Build a Birdhouse With Your Kids

Building birdhouses with your kids is not only good for their creative skills but it can also help develop motor skills and help  your child build a better understanding of nature.

Here are some simple ideas for s birdhouses to make. Get an empty half-gallon milk carton.  Make sure that the milk carton is washed thoroughly and dried before you start. Staple the carton shut and then wrap the entire carton with two-inch wide masking tape. Next color it with shoe polish or a marker taking care that you try and make it look like tree bark.  A hole in the side of the carton can serve as a doorway.  Make sure there are also several holes poked in the bottom so rainwater can drain out.  String this birdhouse from a tree and you are done. 

You can also build a birdhouse using paper mache and balloons.  This type of birdhouse is completely round. The recipe for papier mache is to boil newspapers boiled in water for half an hour. Then add two cups of flour.  Layer newspaper strips around the balloon but make sure you patch in a hole so that birds have some way of getting in. Once it is dry you pop the balloon, take it out of the shell you made with paper and color it with bright paint. You can then hang it from a tree. 

A very simple birdfeeder can be created from an old straw hat. Make a hole in the side of the hat for a doorway and suspend it from a tree. The birds will perch on the rim of the hat.  If you hang it low enough you can put birdseed in the hat hollow. Nesting shelves are also easy for kids to build. They attract birds like phoebes, robins and swallows. All you need is a wooden box that is about the size of a shoebox. You simply hang it on a hook so it can hang vertically. This allows the birds to build their nests in the open cavity.  This type of birdhouse allows your kids to observe the birds and it can easily be nailed to a front porch post or fence post. 

If you want to attract doves try building a nesting cone. Simply take a foot long length of finely meshed screen and wrap it into a cone shape. You can than wire it into a tree. Be sure to place it high up in a tree so the dove sees it as a safe place. The dove will see the cone shape as a friendly place to build a nest. 

Bird watching is a fun, inexpensive activity for families.  All year long you can watch the variety of birds that come to visit. If your child can handle a hammer, nails and glue there are a large variety of plans for birdhouses that kid can make available for free on the internet. Usually the provider of the plans can tell you what age group the project is best suited for. You can also find plans for birdhouses at your local library.  

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How To Make Your Medicine Cabinet Safer

Your medicine chest looks like a place where candies are stored to most kids. The fact that most medicines for kids taste pretty good also doesn't help. This is why it is important to clean it out as often as possible and put harmful medications under lock and key if you can. 

You should get rid of left-over or half use prescriptions as well as over-the-counter or prescription medicines that are past their expiry date.  If your kid doesn't finish his or her medication you should probably be throwing it out anyway.  It is dangerous to have old prescriptions around unless your pediatrician specifically told you to keep them. 

To make it a little safer you should also get rid of all the medications that do not have child resistant caps or packaging.  Even better yet don't keep any kind of medicine chest or medicine storage in your child's room at all! 

There are also some medications that you may have on hand that are not recommended for use by doctors or the American Pediatric association.  A good example is syrup of ipecac as the Academy of Pediatrics no longer says this is a good item to keep in the home. It used to be used to induce vomiting in kids that were accidentally poisoned. 

You should also get rid of any old mercury thermometers and trade them in for the newest sensor digital thermometers. The old fashioned ones can break and expose your kid to mercury and mercury vapors.  S

urprisingly the Academy of Pediatrics also recommends getting rid of hydrogen peroxide. We typically use it to disinfect cuts or wounds but apparently instead of helping to heal hydrogen peroxide may actual damage healthy skin cells. Try not to keep any aspirin in your medicine cabinet. Both very young children and adults are at risk of developing Reye's syndrome if they even take just one pill.  This is not a matter of overdose!   It is also common knowledge that you shouldn’t give your child, or even your teenager, aspirin unless there is no other option and you are stranded at a cottage. Start with half a pill if you have to and watch for any reactions (such as a rash.) 

When you are done cleaning out your medicine cabinet you should not just throw everything in the trash.  Don't flush them into the toilet either. These medicines are getting into our groundwater (especially the antibiotics.) As we are consuming antibiotics unnecessarily through water sources we are becoming more and more resistant to them. This can result in flesh eating diseases such as MRSA and illness from ordinary bacteria like staph. 

One way to keep your kid out of the medicine chest is to never give him or her the idea that is okay to go in there in the first place. Never say to your teen 'go get it yourself.' You don't want to end up with a Little Lindsay Lohan on your hands who has no idea about how to handle drugs.

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