Now that the kids are finally returning to school, many moms are able to focus on themselves just a bit more. This could be the perfect time to lose those excess pounds and develop healthier habits. By planning ahead and incorporating exercise into ordinary activities, it is possible to control the fat without feeling deprived. Before you begin, use a free weight loss calculator to help determine some realistic weight loss goals to aim for, then make an effort to make some healthy changes to your daily schedule.

Tips for Finding Time for Exercise

Everyone knows that moms have plenty to do even when the kids are not at home so how is it possible to find time to eat right and exercise? The following suggestions may be helpful:

• Keep exercise equipment in an easily accessible place. This includes free weights and exercise bands. When performing any household chore that requires wait time, such as boiling spaghetti noodles, grab the gear and use those few minutes to work on building muscle because muscles burn fat more efficiently.

• When performing ordinary household tasks, such as carrying laundry in a basket or bringing in groceries from the car, perform lifts all along the way.

• Try to perform all chores at a higher rate of speed, whether this is folding laundry and putting it away, collecting the mail, or vacuuming the floor.

• When paying bills, keep an exercise band around the ankles and keep the legs moving. Do neck and shoulder rolls as well.

• Make visits with friends more productive by meeting to walk in the park, rather than communing over coffee and dessert.

• Do isometric hand exercises when sitting in the car line waiting for students to be released.

• Turn on the music and dance with the broom, dust cloth, or mop.

Tips for Dealing with Food

With the kids out of the house, many moms have trouble finding new routines and end up eating out of boredom. It may take awhile, but new habits can be formed in a short period of time. These tips work well for many women:

• Set up six specific times for eating each day. This allows for three full meals and three smaller snacks. Do not skip meals and do not eat at any other time.

• Prepare snacks of fruits and vegetables when preparing the kids’ lunches each day.

• Take the time to bake and broil rather than frying.

• Cook two servings at one time and make a plate for the next meal or freeze for later.

• Take a multi-vitamin each day to ensure that the body is getting what it needs to function well despite the limited caloric intake.

• Remove all unhealthy snacks from the house; this will also be great for the children who will be forced to eat better alternatives when they are hungry.

Losing weight is never easy, but this is usually because we are too impatient to wait for the results and limit our diet too severely to maintain it over the long haul. With just a few daily changes, it is possible to lose a pound a week without feeling like you’re missing out.

This is a guest post by Joanna Clark, who is committed to achieving her weight loss goals and uses the ideas outlined above to make healthy eating and exercise part of her daily routine. She found it helpful to use a target weight calculator to work out how much weight she can realistically hope to lose each week.

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My son had two ear infections in fifteen days. Too much pain, discomfort and sleepless nights. Poor Daniel!

Doctor said that for sure the ear infections are due to the constant use of the pool. It is the fourth year in a row that we have a swimming pool at home and this never happened, so, what is different this year? I really don’t know.

Since my daughter, one month ago, also had a ear infection can we be facing some sort of virus? Have you experienced something similar?

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My daughter has been complaining about tummy ache since Sunday night. It is not a constant pain and she only remembers it when she wants me to be near her or when she’s going to school. I have not paid much attention to it since there are no other symptoms but I’m getting tired of hearing “I have tummy ache”. I wish I had cheap medical scrubs to dress up and feel I could heal her with one touch.

Of course, if pain continues I have to take her to the doctor but I was notified of some tummy complaints at school, so probably it is just a virus that will soon be gone. She has minor complains at school and she has been doing her normal school day.

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The first weekend after school started is here. The kids are a little tired, new routine, new bedtime schedule well, school routine. Today everyone was vegetating on the sofa and only at the end of the day they went outside and play.

Although it is great to have silence around the house while they are at school, sometimes I really miss them even if they used to turn the house upside down.

My son sometimes call me on his cell phone just to say hi and I really enjoy hearing his voice and knowing that he is just fine. However I really don’t like that he uses the cell phone. I know it is a mean of communication, that we are able to keep in contact but we hear so many things about radiation and brain damage that I don’t know if it wise to let him use the cellphone. Last year he had headaches during a few weeks and we were worried it had something to do with the cell phone but the result was headaches due to school stress. I was so relieved but at the same time I was more aware of the cell phone possible interaction with the brain.

I recently heard about Phone Shield and how they are determined to protect us from radiation that comes from the use of computers and mobile phones. The concept of the PhoneShield and Wi-FiShield devices is very important in our daily life. The use of mobile phones and wi-fi connections has increased tremendously as well as the use of them by younger kids. Most seven years old kids already have a mobile phone and computer so they are very exposed to radiation and we have to do everything we can to protect them.

Even if kids don’t use the mobile phone they for sure use the computer, whether it is for gaming or for school works, therefore there is no way we can keep them away from the danger of radiation. The solution is prevention and I’m determined to do that with my kids.

Do you worry about mobile phone and computer’s radiation? Do you control the time your kids spend using those gadgets based on the radiation or based on study habits?

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This post is being written from the hospital waiting room. Yesterday my father was feverish and with breathing problems.

Just to remember who didn’t follow my posts for a long time, my father is 80 years old, he has Parkinson disease as well as Alzheimer’s. He is bed for almost three years, his muscles are gone has well as his mobility. We can barely understand what he says and he’s having dysphagia difficulty in swallowing food.

Yesterday I called the doctor and after taking a check to his lungs she told us (my mother and I) that he needed to go to the hospital because she suspected of pneumonia. He arrived at the ER at 9pm and he has just been transferred to the nursing room.

We still have no information on his condition and we are waiting to be able to get in to visit him.

What I see is that my father is very, very weak and I really don’t know how long he’s going to hold on to life

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photo credit: Blip

Lately I have been dealing with some ugly, disgusting and inconvenient bugs. I remember that when I was a small child my mother talked about them and even checked if I had them on me. What I am talking about are Lice.

My son never had them although I knew that from time to time some classroom mates had them, no for the second time in one month we are have an invasion of Lice brought by my daughter from school.

It has been awful. Itching is the worse part of it for the kids. For me just the idea of having Lice crawling, sucking my blood from my scalp gives me the creeps.

Lice are described as:

• human disease agents
• Most lice are scavengers, feeding on skin and other debris found on the host’s body, but some species feed on sebaceous secretions and blood.
• if feeding on blood, they may become considerably darker
• Many lice attach their eggs to their host’s hair with specialized saliva

Yeck!!! this is disgusting.

Well, as soon as one child appeared with lice in the classroom the school sent us a message to check on our kids heads. The problem is that we are often together (daughter, son, myself) hugging, playing so we also got those awful creatures.

Every time they show up we have to kill them with a special shampoo, change bedding everyday, change pyjamas every day (underwear we already change everyday ok!!), wash the combs with boiling water, etc. The washing machine works no-stop so you can imagine the electricity bill.

This week we started using a special Lice Spray that should keep the Lice away from our hair, let’s see if it works.

I know some people don’t talk about this problem because they think they will be discriminated because although it’s not true most people think that Lice appear due to lake of personal hygiene. Lice prefer cleaner and softer hair to put their eggs and grow up. Yeck!!.

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My father in law came home last Friday from a 3 week stay in a local Hospital.  He is one of those that think that doctors will kill him, surgeons will open his belly and cut what it’s not to cut (Gregory House M.D. style), well he is a difficult men.

The fear of doctors made him arrive at the hospital in serious conditions:

• severe Pneumonia
• high level of diabetes
• two stomach ulcers
• anemia
• cardiac arrhythmias
• high cholesterol values
• kidney infection

the doctors told him that he could have died if he didn’t arrive at the hospital that day.

He is now at home following a specific diet for his case, he is getting shots of insulin, he is doing a cholesterol treatment, antibiotics and he has to return next month to remove one stomach ulcer (the other was removed during the time he was in hospital).

He gave up smoking the moment he entered the hospital, he is forbidden of smoking or his lungs can fail, and he has to eat exactly what doctors tell him otherwise he can get worse again.

A annual check up wouldn’t do him any harm…but…he thinks he knows everything.

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My daughter will be six in March and still sucks her thumb. Sucking her thumb really calms her down and it’s really a comfort for her to be able to do so. She was a baby that never wanted a pacifier and she only started thumb sucking at the age of 2,5 years. I remember quite well that it was summer and she started being interested in the babies that were in the day care nursery. Some of them slept sucking their thumb and out of nowhere she started doing it also.

I know that I shouldn’t concern myself unless it continues after the age their permanent teeth begin to appear, around six years old. Experts say that the act of sucking implies some strength that can cause deformation of the teeth and in the future braces might be needed. My daughter sometimes just puts her thumb passively in her month and doesn’t do it aggressively, but I’m still concerned with the implication that might have in the future. For those who doesn’t know how your kid do it just closely monitor your kid and analyze her/his technique. If the child seems to be sucking vigorously, you may start thinking about curbing the habit earlier.

Punishing or nagging our child to stop won’t help, believe me, I’ve tried that several times. I thought about putting some stop nail bite on her thumb, I even tried that once, but is was too painful for her and me. She felt I was punishing her and I felt awful, especially since she indulges in the habit for comfort and security.

I’m going to follow some advice I found on the web and from some expert people I know. I’m going to try to find some alternatives to comfort her as a soft blanket or a teddy bear she loves. The key is to offer an alternative.

I’ve already spoken with a dentist and for now everything looks just fine with her teeth so he told me not to worry too much and that with time she will give up the habit.

What about you? Do you have any advice for me?

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Who said the acne only happens to teens? Well, I’m 40 years old and I still get acne on my chin. On one hand it makes me happy, I’m still a teenager… on the other end I think, when will this stop happening.

I consulted a dermatologist that told me that this is a hormonal problem, nothing serious of course but depending on my hormonal levels I get a few pimples on my chin. I never had acne on my forehead, it’s always the chin.

Treating adult acne is not different from teen acne, the difference is that due to our skin changes over the years most acne treatments don’t work. I’m glad this only happens to me from time to time, not all the time. Lucky me.

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Being at home with a medical leave is doing me so good. For 22 years I worked without stopping (only for the two pregnancies leaves) and I feel I am a housewife now. I like the quietness of the house while the kids are at school, I like having no bosses requesting coffee and sheets of paper, I like to manage my time the way I want.

Unfortunately, especially this week that I’m busy doing some stuff to my blogs, I forget to eat. The time goes by and I don’t know if it is the medication I’m taking, the depression itself, I barely eat.  Saturday, my SIL even asked me: Are you taking some sort of natural fat burner or what? This question made me think, being underweight, am loosing even more weight now that I’m at home with all that food available and no one to check on me?

I checked my scale and guess what, although I’m not eating well, I guess the fact that I don’t spend energy on my office job, makes me less needed of calories. This is what I think…  So, no fat lady at home, just plain and slim Laura enjoying being at home.

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My husband has been a very healthy men over the years. His analyses are always fine except from time to time high levels of uric acid (Gout) that are easily treated with some appropriated pills.

Every year he does a check up through the work medical company and advises are given for an healthy life. As he is a little overweighted he is always advised to be careful with cholesterol. Although he never had high values of cholesterol he has to prevent them of appearing. Nowadays there are available to the public the best cholesterol medications, but we should be careful and not let cholesterol take advantage of our body.

Regarding the uric acid my husband is already very careful and prevents to eat what he already knows that will harm him. I just want him to lose some weight to prevent cardiac arrests and other diseases related to overweight.

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My son has some mild acne especially on his nose. He is only (almost) 11 and I’m afraid to use acne creams on him specially because he has a very light skin and I read that acne products usually contain tretinoin. According to some researches I did online a tretinoin gel, that it’s excellent to treat acne can have severe side effects.

Quoting Wikipedia:

More sensitive patients may also experience redness, scaling, itching, and burning.

This product increases the risk of extreme sunburn; care should be taken (shade, sunscreen, etc.) to protect treated skin from overexposure to ultraviolet light.

I know that maybe I’m being overreacting but my sun has a very sensitive skin, he is in the risk group for sunburns (blond, blue eyes), he plays on the sun all time at home, at school, etc. so maybe I should look for some natural acne treatment with the same treatment rate but less or none side effects.

Any ideas?

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