Weekly Favorites 1/25

Hi everyone. 

Education
This week I've found these really cute letter and number heart puzzles to do with your preschoolers/kindergarteners. They are perfect for a Valentine's day theme so I'm planning to try them next month with Little Guy. As I linked to their activities many times earlier, Totshooling is a great site to find free educational printable activities for preschoolers and kindergarteners. If you find it useful, make sure to subscribe to their newsletter because there are more free printables for subscribers and I found most of them really good.

Finance

Now that I've sort of started to take control of my time (thanks in part to bullet journaling), I've started to work on our finance. Our financial situation has improved dramatically in the past couple of years, which is good, but it also made us lazy about our financial dicisions. So I've decided to make more conscious decisions with regards to our money. These two articles, How to Make a Spending Plan and Why I'm Tracking Every Single Purchase I Make in 2017 put me on track.

Yum!

Lastly, I have this yummy White Bean and Avocado Baked Burritos recipe for you. I've made this a couple of times before and it's always been a hit. This time, in addition to making brritos as per the recipe, I just baked the fillings to cut down on the amount of wheat I eat. I did cover the fillings by putting a tortilla over the fillings so it won't dry while baking but did not eat it together. It was delicious this way too.

If you liked these stories don't forget to follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Flipboard to get notified as soon as I share them. Have a wonderful day :)

Weekly Favorites 1/18

Here are some of my favorite reads this week:

Education

My son loved this worksheet! It's a great starting point to learn how to read a clock: Telling time preschool worksheets

When considering what skills my son (and the kids of his generation) would need to get a great career, one cannot ignore the fact that AI and robots will be taking over a lot of jobs by the time they grow up (probably even sooner). Even the skills currently in need or popular to study may not be so in the future. I love the conclusion, though, that we need real physical experiences to stay ahead of AI and robots in the article

The skills your kids should cultivate to be competitive in the age of automation 

Mind

I'm a very typical introvert. I do like my introverted nature most of the time but many other times I wish things were a little different. So it's nice to be reminded of positive aspects of being an introvert in The 12 Gifts Of Introversion 

Learning Spanish

My Spanish skills are not so great yet but hopefully soon I can learn more natural conversation from one of these shows: Top 5  Spanish TV shows that will let you learn  Spaish on your couch

Books

One of my goals last year was to squeeze in some reading time for enjoyment, even for a few minutes, everyday, because I felt like I hadn't done anything just for fun in a long while. Happily I was actually able to finish a few novels last year (which you can see in my read list on Goodreads or in the sidebar on my blog). The Perfume Collector is the most recent one I've finished reading and I loved it! It involves a woman who receied inheritance from a woman she didn't know. She went out to Paris to find out about her inheritance and this woman. Her story is beautifully intertwined with the story of this woman. It was actually not that difficult to guess who this woman was but you'd still want to know how and why. And the reference to perfume and scents was just fascinating for someone like me who used to own a collection of perfume.

If you liked these stories don't forget to follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Flipboard to get notified as soon as I share them. Have a wonderful day :)

Weekly Favorites 1/12

It's already been more than 10 days since the new year started. I've been busy working on my 100 things to do list and setting goals for this year. This year I've decided to give a go at Bullet Jounal. I'm going to write about it in a few weeks but in the meantime, here are my favorite reads for this past week:

Cats

A nice reminder for veteran cat parents, a concise useful infographic for new cat parents:

Keeping your cat happy indoors infographic 

Education
It's not particularly an eye-opening idea that lanugage and math are not the only areas where you can assess people's smartness but it's still a nice litte video to check out and think about what it means for someone to be "smart"

8 Intelligences: Are You a Jack of All Trades or a Master of One? 

‎

We haven't tried this activity yet but looks fun

Snow globe sight word free printable activity 

Mind

You know, we always hear a phrase "find ourselves" but this article states that it is not the right mindset. Rather you create yourself, which to me is an intriguing idea.  "If we attach ourselves to something, we are desiring for it to be stable, which directly goes against the forces of the universe." Hmmm
Neuroscience Learns What Buddhism Has Known for Ages: There Is No Constant Self 

I love this quote, as I myself am a bit of a worrisome person

"Worrying means you suffer twice" 

Music

Don't know if true but it'd certainly be nice if these brain functions translate to everyday activities

Science says piano players' brains are very different from everybody else's 

Books

I also have two great children's books we've recently read. The highest mountain of books in the world by Rocio Bonilla is a perfect book for those who want to pass on their love of books to their child. The title itself is appealing to book lovers, don't you think?

Hooray for Today! , a sequel to the fun book Hooray for Hat! by Brian Won, is a yet again fun book to read. The story might look simple with a lot of repetition but perhaps that's a good thing for small children.

Have a wonderful rest of the week!

If you liked these stories don't forget to follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Flipboard to get notified as soon as I share them

Mochi on a stack of blankets

I always know the warmest, the most comfortable spot in our house

Weekly Favorites 1/4

I hope you all had a wonderful winter holiday with friends and families.  Sadly some nasty colds caught us all and our holiday wasn´t as eventful and active as we had planned. But we instead had a goood rest and a warm family time sitting in front of the fire or watching a few movies together, so that wasn´t bad after all.

Here are my favorite reads these past weeks:

Education

As an introvert myself, I wish one of my teachers had thought of this when I was a student:
How to teach a young introvert

Some great tips for a teacher who's just come back to school: 
Teacher tips for the first day back from winter break

Home

I wish I came across this article before I had that birthday party

10 Little Things To Do Before Company Arrives

Have you ever thought it'd be awesome if things you created with Lego blocks actually moved? Now they're making that thought come true. And kids can learn how to code too. Sounds very fun.

Lego Boost teaches kids how to bring blocks to life with code 

Music

This article explains how a piano was invetned pretty well. I listened to the recording after reading the article, and I could easily imagine the people back then amazed at this new instrument, perhaps with a little skepticism. Beautiful sound.

What does the world oldest surviving piano sound like

Yum!

I've recently tried this Creamy Butternut Squash Linguine with Fried Sage, and really liked it. I thought the sage might get overpowering but actually it just adds a nice salty accent to the pasta. I'd add more next time. If you omit the red pepper flakes, it'll be very kid friendly. My son loved it too.

Miscellaneous

An inspiring article for these first days of a new year to set goals, decide how to approach your goals and work on it. I've started to make my 100 things to do list too. Hope it helps me reach my goals, as right now they are very messy and I need some structure to tackle it.
How To Invest In Yourself

I remember how sad I felt when I heard of the passing of Alan Rickman. Seems like he was indeed a good person. RIP

Kate Winslet Remembers Alan Rickman Using His Harry Potter Fortune for Good

And speaking of Harry Potter, here's a fun little article:

J.K. Rowling’s 12 Biggest ‘Harry Potter’ Revelations of 2016

I know Christmas is over but here are two fun articles about some unique (and maybe a bit strange) " Christmas traditions" in Japan:

Why Japan is Obsessed with Kentucky Fried Chicken on Christmas

Why the Japanese Eat Cake For Christmas

Have a wonderful rest of the week!

If you liked these stories don't forget to follow me on Facebook, Twitter and Flipboard to get notified as soon as I share them

Weekly Favorites 12/19

(Almost) everyday, I share stories I found and liked on the Internet via  Facebook, Twitter and Flipboard, the topics ranging from Cats to Bilingualism to Early Childhood Education to Music and more. Here are those stories in a more convenient weekly roundup form for you. Hope you'll find something that interests you. If you liked these stories don't forget to follow me via one (or more!) of the social media sites above to get notified as soon as I share them:

Cats

A cute photo of a kitten and kiwis 

Finance

What Dow 20,000 means for stock-market investors

Health
These Buddhist principles can help you stop ruining your diet at work—and chill out, too

Language

Learn a New Lingo While Doing Something Else

Weekly Favorites 12/12

(Almost) everyday, I share stories I found and liked on the Internet via  Facebook, Twitter and Flipboard, the topics ranging from Cats to Bilingualism to Early Childhood Education to Music and more. Here are those stories in a more convenient weekly roundup form for you. Hope you'll find something that interests you. If you liked these stories don't forget to follow me via one (or more!) of the social media sites above to get notified as soon as I share them:

Cats

Celebrating Christmas With Your Cat

Music
The world’s smallest grand piano actually sounds really sweet

Books

Here comes santa cat

Happy 4th birthday - Dora and Diego party

Little Guy turned 4 just the other day! Past years had a Sesame Street Party (2nd), a Thomas & Friends Party (3rd) and this year we decided to have a Dora and Diego party (they are his current favorites as written in this post). I found lots of inspirations on Pinterest, such as the "Swiper No Swiping" sign (to which I added Swiper's picture myself) and the favor bags that looked like Rescue Pack. I originally planned to make Backpack favor bags for the girls and Rescue Pack for the boys but unfortunately I couldn't find orange bags that were the right size. I used this template for the favor bags. Instead of printing in colored paper, though, I had Little Guy color the eyebrows and the mouth, adding a little personal touch from the birthday boy. The colors were not perfect but I liked it better. It turned out to be a really good idea to have him on board to prepare for the party. We had a lot of fun together and Little Guy seemed to have gotten more excited about his upcoming party. One thing I couldn't make it work was this idea where you draw eyes and a mouth on a cheese stick to make it look like the map. I couldn't find a pen that could write on a cheese stick wrapper. Too bad. It looked really cute on the picture on pinterest. And I used this recipe for the cupcakes, which were frosted with whipped cream with some orange and green sprinkles to match the theme.

The baby jaguar on the table was a present from us, like Diego's best friend :)

I prepared a few activities for the kids, suc as Dora & Diego masks, bubbles, origami paper, Dora & Diego coloring pages. One of these coloring pages, I rolled it and draw eyes and a mouth to make it looke like the map and put it in the favor bag. We also had some toy animals hidden in a room and gave the kids some toy telescopes (like the "spotting cope" that Diego has) to find the animals. But alas they didn't really play with these things, preferring to play with Little Guy's other toys they found in the play room. Oh well, as long as they had fun, that all matters. 

All in all we, both the kids and the parents, had a great time. Little Guy's so pround of being a big boy that he tells everybody he meets that he's four years old now. So cute. 

I compiled more ideas and inspirations for a Dora and/or Diego party on my "birthday party ideas" board on pinterest, some of which I didn't use for our party but still seem like a great idea. Please check it out if you're interested.

Weekly Favorites 11/27

(Almost) everyday, I share stories I found and liked on the Internet via  Facebook, Twitter and Flipboard, the topics ranging from Cats to Bilingualism to Early Childhood Education to Music and more. Here are those stories in a more convenient weekly roundup form for you. Hope you'll find something that interests you. If you liked these stories don't forget to follow me via one (or more!) of the social media sites above to get notified as soon as I share them:

Early Childhood Education
Christmas cookie sight game 
Top 5 Reasons Why Montessori Works

Language

How to learn a new language: 7 tips from TED Translators

Miscellaneous

Very cute crochet animation Turtle bites, solar energy and 400 hours of crochet: A very unique TED-Ed Lesson

 

Weekly Favorites 11/13

I haven't been able to read enough to find interesting articles lately but just wanted to share two things this week, which were great hits with Little Guy. Hope you (and your little one) will like them too:

Early childhood education (preschool to kindergarten activity)

Fall Color by Sight Word

Books

A Friend Is Someone Who Likes You