Rage Against The Minivan

This past weekend was one of the more relaxed Thanksgivings we had. Remember last year, when we were in Peru and I was mugged? No mugging this year. Bonus! Mark’s sister had the family over and it was a fun flurry of food preparation for a few hours. Mark’s mom made this fun turkey veggie plate as an appetizer. Thank you, pinterest!   Someone decided we needed to boil the turkey neck. Now, Jafta has eaten everything known to man. He’s the kid that will eat a mussel straight out of the . . .

I’ve got a number of photos to share from our Thanksgivving weekend, but first I wanted to share some funny photos of Jafta’s favorite Thanksgiving tradition: having a pie thrown in his face. This was something he first asked me to do when he was 5 years old. I have no idea where the idea came from . . . he just saw some pies and knew they would be more awesome in his face. He begged, and to the cheering screams of his entire family, I obliged. Every Thanksgiving since, he has remembered this . . .

The video footage of the brawls at Walmart last night . . . I cannot even. While people are going shopping in droves, I’m hiding out home in a panic, hoping that no emergency could possibly force me into a store today.  (Or this month.) I am truly hoping that I can avoid going to the mall altogether from now until Christmas. I hate the crowds. That being said, there are some stellar online deals happening right now, and I did take advantage of some sales from the comfort of my living room . . .

Originally published in OC Family Magazine. Looking at the world through a lens of gratitude is not easy -- many adults have not even mastered it. But instilling the practice of being thankful in our children is important because thankfulness is a habit that will benefit them throughout their life; people who focus on gratitude tend to report more contentment and also tend to cope better with life's challenges. There are several tips for teaching your children the art of being grateful, but the . . .

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We’ve actually had our Christmas tree up for a week already. I posted about it on facebook and managed to apparently ruin Thanksgiving and Christmas simultaneously. It seemed like half of the people who commented were full of rage that someone could dare to put up a tree before Thanksgiving. The horror! And the other half were mortified that I dared to admit that I wasn’t really thrilled about hanging some of the eyesore ornaments that had made their way home from school. First of all . . . I . . .

I did a juice cleanse last week with Nekter, a local juice bar. I’ve been to this juice bar a few times – I’m actually a big fan of fresh veggie juice and they’ve got a great acai bowl as well. I tried one of their 5-day cleanses in January. I’d recently watched the movie Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead in which a severely overweight man with a chronic disease goes on a juice fast and basically heals himself.  (If you haven’t seen it, you should. It’s eye-opening.) I had a great experience with . . .