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By Mom Unplugged, September 23, 2009 9:45 am

Are you trying Turnoff Week this week? Don’t know what to do? It’s Wednesday, are you running out of ideas? Here’s a brainstorming-type list. See if you can find some inspiration here:

- Cook together - Bake fun goodies or make dinner. Try something exotic - kids are far more likely to eat “weird” food if they make it themselves. Have a Kids Cook Night!

- Be tourists - visit a local attraction that you have never visited before.

- Try a craft or an art project. For ideas, you can always search the old Unplugged Projects (the category is: “Unplugged Project” of course!). Be sure to check out readers’ links for ideas too.

- Flip a rock to see what’s under it. Photograph, draw, or write about your results.

- Go outside and play. If you live in a city and have no yard, then go to the park.

- Read a book out loud. By the way, you don’t have to read only simple picture books to toddlers. They love those, but a nice, appropriate chapter book read in bits can hold their attention (and yours) too.

- Put on some music and dance.

- Dejunk your house, or a room of your house. Eliminating and organizing stuff might not always be fun, but it leaves you with a lightness of spirit when you are done. Here’s a post with some ideas for what to do with your cast-offs: Sort, Junk, Donate.

- Volunteer with your child for a local charity. If you are unfamiliar with the organization it is best to call first to find out what they need and whether a child the age of yours would be welcome.

- Play some board games together, or have a formal family game night. My advice for preserving your sanity: try to pick a game that your children like, but that is not deadly boring for the adult participants. (ie. stay away from Candyland - that one sends me into an immediate coma.)

- Write a story together and illustrate it.

- Play with your pets, wash the dog, teach him dog tricks, put the cat away and get the bird out …

- Learn a new skill together: knitting, crocheting, French knitting (aka. corking, mushroom knitting, knitting knobby, knitting nancy, spool knitting), finger knitting, weaving, embroidery, needlepoint, wool felting. If you don’t have a French knitter, make one out of a tin can. If you don’t have a weaving loom, make one out of a picture frame!

- Take a walk around your neighborhood, or be adventurous and go on a real “nature hike!” Check out these sites for more outdoors/nature-related ideas: Backyard Nature, Green Hour

- Organize a family (or neighborhood) soccer game. Or basketball, or baseball, or tag, or “Mother May I…”

- When all else fails…bring out the Mommy I’m Bored Box.

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By Mom Unplugged, September 20, 2009 9:48 pm

We all had a lovely time flipping rocks this morning for the 3rd Annual International Rock Flipping Day! Honestly, I could not have imagined that rock flipping could be so interesting, but my children, my husband and I all had the best time wandering around flipping rocks (and putting them carefully back of course).

The children ran through our yard and the woods by our house searching for perfect rocks:

We learned that our rocks here are quite beautiful, very volcanic and full of holes:

This one actually showed a distinct lava flow pattern on it:

Under our rocks we discovered:

Mold:

A small mushroom that grew up in the shade of two tightly stacked rocks:

A baby centipede - a teeny tiny yellow thread with lots of legs. I apologize for the bad picture, but much of what we found was very small and hard to photograph:

Strange white beetles with legs and antennae, barely the size of a grain of rice:

The much expected “Rollie Pollies” or Pill Bugs, but these guys were whiter than we had ever seen before:

Ants, LOTS of ants and eggs. Much to our surprise we found that ants don’t just live underground, but actually use the holes in our volcanic rocks as homes and nurseries!

You can even see little dots inside the ant eggs in this photo, Each collection of eggs seemed to have a “nurse ant” to go with it:

A peanut that had been buried (and probably forgotten) by a squirrel - round thing in the middle of the photo:

A small cricket:

Mystery eggs? Not ant eggs and about the size of small beads. Any ideas?

A spider on a pretty rock. Can you see it?:

What did you find under rocks where you live? Email Susannah of Wanderin’ Weeta with a link to your post, or upload your photos to the Flickr International Rock Flipping Day Group.

I will post our feather Unplugged Project and the Linky tomorrow afternoon or evening.

Hope to see you then!

PS. Thank you Susannah for our Junior Rock Flipping Badge. The kids will be excited about this tomorrow morning!

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By Mom Unplugged, September 15, 2009 5:55 pm

Uh oh, I almost missed it and the dates are actually posted here on my very own blog. National Screen/TV Turnoff Week is now twice a year and the September Turnoff Week will be from September 20th -26th which is next week!

Have you ever wondered what would happen in your family if you eliminated (or reduced) TV? Mutiny? Peace? More reading? Less arguing? More arguing? Boredom? More playing outside?

Now’s your chance to find out. People all over the United States (and the world?) will be turning off TVs for one week. No real commitment is necessary. You don’t have to blow-up your TV, or even donate it to the local thrift store. Just turn it off for one week (unplug it from the wall if the kids know how to turn it on by themselves).

I know that many readers of this blog are already TV-free (or at least minimalist when it comes to “The Box”). How about trying to minimize other screens that week? My personal downfall is of course the computer. I will try to turn it off (as much as possible*) that week. [*See? Am I already waffling?]

I will TRY. That is what counts. Perfection is not required.

By the way, from my past experience with feedback from TV Turnoff Week, it is usually the husbands rather than the kids who put up the most fuss about eliminating the tube.

Something to think about.

PS. I am not sure about organizing a formal Turnoff Blog Challenge this time. Is there any interest?

Comments (10)

By Mom Unplugged, September 8, 2009 1:18 pm

As I am sure you all know, September 20th, 2009 is the 3rd Annual International Rock Flipping Day.

Oh, you didn’t know that? Well, on September 20th take your kids outside, choose a rock to flip, then:

1) Record what you find. “Any and all forms of documentation are welcome: still photos, video, sketches, prose, or poetry.”

2) Replace the rock as you found it; it’s someone’s home. But if there are critters underneath, move them to the side before you replace the rock and let them scurry back. You don’t want to squash anyone.

3) Post on your blog, or load your photos to the International Rock Flipping Day Flickr group.

4) Send a link to Susannah at Wanderin’ Weeta. Her e-mail address is in her profile.

5) Susannah will collect the links, e-mail participants the list, and post it for any and all to copy to their own blogs.

6) She also says: “Maybe we can Tweet it, too, this year. Use the hashtag #rockflip.” (NOTE FROM ME: This information is totally beyond my comprehension, but if you understand Tweeting, then give it a go that way and I will be impressed.)

(All instructions are from Wanderin’ Weeta’s blog - edited slightly by me)

I love this idea because it reminds me of something I did in very early elementary school (Kindergarten? 1st Grade?). We went out and measured a one foot by one foot square of dirt behind the school, and then we had to look closely and draw what we saw in that square. Obviously it made an impression since I remember that lesson VERY many years later!

So go ahead, take the badge, the link, and the instructions, and pass it on.

It’ll be fun and interesting, so please join in! We’ll be there! (…and September 20th is even my sister’s birthday…)

NOTE: More on the history of Rock Flipping Day at Wanderin’ Weeta’s.

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By Mom Unplugged, September 2, 2009 9:26 pm

Do you have thoughts to share on peace? If so, then unite with bloggers from all over the world on November 5th, 2009, for Mimi Lenox’s Blog Blast For Peace. After a long stretch of perfect attendance, I somehow managed to miss it last time around, but this time I hope to be more on the ball!

Head over to Mimi’s Blog Blast website to design your own Peace Globe and read about how to join in.