Entertaining Your Kids Without Going Broke

Are you leaving all of the entertaining of your children to the television? I don't blame you. Watching television is so cheap!

Some recent studies show that now as many as 83 percent of kids are watching two hours of television or more each day, while an incredible 90 percent of toddlers spending that much time around the tube. That does not give them that much time to interact with people.

Activities with others and in the great outdoors allow for happier, less anxious kids that feel better and are more relaxed. A sedentary kid is going to be a fat and unhappy kid.

You do not have to spend a fortune to play with your kids or make them feel more active. All you have to do is make them simple forts out of boxes and blankets. Any big cardboard box can easily be turned into a castle or a fort. Cardboard boxes and tubes also make great rocket ships. You can make your little girl a kitchen complete with fridge and stove out of cardboard boxes.

It is not that hard to find large boxes. You can find them at stores that carry appliances.
One warning – if you are cutting cardboard, do it by yourself. Your child's safety scissors cannot handle thick, stiff cardboard.

There are also hundreds of fun crafts that your kids can make. You can find instructions for most of them online. You can have them build their own kite and fly it in the back yard. You can have them put together a popsicle stick house or have them build a boot scraper mat out of bottle caps. One of the most fun and simplest of toys is a phone connected by a string and made out of two empty tin cans.

Awakening your kid's creativity is as simple as giving them some paper and colored pencils. You can also let them decorate their own room using washable paints. They can draw all over the walls and you can wipe it clean later.

To get your kid off the couch and walking take a field trip to somewhere free. Go view the nearest public government buildings or take a walk in a part. Some kids enjoy strolls through cemeteries. Basically a kid will go anywhere with you. For them, the quality time has to do with the connection to you. So it does not really matter where you go as long as the two of you are together.

Parenting Tips
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Can Sleep Help You Lose Weight

Are you a busy mom who is just eating all wrong or trying to lose post pregnancy weight? The good news is that the experts now say that you can lose it by sleeping!

Have you ever noticed that you eat more when you’re tired? That is just one reason why you should get more sleep.

In addition to a healthy and balanced diet and regular exercise, a restorative night’s sleep can help flatten that tummy. According to recent studies published in the Journal of the American Medical Association and the Lancet, lack of sleep can slow down your metabolic function and make you huge!

This is because there are hormones that make you hungrier if you are not well rested. Two hormones in particular – gherkin, which is responsible for making you feel hungry, and leptin, which makes you feel full – are affected by your sleep patterns.

When you’re sleep deprived, ghrelin levels increase and leptin levels drop, making you feel hungry and escalating our need to indulge cravings. When faced with cravings, our tendency is to grab highly processed sweet and starchy snacks that make us really fat. You are more likely to keep eating even when you’ve had enough because when you are tired.

The hormone cortisol also appears to be linked to body weight. Stress or sleep deprivation can cause cortisol levels to rise, and your appetite and cravings will rise right along with it. Excessive cortisol has been linked to a surplus storage of fat, specifically around the mid-section – this is a bad place for extra pounds as it can put women at higher risk for heart disease, stroke and cancer.

In order to keep your hormonal cycle in check, aim for seven to nine hours each night. You are sleep deprived if you have difficulty falling asleep, wake up a lot during the night, wake up too early in the morning and if you wake up and you don't feel rested. These are all experiences that mean it is time to alter your routine. Try adjusting your bed, clearing out distractions like television and blackening out your room so you can get a better rest.

If you have answered ‘yes’ to any of these questions, it may be time to address your sleep routine to help you lose those extra pounds. Just remember, the better the quality of sleep is, the more pounds and fat you will just lose naturally! I'd rather nap than exercise!

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