We have so much going on at our Facebook [Family Value & Large Families] and Twitter [Family Value & Large Families] pages and we realise not all our readers are a member of these 2 social networking avenues, nor do we expect them to be, so here it is - the week in review….

Things to do at home with the kids

• Nicole at Planning with Kids has inspired with some Christmas Themes and planning for Christmas 2011
• Catherine at Squigglemum has an awesome idea having a Backyard treasure hunt
• Childhood101 has listed Playopedia Picks : Play Ideas for BIG Kids
• Tricia from Little Eco Footprints via Childhood101 has written an inspiring article on Creating Children’s Spaces in Every Corner of Your Home
• How to make magic sand
• Lego Quest Kids is a blog dedicated to children and validating their lego creations & imagination.
• Jean has written an article for Toddler Times 11 Activities to try with your toddler
• Ohdeedoh home, design & children has presented a wonderful article on How to make ‘clean’ play slime
• Grace has a step by step guide on how to make Fizzy milk bath bombs

Recipes & Cooking

• Chicken Balls by Planning with Kids
• Nicole has suggested ‘baking days’ with the kids to fill the freezer with lunchbox snacks (yes! we have learnt muffins CAN be frozen)
• Vegie Smugglers is a new blog / website we have discovered which has lots of recipes (lunchbox stuff too!) to sneak the good stuff in!
• The Organised Housewife has a very yummy recipe for Choc Coated Oreos, Oreo Cookies & Carrot Muffins
• Childhood101 has a recipe for a different brekkie Bacon & Egg Muffins

Things to do out and about

• To spend or not to spend on school holidays……… do school holidays have to be expensive?
• Family Capers has listed a comprehensive list of zoos around Australia.  What to do this weekend - playing with animals

General issues & conversation

• Jane from My Life At Home has written a timely article 10 Things I consider in buying toys for my (young) kids
• Awesome article by Kate at Picklebums on Won’t they miss out? , discussing about our children and whether or not they need to do extra-curricular activities.
• Moving Smart has an easy explanation why You can’t run uphill indoors
• Treating worms
• WifeSwap Australia is coming soon to our TV screens, and although I won’t be applying, FYI applications are due by 15th July.  All details for applying are here
• Motherhood the Musical is currently touring, soon to be in Sydney and we have secured a very special offer especially for our readers.  For more info click here
• WIN a night out with your Mothers Group to Motherhood the Musical

QUOTE OF THE WEEK: [5 year old boy]”There’s one thing good about having lots of brothers and sisters!” [Proud Mum] “What’s that?’ [5 year old boy] “Because I get more presents!”

Today was a ‘first’ for me.

While I slept after night duty - the 4 middle kids went out with friends and relis, which left me with the youngest (21 months) and my eldest (11 years - girl).  Always scamming to make my life as easy as possible I decided that it probably wasn’t too much to ask my daughter to care for my 21 month old IF she had a friend come over and help her!  My daughter didn’t complain about the idea and really ’stepped up’.  The only proviso B1 had was that she wouldn’t change a pooey nappy - fair enough I guess!  And lucky for me he saved his pooey nappy AFTER I awoke from my slumber!  Overall, B1 was a credit to herself and did a wonderful job entertaining K6.

They ate chocolate, watched DVDs, played ‘hairdressers’ (with K6 -boy copping hair clips & hair ties in his hair), made smoothies, played games, made their own lunch and played the Wii.  They had an awesome time and I reckon they would easily volunteer their services again!

Do you employ the services of the older siblings to babysit?  Is it right or wrong?

So last night it was ‘date night’ with the hubby and today is was my ‘date’ with K5. 

As many of you whom have large families would understand, spending one on one time with each child is a difficult task.

Definately we manage odd moments during the day where we read a story or do a craft activity, but more than likely one of the other siblings will make a disturbance usually highlighting the fact that they are feeling left out at that particular time.  In the second half of last year I realised that the children were starting to grow up quickly and it was time to factor in ‘time’ with each of the children.

Hence, the Family Value ‘Time’ Plan has been devised!

THE PLAN

Each year Ian & I are to spend time with each of the children individually doing whatever they choose (within reason).  This means 12 days in a year are taken up for ‘date time with the children’.

When I explained this idea to the children they responded extremely positively and are constantly dreaming about the ‘dates’ they are going to have with each of their parents.

The plan kicked off last year with Ian taking K5 to BEN 10 LIVE, Me taking K5 to The Pancake Parlour for breakfast & Build-a-Bear Workshop, and Ian taking B1 to dinner and to see Hairspray The Musical.   So, this year L2 has been to see MSO Disney in Concert  & ACMI Disney’s Dreams Come True exhibition . 

And today……. K5 & I went to see the Yogi Bear Movie & went shopping at the Chapel Street Bazaar in search of a retro Yogi Bear item, which we found - check out the tin lunch box!

Advantages

• The children don’t get jealous of each others outings
• It takes out the obligatory factor of purchasing a ticket for everyone, hence sending you broke!
• Most importantly, allows for the one on one time you need to spend with your child
• Allows each child to express their individuality reflected in their choices

AND before you think we’re playing favourites with ‘K5′, the children whom didn’t get a chance last half of last year make up for it this year, then in 2012 we’ll be up to date!

So, what do you think?

Would this be beneficial in your family?

‘Date Night at Gold Class Doncaster - The Tourist’ 

Back in the infantry years of mothers group I remember one of our guest speakers - a psychologist, and the one piece of advice that stayed with me is to make time for our relationship and one way to do this is to diarise regular ‘date nights’.

Over the years we’ve managed to find time for ‘us’ as a couple however this has become an increasingly difficult task as the children have multiplied to 6 in 10 years!  Always valuing and believing in the advice of ‘that psychologist’ 11 years ago we have made a concious effort to continue our date nights.  Whilst the children are extremely important to us, if we, as parents feel under pressure we find that the children reflect our stress by way of misbehaving which causes the cascade effect of one very stressed family!  Do you relate?

So it is, we have a ‘date night - out’ approximately every 2 weeks, and a ‘date night - in’ every other week.   Whether it be to see a movie, go out for dinner or simply have ’secret takeaway’ after the children have gone to bed.  This time is very important.  We look forward to these nights and value the ‘couple time’ that they give us.

So, who will babysit? 

• find some teenage girls known to you (family friends, work colleagues, children’s friends older siblings, local church teens, coaches at local sporting club)
• ask the grandparents. aunties & uncles
• swap with another family and do the same for them

Points to Note 

• even if you just get 2 hours together, that time proves extremely important!
• factor in the babysitting money into your weekly budget
• don’t be late coming home if using family members / other couples (everyone is usually happy to help if they know exactly what time they will be required for)
• settle the children into bed (or the majority of them) before you leave

Do you do ‘date nights’?

Have you seen ‘The Tourist’? 

We had a ‘chill out’ day in Ballina today and after a bike ride, a swim and fun in the games room, the kids were……… B.O.R.E.D. so I came up with a solution that kept them occupied for 1 hour!  Armed with a camera for 10 minutes, each of the children had a turn at sharing their artistic ability!  And so it is, the “Family Value Famous Photo Comp” was born - and YOU TOO can participate!

Above are the final entries from each of the 5 children! Being the healthily competitive family we are, the children are keen to have their photos judged by YOU - our Family Value Blog followers, Twitter followers and fans on Facebook! So vote for your favourite by putting the name of your favourite photo… in the comments section!

Voting closes tomorrow 5th March at 9pm.

Happy judging!

By the way, all children will get the same prize so don’t worry about causing fights in our mostly harmonic family!

JUST FOR FUN!

A rainy, humid day in Ballina - our first full day here and what can we do?  We thought it risk-free to explore Thursday Plantation - a World of Natural Medicine.  It’s FREE to enter, has a maze for the kids, a rainforest walk, sculptures and a theatre room set-up to explain the origins of Thursday Plantation.  Half of us enjoyed this attraction and half of us didn’t!  The staff were very helpful and friendly, allowing us to apply liberally their tea-tree Walkabout Insect Repellent.  Donning our Rainbird spray jackets we ventured deep into the sculpture garden, spirit of australia tea tree maze and the rainforest walk & botanical gardens. 

The sculptures were interesting and the maze was fun with the beauty of nature obvious in a beautifully designed spiderweb (we also found the spider!) and the occassional ‘interesting’ sculpture along the way.  From the maze we continued deep into the tea tree rainforest where mosquitoes were aplenty!  This is where the fun tended to demise from the childrens perspective as they felt they were being ‘eaten alive’.  Mozzies must LOVE children as I feel I came out of the experience relatively unharmed from those little pests.  The highlight of the rainforest walk, apart from the obvious beauty of nature was the door in the middle of the forest.  K5 enjoyed jumping over what he named ‘crocodile creek’ - a little stream running at the end of our journey.

Whilst the children were in a frantic hurry to get back in the car and return to our ‘holiday home’ I spent 5 minutes back at the gift shop and purchased some Thursday Plantation Walkabout Insect Repellent (it worked for me!), Thursday Plantation Tea Tree Antiseptic Cream, Thursday Plantation Tea Tree LipGuard & Thursday Plantation Tea Tree Skin Wash.  I hope the family doesn’t mind me smelling like a Tea Tree!

Have you been to Thursday Plantation? 

What did you think?

 Today I had ‘one of those moments’ - I just wanted to shrink and disappear!  Well meaning ‘ME’ thought it would be a wise idea to introduce 4 year old K5 to another child at kinder whom I think could be a potential long term friend.  I think it was a case of ‘bad timing’.  I introduced K5 to his new potential friend.  It was K5’s response which made me want to disappear…………. FAST!  “I don’t like you!  I don’t want to play with you!”.  As potential friend just looks forlorn and bewildered by this comment I realise potential friend has just turned into potential enemy.  Embarrassed I promptly apologised to the mother and assured myself that he didn’t mean it.  I took K5 aside and asked him why he said that, and he said “I haven’t known him for a very long time”.  Phew!  Perfect explanation BUT I now realise I need to do some serious ’social teaching’.  Just because you haven’t known him for a very long time doesn’t meant you DON’T LIKE HIM!!!!  Thankfully the potential friend, now the potential enemy’s mother is all forgiving and we are going to organise a ‘getting to know you’ playdate!  Hopefully this will go well! and I’d better help K5 in socialising a little more appropriately otherwise he might ‘fail’ 3 year old kinder.  Eeeeeeek!

I actually googled “4 year old telling friend he doesn’t like him and doesn’t want to play with him” and unsurprisingly I didn’t really get any useful advice, however, I did find the following articles:

Raising Children Network - Child Development 4/5 Years

Kidslife Readiness for Pre-School : Expectations & Preparations

You’re not my friend anymore by Karen Jacobsen

and I will be reading I’m not your friend by Sam McBratney at least every second night!

Can anyone else share their experiences in a similar situation?  Offer advice? I hope I’m not alone!

With the bushfire season upon us, and living in a bushfire prone area, this mother of 6 is beginning to feel quite a responsiblity with her young brood.  So it was, I insisted that we decide on a definate fire plan and practice it with the children,  and this INCLUDES me learning how to use the fire pump associated with our dam!  Our plan is of course to leave as early as we can, however, as we have been made aware by Black Saturday this is not always possible if the fire is imminent and we can see flames closeby.  So we now have a plan and now I KNOW how to turn the fire pump on!  It was quite a sight tonight when I got saturated after being successful in my first attempt!  Gave the children quite a laugh in an otherwise serious excursion to the dam!  Do you live in a fire prone area?  Do you have a plan?

Happy New Year!

Like millions of families around the world, last night we celebrated the new year, 2010!  Is it Two Thousand and Ten or Twenty-Ten?  We had a fantastic time with two families very close to us!  Although, our efforts at having a ‘dive-in outdoor movie night’ was  hampered by the extreme conditions of thunder & lightning, these 6 adults and 12 children partied on, enjoying each others company and finally seeing the New Year in!  The only casualties of the evening was our landline telephone and our modem which were damaged by the storms.  Unfortunately the folk in Strathewen encountered a poor start to the New Year with torrential rain causing mudslides. 

And like millions of people around the world, we have also made a few New Years Resolutions! 

Here are some of mine……..

• Continue to enjoy the company of my beautiful family & the people closest to us
• Embrace life and try not to allow the ‘insignificant things’ to get in the way
• List at least 700 new family attractions within Australia

For one of the first times EVER ‘losing weight’ is not one of my resolutions.  This year I’m hoping I will ‘tone up’ without the pressure of the resolution!!!!  We’ll see! 

Have you got a New Years Resolution you would like to share? OR Are you having trouble finding one?  Look here for some ideas!

Also, I managed to teach a few children the art of counting the time as to how far away the storm is!  I am now responsible for extremely frightening some children, however, they are now more educated!  :-)  Here is a link to some info on Thunder & Lightning!

Must admit Hubby Ian made an excellent dessert tonight - Golden Syrup Dumplings!  Disappointed I forgot to take a picture……. I’ll just have to get him to make them again! 

Hubby’s Golden Syrup Dumplings  -  SERVES 8

SAUCE:

• 2 cups water
• 1 cup white sugar
• 2 tbs golden syrup
• 2 tbs butter

DUMPLINGS:

• 2 cups SR flour
• 2 tbs butter
• 2 eggs lightly beaten
• milk  (as required)

Place sauce ingredients in a pan and heat.  Rub butter into flour, stir in egg and enough milk to make firm dough.  Roll into little balls and drop into the boiling syrup for between 5 - 10 minutes.