Trying new things

I'm tired of being slack and I am bored of our summer routine.  This weekend, I read a few new blogs and got some inspiration for new foods and new activities to do with Max and Claire.  I have been slack about doing a lot of hands on activities with M and C bc most of the ones I tried would last a few minutes and create a lot of mess.  Then I found this blog.  She has a ton of great learning and hands on activities.  I went to Target to get a few supplies today and will have to get more when I can shop alone.  They did, however, do one of the art activities I wanted to try at The Children's Museum today.

This activity used different types of circles: empty yogurt cups, straws and paper towel rolls.  They really enjoyed it and did a pretty good job of staying clean.   They did try a few times to stick their hands in to "finger paint".
I bought some pipe cleaners and pom poms at Target and look forward to an activity with those!

So food... like I mentioned in a previous post, I would like to have a cleaner diet.  Admittedly, in the past I have just looked at fat, calories and fiber and in the past two years, I've looked for partially hydrogenated oils and HFCS.  I've never really payed attention to suger and little to protein.  Until now.
I was surprised with the amount of sugar that was in a lot of M and C's food - especially their organic yogurts that I thought were "so healthy".

Yesterday I went to the grocery store with a good friend who helped me navigate the store and read labels.   So far, so good today!  I was especially happy with my new lunch!

It satisfied my need for sweet, crunch and salty.  Carrots, dollop of hummus, grapes and tuna salad on a wasa cracker.  I made the tuna sans mayo and instead, mixed it with a tbs of plain greek yogurt and a tbs of garlic hummus. It was soooo good!!  I have also snacked on some plain popcorn.  I'm not sure where I read about it, but it was super easy.  Brown lunch bag, popcorn kernels and a microwave! no butters or oils.  I did add salt.... gotta have some taste :)

And... dinner is in crockpot.
I saw this recipe for cooking a whole chicken in a crockpot.  It will (hopefully) be perfect for this week since Justin will be out of town til Thursday :(

It's as easy as cut up onions, spices and crockpot!  Hopefully it turns out as good as it smells :)