Zarbock Photography

I’ve decided to move my blog from blogger to a self hosted site thru godaddy.com. I’ve really liked blogger but I want more control, plus I like a challenge & learning how to set up & run my own site certainly is one! Right now I’m dealing with a small glitch involving my URL. I can’t quite get it to point where I want but I’m working on it. People who type in (or have their link buttons set to) www.bluemoonmama.com are still being directed to my old blogger site while those of you that just type in bluemoonmama.com are directed here. Supposedly it’s a simple fix but I haven’t mastered it quite yet. I will though!! I was thrilled at how easy it was for me to set up & install the wordpress platform to my site so that was a big confidence booster. Eventually I will get the hang of this. It can be frustrating but also fun. I’ll probably try out several different layout styles, backgrounds, etc before I land on one I love so bear with me. For me, my blog design is a creative act & I love playing around with it. I’ll be adding fun sidebar content & a header soon, as time & my babies permit. I often just snatch a few minutes at a time to work on my blog between baby feedings, diaper changes, and the general chaos that is my life as a mama.

Content is something I will also be working on over the next few months. I need to dig deeper, start talking about the things that matter to me, otherwise what’s the point? I realized I was becoming bored & dissatisfied with blogging and then it hit me that maybe that’s because I wasn’t putting much into it. I’d been comparing myself to all the artsy bloggers I admire who are constantly posting their projects & feeling bad because I didn’t have much to share in the form of art. I’m just beginning to experiment with art & creativity and I felt I had little to add to the blogging community by comparison. Then it hit me that I don’t have to follow any set path. Right now my time & focus is mainly on parenting & homemaking and that’s okay. There’s nothing wrong with just having a personal blog that’s PERSONAL, not devoted to one specific genre of blogging but that covers whatever I’m interested in that day, week, or month. Maybe I’ll add photos and art projects some days, maybe another will be a purely text article on parenting. Who know’s? I don’t have to try & pigeonhole myself into one narrow category. This is just my place to be ME! So, welcome to Meegan’s Place. Hope you enjoy your visit .

I’m featuring my first guest post today! This is from Sarah At Primrose Schools and seems very appropriate considering we are fast approaching Thanksgiving, a time when families often spend a lot of time in the kitchen.
*Safe Creativity in the Kitchen with Kids*

Getting creative in the kitchen is a great joy in life, made even more enjoyable when you can cook with family. Invite your littler helpers into all of the cooking activities so that they can feel included and have fun- safely. Boiling water and hot burners can be dangerous, but if you set some ground rules, spending quality time in the kitchen together can be a lot of fun.
The Recipe for Safety:
1 part adult supervision
2 parts helpful children
A Pinch of rules
A Dash of fun
Mix together and serve at least weekly so that everyone can enjoy their time in the kitchen.
It doesn’t matter what you’re cooking – let the kids help. There are plenty of ways to let them as long as you know what they are capable of.
If there are little kids around, hand them some pots and pans. Let them make some drum music for you as you go about cooking. The sound that they make will tell you exactly where they are so that you don’t have to worry and can go about your culinary creations.
The older kids can help with some of the basic preparation.
The easy stuff:
- Rolling dough
- Measuring flour, water, and oil
- Breaking eggs
- Counting slices of bread
- Topping off sprinkles
Once your child has mastered helping with some of the easier tasks, you can start to delegate some of the harder tasks for them so that they feel like they are helping even more. This will help you create a bond with your children and also help them learn how to cook.
The harder stuff:
- Mixing batter
- Filling muffin pans
- Pounding chicken
- Frosting cakes
The more your child helps, the more he or she will get a sense of accomplishment with the task. You just need to focus on the safety at all times. Keep handles on the burners facing inwards to avoid bumping. When you open the oven, make sure no hands get in the way of what’s going in or coming out. If you’re moving hot liquids around the kitchen, make sure everyone stays still while you transport the liquid.
Your children can become more responsible and more helpful when you introduce them to the kitchen at an early age. You can have them take over step by step of the recipe once they learn to read and by the time they have mastered all of the skills in the kitchen, you can hand the reigns over to them for them to create an entire recipe (with your supervision). This way you give them the ability to show off what they can do and they will appreciate the boost in self esteem.
There are plenty of cooking and baking supplies out in the market to make it easier for kids to participate in cooking. You might want to pick up a few smaller whisks and bowls so that they can use everything in a smaller scale so that it is easier to work on their motor skills before advancing to the full size version of something.
When the food is done, make sure your assistant gets first taste of everything. They should also help with the clean up so that they understand the full realm of responsibility. When it’s time to cook again, see if they have any suggestions on what to make.

Submitted by Sarah Morris on behalf of Primrose Schools- with preschools across the country, give your little on the benefits of a Primrose education.

For the past few weeks I’ve been rather quiet here at my blog because I’ve been caught up in “real” life. Nora is a VERY active toddler and at 4 months old Wyatt is also trying to get mobile, rolling about on the floor & trying to climb out of his bouncy seat. They take alot of supervision! .
Recently I’ve started letting Nora experiment with painting. We work on projects two or three times a week. She loves it!! And since I’m getting art supplies out for her I don’t have any excuse not to dabble in them myself. I’ve started work on a few little projects. It’s so much fun to dip my toes into the creative water. Up until now all art I’ve created has been digital. I’ve never had the nerve to play with paints before. We have a lot of bare walls in our new apartment & unfortunately limited finances leave me unable to splurge on buying the gorgeous art of all my bloggy friends, so maybe I can try my hand at making my own art. Here’s a little canvas I started working on; my first art project since high school 20+ years ago:

Besides taking care of babies & dabbling in art projects I’ve also been mulling over changes in design & content for my blog. Here at Blue Moon Mama I want to start broadening out a bit, posting more parenting & homemaking content along with my daily life/art attempts/ general ramblings. So hopefully over the next few months you’ll start seeing a few changes around here!

And to brighten your day, here’s Nora creating some wearable art for herself:

And her finished art project: