The Chaos and the Clutter

Parenting in the Chaos

My Favourite Things 2020

background is pebbled beach. Lady's face. Text reads "My Favourite Things 2020"

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You know those things that you find and you want to shout from the rooftops how awesome they are? These are my favourite things of 2020, the things I wish I could give to everyone.

While I’m certainly not Oprah and can’t give these to each member of my audience, I did want to gift these to one lucky member.background is pebbled beach. Lady's face. Text reads "My Favourite Things 2020"Today’s giveaway is a collection of my favourite things.

The winner will get one of each of the following items:

AquaNotes

These handy waterproof notepads hang in my shower. As a busy mom of many, it’s hard to find quiet moments for myself. In the shower, I’m able to think clearly and therefore, often come up with ideas or remember things I need to do. 

In the past, I would then promptly forget when I was out of the shower and cries of “mom” would interrupt my thoughts. But now, I am able to use my AquaNotes to jot down ideas, make to do lists, or even to leave a little note for my husband. It’s easy to see why I love these!

The Sun Does Shine

This was my favourite read of the year. It’s a powerful story and powerfully written. The Sun Does Shine, How I Found Life and Freedom on Death Row is also timely in that it is an example of the injustice that can occur when race clouds decisions. 

I found the book a bit hard to get into at first because from reading the back of the book, you already know he is going to be wrongly convicted so the parts leading up to that dragged a bit for me, but trust me, stick with it. Anthony Ray Hinton’s time on death row is gripping, heart wrenching, hope filled, and will open your eyes and heart, especially when it comes to the complexities of racism. 

Kleenex Find Your Fearless mini packs

With reminders like “Summon Your Strength”, “Find Your Fearless”, and “Believe in Yourself”, these purse sized kleenex packs have accompanied me this year to difficult specialists appointments with one of our daughters, my favourite uncle’s funeral, and lots of moments in between.

It might be a small thing, but those written reminders on the packages brought smiles through my tears.

hand holding a small pack of tissues that say "Find Your Fearless"

Crock Pot Liners

Oh my goodness! I wish I had discovered these sooner. They make crock pot cleaning a breeze! No more scrubbing or soaking. Just take out the liner and throw it in the garbage.

I don’t use them for every crock pot meal, but for things like perogies or tater tot or hash brown casserole that stick to the side and are no fun at all to clean out, I treat myself and use a crock pot liner. crock pot with plastic liner on counter with blue box of slow cooker liners next to it

Rosco Emmit Cedar Lavender Bubble Salts

My mom told me about these. The first time I tried them, I was in love! They are bath salts but they bubble! I don’t get to have baths that often, but when I do, I want them to be as relaxing as possible and between the scent and the bubbles, this totally creates that.

These are also made on Vancouver Island which is one of my favourite places in the world so that makes me like these even more.jar of bath salts sits on edge of white bathtub

Maybelline Instant Age Rewind Dark Circles Eraser

I don’t wear a lot of makeup, but I saw a makeup tutorial once that showed how to use this to create some highlights on your face and take years off by hiding the bags under your eyes. This has been a go-to for me for a long time, but with getting older and the stress of 2020, I’ve needed to use it more often.

I think it helps my confidence too. makeup tube on counter with sink in background(I’ll be contacting the winner to see what skin shade you need.)

The World’s Softest Socks

I live in fuzzy socks. I know it may not be what grown ups are supposed to wear, but they make me feel cozy and comfy. And the fuzzy socks made by The World’s Softest Socks are my new favourite.

Bath and Body Works Foaming Hand Soap

This year with all the extra hand washing and hand sanitizers, my hands started to feel dry. These foaming hand soaps helped with that. They don’t dry out my hands and are super foamy. 

They have so many great scents to choose from too!white hand soap bottle on bathroom counter

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November Emotions Printables for Kids

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Thanksgiving is a time for family and friends. It’s about getting together, eating great food, and making memories. But for some kids, any holiday or change in routine can bring with it a variety of feelings. These November Emotions Printables invite kids to explore their emotions about Thanksgiving, visiting relatives, and the day to day.

display of printed worksheets with orange pumpkins. Text reads "November Emotions printables"

November Copywork Emotions Sentences:

I firmly believe that teaching emotions is even more important than teaching reading, writing, and arithmetic. Children need to develop a real understanding of emotions and know how to express their own. These November emotions printing practise worksheets allow kids to work on their printing while learning about emotions.

These copywork pages allow students to explore emotion words and associate the images with the corresponding feeling. This expands their emotional vocabulary.

Supplies needed:

  • November Emotions printables
  • pen or pencil OR
  • plastic sleeve AND dry erase marker

Download the printable pages. If you want to make them reusable, laminate the pages or slip them into a plastic page protector. Students can then use a dry erase marker to complete the tracing and writing.

If these are for a one time use, give the student a pencil, crayons, coloured pencils, or markers and the printed papers.

Instructions for the student:

  1. Read the sentence.
  2. Fill in the outline.
  3. Trace the dotted words.
  4. Write the sentence on the lines provided.
  5. Discuss the various emotions.

These worksheets can be the jumping off point for a class discussion or one-on-one talk about different emotions.

November Feelings Log:

Keeping a daily log of feelings helps kids to examine their emotions. It also allows them and their teacher or parents to analyze any patterns they see emerging when looking back through the log.

Doing this quick daily exercise is also a great jumping off point to help kids to talk about their emotions and most importantly, get to the root of why they are feeling the way they are.

I believe in teaching emotions with as much zeal and intention as we teach reading, writing, and math. It is with that belief that I create opportunities for children to learn about emotions and to put that into practise.

I’ve put together a special Feelings Log for November (please note that it does contain two questions about Thanksgiving, so if you’re Canadian, this may be more appropriate to use with your child or student in October). It includes a writing prompt, a drawing prompt, and weekly tracking sheet of “Today I feel” along with adorable pumpkin faces to use to help them express their emotions.

Supplies needed:

Simply enter your email below to download these November Emotions Printables. You can use this with your child at home or print it off to use with your students in the classroom.

You may also be interested in these resources for helping kids with their emotions:

Spider Emotions Matching Game

Make Your Own Emoji Squishies

Pirate Emotions Playdough Mats

Sanity Savers for Busy Moms

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As moms, we take on so many roles. We are parent, chef, teacher, caregiver, chauffeur, housecleaner, referee, advocate, counsellor, and more. Let’s face it. It can be exhausting and overwhelming. These sanity savers can help make life just a little easier. 

Home Management Success Kit

The Home Management Success Kit was designed by my friend Lena. She is an entrepreneur, a wife, a mom, and a CPA. That means not only does she understand being a busy mom, she understands finances. 

The printable packs included help you manage your home finances, set up a proper cleaning schedule, and get meal planning done easily.a huge array of printed out pages and checklists and the cover of a binder

This system will help you:

  • easily track your monthly budget
  • prioritize your life goals so that you know exactly how much you need to save
  • keep a complete list of your financial accounts so you have a quick reference
  • keep track of important financial and household documents in case of an emergency
  • set up a simple bill payment system
  • quickly plan school lunches for the week with the mix & match checklist
  • plan family meals by the week or by the month
  • organize your grocery shopping so that you buy what you need
  • save money by making meals with what you already have
  • track your family’s favourite meals
  • set up a simple cleaning schedule for your family to follow
  • help your kids understand their roles and limit arguments about chores with chore charts
  • teach kids how to be responsible for cleaning their own rooms
  • see at a glance what needs to be done each week
  • easily get things done in small chunks of time with the micro cleaning tasks checklist
  • and so much more!

Read more about the Home Management Success Kit.

The winner of today’s giveaway will receive the entire Home Management Success Kit! My thanks to Lena from What Mommy Does for donating this awesome prize.

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Happy at Home Challenge

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There’s nothing quite like being stuck at home to test certain aspects of your character. Whether we’re at home due to a pandemic, an illness, a new baby, or choosing to be there, feeling cooped up can test our patience, resilience, and positivity. That’s where this Happy at Home Challenge comes in.woman's socked feet are visible as her hands hold a teal mug. Text reads "Happy at Home Challenge"Even under difficult circumstances, we can determine our own happiness. Happiness is an attitude, a choice.

It’s obviously easy to choose when life is roses! But when life is more challenging, that’s when it’s even more important to take responsibility for our own happiness and do what we can to improve it. 

The research is clear. There are things that we can do that increase our happiness.

So will you join me in this Happy at Home Challenge? Try it for just two weeks and see if it makes a difference for you. 

Gratitude.

Gratitude is consistently shown to correlate to higher levels of happiness. Simply writing out 3 things each day you’re thankful for will dramatically increase your satisfaction with your life. 

For many years, I had my kids write out 5 things they were thankful for to start out their homeschool day. And when the pandemic lockdown hit last March, it’s a practise we started again right away. It was so good for all of us.

The challenge? Jot down 3 things you’re thankful for each day. Write each one on a Post-it note and stick those around the house in places you’ll see them to get even more reminders of your blessings. 

Kindness.

Serving others provides us with connection to community and triggers feelings of pleasure in our brains. In other words, helping others also helps us. It feels good.

I also find for myself personally that helping others gives me better perspective on my own circumstances as it brings a greater awareness of the needs and pain of others which leads to me realizing that I have much to be thankful for.

array of scattered papers and pencilsThis Family Kindness Calendar is full of lovely ideas for ways to help others. The kindness suggestions included can be done by school-age children or younger children with the help of an adult. They’re great for getting the whole family working on a common project.

The challenge? Do one small thing for someone else each day. It can be a kind word, an act of service, or even writing a little note on a Post-it and sticking it on their door. If you’re having a hard time thinking of ideas that are safe given the pandemic restrictions, we have a list of ways you can spread kindness without spreading the virus.

Get outside.

Yes, we’re talking about when you’re stuck at home, but the research is clear. Going on a nature walk, spending time in a forest, or even just getting fresh air improve mood and decrease cortisol, the stress hormone. So even if you’re not able to go far, get outside.

The challenge? Get some fresh air every day. If possible, add some movement like going for a walk to get those endorphins going. 

Move more.

Speaking of endorphins…

Endorphins are one of the brain chemicals which are known as neurotransmitters and endorphins trigger positive feelings in your body. They are the “feel-good” chemical and you can release them naturally through exercise.

The challenge? Move more every day. Choose whatever you want and are capable of. Run up and down the stairs, do a YouTube workout, do an exercise video, yoga, or have a dance party with your kids in the kitchen.

Write down your feelings.

Writing out your feelings helps clarify your thoughts, relieve stress, help you identify specific emotions and get at their root causes, and more efficiently solve problems. 

Of course, as adults, most of us can identify our feelings, but kids may not be able to easily identify their emotions or the emotions of others. That’s one of the reasons it’s so important to give your kids an emotional vocabulary. 

The Teaching Emotions Toolkit helps parents or teachers provide kids with a rich emotional vocabulary and better understanding of their feelings.

The challenge? Start a journal to track your emotions.

Today is Day 9 in the 12 Days of Christmas Giveaways and I wanted to include some things that could contribute towards you feeling more Happy at Home. Today’s winner will receive the Family Kindness Calendar (PDF) and the Teaching Emotions Toolkit. a Rafflecopter giveaway

2020 Pandemic Journal for Kids

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The 2020 Pandemic Journal for Kids is a powerful tool in helping your child focus on the positive, express their feelings in a healthy way, shift their thinking to gratitude and hopefulness, and create a memorable time capsule keepsake.

As much as we try to shelter our child from the stress of what’s happening in the world right now, we can’t shield them from it all. Their reality has been altered. School closures, not being able to hug grandparents or visit friends, not going out to the playground, movies, or even the store, and maybe hearing the hushed whispers of adults are just a few of the changes your child may be facing. 

Even though we are doing our best as parents to make things as normal as possible for them, chances are, they still carry with them some concern. Worry in a child may look like:​

  • teasing or arguing with siblings more than usual
  • being irritable
  • having trouble falling asleep or having nightmares
  • whining
  • outbursts or meltdowns
  • being rigid/inflexible
  • quick or easy to anger
  • easily frustrated
  • big emotions
  • asking a lot of questions
  • aggression

What can you do to help your child through this?

Offer hope. ​

Talk about the future without making promises you can’t keep. The statement “Someday, you’ll be able to tell your kids that you were 9 years old during the 2020 pandemic.” is very powerful. It conveys to them that this will not end the world. That they have a future to look forward to and it also helps them feel like what they are doing now will hold a place in history. 

Help them focus on the positive.

There is so much surrounding them that is difficult right now that it can be easy for kids (and adults) to slip into negative thought patterns. “It’s never going to get better.” “I can’t do …”

By helping them reframe what they are going through in more positive language, kids can shift their thinking to gratitude and hopefulness.

Give them an outlet for expressing their feelings.

When kids are able to identify their feelings, they can better manage them. By tracking their emotions, they can also learn to communicate about them. This helps parents and teachers be able to help them through even the most difficult emotions and enables them to equip their child or student with appropriate calm down strategies and tools to better manage those.

What the 2020 Pandemic Journal for Kids includes:

  • 19 printable pages
  • prompts to help kids document the journey for a time capsule keepsake
  • pages for them to help identify and process their emotions
  • new habit tracker 
  • gratitude journal 
  • encouraging colouring pages
  • ideas to help them focus on the positives
  • and more

How to Use the Journal:

Supplies needed:

Instructions:

  1. Download the pandemic journal.
  2. Print off the pages. You may want to make multiple copies of some of the pages such as the gratitude page and daily journal. 
  3. Have your child complete the pages of the journal.
  4. If you want to, you can hole punch the papers to keep them in a binder or duo tang. 

How to adapt the Pandemic Journal for Preschoolers:

Even preschoolers can easily use this tool. They can colour the title page and colouring pages, a parent can help them fill in the answers for the “my life during the pandemic page” by interviewing them and recording their answers, the Feelings Log pages can be completed by colouring, cutting, and pasting, and all the other sheets can be completed by drawing rather than writing. 

How to adapt the Pandemic Journal for Older Kids and Teens:

This tool can actually serve as an inspiration for your teen or older child to expand on this idea. Perhaps they will want to create a video journal or scrapbook of news articles to accompany their Pandemic Journal. Maybe they will choose to write a report on what they are learning through this experience or about the ways the world came together. 

They can use the pages in the journal to write their experiences, thoughts, and emotions as well as to document the experience through their eyes. Depending on the age, maturity, and personality of your teen, they also want to follow reputable news sources to create a timeline or even write a book about the pandemic as seen through their eyes.

To download your free copy of the 2020 Pandemic Journal for Kids, enter your email address in the box below.

You may also be interested in reading:

Your Complete Guide to School at Home

How to Talk to Your Child about the Pandemic

Theme Day Ideas for Family Fun at Home

Theme Day Ideas for Family Fun at Home

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Is it just me or are the days starting to blend together?! Without school and appointments, it’s hard to know what day of the week it is. There was one day when I didn’t even realize that it was a weekend. These theme day ideas are a great way to break up the monotony and add it some fun.collage of party images with text that reads "Theme Day Ideas for family fun at home"

The idea for this came because my kids were officially on Spring Break but with it snowing and cold outside and no option to go anywhere fun, I brought the fun to them with a family Beach Party. We even Zoomed with our neighbours who had a beach setup happening at their house too. The beach party gave us all something to look forward to as we prepared for it and then gave us memories to look back on. It certainly helped that Tuesday stand out from the other days that week!

Since I know that some of you are also trying to teach your kids at home right now, I’ve also included some learning or art activities into some of the theme day ideas. 

One last thing to mention: Busy mamas, this is not meant to give you ONE MORE THING to do. Enlist your kids to do the planning and decorating. Ideally, this should give you less work because you won’t hear the cries of “I’m bored” as often. It can also give your kids something to look forward to when so many of their events are being cancelled. They can look and see that on Friday, it’s the family dance party and get excited for that.

Theme Day Ideas:

Backwards Day:

This is such an easy one to do. You don’t need to buy extra supplies or spend money and you can pull this off at the last minute. Here are just some of the things you can do:

  • supper for breakfast and breakfast for supper
  • dessert before the meal
  • wearing your clothes backwards
  • have kids learn about palindromes (words, phrases, or sentences that are spelled the same backwards and forwards – find lots here)
  • count backwards
  • say the alphabet backwards
  • sing a song backwards
  • call everyone by their name spelled backwards
  • read a book backwards
  • walk backwards

Beach Party:

Our beach party was so much fun! It was like bringing a bit of tropical vacation right to our living room. Making the decorations and food for it also gave the kids a fun project to work on for days beforehand. 

If it’s warm out where you are, you could have this in your backyard instead. Here are some ideas for having your own beach party:

  • decorate with beach towels, paper fish (we taped ours to blue recycle bags to make it look like water), sand pails and sand toys, tropical confetti, sunglasses
  • bring in beach chairs or loungers
  • food ideas: goldfish crackers, cupcakes with blue icing and brown sugar (sand) with a tiny umbrella, umbrellas in drinks, picnic food such as sandwiches, chips, candy fish, clear cups filled with blue jello and a gummy shark “swimming” in it, fruit skewers, sand dollar cookies, watermelon slices
  • dress in bathing suits, shorts, sundresses, t-shirts, flip-flops
  • play music like the Beach Boys and dance on the “beach”
  • read books like The Rainbow Fish
  • have a Limbo competition
  • set out a station for fish crafts or put out beach theme colouring pages with markers or crayons
  • paint seashells
  • read lounging out on your beach chair or towel
  • toss around a beach ball

Minute to Win It Theme:

Our family loves, loves Minute to Win It games. They are easy and inexpensive to set up, great for all ages, and best of all, hilarious! Here are some of our best Minute to Win It Games:

Dollar Store Minute to Win It party

Camping at Home:

Drive in Movie in the Living Room:

This is so fun if you have little ones. 

  • Decorate a large box as a car. You’ll need one per child. Let your child use their imaginations. You can use paper plates for wheels and the steering wheel and paint details or add them in Sharpie. 
  • food ideas: popcorn, juice boxes or pop, chips, raw veggies, movie snacks
  • Set the “cars” up in front of the TV and watch a movie. 

Christmas:

Pull out the tree, turn on the outside lights, and start baking! Since it kind of feels like those weeks around Christmas anyway, you might as well embrace it!

Family Talent Show:

Hosting a talent night in your home is great because for days before, it gives the kids something to practise. Set the stage in the living room or backyard and cheer on each family member as they perform. Here are some ideas for talents to be performed:

  • a skit or short play
  • reciting a memorized monologue or poem
  • playing a song by tapping on water glasses
  • playing the spoons
  • magic tricks
  • displaying art
  • singing
  • lip syncing
  • dancing
  • gymnastics
  • juggling
  • comedy act
  • martial arts
  • playing an instrument
  • showcasing a new skill such as knitting, whittling, or macrame 
  • hand clapping routine
  • yo-yo
  • jump rope routine
  • hula hoop
  • baton twirling

Fun Food Ideas:

We’ve been doing these fun food nights mostly for our Survivor nights. I pick a different one each week. 

  • Build your own nachos bar – pie plates for everyone, different kinds of tortilla chips, shredded cheese, and all the toppings: sliced black olives, jalapeños, tomatoes, onions, red peppers, taco meat or shredded chicken, beans, sour cream, salsas, and guacamole
  • Make your own pita pizzas
  • Sundae bar
  • Decorate your own cookies or cupcakes
  • Appetizer night
  • Popcorn bar
  • Pasta bar
  • Breakfast for supper
  • Fondu night

Other Fun Theme Day Ideas:

  • pyjama day 
  • crazy hair day
  • Rainbow party
  • formal day
  • Dr. Seuss party
  • sensory play all day
  • celebrity lookalike day
  • dress up
  • twins day (dress to match someone else in the house)
  • Lego building challenge
  • baking or cake decorating challenge
  • family dance party
  • family fun night (hilarious!)
  • backyard or living room picnic
  • 50s day
  • 60s day
  • 70s day
  • 80s day
  • 90s day
  • moustache day
  • backyard Olympics
  • math game marathon
  • role reversal day (kids and parents swap clothes and roles)
  • kitchen restaurant (kids make menus and cook for parents)
  • Zombie day
  • un-birthday party (cake, decorations, singing, streamers for no one’s birthday)
  • fort building competition
  • kitchen science experiments

These fun family theme day ideas can help you make the most of this time you have together. You can build memories and infuse some laughter into these weeks and focus on building family connection.

Looking for more ideas for family fun or resources to help you connect with your child? Join our free 5 Days to Better Family Connection email series.

You may also be interested in reading:

The Ultimate List of Family Game Night IdeasThe image contains a collage of 5 photos and the words "the best family game night ideas". The pictures include a boy with his nose and mouth covered in flour sitting over a plate of flour, a boy with a stack of Oreo type cookies stacked on his forehead, a girl wearing a light green shirt with a pair of panty hose on her head with a tennis ball in the end of each as she swings her head from side to side trying to knock over red cups on the floor, a smiling blue eyed girl holding a paper bag between her teeth, and a curly haired boy with an Oreo on one of his eyes.

The Complete Slime Making Guide