:
Fabulous Natural Toy Websites
October 11th, 2007
I am sitting down. One child is at school. One child is sleeping. I am not chasing a child while at home for the first time since I can’t remember when.
I am almost overwhelmed. This small window of free time is nearly panic-inducing. What to do with such a tiny window? There is dinner to cook and laundry to switch. There are phone calls to make. Toys to put away. It is almost easier when I have no free time and I am not sitting, frozen, unsure of which of the 3 gazillion things on my list to start doing.
But the best part? This scenario may repeat itself tomorrow, if Gloria naps while Frances is at school.
It is almost too much to think about.
September 10th, 2007
So in your opinion, what are the very best toys out there? if you have kids, what are the toys that have gotten the very most use in your house? if you don’t have kids, what childhood toy would you name as your favorite above all others?
just curious, as someone who spends a lot of time organizing toys.
August 8th, 2007
I first got hooked on YouTube by searching for old Sesame Street clips from the ’70s. I watch plenty of current Sesame Street these days, and it’s perfectly fine, but somehow the magic of the show has waned over the years. I remember watching it as a kid and thinking it was hilarious and weird and entrancing and pretty much the best thing ever. Now, it’s sweet and still very educational, but it’s lost a lot of its spark, its edge, and its pure wacky psychedelia. In a quest to bring my kids the magic of the original Street, I purchased the Sesame Street Old School DVDs, but of course they don’t cover everything. Here’s a list of the absolute best vintage Street on the block. (Hooray for YouTube!)
Classics:
Letters:
Numbers:
Muppets:
Guest Music:
Obscure yet wonderful:
Bonus Electric Company stuff:
June 14th, 2007
A few months ago, we had reached a not-so-nice place in TV Land: the power struggle. My almost-four-year-old daughter had decided to push the limits of TV watching, bargaining and pleading for more shows and getting pretty upset when we didn’t give in. Now I don’t really mind television, having grown up on a steady diet of Sesame Street, Superfriends, and Brady Bunch reruns, but I do mind a daily power struggle, so we looked for a solution. The fix came from my dear friend Julie, who told me about a TV chart she was using for her own kids.
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May 2nd, 2007
Third time’s the charm, right?
I am happy to report that my third try at finding a new “staple” recipe was wildly successful. Thank you, thank you, Jamie Oliver! I own several of his books, but haven’t gotten around to cooking many of the recipes yet; I flipped open one of his cookbooks last week to find a seemingly simple chicken dish that looked both tasty and low-maintenance. Here it is, also posted on his website:
Tender and Crisp Chicken Legs with Sweet Tomatoes
First, I must also thank Gloria for taking a long enough nap in the afternoon to enable me to completely prep the dish ahead of time. It only took about twenty minutes — I chopped up a bunch of fresh red, yellow, and cherry tomatoes, a whole bunch of basil, and one red chili pepper. Frances helped me peel the skins from six or seven garlic cloves, and we were ready to roll. I used two packages of skin-on chicken (thighs and legs were all we could find), seasoned them, threw them in a casserole dish, distributed tomatoes over and under them, added garlic cloves, and then covered with saran wrap and put in the fridge.
At around 4pm I slid my totally completed dinner out of the fridge, removed the saran wrap, drizzled it with olive oil, and put it into a preheated oven. My only mistake was covering the chicken for the first hour; the recipe didn’t specify and I was being cautious, but truly I think this is meant to be cooked uncovered. After the recommended 90 minutes at 350 my chicken wasn’t done, so I cranked up the heat to 400 for 15-20 more minutes, and it ended up just right.
This basically makes a nice mellow flavorful chicken with meat that falls off the bone. Jamie recommends serving it over mashed potatoes (which would be excellent) or noodles (which I did, was very good too). I had some fresh parmesan on hand and used that on top. It seems like it is very hard to mess up this recipe (a major plus) and the leftovers were fab. Totally going into our regular rotation and possibly even nice enough to serve to company.
Frances did not eat it due to having a very slight stomach bug, but I am sure she might actually eat some of the chicken in the future; I’m going to go out on a limb and even call this recipe kid-friendly.
So: Allrecipes 0, Moosewood 0, Jamie Oliver 1!
April 18th, 2007
I was feeling so optimistic after making that tilapia earlier in the week. Hey, I can do this! I thought. I can pull it all together AND watch the kids! Well, pride comes before the fall, I guess. It certainly comes before the broccoli mushroom casserole.
I selected this recipe from the Moosewood Cookbook because even though it had a long cooking time (45 mins), it had a relatively short prep time (30 minutes) and I thought I could throw everything together and then relax while it baked. Nice idea in theory, right? Let us just say that on the particular day I made this recipe, I could not accomplish even the simplest task without being interrupted by disaster (aka Gloria).
The prep: Chop one onion. I thought I’d chop the onion early in the day, so at about 10 a.m I put one in the freezer to cut down on crying problems, and then got Utterly Distracted ™ and forgot what I was doing. Thus, when I went to chop the onion at dinnertime, it was still in the freezer. Frozen. On the plus side, a frozen onion does not cause very much crying, and it seemed to behave very much like a regular onion. Still, I was glad the recipe did not call for operating heavy machinery.
Next, chop broccoli. This went… okay. By this point, Gloria, contained in her exersaucer, decided she was done with the exersaucer. I tossed Gerber baby snacks onto the exersaucer to buy myself some time. This extra back-and-forth motion added at least six minutes to the prep time, and Gloria started letting out a bloodcurdling shriek every time she ran out of star puffs.
By the time I got the onions and garlic cooking in a saute pan, the broccoli chopped, the noodles drained, and the rest of the casserole ingredients measured out and mixed, Gloria was in full meltdown mode. Star puffs or no star puffs, she wanted an immediate change of scene, preferably to the high chair with mommy’s full attention and a jar of apples and apricots. I put her on the floor and attempted to distract her with toys, and she crawled off for a moment and allowed me to add the broccoli and mushrooms to the saute pan. While I was stirring the broccoli I heard a thud and a wail. Poor Gloria had slipped and smacked her head on the wood floor; she was fine, but tearful. I now had to complete this recipe with a baby on one hip.
(I must add at this point that while all of this was going on, Frances was sitting in the TV room politely asking for a bowl of grapes every five minutes. The telephone also rang several times, and my contractor came to the door to discuss the fence he was building for us. All of these things added slightly to the prep time of the recipe.)
Finally I put Gloria in her high chair, ignored her wails, and assembled the casserole. My kitchen looked like a bomb had gone off. Eggs and milk and broccoli scraps and cottage cheese containers were all over my counter where I had left them every time one of my kids had demanded my attention. A full forty-five minutes after starting to chop my onion, I finally got the thing into the oven. It looked good. I was ready for the angels to sing when at last I pulled it from the oven. This better be the best casserole in the known universe, I thought.
It wasn’t.
You know, it was fine. If I had made it without any distractions, it would have been a relatively easy recipe, and I would not have expected an orgasmic taste sensation. But I had struggled through forty-five minutes of screaming and wailing and puffy stars in order to get this thing in the oven, and because of this, I had slightly elevated expectations.
It was…. sort of casserole-ish. It required a whole cup of breadcrumbs in the casserole mixture and in hindsight this seemed to be the problem with the taste and texture; they created a slightly bitter paste out of what would have been a creamy cottage cheese sauce. Also, the egg noodles failed to elevate it above the classic Ye Olde Tuna Noodle, or even the exalted Noodle Kugel, both of which are much better. On the bright side, I’m sure I could make a better version of the broccoli mushroom with a few modifications: axe the breadcrumbs, add more seasoning, switch the noodles to regular penne or farfalle, and most importantly, get someone to watch the baby.
Oh, Frances didn’t eat it, either.
In celebration of my culinary adventures, last night we had takeout. I plan on attempting another recipe when I have recovered from the marathon that was Broccoli Mushroom.
April 12th, 2007
Now that my diaper bag obsession is temporarily satisfied, I’m on to the next project: finding new recipes to add to our sadly limited repetoire of weekly favorites. This is not easy; Frances eats only a handful of foods and spends most dinners fidgeting, jumping out of her chair, feeding Cheerios to Gloria, and asking if everyone else is finished eating. Not the most appreciative audience. I’m pretty much cooking for myself and my husband, and if Frances happens to taste a bite of something in between jumps and fidgets, I’ll be happy. Incidentally, if I used Frances’ technique to eat my own dinner, I would probably drop ten pounds in a week.
Requirements for new recipes: They must be easier than easy, require almost no hands-on time, and be able to be prepared one-handed if necessary. (No stir-frys or anything that requires standing over the stove for the duration.) They can involve some pre-prep and assembly, as long as that can take place the night before. This is because at 5 p.m., Gloria is demanding her own dinner, crawling around the kitchen trying to get to the hot oven, crying if I attempt to contain her in the highchair, unravelling the family room rug, putting pieces of lint in her mouth, and disappearing if I take my eyes off of her for less than a minute. She would probably attempt to juggle knives at this hour if given the opportunity. (Thus, the Utterly Distracted Cook.)
First on my list of new dishes to try: Broiled Tilapia Parmesan from Allrecipes.com. I found this dish by clicking on the “top 20 recipes” list; it happens to be #1. With 5 stars and 1,856 reviews, I figured this would be a safe bet; even better, it satisfies my requirements for prep time (like 10 minutes) and difficulty (dead simple).
I was able to whip together the highly caloric butter-mayo-parm mixture while Gloria was playing on the floor, and did most of the actual broiling while she was in her high chair eating Cheerios. On the side: leftover asparagus risotto (gluey glue, alas) and steamed baby carrots with a touch of brown sugar in the hopes that Frances would eat one. (She did. Just one.)
I think the recipe turned out just exactly right; the fish was cooked perfectly and the topping was nicely browned. It looked very pretty on the plate and I had a moment of feeling like Supermom when I served an actual dinner with fish and risotto and a vegetable. And you know, it was… pretty good. Good, but not great. Not five-stars, two-thousand-raving-fans great. It was somehow a little bit too inoffensive, or something. Fabulously easy, but not so memorable. I will probably forget this recipe in a week and never make it again, just because it failed to be compelling. But it was quite tasty, and probably worth trying one more time at some point. Unfortunately, I think it lacks the personality to make it into our regular cast of favorites.
Next up: A Moosewood Cookbook casserole. Hopefully I’ll have time to cook it tomorrow.
April 9th, 2007
After my last post on diaper bags I discovered the world of the truly diaper-bag-obsessed. I took the plunge off the deep end and wandered into fantastic message boards filled with like-minded organizational lunatics. First of all, there’s the Babybags Yahoo! Group. This place, a buy-sell-swap-discuss mecca of all things diaper bag, actually has a database of photos of different bags. Please do not hold it against me when I say that I actually spent several hours perusing the photos just to see the interior shots of all the bags. Because how often do you have to buy a bag without seeing the inside first? Too often, in my opinion. Even more helpful were the comparison shots: Skip Hop Dash next to Fleurville Sling Tote. Front view. Side view. Observe.
Also helpful were the Baby Bargains message boards; their diaper bag forum is teeming with diaper bag addicts eager to discuss the differences between the Land’s End Triple Compartment Diaper Backpack and the DadGear Diaper Backpack. At this very moment someone is cataloging the differences in measurement between all available diaper bag packs. YES.
Then there are the lovely folks over at the Ju-Ju-Be message boards, kvelling happily over their latest JJB acquisitions. This is, dare I say it, Diaper Bag Fandom. The innovative and super-nice head honchos at JJB read these boards and actually take their users’ feedback into consideration when designing or modifying these bags. I was pretty darn impressed with the obsessiveness of everyone involved, and sent away for a JJB bag to see if they had managed to achieve diaper bag nirvana.
Based on photos and message board reviews, I also sent away for a Lexie Barnes Superstar (on SALE!), a mega-sized messenger style diaper bag that was rumored to be both lightweight and pretty darn big. I have been thrilled with my Fleurville Sling Tote as a small bag, but if I’m going somewhere and need to carry a packed lunch for both girls and extra sweaters for everyone, it just doesn’t cut it. So I thought I’d compare the Ju-Ju-Be Packabe and the Superstar, both of which got raves — one of them would have to be my perfect Big Bag.
Well, apologies to the lovely folks at JJB, but for me, the Superstar came out on top. Although the Packabe was rumored to carry a huge amount of stuff, it lacked the interior organization to make the stuff easy to find. And although it was cute as hell (especially in brown & robin’s egg blue), it was HEAVY. All those special teflon thinsulate space age materials really weighed it down. And although it was billed as the biggest JJB bag, I found it to be roughly equivalent to the Sling Tote in size, and I needed still bigger.
The Superstar, on the other hand, weighed less than the Packabe, but fit all my stuff with tons of room to spare. It’s not as easy to carry, since it’s not a backpack, but since it’s lightweight I don’t think it will be too awkward. It also has magnetic closures, a wipeable exterior, a brightly colored interior, and enough pockets to make angels sing. The only big disappointment with the Superstar is that it lacks rings or straps to attach it to a stroller. It also doesn’t have the cushy cellphone-specific mom gear pockets of the Sling Tote. If it had those things, it might actually achieve nirvana status.
So I’m keeping the Superstar (yeah, I know, another bag), which will leave me with two bags in regular rotation (Sling Tote, for little outings, and Superstar for big ones), plus my old DadGear backpack for airplane travel. Even more satisfying than sampling new diaper bags was organizing my stuff to easily switch from one bag to the other.
So now I’m on to my next obsession for now: finding new recipes to work into our regular rotation. More about that very soon.
April 8th, 2007
As promised, here’s a list of what usually lurks in my diaper bag.
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April 3rd, 2007
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