Halloween

Healthy food recipesFor Samhain or Halloween ideasSamhain and Halloween idea's

   

As Samhain approaches so does our cultural candy day, Halloween. I like to remind parents everywhere, that we can provide a fun and healthy holiday for our children without allowing them to pig out on store bought candy.

On holidays, it's natural children should have some treats, but what those treats are, are in our power.

First, how do you avoid all this junk food on a night such as Halloween. Well one of the simplest ways, is host your own party. Allowing you control of what's on the menu.

Whether you have a party or not it's important you provide your children special holiday treats that not only taste good, but look appealing. The secret is, finger foods! 

Making a spread of delicious treats, preferably home made and with your children actively involved. Cooking is a great way to bond and a useful life skill. Decorate a table in the house on Halloween, even if you go out. Be creative and festivel. 

Ideas for Samhain and Halloween

Healthy Recipes

Trick-or-treat

My favorite part of Halloween. The process of wandering the night in a costume, collecting candy, fills me with thrills. I knew I could never deny this experience from my children. Yet how does one trick or treat and not allow your children to eat candy?  

If your children are older and have experienced the traditional Halloween traditions, you can't avoid it altogether.

You will have to allow SOME, but you can limit the amount and hold onto the candy after the festivities. With younger children, you can snatch the candy up and out of sight, out of mind.

Personal Story

Last year on Halloween, I took my daughter out for her first real trick or treating at the age of two.

When walked back to our house, some trick or treaters had come to our door, but we had no candy. My precious little girl reached into her basket and handed generously amounts of candy for each kid. She did this on her own, without even my suggestion. My heart swelled with pride and joy.



 Now what to do with all that candy!
I'm against being wasteful, so throwing out the candy isn't an option. I admit, last year my husband and I ate the candy. Which is an option but not the healthiest.

Re-Gift

You can use the candy to make small gift baskets, you and your child can give them to night shift workers. Community helpers, such as emergency room workers, fire houses, police, ambulance etc, can benefits from a sugar rush in doing there jobs, which can be exhilarating.You can give out small goodie bags to give to friends, family teachers and other facility in the school. A sort of random act if kindness.


Candy the art medium
 You can save the candy for art projects.

 

Science

You can use them for scientific experiments and projects. 

My motto is, you don't have to do things exactly the same, to have the special experience. 

Ps. When it come to giving out treats to trick or treaters, I by no means imply that you give out home made treats. You can instead of giving out candy, give stickers, plastic toys or fresh uncut fruit with a peel. Such as oranges or bananas. 

Also bottles of water is a great treat to give out. The kids are doing a lot of walking. Best to keep them hydrated.

Samhain, time to talk about Death!

As the year's wheel spin to the direction of Samhain, the day of the dead, old Hallows eve, Halloween, the time of death being celebrated.

Today's culture, has embraced Halloween, a day of costumes, candy, and themes such as ghost, horror and simply death. Yes death is the main topic of this time period, the Autumn season. Even more so than in the winter, the symbolic death, which we customary celebrate the return of longer days, a new year and the anticipation of spring.

It is now, when the leaves change, that we as a species seem to focus on our own great equalizer, mortality. In some ancient cultures, people would literally bring out dead bodies from cripts and burial chambers, to visit the living. Although I don't recommend following such traditions, for neither the legal or sanitary risk are not worth it. As our modern culture embraces death with horror films, ghost stories and any story that insight fear. 

Death, being commonly feared, it is worth teaching children about the subject in a progressively healthy approach. Starting even before the equinox, it is best to start preparing for this subjects and how you can explain it to your children.

How do we as parents teach our children about the subject of death? 

You can begin with studies in nature. With small children, you may not want to explain how one day they and everyone they know will die, just yet. You can introduce death gently, with pointing out plants that are dying or dead. You could work your way up to dead insects, eventually mammals, including human.

You may want to honor your ancestors forgotten by time, by incorporating some ancient context. This is a time to inspire history. Especially many fairytales, outside the Disney context and legends are great ways to learn the mindset of the ancient people who told these stories. 

You may have statues of God's of your ancestral background. You can even incorporate Christianity. Christianity holds stronger held beliefs in regards to death and if your more recent ancestors were Christian or a different form of religion, you may want to incorporate their symbolism in relations to your ancestors or recently lost. 

Catholic saint are an effective way to use magic. Especially when dealing with Christian. They believe the saint has the power to sway gods opinion, providing the energy to find a sway them. In cases of sudden death of may, I suggest, Saint Andrew of Avellino.

Your children will have to face the loss of a loved one. 

 Sadly people in your life will die. Some of the death is expected, such as cases of advanced age and or poor health. Others are unexpected, and life is often cut short significantly


Samhain is a time to bring out picture and memorabilia of loved ones past, friends, family, etc... It is a time to remember those we have lost. If your child has not yet suffer a loss, btw pets count, tell them of loved ones you have lost. If your family has suffered a loss this year, talking about the recently departed. Encourage natural feelings your child has, rather than insist they react in a differently manner. Crying is encouraged, emotions run high in the time of Scorpio. 

Come the ending of Samhain, you and your family should begin to find peace with the new relationship with you lost loved ones, as either memories or spiritual entities. As the wheel shifts towards the longer day, begin putting the dead back in their safe place until next year.

Giving your children a healthy respect and understanding of death will allow you and your family to appreciate life, while it is available to them.

Happy Samhain!

YouTube page!!!

I dedicate this this blog post to Jim Henson, happy belated birthday, and blessings to all who are part of the Jim Henson company.

Having lived the nomadic life as a child and my education suffered as a result of the constant change in curriculum, teachers, expectation , etc.. which is why I'm a huge supporter of education and alternative methods to educate children. When it comes to education, one key factor I feel is extremely important, is to encourage people of any age to enjoy learning. Learning had become a chore, causing students to suffer from mind blocks and can lead to difficulty in understanding new subjects.

Rather than view education in a negative fashion, I suggest a more pleasant approach. I'm admit, to being of the mind set of rather than change the child to make her or him learn, we should change our methods of learning. Our goal is to teach, not persevere out dated ideas.

I have started a page on YouTube, it is a work in progress, while being up dated. Also, I welcome any videos you may suggest. Please post them in the comments and if I think they are appropriate I will add them.

A personal note from the author

I wish to clarify some of my ideas and meaning behind my line of thinking..

Quite often I am mistaken as an atheist. I am not but I can understand why someone would get that impression. I am not personally offended that other people do not belief in a god. I see it as none of my business, to gives a (naughty-word)! I support keeping religion out of government and religious freedom. Apparently, that makes me extreme.

My view of god separates myself from even many polytheist and more so with monotheist. Gods have longed had many definitions, but unfortunately it has been combined with the notion of a creator. God or gods does not always mean creator. I follow the belief that god or gods are concepts that have developed a life of their own that lives on beyond its original creation.

These concepts are many, love and war, are two prime examples. Love and war, two concepts that are known in many forms. We often experience them through passion and conflict, they create life and death. They are both celebrated in many forms, ritual holidays included. Valentine's day and any countries independence day, for example. They come in symbols, heart and gun. Theses two concepts are so tie into our species nature, has altered our very labor of existence.

Of course, gods are formed from these concepts. Venus and Mars, as they ancient Greeks called them. They had many names.

They are ideas that have formed a life on its own. They are a creation of man, but two key components in our species evolution.

When I call on a god, it is the idea of what that represents. It being a literal being or simply a metaphor, honestly doesn't matter, it is the out of the idea, which changes always and keeps it alive. The key to the immortality of any god.

There is one term I truly disagree with is  "higher power." What is a higher power exactly? The vastness of space, is a size that is mind blowing. Yet the universe, as vast as it is, is not able to appreciate itself on all of its glory. Mountains can be created, craved and destroyed by a small stream of water and time. A volcano may have destroyed Pompeii, but Vesuviua never wrote a poem. So I don't believe in a higher power, but a different power.

The Autumn Equinox

The year in many cultures is displayed as a circle, decorated by the season. As the Autumn equinox approaches, people blessed to be in a climate that have seasonal change, experience the vibrant colors in the foliage and that smell in the air, that tells you Autumn is here. I however, live in the tropics, so I have to be more creative.

The time of the equinoxes, whether spring or fall is when night and day are of equal durations. It marks the Greek Zoidca sign of Libra, the scale, the time of balance.

During this time of balance, it would do yourself and your family some good to cleanse away some of that negativity. The Jewish new year, Rosh Hashanah is celebrated close to the equinox time period.

On the afternoon of Rosh Hashanah, the tradition of Tashlikh, which translates to cast away, where families throw stones symbolizing their sins, into a body of water leading to the ocean. You do not need to be Jewish or spiritual to see the physiology benefits this exercise provides. It's a physical activity, great for small children to adults. It's a great way to clear the air, for the Jewish New year or just to help restore the balance in your home.

 One night this month, I burned some sage, after I was done with it, I snuffed it out and left it on my sink. I do this with flammable objects like sage, for this very reason. This was a different kind of sage than I'm use too. It's dryer and after I thought I smudged it and it wasn't smoking, a cinder must have grown to have burned it all the way through. Thankfully, this mishap was contained in my sink and no real damage was done. Upon recognizing my own sensibility, I couldn't help but acknowledge that my home, in a sense cleansed itself.

As the snake sheds its skin, so must we shed what is dead in our lives,

After a good mental and spiritual cleansing, it is good to give your mind and spiritual positive boost. Hence why we have these rituals throughout out our lives. Although the wheels traditions can at times become mundane, you can always change things up.

Adding the tropics to your Autumn traditions!

1. Leaves, even if the leaves are green this time of year or not, this a great time of year to learn about different leaves. To teach children to identify both harmful leaves and editable ones. Some fun activities to try with this. Make leaf charts. Make leaf prints.

2. Death. This is an ideal time of year to discuss death. Whether in nature such as animal or plant, or historical example, such as dinosaurs or ancient ancestors or your personal dearly departed, this is a healthy time to teach children about our own mortality. As springs brings up subjects of sex and birth, the turning of the wheel must be dying and death. You could go to a historical museum to look at fossils. Put together a dinosaur skeleton puzzle. Pull out the old family albums or visit a graveyard.

3. Oranges, the tropics pumpkin. The Oranges grow naturally in tropical area's and where pumpkins have trouble in the heat. I will always carve a pumpkin, but decorating an orange with cloves is a fun and safe activity to add to your tradition.

http://indiasroses.wordpress.com/2013/09/23/how-to-orange-clove-pomanders/

4. Add tropical fruit to your traditional Autumn goodies. Banana Pumpkin Bread, add some pineapple to your maple coffee, put some orange slices in your Apple cider. All are great ways to incorporate the tropics into your Autumn holidays.

5. Collecting rocks and sea shells and painting them.
This is a great way to spend time with your family, doing something creative together.

I also suggest this fun book Bats at the Beach





No matter where you are, you can celebrate the coming of the cold months, make it memorable, no matter how you do it.
Happy Autumn Equinox to you all!

the Teenager!

Her mother was a Victorian!

Out of all the different labels out there, one group is often overlooked in praise, overtly feared, primarily judged, least understood, which leads to them being aggressively controlled and penalised.

Don't do that thing
your grandpa did during the war!

Grandma showing off her pelvis!

Mom's hypocrisy!

The teenager, first to be locked up by authorities and first to be sent to war. Needless to say, the teenager gets a bad wrap from society. The time between childhood to adulthood, is a gray area, with diverse differences from the two groups they linger between. This time period is an important part of one's life. Its a defining aspect for most, as they separate themselves from generations past. Mainly their parents, but also society at large. It is a time of sexual fever, as hormones shape the nearly genderless body of a child into a man or woman. They naturally feel the desire to push away their past and embrace a future foreign to all generations present and past. Teenagers possess the power to sway society from fashion to war. Which is why authorities tend to have trouble with this age group the most. As the older generations may have the rules of today on their side, the teenager had already mastered the technology that will over throw the pasts powers. Teenagers, are scary to those who fear the future, for they are the reminder of their own mortality.

All about the Mtv!

Being a teenager isn't easy for most people. It's bad enough in dealing with the judgment of peers, but the condemnation of their elders. Always labeled lazy, yet difficult for many to find a job. Piled with expectations, with school, sports, extracurricular activities, for the dream to fall into crushing debt, just to have a job. Teenagers don't have it as easy as adults would like to believe. So I say you, be understanding of the teenager and all their faults. Allow your age to give you patience when dealing with them. Remember that they are struggling in their ever changing role from child to adult. Show them kindness.

Why are we attacking teenagers today
 for practicing a trend we started!

Ice Cream For Breakfast

I like most people have an addiction, to sugar and salt. Our society has made popular foods, condensed with one or both of these substances.

Our taste buds are effected with a lifetime of salt and sugar over load, making it harder for us to enjoy other flavors the world has to offer. I still struggled to make myself eat and drink the right foods, which if I don't fix, my health will suffer, limiting my abilities and life span.

For my child, I hope to give her a better relationship with food than what I had. It has not been easy, family and society often feel threatened by this notion and it's been an up hill battle all the way.  I do this for my daughter, because I really love her and want to expand her pallet to other taste, than salty and sweet.

One important key aspect is to feed her healthy foods with natural sweeteners like fresh fruit. Sometimes very small amounts of honey, real maple syrup and on occasion sugar can be added, but never allowing the sweetness (or saltiness ) to be over bearing.

Along with trying to encourage a diet low in sugar and salt, but filled with my kids daily nutritional needs. Most important of all, it has to be visually appealing and taste good. Here is a great ideas to help out.

Ice cream for breakfast

Ice cream pops and a blender.

WHAT!!!! You may be maybe saying, but you honestly can make chocolate ice cream a healthy breakfast food.

Ingredients

1 Avocado soft
1/2 lemon
Coconut, almond, rice, cow milk or yogurt.
1/2 cup of sweet fruit
Optional 1/2 cup or less of vegetables you may want to sneak in.
Honey, sugar, maple syrup or any sweetener to preferences. If your family is use too sweets, you can lessen the sugar context over time, to ween them off the sugar.
Unsweetened cocoa powder to preferences
2-4 orange wedges.

First peel avocado and remove pit. Place in a bowl, squeeze lemon on top and around the avocado and allow it to soak.

In blender add your milk, sweet fruit, added vegetables, blend until liquid.

After avocado has soaked in the lemon for about 10-15 minutes, add to mix, along with sweetener and coco. Blend until it looks like chocolate pudding.

Place mix in bowl. Then squeeze orange wedges in mix, add more coco and sweetener for personal preference.

Put the mix in ice pop containers, add stick, put in freezer until frozen.


This can be a dessert or a light meal. You can add infant oatmeal to make it a more filling meal.  I once added slices of strawberries and banana inside the ice containers after adding the mix. It was a big hit.

Disciplining Grandma

Grandma and grandpa, parents to you, but oversize children with disposable income to your children. You say no sugar, grandma a serves chocolate covered sugar cubes with milk.

You tell your children they can't have something and grandpa shows up with multiple of whatever it is, in different colors. Grandparents aren't the only culprits, mean welling aunts and uncles, childless relatives, even siblings will over step your boundaries. You are parent, you wants what is best for your children, but sometimes you can learn something new or even admit to being wrong. However, there are times people need to back off and respect your authority as your child's parent.

Your parent's and your partners parents may feel a sense of entitlement in how they handle your children, their grandchildren. They assert authority over you, your partner and your children. Often they assume theses methods must have worked for you or your partner, hence the methods in question should therefore be repeated to the next generation.

We'll all heard the saying, from our parents that their grandchildren will be their revenge. This is often said in good natured humor, but often it's a self profiling prophecy. The saying is a curse, directed at you by the grandparents, that negatively effective each generation, including the generation enacting the vengeance. It's a cycle, of generations cursing one another, far worse than even the infamous F-word. It's encouraging conflicts between parents and their children and grandma and grandpa often cause many of the conflicts. Grandparents will often undermine the authority of the parent, which can lead to emotional and behavior problems in the children involved.

One method that has given me success is explaining to my parents that their methods, though well intended, was actually harmful. For example my mother took my toddler daughter to a park, where they encountered a preschool aged little girl. My daughter referred to the little girl as a boy. This naturally upset the other girl, when my daughter kept calling her a boy, even after the little girl corrected her.

My mother saw this as cute and amusing. She was telling me about what happened and expected me to be equally amused. I was not. I reminded my mom that she had encouraged this behavior in myself when I was my daughter's age. I explained to her, even though it seemed funny, to the little girl being teased it was abuse.That this was teaching my daughter to be a bully and could cause social delay, which I myself suffered.

Explaining the consequences of the parenting action is often effective. However your child's grandparents may not be willing to listen to reason and you may be forced to constantly supervised them, restrict access to your children or if necessary even cut them off. Though please leave the latter for a last resort.

Sometimes it's better to tough it out, until their method bites them in the ass. Allowing your children to show them the errors of their ways. For example if someone gives your child sugar, make them deal with the hyper active little speed demon, as a consequence of their own stupidity



Usually when grandparents and other families behave in this matter, is a reaction to the changes happening in their life. Empty nest, loss of a spouse, a move, loneliness, depression, etc... while your life is speeding up with a family, a relationship, work, school, and whatever is on your plate, these trouble makers in your life could be crying for help, as the dinner table for them becomes smaller.


It sometimes helps to be the bigger person and react with sympathy and kindness.