Frugal Friday: Fabrics

I love sewing, but with fabrics frequently costing $6-12/yard, making clothing (or anything else) can easily cost more than just buying it ready made. Of course handmade items can have a more perfect fit, and there are some things that cannot be purchased (be they clothing or custom curtains or quilts), but all in all buying fabric can break the bank.
Of course it depends what you plan to do with the fabric--if you need something very specific, or in a hurry, then you may be at the mercy of the market...but if you have a little time to spare, or can be flexible, then here are a few ideas for acquiring fabric on a more budget-friendly basis:

• Get on mailing lists for fabric stores to get coupons--For example JoAnn's Fabrics has a mailer every month or so, and each one shows the current sale items AND also includes a 40% off coupon that can be used on any one item--including one cut of fabric of any length.
• Look for sale items. I know this is obvious, but it's worth repeating. ☺ Some stores have bargain racks or $2 fabric tables. (Walmart is famous for having cheap fabrics but even when I used to shop there I found that of them were low quality...)
  
• Look for discontinued fabrics--they are often on sale (but you won't be able to get more later, so get plenty!)
  
• Check out the remnant shelves at fabric shops--they usually take any pieces under 1 yard and put them in the remnant bin for as much as half off. Sometimes the pieces are larger but have a flaw. If you are going to be cutting smallish pieces anyway (such as a quilt, or small clothing), then you can use small cuts of fabric. I have often been able to find multiple remnants of the same fabric--for example yellow flannel, or red fleece--and then I can make something larger by buying three remnants of the same fabric. Alternately, you can buy part of your fabric as a remnant and only have to pay full price for part of your yardage.
• Be friends with other people who sew--or who plan to sew but never do. I've acquired quite a bit of fabric from people who "bought this but never got around to using it..."
  
• Visit thrift stores or yard sales and look for old sheets or curtains or tablecloths. These are large pieces of fabric, and often come in pretty prints. Sheets can make good linings, petticoats, or aprons. They are also good for mock-ups (which is when you make a practice run of the pattern in order to make sure that the alterations fit correctly--I have a funny story about this which I'll share at the end of this post!) Curtains and tablecloths can make good curtains (shockingly!), or capes, skirts, jackets...anything that calls for a heavier weight fabric.
• If you have the time, and need a lot of fabric, there are many online fabric co-ops (I mostly frequent the ones that cater to diaper-making fabrics, but there are others--search in yahoo groups). They make bulk orders and are able to get the fabric at wholesale prices rather than retail. There is often a wait of 2+ months between ordering and getting your fabric, and there are often cutting fees, so if you just getting a few yards then it probably won't save you any money. But if you buy in bulk (more than 5 yards of something) then this can save you a lot.
• Recycle/upcycle things that you have already (or find them secondhand). Old jeans make great quilts, as many people know. Old corduroy pants make great quilts too (and they are a lot softer than jeans!). Skirts on the longer/fuller side have a lot of fabric. Old formal gowns have a lot of fabric (and are great for making kid's costumes!) Any type of clothing in larger sizes has (wait for it...) a lot of fabric!
• Do you have any other suggestions?
  

Just a note--When using secondhand fabric, be sure to inspect it before using it. Sometimes the fabric itself is very old and wearing out--if the fabric is going, then anything you make with it will be short lived. Thinner fabrics are notorious for this, but thicker fabrics can split and fray if they have been washed/worn enough times. So always inspect a fabric for signs of wear!



OK, so the funny story...
When I was engaged, I looked around for a while and finally concluded that I would make my own wedding dress because nobody had anything I really liked, or that flattered my figure. I hunted for patterns and ended up finding three different ones that I planned to combine and alter to create the dress I wanted. Because I was doing a "frankenpattern" I needed to do a mock-up to make sure that I had my alterations right before I cut into the expensive dress fabric. So I got a couple of sheets from the thrift store. I had been through two mock-ups on the bodice and had gotten it all right, and I excitedly showed my fiance what I had created...the sheet I'd used happened to be white though, and when he saw it he said "um, honey, I know we're on a budget, but maybe you should just buy a dress?" He thought I was making my actual wedding dress out of a secondhand sheet! ☺ Nope, I explained mock-ups and then made the dress of velvet and satin.

Going Without Gluten

I have recently begun seeing a doctor for some issues I've been having. I suspected hormonal imbalances, but he tested several other things to make sure we didn't miss anything (thyroid, adrenal function, neurotransmitters, vitamin D levels, the list was not short). One thing that came up--something we had not anticipated--is that I have a mild intolerance for gluten. (A test result of 13-14 is "borderline intolerance" and 15+ is intolerance, with 30+ being severe intolerance. My result was 16.) I got these results the day before we left on our trip, so I haven't been able to do much about them yet. My doctor recommends going completely gluten-free immediately. The information pages he gave me suggest that if I stick to a strict gluten-free diet for 3-4 months, then after that (because I have a milder intolerance) I can have something with gluten once every week or so.
I am thoroughly overwhelmed.
Going gluten-free would require some MAJOR changes in how I cook (starting with no more homemade whole wheat bread...) and honestly I am feeling very lost in how to start. I know there are lots of GF families out there, and I'm hoping that perhaps you can help me in three ways:

1. Can you recommend specific websites and/or books that will be helpful for me in understanding better what gluten-intolerance is, how it works, and for goodness sake which foods have gluten and which don't (for example oatmeal--I'm finding conflicting information on whether it's ok or not).
2. Can you recommend specific websites/cookbooks where I can get good GF recipes?!
3. Are there ways to prepare gluten-containing foods so that the gluten is already broken down and therefore not a problem? For example, if I sprout my wheat before grinding it into flour, then can I eat it? What about soaking? This is actually something I'm very hopeful about, especially since my intolerance is on the very mild end of the spectrum. I would vastly prefer to find a way I can just cook for my whole family, rather than having to cook separately for myself...and trust me this family is not giving up carbs.
   

I really appreciate any help you can offer. ☺

Tender Mercies and Little Joys

This morning's post was pretty dismal, I know. I was definitely in a depressed state both yesterday and this morning when I wrote it. However a good shower, a comfortable night's sleep, and just writing out all my story has been cathartic and I'm feeling better now. Not 100%, but better.
Our trip did have good parts, and that's what this post is about.
Tender Mercies

• The new transmission for the van was under warranty--no monetary cost to us. They also fixed the back seat which has been stuck (it's supposed to be easily removable but we haven't been able to get it to pop loose in the last year or so).
• When the van went kapoot (or, rather, when the transmission went kapoot) we were 1--in a decent sized city (Alaska only has a couple of those, and it's literally hundreds of miles between them) 2--that city had a Kia dealership (Our hometown does not, so if it had died at home we would have been worse off...)
  
• All the kids are pretty good travelers
• The audiobook "The Lightning Thief: Percy Jackson and the Olympians" (thank you public library!) which got us through many hours in the car...and led to some amusing discussions of Greek Mythology as well.
• Bear's bright orange pants (his favorites) which made it very easy to find him even on a crowded playground.

Little Joys

• Seeing Bear's grins when we said that yes he could go on "the horses" (carousel) and when he picked out "the stripy horse" (zebra) and as he came around and around on his first carousel ride. (Daddy went next to him, because Mommy gets nauseous on merry-go-rounds.)
• The fact that every time the carousel came around, Wolf was in a different position on the horse...

• Wolf's getting up before anyone else and go out to chop wood...because he was so excited about being allowed to do the work. (OK, I think maybe we can get a wood stove now ☺)
• Watching Bear run around everywhere barefoot--yes, including outside in campgrounds, over gravel, etc. He just likes being barefoot apparently. He took off his shoes at every opportunity.
• Watching as Wolf grows into a great babysitter
  
• I came home to four packages--three etsy trades plus a box from my secret sister.
• A beautiful sunset over the ocean (at 11:15pm) and Mt Illiamna on the way home

Our Trip

I will just warn now that this is long...read on at your own risk.

In 2008 we made the lengthy drive down the AlCan (Alaska-Canada Highway) by way of a few national parks (both Canadian and US) to visit family in the lower 48. We were gone for 6 weeks and spent a small fortune.
In 2009 we used airmiles to fly to Utah and stayed with family for 9 weeks, but took a couple of shorter camping/canoeing trips, and spent a small fortune on those things plus fixing up our house down there.
This year we decided that--in spite of two grandmas who really want to meet our newest family member--we should choose the modest option and just take a short in-state trip. With our job (or lack thereof) in mind, we really wanted to keep costs down, but still wanted to have a good trip (we needed to get our minds off things). We thought we could take the budget route on most things (short trip, camping, lots of PB&J for lunches) and thereby make a couple of splurges (such as the bus in Denali). In spite of living in Alaska for 3 years, we had not yet seen the interior of the state, so we sat down with maps and destination wish lists and planned a 12 day road trip.

Things we had planned:

• 12 days
• Visit Denali National Park
• (in Denali) Hubby and Wolf take the spendy all-day bus into the interior of the park (with the good views of the mountain)
• (in Denali) The little ones and I go see the sled doggies (they do winter patrols via dogsled, and in the summer you can see/meet/play with the dogs)
• Visit Dawson City (center of the Alaskan gold rush)
  
• Spend a day or so seeing what there is to see in Fairbanks
• Visit North Pole (which, incidentally, is south of Fairbanks...)
  
• Drive north of Fairbanks and cross the Arctic Circle
• See the midnight sun
  
• In Coldfoot (the city north of the circle) visit the visitor's center for Gates of the Arctic National Park (the park itself is a massive wild place, accessible by plane or for backcountry hiking/cross-country skiing, but not a great place to go with kids)
  

As we prepared for our trip, I remembered that Dawson City is in Canada. We have our passports and the kids' birth certificates, so the border crossing isn't a problem...except that I knew we would have our dog with us, and to take a dog across the border one has to have a health certificate for the dog (they are only good for 60 days and cost $60!). We decided that for one day across the border, the paperwork wasn't worth it, (deep breath) and concluded that we would add Dawson to the itinerary some other year when we drive the AlCan again.
OK, so now our trip was at 10 days, no Dawson City...but we still had a lot of exciting things planned.
We had planned to leave in the middle of the month, but for assorted reasons decided to move the trip up a bit, so it ended up being the last minute when we got online to make our camping/bus reservations in Denali. The website was down, and the phones were busy, so we wrote down the number and figured to call from the road. Therefore we were a day into our trip (one day out from our intended arrival at Denali) when we learned that the bus we intended to take would not be running for another week. OK, deep breath, we can handle this. We just flipped our itinerary around backwards and moved Denali to the end of our trip rather than the beginning. Reservations made, and we took the other road and headed out of Anchorage the other direction. So far so good.

The first couple of days were fine. The afternoon that we'd planned to camp near Fairbanks though turned out to be very rainy. We decided to stay that one night in a hotel, and (since we wouldn't have to strike camp) we'd head out early to go for the Circle. So much for budget...but it's just one night, and we all got showers... deep breath ok, it's ok.
In the morning we headed out (not nearly as early as we'd wanted too) and started north on the Dalton Highway.There are about 200 miles between Fairbanks and Coldfoot, and about 60 of it is dirt road. There are roadsigns and guidebook notations recommending carrying two spare tires, extra gasoline, etc because there is literally nothing out there. (The road continues past Coldfoot for another few hundred miles of dirt all the way to Prudoe Bay, but we had no desire to go that far.) We figured that with a full take of gas and our standard one spare tire we'd be ok because we were not driving the whole road, just the first little bit up to Coldfoot. Imagine then our concern when we stopped at an overlook for lunch (about 150 miles in, most of the way through the dirt part) and then as we pulled out the van made a funny noise. At first I wondered if a pebble had gotten thrown up into something under the car because sometimes it would clank and then sometimes it wouldn't, however it was a loud noise and as I slowly drove across the pullout (with Hubby outside looking at the car to see if he could see/hear anything more) we both had the feeling that we were not going to cross the Arctic Circle on this trip.
deep breath
We turned around and went back to Fairbanks; a whole day in the car, and we ended up right where we started, without having really seen anything. On the way back the "check engine" light came on, we checked under the hood (topped off the oil) and determined to take the van in to be looked at in Fairbanks. We guessed it was probably no big deal, but better safe than sorry, right?
Strike the Arctic Circle and Coldfoot and the Gates of the Arctic Visitor's Center. Sad, frustrating, disappointing, but at least we still had Denali to look forward to.
We found a campsite right in Fairbanks. The campsites were decent, there were flush toilets and free showers. The jets from the airport flew over us periodically, and the fighters (and who knows what all else) from the air force base flew over us often. The boys loved looking up at the planes and trying to identify them. I wished they were not quite so loud...but hey, it was entertainment, and it was looking like we'd be in town for a few days.
The next morning we took the van into a shop. They plugged it in and the computer told them that it was a transmission problem (our van is 4 years old with only 37,000 miles on it, so this was shocking). They didn't do transmissions though, so they sent us to a place that did. We went to that place and they noted the make of our car and said "you know there's a kia dealership in town?" We didn't know. It was a new dealership, and we'd never been to Fairbanks anyway, but our van is under warranty so we went over there. They told us that we needed a whole new transmission. (I guess they're faulty on this model?!) It was going to take two days to get the transmission in, and then another full day (12 hours of work) to install the thing.
So one day in Fairbanks became four. deep breath Wow, this trip just isn't what we planned at all. No Dawson. No Circle. But we still had Denali. And in the meantime, I was able to meet a couple of online friends who live in Fairbanks, and one invited me to come to her house to do our laundry so I didn't have to spend an afternoon in a laundromat. We visited LARS (University of Alaska Fairbanks' Large Animal Research Station) with musk oxen and caribou. We visited North Pole and the Santa Claus house, and saw the reindeer there. We spent a day at Pioneer Park playing on playgrounds, eating greek food, playing putt-putt golf, and sending Bear on his first carousel ride. We went to the local fudge shop and tried cranberry and blueberry fudge (YUM). The transmission was supposed to arrive on day 3 (with installation planned for day 4) but on the morning of day 3 as we tried to pull out of the campground the van didn't want to drop into gear, so we emptied out everything, left it all in the campsite, and drove straight to the dealership. We'd hoped they would give us a rental vehicle, but they didn't have any, so we had to find our own (though they did take us over to get it). More money. deep breath They said it was helpful to have the van a day early though because they could get everything dismantled that day, and it would be ready to start installing the transmission first thing on day 4. We hoped that might mean we would be able to leave town midday on day 4--and get right on down to Denali.
As you may have noticed, we fixated on Denali as a great equalizer. We'd had so many hopes dashed on this trip, but Denali was one of the things we'd been most excited about, and we still had our reservations, and we were still going to make it there. The van wasn't finished until 5pm on that 4th day, but we were so ready to leave Fairbanks that we packed up and left town anyway. Fortunately Denali's campground check-in is open until 11pm (it's still as light as 5 at that time) and we rolled in at 10:54. No joke. We checked in and set up camp and finally tucked in around midnight.
In the morning, we awoke to rain. Lots of rain. Not a downpour exactly, but enough to get ya pretty wet if you went out for more than a few minutes, enough to have the tent very wet, enough to chill us...and enough that the clouds were thick and low and we couldn't see the mountain at all. We checked weather reports and they indicated that the clouds and rain were to be expected for the entire coming week. Unfortunately we were at less than 24 hours from the bus departure time, so no refunds. We talked it over and decided to give up and leave. We didn't want to spend three days camping in the rain if we weren't even going to be able to see the mountain that we had come to see. So I inquired about getting a refund for our other nights of camping...check in/out time was 11am, since it was already 12:30, sorry, I was too late, we couldn't get a refund for that night. We also could not get a refund for the next night because of their 24hour notice policy. We spent one night there but between all the un-refunded things we paid more than that hotel in Fairbanks had cost, and we got rained on. We didn't even stick around an extra hour to see the sled dogs because it was a 10 hour drive home.
deep breath

I've had disappointments before, but this trip really does beat all. I don't think I've ever been so glad to get home from a trip, or wished so much that we'd just never gone at all.
I understand why Denali has their stringent refund policy--Alaskan weather is finicky and they would lose a lot of money if they gave refunds easily. In the future I will not make reservations in advance. I'll plan to arrive mid-week when they're not crowded, and I will watch the weather forecast and not even go if it doesn't look clear. The campground was actually pretty nice, I just was too worn out to be willing to camp there in the rain.

In spite of all the things we didn't do, there were memorable things that we did do, and some of them were good.
Things we actually did:

• Visit Denali National Park (but not see the mountain)
  
• Hubby and Wolf take the spendy all-day bus into the interior of the park
  
• The little ones and I go see the sled doggies
• Visit Dawson City (center of the Alaskan gold rush)
  
• Spend a day or so seeing what there is to see in Fairbanks
• Visit North Pole and the Santa Claus House and reindeer
  
• Drive north of Fairbanks (lotta good that did us) and cross the Arctic Circle
• See the midnight sun (In Fairbanks it didn't matter if I looked up at the tent ceiling at 8pm, 11pm, 2am, 5am, or 9am--it all looked about the same. This makes it very hard to get kids to sleep. It also gave me a remarkable (and sometimes frustrating) sense of timelessness.
  
• Visitor's center for Gates of the Arctic National Park
• Acquired two new national parks magnets for the fridge (Denali NP and Wrangell-St Elias NP)
• Eagle cut his first two teeth
• We met a French couple who camped next to us in Fairbanks--they had a tandem bicycle and had taken an entire year off work and were going to bike from the Arctic Circle all the say down the west coast to Chile and the Antarctic Circle. Whoa!!
• Bear's first carousel ride
• Wolf learned to split firewood and kindling and build/light a fire

By the way, it's sunny and gorgeous here at home.

Gentle Discipline: Laying It Out

Recently I discovered Baby Dust Diaries by way of her gentle discipline carnival (she found one of my posts, and left me a comment to let me know that she had linked me). She has lots of links there, numerous posts of her own, plus she does the GD carnivals monthly now.
I especially liked her post Getting it Wrong: What Gentle Discipline is Not, and I hope she doesn't mind but I wanted to share a short excerpt of my favorite part (it's really worth going over to read the whole thing, but this chart is awesome!)

Below is one of my favorite charts showing parenting styles. I like it because, unlike most quadrant-based charts on parenting styles this skews it on its side so you can see the continuum of effectiveness down the left side and because it shows the shaded blending of the styles. What she is describing is called permissive parenting typified by low levels of expectation and high levels of nurturing responsivness. As you can see in the chart, permissive parenting rates quite low on the effectiveness scale (only slightly higher than being completely disengaged). Authoritarian parenting, where punishment falls, actually has high levels of expectation in common with gentle (nurturing in the chart) parenting.

Gentle parents, like authoritarian parents, care a great deal about the behavior and discipline⁴ of their children. And, as you can see from the chart authoritarian parenting actually has a high level of effectiveness (as measured by child behavior) as it scales with the level of responsiveness/nurturing.

Gentle parents are no more permissive than Authoritarian parents are uninvolved. To assume so ignores the intention and creates an inflammatory divide. I don’t assume you beat your kids. Don’t assume I let mine run wild.

I admit to having been guilty of exactly that last sentiment--I was raised in a household that was more on the authoritarian side. We were extremely well-behaved kids by most folks' standards, and since the end result was good I assumed that the method must be good as well.
Then I met my Wolf.
Nothing I had been raised with worked with him. He was his own kid and frequently could not be convinced or even coerced into things he didn't want to do--not by anything or anyone. Punishment had little or no effect on his behavior. Attempts at force were usually ineffective. I had to learn something new, and gentle discipline is where I have ended up.
In my younger years when I saw a kid who was out of control, I thought "well if only his mom would set boundaries, or give him a good lecture, or a swat on his naughty little behind..." Over time (due to living with Wolf, reading many books, and talking with other parents) my perspective has shifted.
I am not by any means a perfect "gentle parent." I've used spankings and time outs, I've yelled and threatened and completely lost my temper. Over a year ago I wrote a post on spanking and said I planned to never do it again...um, strike. However I am trying. I think I am improving. For every time I fall down, I get up again--and in my opinion that's the real measure of a good parent (or a good person)--no matter how often they make mistakes, they keep trying again to be better next time. I continue to read and ponder and try to develop my sense of what I want my parenting to be like...and I continue to work on bringing myself closer to that idea.

May FOs & WIPs

Finished Objects & Works In Progress


For self/family

Finished:

♥ 1 diaper for eagle (I am really loving stripes right now, and I worked up a new soaker design that dries faster and I'm loving that too!)
♥ 1 diaper cover for Eagle (newly designed pattern--with gussets cuz my kids have skinny legs) (Thanks B for the cute fabric!!)
♥ 1 pair fleece pants for Bear (his favorite pants are fleece, and he loves them so much he even fishes them out of the dirty laundry basket so that he can wear them again...so I pulled out my fleece and let him pick a color and made him another pair of fleece pants. He picked neon orange--leftover from the hunting vest I made Hubby.)
♥ mending knees on 3 pairs of Wolf's pants

In Progress:
♥ second sleeve of Wolf's sweater (it's past the elbow...barely...)
♥ body of Wolf's sweater (I did do a few rows!)
<--- ♥ a pair of wool longies for Eagle
♥ a "vacation shirt" for Hubby ("Hawaiian shirt" style) with this sweet Alaskan fabric ---->




For shops/sale

Finished:
♥ 1 diaper cover
♥ 4 wetbags

In Progress:
♥ 2 cloth pad value packs
♥ 1 more diaper cover (for trade)
♥ 2 diapers (for trade)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I also have four (yes FOUR!) trades going on right now.

1) Giving diapers and wetbags ---> from SweethavenArts getting several pairs of knitted socks (she has a sock knitting machine, which may be about the coolest thing I've ever seen!)


2) Giving nursing pads ---> from SevenAcreWoods getting handmade soap and alpaca fiber (from an appaloosa alpaca named Houdini!)


3) Giving a diaper ---> from BananaBottoms getting this diaper (because in a houseful of boys, obviously, I need all things camo!) --------->


4) Giving diapers, covers, and wetbags --->from Silverstarflower getting earrings and silver hair barrette (my earrings are this style but in silver and with a green stone)









See what can happen when you turn off the computer one day a week? ☺

Monopoly with a Three-year-old

This week my husband brought home Alaskan Monopoly (he inherited it from someone at the school I think). Anyway, Wolf was very excited to play it, so tonight after dinner we set it up.
Bear was on my team, since three is pretty young to try to play on his own. After about our fourth turn he got tired of waiting for turns and started playing on his own.

First he traded out everyone's playing pieces.
Where's my piece?
What were you?
I was the car.
Oh, well, I think you're the hat now.
I thought [someone else] was the hat.
No, he used to be the hat, but now he's the battleship, gee, weren't you paying attention??

Then he started playing with the houses and hotels.
Wait, you can't have a house on Juneau, you don't own all the reds.
I didn't put a house on Juneau!
Oh, it was Bear, Bear, you can't just build houses on the board, you have to do them on the table.
[Bear grins and puts a hotel on the board]

And then there was the money.
Here mommy, you can have a pretty pink money.
Oh, thanks honey, where did you get that?
From Daddy.
Oh, well then give this other pink money to daddy, ok?
--and--
Hey, I thought I was broke, I just mortgaged three properties to pay you, how did I get a $500 in my money?
You must not have noticed it
Um, I'm pretty sure I checked...
[Bear grins innocently]

Lost in translation...

My boys have this little plastic knight's helmet. They've had it since, well, Wolf had it before I met him, so for a very long time. It is much-loved and often-worn.

The other day I just happened to notice there was some raised writing inside of it:

"CAUTION
THE SIMULATED PROTECTIVE DEVICE WAS NOT SAFETY DEVICE AND OFFERED NO PROTECTION"

"MADE IN CHINA"
[of course]

Telling vs Tattling

The thoughts in this post stem from the ideas in Barbara Coloroso's book "Kids are Worth it: Giving Your Child the Gift of Inner Discipline."

If your kids are old enough to talk, you have probably heard it: "Mooooooom, Johnny is ______"...and then you are supposed to figure out what to do next. Is Freddy's telling of the situation accurate? Should you intervene? Would your intervention be helpful? Is it too late? Did Freddy need to tell you or is he just mad at Johnny? Does Johnny need to be disciplined? Does Freddy need to be disciplined?! It can be complicated.

In the book, Barbara Coloroso suggests this litmus test for determining whether something is "telling" (good) or "tattling" (bad).

Tattling will get the other child into trouble
~
Telling will get the other child (or both children) out of trouble.

So if Johnny stuck his tongue out at Freddy, Freddy is tattling because he's trying to get Johnny into trouble.
If Johnny is stuck on the bathroom counter and can't figure out how to get down (don't laugh, it happens!) then Freddy is telling, and it's a good thing he is because otherwise Johnny might never make it down! ☺

Now I'm not saying that it's ok for Johnny to hit Freddy, and if Freddy was hurt then of course mom should step in and address some things with Johnny. But if there was no bodily harm, then consider letting it slide. No harm no foul...and maybe next time Freddy won't tattle about stuff that doesn't matter.
Ms Coloroso proposes the idea that parents only get involved in what they themselves actually see or hear happen. With the exception of blood or other serious damage, if you weren't there, then let it lie. If you're an attentive parent then you will see/hear a lot of things, and there will be opportunities to teach your children what they need to know. It's a much calmer (and more accomplishable) goal than intervening in every little thing.
I personally stand somewhere in the middle. I don't necessarily wait for serious damage, because I think that certain careless or aggressive behaviors, even if they didn't cause a big problem this time, they might do so next time. So if there was no serious damage but there was potential for it, then I try to intervene with teaching (though not generally with punishment).

I will say that in a household where tattling doesn't accomplish much, it doesn't happen very often. We get reports of legitimate problems, and a smattering of reports which I answer with "sounds like you guys need to work something out, do you want help?" Of course there is telling, but not very much tattling.

WFMW: Sweet Treats

I suspect that most of us get sweets cravings from time to time. Maybe all the time. My regular readers know that I believe in healthy eating, but that I also believe in moderation, and that I have no objection to whipping up a batch of brownies for no particular reason...but I do object to doing it every day. Unfortunately, I get those sweets cravings almost every day, and when I try to just ignore them they get more intense (isn't that how it always goes when you're trying to quit something?!) So I've found a solution: satisfy the sweet tooth with something that's just a little sweet, but that's more or less good for me.
So, when I have a hankering for brownies, or ice cream, I am usually able to satisfy it with one of these things:

• A bowl of box cereal (we don't have the super sweet ones, but something like "Honey Bunches of Oats" is sweet enough)
• Applesauce
• Yogurt (mine is usually homemade)
  
• Yogurt with berries/fruit in it
• Fruit--fresh or canned (hey, I live in Alaska, fresh fruit is in season for about 2 weeks up here!)
  
• A smoothie
• A homemade muffin (especially if it has berries in it)
• A piece of toast with butter and/or jam
• A cup of hot cocoa--especially with coconut oil or cream in it
• Fruit juice (this usually doesn't work as well, because there's no chewing so it just isn't very satisfying...but in a pinch it's more satisfying than nothing)
  
• any other suggestions? (comment please!)
  

Just as an observation--my mother and I have both observed that a lot of times when we think we're craving sweets, sugar alone does not actually satisfy the craving. Interestingly, what does satisfy the craving is fat--saturated fat (cream, butter, etc). We think it's because of two things 1--those fats usually come together with sugar (brownies, ice cream, cookies...) but sugar is the more recognizable 'taste' for our brains. 2--In our culture's fear of saturated fat, we end up consuming too much unsaturated fat and our bodies are imbalanced (you need a little of each kind of fat because your body uses different types for different things). Due to that imbalance, our bodies give us cravings to get us to consume things that we need.
SO, you'll notice that most of my sweet alternatives also have a little fat in them--and I think that's important. ☺


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