Small Fry | Page 4

love day pennant flags

While we try and make each post meaningful (or at the very least enjoyable) for our kids, sometimes things are just for cute’s sake.

Love Pennants

These pennant flags definitely fit that description and you can see it all over Dash’s face, he doesn’t get the hype. But, we’re digging them (anything in French usually wins us over) so maybe you will, too!
Love Pennants

Here’s what you’ll need to make them at home:

Stiff felt (you can buy it in sheets at the craft store.) Wood dowels, soft felt for lettering, scissors, a hot glue gun and a printer if you want letter guides.

Love Pennants How-To

You can buy pre-cut stiff felt pennant flags, but if you want more options color wise, you can easily cut your own, and they’re a lot cheaper too. They’re usually 9 inches wide and 18 inches long, so find the center of the felt, count out 4.5 inches on either side and mark with a pencil. Then mark the very center of the other side as your angle guide. Take a ruler, and connect the markers to create your pennant shape. Then cut it out and you’re ready for lettering!

Love Pennants

The lettering can be done one of two ways, you can print off guides with your favorite font in a word document, (starting with 8 inches tall and slowly tapering down in size) and use them as a guide while cutting the felt out. Or you can eyeball it. Eyeball it! Eyeball it! We’re cheering you on, because really cutting out a guide is sort of annoying. Obviously we went the eyeball route, and they’re not perfect, but they’re totally personalized and after that much labor, Emily wouldn’t sell them for $1,000. Consider them a new family heirloom!

Once you have your letters cut out, simply hot glue them on, and then on the back hot glue the dowel to the widest part of the felt. To keep it clean looking, we cut out a piece of the extra stiff felt and glued it to cover the dowel and secure it a little bit extra. (Refer to the final step in the tutorial collage to see what it looks like finished.

Emily has them sitting proudly on her table in a vase, we’re thinking they’d look pretty good hung on the wall too, or maybe they’ll come along to embarrass her husband a bit at his next softball game. Endless possibilities!

Need more Valentine’s Day inspiration?

Check out our boys’ Valentine’s cards from last year, a playlist of our favorite kid-friendly love songs, and we heard the Babushka Valentine’s printable was giving some of you problems, if that’s you, email us directly and we’ll manually send the file!

lumineux family film [giveaway!]

We were in a big meeting last week and were asked to share a favorite post, such a hard choice! We finally settled on this film, although our whole catalog of films produced with Lumineux hold a special place in our hearts. In honor of the upcoming Month of Love we wanted to share this fave with our new readers and also announce another chance to win a Family Film from our videographer Jenner over at Lumineux Films!

We’ve had the amazing opportunities to create family films with our friends, like:

and several more beautiful families (see them ALL here.)

We can’t wait to add your name to that list! Ready to enter?

Here are the details:

Jenner will be in Los Angeles, California February 26-27th, 2014 and the selected winner must be able to meet him in Los Angeles or neighboring areas in Southern California. Other than that, all families are eligible.

Complete these two steps to enter:

1. Share this post’s link via Facebook using #smallfryfilms so we can see it! (Copy this into a status: http://www.smallfryblog.com/2014/01/28/lumineux-family-film-giveaway/)

2. Pin this post via Pinterest tagging us @smallfryblog so we can see.

For extra entries, follow Jenner via Instagram @jennerbrown_ as always you can follow us across our social networks: Facebook // Pinterest // Twitter // Instagram.

Leave comments for each entry and we’ll pick a winner February 5th, 2014.

Not going to be near California anytime soon? Don’t worry, we’ll be running a few more cities throughout the year, so stay tuned!

Tiny Tour : Hong Kong

Today we have another International Tiny Tour! Heidi says this time of year is ideal for traveling to China, the weather is great and this weekend is Chinese New Year! Welcome Heidi, who will be sharing her favorite family-friendly stops year-round:

“Hello! I am Heidi and I live in Hong Kong, China with my husband and three children (Brenden, 9, Macs, 6 and Vivian, 4 months). When we first moved here it seemed like a city of concrete, endless high-rise buildings, too many people to count, and nothing family-friendly to offer. However, we soon came to find the city to be a place to explore. We are embracing the lifestyle here and loving every minute. So here is our list of kid friendly things to do and places to visit in Hong Kong.

Tiny Tour : Hong Kong

1. The Beaches:

I know what you are thinking…beaches in Hong Kong? Yes, there are so many wonderful beaches here and is our absolute favorite place to spend the weekends. The two we like are a little off the beaten path and therefore less crowded and when I say less crowded I mean sometimes we are the only people on the beach! The first is Ha Mun Bay Beach on Sharp Island that is located on the Kowloon side. To get there hire a Sampan (a traditional Chinese Fishing boat) at the Sai Kung Peir to take you out to the island. It’s a fun experience because you can barter for the price of your journey.

Tiny Tour : Hong Kong

The boat ride is about 20 minutes to the island where the boat drops you off at the pier. The beach has bathrooms, and places to change, but more importantly the beach is clean. There are rocks and shoreline for the kids to explore and a great place to play in the sand and splash in the water. We typically pack a lunch and spend the day. After returning from the beach there are lots of restaurants along the water to people watch and eat fresh seafood. We find it more interesting to just look at the sea creatures and watch the fisherman sell there daily catch.

On the Hong Kong Island is Chung Hom Kok beach near Stanley. Again there are bathrooms, a playground, a place to get cold treats, and a beautiful beach with amazing views of the surrounding islands of HK. To get there hire a taxi or drive towards Stanley via the Aberdeen tunnel.

2. Sai Kung:

We live near Sai Kung and we love it! It’s more of a village, and is near the Sai Kung country park which is known for its great hiking. We spend much of our time down here. It is where we grocery shop, and run all of our day-to-day errands. It has a great community feel to it, there are parks, restaurants offering everything from Indian food to dim sum. One of our favorite restaurants is Classified, there is outdoor seating in the square and a great place for the kids to run around and ride scooter or bike. They also have an amazing eggs benedict (which is hard to find in HK) We also enjoy Chips Fish n chips street restaurant. You order at the window and they serve them in these great paper boats, we just find a spot in the park and eat. The boys love it! Sai Kung has a laid back, Fisherman’s village feel so it’s a great place to spend the day with kids. Near the water there is a promenade to walk along (also where you catch the Sampan boats) and restaurants to eat and enjoy the view of the water.

3. Disney Land/Ocean Park:

I don’t think I have met a kid (or adult!) who doesn’t like DisneyLand, so this is a great place to bring the kids while in Hong Kong. It is smaller than the Disney Park in the states, which makes it easier to manage especially with little ones. Disney HK has Space Mountain and the teacups of course, but our favorite part was the Toy Story rides. Hong Kong makes Disney very accessible and easy to get to by taking the MTR train right to the park.

Tiny Tour : Hong Kong

Hong Kong has another theme park called Ocean Park, It is a mixture of aquariums, animal exhibits and rides. To get from one side of the park to the other, I recommend taking the gondola ride over the mountain and enjoy the crazy view of the Island and South China Sea. This park offers rides for every age group and level of thrill seeking.

4. The Peak:

The Peak is THE place to see all of Hong Kong, literally To get to the Peak, you can drive, taxi, take a bus, or the best way is by the Peak Tram. To get the best view you take the many escalators to the very top of the Peak Look out. The cost is a few dollars but worth it to see a 360 degree view of Hong Kong. Just be sure it’s a clear day, or you won’t see much of anything. ☺

I can’t talk about Hong Kong and not mention a few things for the mom’s. The shopping is AH-MAZING! They have all the high end shops like Chanel, Lanvin, Hermes, and upscale malls offering every name brand you can imagine, but the markets and street venders are also a must to see here in Hong Kong. I especially love the Jade Market for handmade jewelry and the Stanley Market where you can pick up scarves, art, and postcards.”

Catch more of Heidi’s gorgeous photography on her website here.

For more International stops check out London or Perth, Australia! Also, the whole series here.

Family Photo of the Selch’s by Mandi Carroll Photography

Obaby+

This post is brought to you by Obaby the iPhone and iPad app that celebrates early childhood. In honor of their Reveal Week, buy it in the App Store for only $.99!

Do you all use the app “Over” to write text on your photos? It’s a hugely popular app and the makers have done it again! They created Obaby (and Obaby+) specifically for expecting parents, new parents, and toddler-aged children. They have discounted the app to only $.99 and $9.99 respectively (normally $4.99 and $14.99) to celebrate their Reveal Week!

Check out what we’ve been Obaby-ing:

☝A mom and Quinn date, a trip to the library with a best buddy, and Jude being sweet as can be.

Obaby has a huge collection of graphics to add to your photos for nearly every occasion. Baby’s firsts, the 1st and 2nd years, adoption, pregnancy, siblings, and darling borders and doodles, too.

obaby2

☝ Sparklers for the New Year, Cal and mom on the ferris wheel, Hayes first night in his big boy bed (yep, he didn’t climb out of his crib until nearly 4!)

We love printing our Instagrams in to books and one thing that we thought is so great about Obaby is that you are basically captioning your images to further remember the moment. And when you finally upload them to print, you don’t even need to write a caption necessarily.

Sunny on the carousel, Dash and mom at the Grand America gardens.

Obaby will only have their app discounted for a short time, so don’t miss it!

Download it here.

Looking for our favorite apps for our kids? Read this post!

babushka doll valentines

Here’s another early-bird Valentine’s Day idea and if you’re lucky, free printable. Just kidding, of course there’s a free printable!
valentine babushka doll printables

It starts out as a Valentine’s Day card, but then when you take it home you can make it into a garland, too! You all know how we feel about a garland.

HOW TO MAKE THE CARD: All you need to do is print the download onto cardstock (in color) and cut out each babushka. Then take a separate piece of cardstock for the carrying envelope. We fold the bottom third up to create the front lip, then glue/tape/staple the sides to create your open envelope. Then cut out the included “I wish there were six of you” card and glue it onto the front lip.

HOW TO MAKE THE GARLAND:

You can either sew over the tops of their heads or we used mini clothespins to attach them to twine.

valentine babushka doll printables

And let’s finish this one of with a little brotherly love. Awww!

The print above the Babushkas is available at Skoope Home. We’re digging so many of their prints. So fresh and so clean (clean). They have a special Valentine’s Day line up right now that is awesome, too! Here’s some of our regular favorites:

This Much Print // Calendars // Rainy Days Print

Small Fry Films : West Village Picnic

We are beyond excited to share this film with Gaby and Belle with you all today. Do you remember last year when we held a contest to gift a family in NYC a film by Jenner Brown? NYC is our #1 city for readership and we wanted to say thank you in a small way. We didn’t know that the strangers we chose would have such a clear vision for this film, and even a music track performed by Gaby to accompany it! Even more wonderfully, we didn’t know that these strangers would become dear friends. Gaby and Belle live in NYC with their two beautiful kids Biet and Lucien. Belle blogs at (the gorgeous!) Petite Biet and recently launched the killer-cool kids line Welkin NYC. Belle is such a beautiful writer, we’d love to have her introduce her family before debuting their film. Welcome, Belle!

“Gaby and I met 11 years ago in the Lower East Side. I had just moved to NYC from the West coast and had gotten a job in a little French cafe on Ludlow Street. The cafe had these huge windows that looked out onto the street, and when business was slow I would sit and drink hot chocolate and watch the city going by. Ludlow Street was really neighborhood-y then, and everyone knew and took care of everyone else, and by watching the people go by I began to learn all of the characters and people and families of the block. One of those characters was Gaby.

Gaby worked across the street at at a venue that had live music and poetry and comedy every night. He was an Argentinean who had moved to NYC a decade earlier from Israel (our family is a crazy mix of cultures!) and made his career in music. He and his coworkers used to come into the cafe for sandwiches before work, and me and my coworkers used to go listen to music at the venue after work, so, over time, we all became good friends.

– Gaby still tells the story about the first night we met: He was working with his friend Paul, and I walked in with my coworker after we had closed up the cafe and walked right up to them and introduced ourselves. We hung out all night listening to music and after my friend and I left, he turned to Paul and said “I’m gonna marry that girl one day.” Five years later, Paul married us. –

The longer I lived in the city, the more I experienced how everyone in the neighborhood, from the butcher to the deli guy to the waitress at the cafe (me) to the newspaper delivery guy, was a family of sorts. There are so many people in NYC with no roots or family close by, and over time they all band together and form an extended “family”, taking care of one another and growing together over the years, like you would expect of a small town. Its a really beautiful thing to experience and be a part of, and that’s what we wanted to convey with this film. You think of NYC as this big majestic metropolis, but it’s really a collection of small neighborhoods, like little villages.

Over time, Gaby and my friendship evolved from friends to best friends to boyfriend and girlfriend to, eventually, husband and wife. We were married in a park in the village, and all of our friends and people from the neighborhood came. Then we were blessed with a daughter, Biet, and a little less than two years later (just a few weeks before we filmed this!), a son, Lucien. Our community evolved and grew to include the West Village (where we shot the film) and now Brooklyn. It’s really important for us to teach our children the importance of growing your community, fostering relationships with friends and neighbors, supporting local businesses, and appreciating the history of the city. They don’t have any aunts, uncles, or grandparents here, but they have a loving family that we’ve built over time with friends and neighbors who love them dearly.”

This family loves their city, they love each other, and they are just salt of the Earth. We felt so fortunate to be able to meet them all! Follow along their NYC journey via Petite Biet and @augustabelle via Instagram. And of course check out their clothing line Welkin NYC!

Filmed by Jenner Brown of Lumineux.

Music Credit:”Todo Por Ti”

Gaby Savransky / vocals + guitar

Baba Z. Buerger / piano + bass

Shahar Mintz / guitar

Yuval Lion / drums + percussion

Alex Asher / trombone

naturebox giveaway! [closed]

Congratulations to Meaghan for winning this giveaway!

We have an awesome giveaway and a 50% off discount today sponsored by Naturebox! We’ve been Naturebox fans for more than a year now and to celebrate these healthy snack habits we are giving away a free YEAR of Naturebox subscriptions to one lucky reader!

Naturebox

Here’s an example of what might come to your home for your Naturebox order (Fuji apple slices not pictured, as they were already eaten in about ten seconds):

Naturebox Snack Delivery

They send the perfect mix of savory and sweet options. All can be eaten straight out of the bag or added to meals. Granola and yogurt, sea-weed rice pops on top of a salad, really there’s no limit to what these bags can provide! We used them most recently in addition with healthy smoothies during a family-friendly cleanse earlier this month and they were a life-saver.

Naturebox

A new feature they’ve added is their Snack Catalog, where you can go and actually select the snacks you want delivered for those who have more specific dietary preference, or simply know what your kids like to snack on (Fuji apple slices).

So let’s cut to the chase. How do you enter? Keep reading. If you aren’t the giveaway type, Naturebox is offering 50% off your first box. (You’ve got to use this link to activate it.)

Head to Naturebox and pick your favorite snack and tell us in the comments.

For extra entries you can also follow Naturebox on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest.

If you’re feeling really motivated you can follow us as well!

Facebook // Pinterest // Twitter // Instagram

A winner will be announced January 29th and must have a shipping address in the United States. Good luck!!

midway ice castles

If you live near Midway Utah or Breckenridge Colorado or Lincoln New Hampshire, you are in for a real treat. Ice Castles is a man-made dream world and we took the boys to check it out! They’ve all been enjoying the movie and soundtrack to Frozen (who hasn’t?) so our trip was perfectly timed. We’ve got some tips we learned to make your experience even better, let’s go!

Wear boots. With so much foot traffic the ground is loose and you’ll find yourself stepping in foot deep snow at times!

Buy tickets in advance. The line to purchase is long, but there’s a separate line for people with pre-purchased tickets. It will save you a lot of time! Either way it’s worth the wait.

Midway Ice Castles

Ditch the stroller. There are narrow hallways, and lots of people around, and you’ll wish you didn’t have it. Bring a child carrier or enough arms to hold your non-walkers. Luckily, Midway’s has stroller parking at the entrance.

You’ll want to see the castles in perfect daylight and at night when they start lighting them from the inside with colored lights. Either get your hand stamped and come back, or go around sunset so you can get the best of both worlds. It was truly magical for every age!

Find out more about Ice Castles, purchase tickets, and see glorious photos all on their website here. If you’re going to Midway, check out our favorite spots from our Tiny Tour post here.

First photo credit Helen Richardson for the Denver Post, the rest are from our phones!

kira kids

If you’ve seen any of the Small Fry boys around town you already know Kira Kids has become a fan favorite around here! They sent us a care package to check out months ago, but literally every time we got together to shoot our posts, everyone’s shirts were in the wash. They’ve been worn and re-worn, slept, played, and truly lived-in.

The tees and sweatshirts are made out of super soft cotton, and the graphics are perfect and here’s why… Kira Kids has bridged the gap between what we as parents like to put on our kids, and what our kids like to put on themselves.

Each of us has a hard time embracing the commercialized world of character emblazoned attire. But our kids love wearing shirts with characters and “cool guys” on them.

They don’t take pride in wearing a really great blank pima cotton t-shirt like we do. (Get with it, boys!) So you see why Kira Kids is so loved around here!

kira kids clothing

Bears in shades, bears with boom-boxes, bears on skateboards, it’s cool but not so cool that it loses the innocence of youth.

“To the beat of my own box.”

Lucky for you because we’re so slow, most of these items are on sale! Even luckier Kira Kids just launched their Spring Summer line, and they gave us a sneak peek. Keep reading to check it out! Read more

FRYday: Emily

Happy FRYday everyone! For those of you who asked for the full article from our Somerset Life magazine feature, we can finally share it! Here’s the full essay I had the opportunity to write if you’d like:

When we started Small Fry last Fall, we had no idea what would happen. We knew we had a supportive network of friends and family who would be on board, but would anyone else care? What would even talk about day in and day out? How fast would we run out of inspiration? What would it take to make time away from our family worth it? We decided to talk about it over dinner, because our best ideas come when we’ve got a fork in one hand and a pen in the other.

We tossed around ideas, and discussed one another’s talents and passions. Nicole, and amazing photographer, could turn our projects and recipes into something magazine worthy. Jenna with her design know-how and detail-oriented eye, could take our posts to the next level. Emily, with a passion for writing and words could give our ideas meaning and girth. While all those things were great and would certainly provide us with enough content to support a blog platform we just weren’t sold on it. Then that lightbulb moment hit. If we based all of our interests, passions, and talents around our number-one passion, our number-one priority — our families, our baby boys — then that would be a blog worth writing.

We all had chills, tears filled our eyes, (tears still come when we talk about it to this day), and we knew that Small Fry wasn’t just an idea, but could be a reality. If we did it the right way, it could be a way for us to help support our families, to start college funds, and to have wonderful opportunities. All while talking about our own kids? That was going to be easy! What parent can’t do that ad nauseam?

From there we wrote our mission, and signed it off and published it to our little blog with a readership of three: “We’ve been told this season of our lives is fleeting. What if we could say that we soaked it all in, let it envelope us, looked into those big beautiful eyes of our children every morning and said “let me show you something amazing today!”

Small Fry Someserset Magazine Feature

Quickly we realized that our mission to celebrate parent and childhood was a worthy cause for more than just our blood relatives, and we found ourselves with an amazing and supportive readership. We’ve had incredible highs with a week focused on adoption journeys, a viral YouTube video, partnerships with amazing companies, and so many loving and inspiring comments from readers around the world. We have found that we need to consciously commit and recommit ourselves to our purpose and not let the gilded appeal of consumerism take over. We think our site is great, as we should, but we also see where we need to improve. We stress and toil over our missteps and are pretty hard on ourselves.

As a trio we’ve fought for our ideas — really fought, compromised, made up, wanted to quit, been proud, excited, surprised, laughed until we cried. We love and respect one another, we believe in ourselves and our endeavors, and that’s all that matters. We have set the bar high for ourselves, but every day when someone, parent or not, comes to our space, leaves encouraging words, or says “I’m going to try that!: to something we’ve said, a photo we took, or and idea we had, that’s reason enough to keep up the pace.

There are also a lot of forces against us saying that parenthood is too hard, unglamorous, pedestrian even — and maybe it is. But it is also magical, heart-wrenching, life-bettering, and world-shaking. It is simultaneously boring and cerebral, repetitive and pull-your-hair-out challenging, simple and complex. It is quiet and calm, and everything all at once. It is a tug on your pant leg and a stretch of your limits. And it is worth celebrating.

xoxo

Emily

Easter photos by Lindsey Orton

Family Bugaboo photos by Cee Bee

all other photos by our lady Nicole.

•••

We have a guest DIY over on Inspired by This! Catch how to make these super easy initial Helvetica pillows here.

We’ve got the most insane week next week with a big event with Cricut and then the Alt Summit conference. We will be posting as usual, but wanted to let any Alt Summit attendees know where will be during the conference so we can meet!

We’ll be moderating a roundtable on Blog Ethics on both Thursday (4:30pm) and Friday (9:30am)! Then on Friday we’ll be hosting a take-home DIY in Cricut’s Craft Lounge at 10:30 am right after our roundtable. We’ll be sure to share pictures of all the fun (and hard work, too) when it’s all said and done, and follow along via Instagram @smallfryblog. Have a wonderful weekend, everyone!

Small Fry Films ♡ JCPenney

Are you on-board the JCPenney love train? Their brand revamp a few years ago has converted us and we were so excited to work with them with their exclusive Joe Fresh collaboration! For the longest time JCP felt like our little secret, but the more we share “Oh it’s from JCPenney!” the more we realize, everyone thinks it’s their little secret, too! Here is a little stop motion created by Jessica Peterson (she shot over 400 stills to get thirty seconds!)

The back story with this film is so sweet. These two have been inseparable best friends since they were tiny! Their moms brought them in and confirmed that even though they now live several cities away from each other, it doesn’t stop them from insisting on playing together weekly! (It helps that their moms are best friends, too!) They were so fun to work with and giggled uncontrollably at our concept: “You magically change clothes and then look surprised!” We love how versatile the Joe Fresh line is and if you watch closely you’ll see just how many pieces can be unisex!

This post feels a little anti-climatic as we shot this stop motion over 2 1/2 months ago! We’ve learned some dreams are bigger than others and making this one a reality took some serious work on the back-end. We hope you will still enjoy a look at Joe Fresh for JCPenney’s Fall 2013 line, and check out the amazing deals and fashions they have to offer currently.

See all our films here, if you want your heart warmed, check out this one we made especially for moms.

mad for plaid

When we asked everyone via our Facebook page what you’d like to see more of, fashion and style was the most popular answer! We love it too, so we totally get it. After 30+ posts in our Head to Toe series, our boys are, understandably, over modeling. So, we’re excited about our fashion round-ups this year, having more flexibility to add girl’s clothes, and the boys excited about the break! We’ll be picking from our favorite trends, upcoming holidays and special occasions, and of course, if you ever have a concept you’re in the mood for, just let us know!

Today we’re paying homage to our love affair with plaid. This year it has shown up in unexpected ways and here’s some of our favorites!

mad for plaid round up for kids

1. This one-piece looks amazing for sleep or as an undergarment for extra bitter days // $24.99

2. A sweet little buffalo plaid bow // $5.00

3. A Madewell plaid umbrella for the unreliable weather. // $29.50

4. A Trooper Trapper Hat that’s as warm as it is fun to say. // $20+

5. We love the retro look of these Aigle boots! They have a few less expensive (and also less plaid) versions here. // $84

6. The one piece in blue, because if you’re like our kids, color matters. A lot. // $24.99

The perfect plaid tartan scarf // $39

7. A padded printed bomber is a rad unisex option that adds a little edge to the traditional print. // $29.99

8. Another killer deal from JcPenney, the plaid toggle jacket. //$16.99

9. This 100% cotton tartan throw looks so cozy, and something you could use for picnics, a campfire, or movie night.

10. All she needs for this skirt is a yellow sweater, matching jacket, knee high socks and a black beret and your girl is channeling Cher Horowitz in the best way. // $15.99

11. A plaid lumberjack handmade plush toy? Yes please! // $30

Find more looks and shops, and shop some looks all under our Threads label!

kid cleanse

We weren’t sure it could be done, but Jenna found a way! She held a kid-friendly cleanse at her house after Christmas to detox some of that unavoidable Holiday sugar intake. Here’s what she did:
“After Christmas I remember looking at my husband and saying ‘What is wrong with our kids!?!’ They weren’t sleeping well and they were EXTRA whiny and irritable. I was so frustrated with their behavior and kept racking my brain to think what it could be. Was it the presents, the traveling, the endless activity? Perhaps, but those factors had died down and the whining continued and I was left perplexed. As if on cue my son comes waltzing in the kitchen with three caramels in his hands from residual neighbor gifts that seemed to be multiplying on our counter and I knew it was time to do a family cleanse. Personally, I have done several in the past where you are on liquids only for three days but I needed a kid-friendly version. So here is a way I found to do a three day cleanse that kept my children nourished, strong, and happy. My goal here was obviously not to have them lose pounds or trim up, they already have the metabolism of their dad (annoying) but rather to reset their bodies and get the junk out of their system so we could start fresh in 2014 making healthier lifestyle choices.
First thing is clear the house of junk. If you have a big white loaf of bread sitting on the counter, it’s all you’ll hear about is how they want a slice. Out of sight, out of mind!

I started with smoothies we were already making at home and these are the basic recipes our family enjoys. The nice thing about a smoothie is you really can’t mess it up! Depending on consistency and taste you can add various things to get the perfect blend. I had the kids drink 3-4 glasses of smoothies a day. The great thing is there is usually some left over so if they want to get more through the day, it’s available to them in the fridge.

Also I always put some sort of citrus in the smoothies. Whether it’s lime, lemon or orange juice (with no added sugars), any citrus is great for cleansing the body and is fantastic for the immune system. We found from our juicing post last year that citrus (peel and all!) also cuts through that leafy green taste!

My five year old isn’t a huge fan of smoothies. He will drink them but with much protesting and I knew this was going to be a challenge so I prepared by using our dinner chart we posted a few weeks ago. The promise of a prize was enough motivation for him to chug his veggies down.
In between smoothies I had them snack on healthy foods. Along with cutting out sugar, I cut out grains and dairy. They munched on hard boiled eggs, salmon, chicken & turkey cut in to small portions for protein. I also gave them lots of nuts and avocados so they were getting healthy fats. Also I made sure they were drinking water all throughout the day so they stayed hydrated.

get your kids healthy with a kid cleanse

It really was such a great challenge for our family and the benefits were incredible. We were all calmer, more focused, more patient and kind. My oldest has a hard time with focus as it is The biggest challenge was for me honestly because I spent most my time in the kitchen blending, preparing and cleaning. We didn’t go much of anywhere because we needed to be around the foods that we were sticking to. But surprisingly the kids NEVER complained of hunger! In fact they seemed to be getting full faster then normal because of the nutrient-dense foods they were consuming.

Other really great foods to consider:

Multi-grain crackers with Almond Butter

Celery & Natural Peanut Butter

Dried Cranberries

Luckily, we had a Naturebox delivery sent for an upcoming giveaway this month that saved us! Having healthy snacks around was vital.”

So, dear readers, do you think your kids could do it? More importantly, do you think YOU could do it? Creating a healthier world for our kids is going to be our lifelong battle as parents, sometimes it feels overwhelming but so worth it!

a little bundle

One of our most frequent questions and requests is ideas for new moms and babies! We have a Small Fry Shop full of favorites right here, but we can hardly keep up with the amazing new products and brands that pop up each month. We’ve seen our fair share of monthly delivery services and have shared several over the last year or so, so when we were approached by to review A Little Bundle we were probably a tougher sale than most.

A Little Bundle curated delivery service

With all that being said, hopefully what we are about to say next will carry more weight… This is far and away the best curated baby and mom product delivery service we’ve seen thus far! Every item we pulled out of the box we were thrilled about, with each new company introduced we were irritated we hadn’t found them sooner. A Little Bundle is filled with items that fit the modern mom’s aesthetic, with sweet nods to the past, all while supporting small businesses. Here’s what we got this month:

Darling right? Before signing up you share a few things about you and your baby and A Little Bundle makes hand picked selections for you! For those who want to be able to pick and choose they even have a shop where you can by a la carte. Spoiler alert: the shop is amazing.

You can get sneak peeks of the next bundles via their Instagram and Facebook pages, keep up with giveaways and deals via Twitter, and stalk their spot-on Pinterest boards right here.

Who's In Charge Here?

Send Us An Email
Small Fry News
Search Small Fry
Small Fry Picks
Follow By Email

Enter your email address:
Delivered by FeedBurner
Archives

Who's In Charge Here?

Send Us An Email

Small Fry News

Search Small Fry

Small Fry Picks

Follow By Email

Archives