April Foodie Penpals

Last day of the month means an April Foodie Penpal post!

Miranda at Miranda’s Munchies had me for as her April Foodie Penpal. She managed to put together a great package while preparing to move from Alberta to Ontario! Hope the move went well!

This is what she sent me: Miranda’s Oatmeal Recipe (delish, by the way).

Ingredients provided:

  • Gold Top Organics Whole Brown Flax Seed (love flax seed)
  • Westpoint Naturals Large Oat Flakes
  • 2 packages of California Fruit and Nut Mix (Dried Bananas, coconut, raisins, pineapple, papaya etc
  • Organic MacaSure chocolate “Sinfully good for you” bar – 70% Cocoa by Sequel

Miranda’s Oatmeal Recipe:

1/4 cup Oats

2 tbsp ground flax

1/2 cup almond milk (my husbands new favourite)

Dried nuts

Dried fruit

Chocolate ( in pieces)

Almond butter (no necessary with dried nuts)

Directions: Combined the first 4 ingredients in a pot and cook for 10 minutes. Then serve with the toppings!

It was delicious – but I forgot to take a picture of the final product – whoops! I’ve always wanted to try over-night oats since I started blogging …. looks like you’ll be seeing another blog post about Oatmeal 🙂

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This month I had Sharana at Living the Sweet Life – check out her blog, especially if you love to bake! You can see also see what I sent her this month!

Are you interested in participating in Foodie Penpals – check out the details below for May!

The Lean Green Bean

More details:

-On the 5th of every month, you will receive your penpal pairing via email. It will be your responsibility to contact your penpal and get their mailing address and any other information you might need like allergies or dietary restrictions.
-You will have until the 15th of the month to put your box of goodies in the mail. On the last day of the month, you will post about the goodies you received from your penpal! 
-The boxes are to be filled with fun foodie things, local food items or even homemade treats! The spending limit is $15. The box must also include something written. This can be anything from a note explaining what’s in the box, to a fun recipe…use your imagination!
-You are responsible for figuring out the best way to ship your items depending on their size and how fragile they are. (Don’t forget about flat rate boxes!)
-Foodie Penpals is open to blog readers as well as bloggers. If you’re a reader and you get paired with a blogger, you are to write a short guest post for your penpal to post on their blog about what you received. If two readers are paired together, neither needs to worry about writing a post for that month. 
-Foodie Penplas is open to US & Canadian residents.  Please note, Canadian Residents will be paired with other Canadians only. We’ve determined things might get too slow and backed up if we’re trying to send foods through customs across the border from US to Canada and vice versa. 

If you’re interested in participating for May, please CLICK HERE to fill out the participation form and read the terms and conditions.

You must submit your information by May 4th as pairings will be emailed on May 5th!

*If you’re from somewhere besides the US, Canada or Europe and want to participate, send me an email and I’ll see if we get enough interest this month!

Motivation Monday #16

Motivation Monday 

#16

April 30th 2012 (Where did April go?)

What’s stopping YOU from being active now ?

Picture from Pinterest.

Bucket List for Kids

Today, while on Facebook, I came across my friend Colin’s post on Take Me Outside. Last year, Colin ran ACROSS Canada!  Yes, you read the right, he RAN ACROSS CANADA to raise awareness about getting children (students) outside to play in nature. Check out his awesome story at the Take Me Outside website.

What I came across today was an article from The Globe and Mail – called Bucket List for Kids! (I can’t take any credit for the title of this post). As I read through the list, I realized that:

  1. I don’t have a bucket list for myself!
  2. Should I start one for my daughter, who is 2 in June ?
  3. That I have done 90% of these 50 listed activities as a child and some as an adult!!!

What’s the harm in having a bucket list?

[A bucket list is “a list of things to do before you die. Comes from the term “kicked the bucket”.]

As I looked through this bucket list for children – I realized I had accomplished most of these things as a child. The bigger moment was when I realized that children are NOT experiencing these activities for themselves – TODAY.

Sad.

I chose to share 12 out of the 50 examples on  this bucket list:

 

The list

1. Climb a tree                                                       

2. Roll down a really big hill

3. Camp out in the wild

4. Run around in the rain

5. Eat an apple straight from a tree

6. Go sledging

7. Take a look inside a tree

8. Hunt for bugs

9. Discover what’s in a pond

10.Go on a nature walk at night

11. Cook on a campfire

12. Canoe down a river

How many of these activities did you do as a child? Or, as an adult?

Do you have a bucket list? Share some with us in the comments below.

Would you create a bucket list for your child? Or, WITH your child?

 

Olympics are upon us…

The Summer Olympic 2012 Games in London are upon us: July 27th – August 12th and Paralympic Games August 29th – Sept 9th 2012.

I was pretty excited to see that the Canadian Women’s Soccer team made it but sad to say the Men’s team did not. The women are in Group F with Japan (last year’s World Cup Champions), Sweden and South Africa.

Fun facts:

  • During the London 2012 Football competition, approximately 2,400 footballs (soccer balls) will be used.
  • The Canoe Sprint 200m race will make its Olympic debut at London 2012.
  • Around 700 water polo ball will be used during the competition.
  • Goal Ball: Athletes wear blackout masks on the playing court, which allows persons with varying degrees of vision to participate together.
  • Blind swimmers have to wear blackened goggles to ensure that competition is fair. Goggles are removed at the end of the race and checked by an official.

For all those mom’s out there, check out this video: Best Job

What’s your favourite Summer/Winter Olympic Sport to watch?