Grocery Shopping

Alright, at the risk of potentially boring you to death, I'm going to talk about my grocery shopping trips this past week.  I think its interesting to peek into other people's carts and see what they are buying, and I always think Tammy's posts about her Costco trips are fun to read, so here goes...

Costco is about 25 minutes away from my house, so I go once a month and stock up.  Meijer is right around the corner from my house, and I usually run there once a week.  I'd say most of my shopping is done at Costco, but there are several things that we only buy at Meijer.  In general, I try to buy organic when possible and Meijer has a great organic Meijer brand as well as organic produce that we like.  This week I made a Meijer trip yesterday, Costco today, and even stopped at the health food store on the way home for a few things.  Phew.  Keep in mind that all of this shopping was done with three little girls in tow, so I may or may not have made completely healthy choices.

Meijer -
organic Meijer brand: whole milk, sour cream, spaghetti sauce, orange juice, and ketchup;
organic: apples, bananas, potatoes, and onions;
regular: parsnips and a sweet potato (for roasted root veggies)

this is just some of our purchase, waiting to go into the pantry and fridge

Costco -
whole wheat bagels (not completely whole wheat but better than what Meijer carries.  I'm still intending to make my own again sometime, but for now we need something different to eat for breakfasts),
turkey jerky (bad purchase, not flavorful at all),
coffee (for hubby to take to work),
sausages (not free range, but no nitrates, so that's good),
organic frozen green beans,
organic fresh spinach,
pretzel crisps (wish they were whole wheat, but the ingredients are minimal),
fresh raspberries and strawberries (not organic, oh well),
turkey lunchmeat (no nitrates, yay),
cheesecake (yeah, caved on that one, figured we'd save it for a special dinner),
pineapple,
bananas,
oranges,
organic butter - 3 double packs,
organic wheat bread - 8 loaves (great price, we freeze this and use it up all month long),
Kashi granola cereal,
wild rice,
rice mix of brown and red rice (this was out for tasting and Lucy loved it),
organic chicken breast 3 pack,
organic eggs - 2 24 packs,
Hanna Anderson leggings (we've purchased a few HA brand clothes here, love them!),
organic Annie's mac and cheese (not whole wheat, ugh),
organic cream,
avocados,
6 pack of scotch tape (the girls are always taping up some picture or another),
mild cheddar cheese blocks - 2,
maple syrup,
fruit crisps (not organic, but a great snack, its just freeze dried fruit pouches)

Health Food Store -
organic dry beans - black, pinto, kideny, and garbanzo,
yogurt - Stonyfield whole vanilla (Yum!!),
organic cream cheese (the flavored cream cheese at Meijer has all kinds of junk in it, so we buy this and mix it with jam),
hamburger buns (not whole wheat, but not too much junk in them either)

There you have it.  I do buy other things at Costco, but I was already stocked up on them (organic tortilla chips, organic sugar, organic brown rice, etc.)  As you can see, not everything we buy is organic.  Sometimes its just not available.  I could have made my own bagels, hamburger buns, and granola, but not this time.

Our pantry and refrigerator are full!  I will probably make a couple of quick trips to Meijer for produce or random items, but other than that I do not have to make a big trip out until next month.  The girls did great with all of the shopping.  I bring snacks along and the taste tests at Costco keep them happy too.  I got several comments today along the lines of "How did you get three such gorgeous girls?" and "Look at those beautiful little girls.", which was fun.  :)

Pop Up Cities

I recently saw these pop up cities linked to from a blog that I read.  Here are the versions we created:

I drew a castle on full size posterboard and Lucy colored it in.  We made it big enough to fit Playmobil people through the door.  When she was finished coloring I used a sharp razor-blade to cut around each piece so that we could stand it up.

Julia wanted a city complete with a store, museum, post office, house, and barn with a silo.

Our pieces didn't stand up well after a while, so the girls put wooden blocks behind each one.  These were super easy to make and kept them entertained for quite some time!

Eye Doctor

I almost missed the fact that my daughter was going blind in one eye.


Neither my husband or myself wear glasses, so going to the eye doctor was never something that crossed my mind.  Of course I take my kids to the dentist, but I didn't realize that they needed a regular checkup with an eye doctor too.


One day Lucy happened to mention to me that if she covered up one eye, it was blurry to see out of the other eye.  When she said that, I immediately had flashbacks to her struggling with the eye exam at the pediatrician's office several years ago.  We thought she just didn't want to do it, never realizing that she couldn't.  We had all chalked it up to a moody three year old at the time.


I made Lucy an appointment with an eye doctor and anxiously waited the two weeks until they could get us in.  I casually asked Lucy several days later how her eyesight was, thinking maybe it was a blurry eye related to a cold or allergies or something.  She confidently assured me, "No mom, it's always like that.". I knew our appointment was not going to go well.


When the day finally came, both Lucy and Julia had check-ups.  In the doctor's office I saw a sign noting that alll children should have a full eye exam at age three.  No one had ever told me that!  The eye doctor mentioned it as well, saying that even the school or pediatrician eye exams cannot catch everything and it's best to bring them in for an exam.


So... Julia did great.  Lucy did great... with her right eye.  With her left eye, I watched her fail each letter as the doctor made them continually bigger.  I think she was able to see the largest "E", but nothing else.  My heart sank.  It was hard to watch.


Lucy's doctor was very kind and explained in simple terms that basically her left eye needs a strong prescription, and always has.  Because that eye is blurry, her brain has been ignoring it.  We never noticed issues with Lucy's eyes.  She reads very well.  She notices things far away and sees details.  She did not have any tell tale signs.  Her doctor said that because so many brain connections are made at this young age, if we had waited just a few more years to bring her in, it would be harder or impossible to get her brain to use that eye.  She could have eventually been declared legally blind on one side.


Lucy has what is called amblyopia, or lazy eye.  Her eye does not stray, it looks completely normal - her brain just does not use that eye well because of it needing the prescription.  Glasses will correct the vision, and then we will need to patch her "good" eye, to encourage her brain to use the newly fixed eye.

Thankfully, her doctor is confident that Lucy is young enough and can regain full use of both eyes. We received a prescription for glasses and waited the two weeks for them to arrive.  (Pinky purple with flowers on the side, she's absolutely adorable in them!). After four weeks of wearing the glasses, we returned for an exam today.  


As her doctor expected, Lucy still cannot see well out of her left eye.  We have seen no noticeable difference and she continues to say that one side is blurry, seeing only the biggest "E" again.  The glasses have corrected her vision, but now we need to teach her brain to use that eye again.  She will be wearing a patch for three hours every day.  We go back in six weeks for a check-up.  

Today was rough wearing the patch.  She cried and I felt terrible.  Tonight I found some cute patches online that I ordered her along with tiny glasses for her doll and a fun rewards chart.  I'll keep you posted on how she does.

Please take your children for an eye check-up.  Even if they can see perfectly.  It's something we will routinely do now and I wish I had known earlier, so I'm sharing our story with you.

Busy Bees

We've been busy bees around here!  I promise I have several homeschool update posts half written, and will finish them up soon.  :)  We're enjoying Heart of Dakota this year and getting settled into our fall routine.  Speaking of HOD, have you noticed the blogroll page?  Over 50 bloggers have joined so far.  Have fun browsing the blogs, sharing ideas, and being inspired!

For now, here's a picture of a bee that we made.  The girls were learning about bees in science and I needed something else to keep the girls occupied in the afternoon, so we made these.  Our bee model helped us count how many legs and wings a bee has.  We also talked about their fuzzy legs picking up pollen.

Start with a toilet paper tube and draw a face on one side.  Use yellow and black markers to add stripes.  The legs are made from one pipe cleaner that I cut into thirds.  Each third = a pair of legs and pokes into the tube and back out again.  I used a pencil first to make holes for the pipe cleaners.  The wings are all one piece that I cut out and glued on last.  :)

Happy Homeschooling!