For hiccups, that is.

At least at our house.

Want to know what it is? You probably have it in your pantry right now. (Unless someone in your household has an allergy. If so, please disregard this post.)

Peanut butter.

I tell the kids that their frequent bouts of hiccups as of late just mean that they’re growing. (Not true, but it’s what we’ve all heard, right? And it does make them seem a little less annoying and a tad more cool.)

As far as remedies go, we’ve tried it all.

Drinking water.
Drinking water upside down. (Wouldn’t recommend that one.)
A spoonful of sugar.
Scaring.
Holding our breath.

None of these worked. But for us, peanut butter does.

It’s not scientifically proven OR medically validated per se, but supposedly, eating peanut butter helps relax the sphincter muscle and calms the spasming diaphram.

(I’m not the only one who swears by this method.)

Now.

If I can get my kids to stop pretending they have a hiccups so that they can have a spoonful of peanut butter 30 minutes past bedtime.

Anybody got a cure for that? ;)

What to do on a stormy afternoon?

How about pull out some boxes from the closet upstairs….

Just a whiff of the vintage cardboard & vinyl took me back 20 years.

And then there’s the terrific 70s/80s photography on the back of the covers to bring me a smile….

…as well as the evidence of all the times I played “librarian” with these albums:

I’m thankful that most of my childhood LPs survived our many moves and the heat of storage all these years.

My favorites were the ones with the built-in storybooks….

…and it quickly became evident that these were G & R’s favorites, too, within the bunch.

G became instantly bonded to the whole “vinyl” experience. It brought me such joy to see him enjoying these stories and songs, the same ones I loved as a girl. I can see that I’m going to have to keep these out of hiding for a little bit longer!

You don’t have to have a heart-shaped muffin tin to make fun heart-shaped muffins or cupcakes for Valentine’s Day.

Simply line a tin with paper liners, then drop a marble in between the tin and liner. (Balls of aluminum foil will also work.)

Carefully fill the liners to a little over 1/2 full (overfilling will cover the heart shape effect). Bake, remove from pan, remove marbles, cool, and frost.

The kids and I spent the entire afternoon outdoors.  They were in exceptionally energetic and jubilant moods today, and so we had a LOT of fun.  When dinnertime drew nearer and the sun started to mellow, I came up with a quick, fun, impromptu game for sharpening alphabet letter recognition skills.

I simply drew large letters all over our driveway with sidewalk chalk (each was about 1 foot high, enough to allow room for four little feet on top).  I yelled out, “1, 2, 3, A!” and so on for various letters.  The kids had to run around madly searching for the letter I asked for.  They grinned from ear to ear and jumped in place when they reached the right spots.

As a wrap-up, the kids randomly jumped onto letters and yelled out (loudly!) the name of the letter they were on.  This got out some energy and satisfied their urge to use their “outside voices” to the fullest before we went inside to eat.

Can’t get much easier (and cheaper) than a piece of sidewalk chalk!

We’ve started to more formally implement chores at home — at least for G. I think turning 4 is a sign he’s ready to add on some more responsibility, and this is a great way to do that in a fun way. I give all credit to Make & Takes for this idea.

Simply write age-appropriate tasks on one end wide wooden craft sticks; let your child color the other tips their favorite color. Stick them into a jar, facing either direction you choose. Every morning, when G completes a task, we flip it over. When all of them are flipped, he is free to have free time of his choice (play computer games, go outside, etc.). Our list is:
- Take breakfast dishes to the sink.
- Make my bed.
- Tidy up my room.
- Get dressed.
- Brush my teeth.
- Hug someone!

The last one is a fun one. I love him watching him seek out and hug his sister, who’s usually looking at him in a funny way. I have hopes that one day soon he’ll hug her unprompted! (I occasionally hear him tell her, “I love you.” Nothing prepares you for that sweet sound.)

(Thanks, Make & Takes, for a very fun way to encourage helping out!)