What do I do with Noah's DVDs?

I can’t believe how old Noah is getting.  When he was three, he loved to watch Thomas, Barney and Caillou.  I would buy him DVD’s to watch. He would watch some of them many times.  When he was almost six, he informed me that those are baby shows.  I couldn’t believe what he was saying.  I knew he was going to grow out of Barney that was just going to happen.  I thought he would love Caillou for years. We didn’t watch Caillou’s Holiday Movie every time it was on at Christmas time.  He won’t watch anything on Sprout any more.  He has started watching less Nick Jr. I know soon he will no longer love Max and Ruby or Team Umizoomi.  He has moved on to more nonfiction shows.  He loves to still watch NASA of course. He also watches Through the Wormhole with Morgan Freeman, How it’s Made and of course anything to do with fish and sea life.  So what do I do with all the kid’s DVD's he has grown out of?  Since Noah is an only child, at the moment, I don’t want to save them. They are taking up so much space. He has so many Barney DVDs and Thomas DVD’s. I think at one point I counted 50 DVD's that he will no longer watch. I have given some away to friends with young children but I am still left with quite the collection. There are some that he won’t watch that I will keep because they were his first DVD's. I am definitely saving all of the Baby Faith DVD’s.

Thankfully, with the wonders of the internet, I can sell DVD's online. This way they get out of my house and go to a new home where they are loved just as they were once loved by Noah.  The DVD’s will bring joy to children. They are just sitting on a shelf collecting dust here.  I love sharing things with other people that I no longer need or want.  If I didn’t share my stuff, I would be one of those hoarder shows.  I love to see people smile when I am able to give them something.   I will say it makes me a little sad when Noah grows out of his favorite DVD’s or toys.  He is really growing up so fast.

What are some shows your children have grown out of?

Kid's TV Shows Questions

I am a mom of a 4 year old. We watch a lot of kid’s shows. There are many questions I have about the shows. Yes, I think about things like this. I am wondering why certain shows are the way they are. I know that one of the biggest questions parents have is where are Max and Ruby’s parents? I actually looked it up and the author and creator of Max and Ruby wanted kids to learn how to solve problems on their own. Max and Ruby are not orphans that live alone, so no need to call CPS on Max and Ruby’s parents. They are there somewhere. Perhaps locked in a closet or the attic somewhere, I wonder why they have grandma though. I love how they make it seem like grandma lives far away when in reality she lives next door. I really don’t care for the fact that Max is allowed to go to the store by himself when he is probably no more than 4. I know it is a cartoon but not all kids grasp the fact that it is make believe.

Noah likes to watch Franklin. I was thinking about it and started wondering why all of Franklin’s friends are named what kind of animal they are. Bear, Otter, Beaver, and Porcupine for example. Why does Franklin have a real name and why isn’t he called turtle. Maybe it is to distinguish him from everyone else or maybe Franklin’s parents are just more creative. What if another beaver or bear move in the woods then what would they be named? Bear 2 and Beaver 2? Do they have last names? Maybe they really have first names and they go by their last names, but why not Franklin?

I know that is a common occurrence in children’s shows. Now I am thinking about The Berenstain Bears. Why Brother and Sister are called Brother and Sister. I know they are brother and sister but everyone else calls them brother and sister too. What about Mama and Papa Bear. Everyone including other adults call them Mama and Papa. What were their names when they were little? What are the odds that if their parents really named them Mama and Papa they would fall in love and get married? Unless it was an arranged marriage, I don’t see it being possible. I know all of Brother and Sister’s friends have first and last names. Sister’s friend Lizzie Bruin’s parents are called Mr. and Mrs. Bruin. I have no idea.

I am sure I am way overanalyzing these shows but, it ,makes you think about things. I remember the time I looked up why Caillou is bald. I wonder about things like that. I am a dork and I am the first to admit so. In case you are wondering, Caillou is bald because the creator of Caillou wanted to make it so all children can relate with Caillou equally by giving him no hair.

What are some of your kid show questions? I hope this helped clear up some of your questions you have been losing sleep over.

Gilbert

I think a lot of you could answer this question. Who is Gilbert? Especially those with young children. In case you don’t know he is none other than Caillou’s lovable gray cat. Gilbert always gets in to all kinds of mischief and he even gets lost a time or two. Noah loves Caillou as many of you know. So, being an animal lover he also loves Gilbert. He walks around saying Gilbert in the same tone Caillou does. When, I entered giveaways for My Car Pet, I would post in my comments that its name would probably be named Gilbert. I never won one if you were wondering. So, I naturally did what any mother would do and went on a search for a stuffed Gilbert.

Caillou merchandise is not easy to come by. I scoured the internet after all you can find everything online, except a stuffed Gilbert cat. The internet is a wonderous thing. How else can you reach hundreds of thousands even millions of people at once? So, I thought about what I was gonna do. I thought maybe I would keep looking.
During this time I went to a little toy shop and I was looking around. I thought maybe I would find my little boy a new little surprise. Something small, inexpensive then I saw it!


Please pardon the quality of the photo. I took it with my cell. I can’t locate my camera at the moment.
A little Gund Kids stuffed gray striped cat. The employees of the store informed me that it meows. I looked at the price tag as small toy stores can have hefty price tags. I had experience with Baby Gund before when I bought a little soft photo album. The photo album was 15 dollars but I had received a gift certificate/coupon from the hospital when Noah was born.

I did notice the kitty has white feet and Gilbert doesn’t. It was close enough. The Gilbert was really cheap. He was under 5 dollars I believe. I was in shock how cheap it was. When I gave it to Noah he smiled so big. He has a cheek dimple. It’s a special one because instead of being at the middle of his cheeks it is at the top. He inherited that from me cause I had one too. He and his Gilbert are great friends. He carries him around and talks to him. He loves Gilbert. He loves when Gilbert meows. It is a very distinguished meow, enough that I could pick him out of a voice lineup.

We went to Wal-mart today and he managed to carry Gilbert to the car. I waited to get him in his car seat and then explained to Noah that Gilbert was going to stay in our house. I told him that Gilbert is too special to lose. It would be heartbreaking if we lost him. He seemed to be fine with it and Gilbert was sitting on the dryer when we got home.

November PBS Sprout Update!

It’s November so it is time for another PBS Sprout update! I am a member of the Sprout Band of Bloggers so I get the opportunity to share what’s up on Sprout each month. November of course means Thanksgiving is coming.

PBS Sprout has a really cool programming schedule for Thanksgiving week. You can tell them what your Sproutlet is thankful for. It might even be on the scroll at the bottom of the screen starting Monday November 23rd 2009. On Thanksgiving morning your Sproutlet can call in with a grown up Sprout and speak live to the on air host and tell them what they are thankful for. That would be so cool to do. If your Sproutlet calls in make sure you have your family and friends watching Sprout too for your child’s debut.

There are all kinds of really cute Fall and Thanksgiving crafts to make. There are many things to keep your kids busy and they could be used to help decorate your table for Thanksgiving. Some of the crafts are place cards, napkin rings and even woven placemats. There are also some really cute coloring pages too. I really like the Sprout’s Thanksgiving Coloring Page because it has all of our favorite Sprout friends on it.

I hope you all watch Sprout with your kids and visit Sprout Online there is so many great activities  for your Sproutlets to do. Parents check out Sprout for Parents for great resources on parenting and other interesting things.

Noah and I will be watching on Thanksgiving week. We hope to hear and read what you are thankful for. We will be also on the lookout for our homemade hand turkey that we had so much fun making and sending in to Sprout.

Once upon a time

Every night before Noah goes to bed he asks for a story and a song or two. I love telling him stories and singing him songs. It is a special time we share together. I love how excited he gets when I tell him things and I like to build up the anticipation for him. I think that is his favorite part of wondering what comes next. That is also one of his favorite questions to ask is What comes next?

The stories are almost always about a little boy named Noah. I will start the story Once upon a time there was little boy named….. then Noah will chime in and say Noah! I mainly tell the story but I like when he fills in the blanks for me. It is fun to see what he comes up with and watch him form ideas in his mind. The stories are usually about our lives like going to the store or the zoo and things like that.

I have been telling him a story about Noah going to a farm. He has a love for animals and he loves to look at them and talk about them so I thought he would like that. I thought I would share mine and Noah’s story we told tonight with you.

Once upon a time there was a little boy named NOAH. Who lives in his HOUSE with his MOMMY. Noah and Mommy went to a farm and met a cow named CHICKEN. Noah and the cow named chicken were playing in the field. Then Noah and the cow named Chicken met a pig named HORSE. They played together and then saw a chicken named ROM and a goat named SHEEP. They had a lot of fun playing together until it was time to go home. So mommy and Noah got in the car and went home and watched CAILLOU SHOO SHOO and ate dinner and played together until it was time for bed. The End.

The caps are obviously my son’s responses. I thought it was a great silly story. I encourage you to tell stories to your children and let them fill in the blanks. It’s fun and educational. When we were telling the story we were both laughing really hard and I thought of doing Mad Libs when I was little.
It is so much fun to laugh with my son. He is pure joy and I love him.

Toilet paper, light bulbs, Socks for Rosie, Crayons

Toilet Paper, Light Bulbs, Socks for Rosie, Crayons has been stuck in my head all day. We went to the store today and Noah saw light bulbs and said Light bulbs and then he started singing Toilet Paper, Light Bulbs, Socks for Rosie, Crayons. I was walking around the store singing it. I don’t know what is worse the time I was singing Mr. Rogers Neighborhood in Wal-mart which I complete blame my friend Brittany for.

The song I have stuck in my head is from Caillou. Those of you that are familiar with Caillou probably figured it out by Rosie. It’s the episode where Caillou and his mom go shopping and she tells him to make up a song to remember what they have to buy. It’s a very cute show. My family loves Caillou regardless of what other moms say about him.

At the store I sampled a chocolate covered pretzel crisp. I am not sure who makes them but they are delish. Noah even tried to take and eat mine after his was gone. I gave him half of mine. Noah ate two little strawberry muffins too. I love free samples. They were having a special one day sale so it seemed like they had more samples than normal. Noah was a crumbly mess twice each time he ate a muffin. He loved them though. I probably should of bought some. Maybe next time we go there.

I don’t really like that store. We don’t go there very often because it is weird. Everything is little cubbyholes with smaller aisles in the middle. It seemed like we were in there for hours. It is great if you are running in for a few things but not for normal grocery shopping. It is way too confusing. You don’t know where you are going or where you have been. Oh and if you are with another person besides your child who is with you in the cart don’t walk away from them cause it will take you a long time to find them again. It’s not like you can walk down one “hall” and look down all the aisles. Of course when that happened I tried to call and my cell phone died.

In other news, I finally went and got a new cable box. My bedroom cable box messed up the day I went to my friend Rene’s for a visit on July 28th. Now I can watch all the local channels again. I went two months without watching like 5 channels. I didn’t get CBS, FOX and NBC and a couple local local channels. Now I can watch SVU on Wednesdays and Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy again. I have a cable box downstairs too that has never had problems. I am now on my fourth bedroom cable box. I don’t know. I must get defective ones. I have had many issues with Comcast. Everything from defective cable boxes from going down stairs during nap time and glancing at my tv which was on Noggin (which is a preschool channel) and there was a naked woman on it. I totally called and complained I was really upset. Somehow Comcast messed up or something. I never did find out what was going on.

Noah loves Comcast. About a year ago we were driving down the road, out of the blue Noah said I see Comcast. I look out the window and sure enough there was the Comcast office. He always talks about Comcast. I think it has to do with commercials and the on demand. Today he said go on demand when I got out of the car and he waiting with my mom while I ran in. I was carrying the cable box. He is so silly.

Today has been a good and relaxing day.

In my Pantry...

I decided to clean out the pantry today. There was so much stuff in there. It seemed like if one more thing was put in there everything would fall out! I did half of it. There was all kinds of food that I didn't even remember having. I sorted through it all. I threw away all the expired boxes of food. I found some Jell-o that was really old. Jell-o is small so it can get hidden away at the bottom of the basket. I also found 4 yes FOUR boxes of Swiss Miss. They were all open but only missing a couple each. I threw two of the boxes away because they had since expired. I did learn that Swiss Miss has really small expiration dates on them. You have to squint to see it even. It's Summer so I don't see me drinking much Hot Chocolate. I did realize I have a bunch of snacks too. I put them all in a basket. I love sweet stuff and Candy. I had to keep saying to my adorable little helper to stop trying to get in the cookies. Meh I only had to say that a few times. He was very curious about what was in there as was I. I was excited to see that I have 7 tubs of frosting in there as well. I should probably clean out my linen closet and check out if any of my many skincare products have expired as well.

I love cupcakes and cakes and cookies oh and brownies. I really wanna try the Fairytale brownies that everyone is always talking/blogging about. Other than that we have been just hanging out at home. I have been watching Harry Potter all day it seems like. My son seems to be interested in what is going on. I needed a break from Caillou, Thomas, Zooboomafoo, Barney and Blue's Clues. Those are shows that are always on at my house. Yesterday I bought a Panini maker from Macy's for 20 dollars so we are having Cuban Sandwiches for dinner. I love them. I love my kitchen gadgets and goodies.

I love to cook and bake so naturally I would spend lots and lots of time in the kitchen. I have always loved to cook and bake. As soon as I was old enough I was helping my mom and grandma in the kitchen. When I was in Third grade I was making bread from SCRATCH (mixing,kneading the whole shabang) all by my self. I used to make bread on snow days. One Christmas I really wanted an Easy Bake Oven but instead of getting one I got a big box of Jiffy mixes from Santa and was using the real oven. You know what is weird? I love to cook but I have never really had an apron. My grandma always had aprons for me to wear but I never had one. I hope everyone is having a great Saturday.