Wednesday, July 15, 2009

The “Middle Wife” by an Annonymous 2nd Grade Teacher

A laugh for you from the mom-stuff team. Have a great day! Story came from http://homeandholidays.com/ The is a fun site with good content.

I’ve been teaching now for about fifteen years. I have two kids myself, but the best birth story I know is the one I saw in my own second-grade classroom a few years back.

When I was a kid, I loved show-and-tell. So I always have a few sessions with my students. It helps them get over shyness and usually, show-and-tell is pretty tame. Kids bring in pet turtles, model airplanes, pictures of fish they catch, stuff like that.

And I never, ever place any boundaries or limitations on them. If they want to lug it in to school and talk about it, they’re welcome.

Well, one day this little girl, Erica, a very bright, very out going kid, takes her turn and waddles up to the front of the class with a pillow stuffed under her sweater.
She holds up a snapshot of an infant. ‘This is Luke, my baby brother, and I’m going to tell you about his birthday.’

‘First, Mom and Dad made him as a symbol of their love, and then Dad put a seed in my Mom’s stomach, and Luke grew in there. He ate for nine months through an umbrella cord.’
She’s standing there with her hands on the pillow, and I’m trying not to laugh and wishing I had my camcorder with me. The kids are watching her in amazement.

‘Then, about two Saturdays ago, my Mom starts saying and going,‘Oh, Oh, Oh, Oh!’ Erica puts a hand behind her back and groans.‘She walked around the house for, like an hour, ‘Oh, oh, oh!’ Now this kid is doing a hysterical duck walk and groaning.

‘My Dad called the middle wife. She delivers babies, but she doesn’t have a sign on the car like the Domino’s man. They got my Mom to lie down in bed like this.’ Then Erica lies down with her back against the wall.

‘And then, pop! My Mom had this bag of water she kept in there in case he got thirsty, and it just blew up and spilled all over the bed, like psshhheew!’ This kid has her legs spread with her little hands miming water flowing away. It was too much!

‘Then the middle wife starts saying ‘push, push,’ and ‘breathe, breathe. They started counting, but never even got past ten. Then, all of a sudden, out comes my brother. He was covered in yucky stuff that they all said it was from Mom’s play-center, so there must be a lot of toys inside there.’

Then Erica stood up, took a big theatrical bow and returned to her seat. I’m sure I applauded the loudest. Ever since then, when it’s show-and-tell day, I bring my camcorder, just in case another ‘Middle Wife’ comes along.

If anyone knows this teacher we want to know if the video is posted anywhere. We would love to see it and share it with our mom-stuff friends.

Thursday, July 2, 2009

What’s For Dinner?

Mom-Stuff Product Review. This weekend while visiting the What Woman Want Expo in St. George, Utah I found the most unique recipe book I have ever seen. What’s For Dinner by Jana Schofield.

When raising my family I hated the question “ What’s for dinner?” It was the first thing out of everyone’s month when they returned home from school or work, or worse when I returned home after work. They didn’t even say “Hi Mom” before the dreaded question. The decision of what food to fix for dinner has always been more work to me then cooking or the clean up. I wish this book had been available many years, ago. Jana Schofield is a mother who had the same problem. She has worked on this book for thirty years and it is now available to solve this problem for you. This book is a format of menus with easy-to-read recipes for convenience, organization and efficient use of time. I love this concept because it simplifies a mother’s duties to give her more free time to enjoy her life. So buy it now and give yourself more time to play with your kids at the park, have lunch with a friend or treat yourself to a pedicure.
I am really excited to have meet Jana. She is a really cute little lady. I have a new girl friend. I am so blessed to have all of you wonderful moms in my life.

Jana’s story on her own words:

Thirty-one years ago I sat down to make menus for the first time as a newlywed. I wanted to impress my husband with my culinary skills. I had taken many home economics classes, had helped my mother, and had my own collection of recipes, including a small recipe book we received as a wedding gift. My goal was to prepare something different for dinner every day for the first year. It didn’t take long to plan the first week, exhausting my entire recipe collection. It took me hours to finally produce a two-week menu plan, and it was not a pleasant experience. I thought to myself “why would I want to do this every week for the rest of my life. I’ll do it once and then it will be done”! That was the beginning of my “book”…a three ring binder with a notebook paper that I have added to over the years.

The small cookbook we received contained a couple sample menus with recipes for the items included in the menu. It was very convenient to have all the recipes together on one page, rather than searching through the book for three different recipes, and then flipping back and forth as I was preparing them. I thought surely there would be a book with more of the same thing that I could buy. So my search began. I found a magazine offering a full month worth of menus in every issue. As I looked through the menus, most of them consisted of dishes I couldn’t pronounce. Some of the items sounded good, but there were no recipes. Others contained ingredients I had never heard of! Some recipes would call for a white sauce…okay…how do you make a white sauce?

Based on my experiences and the experiences of others, I have tried to create a book, dedicated especially to the new cook with limited or no experience. Now that I have married children, they have been very helpful in letting me know if the recipes are understandable. I have included recipes for even the most basic things. Over the years I have always been on the lookout for new recipes and paid attention to “what has been served with what” so I could come up with creative and different menus.

I have gone full circle with my book—back in the days when there were just two of us…as we added 6 children over the years and now…when I never know if there will be two or sixteen for dinner.

When I first started this book, it was for my own convenience. It has expended through the years; and as I have talked with friends and others, who struggle with the same question every day. “What’s for dinner?” I felt a need to share it with others. The book I wanted to buy as a newlywed is now available for everyone!

The Mom-Stuff team has made arrangements with Jana to sell her book on our site because we know you will love it. If you are interested go to our SHOPPING CART. We know that it will make your life easier. And we know that you will use your extra time to make your life happier.

To your health and happiness, Dianne

Copyright 2008-2009. Dianne E Murray. All rights reserved.

Wednesday, July 1, 2009

Free Social Networkering Products

Hi, all of you Twitters, Bloggers and Social Networkering Moms
the one and only Social Marketing Gifts Giveawaywill open it’s doors on 07/07/09.
… now you can download hundreds of socialmarketing tools and products for zero, zilch, nada
==> http://www.socialmarketinggifts.com/members.php?id=1097
This year’s Social Marketing Gifts event is hostedby 2 of the Top Marketers in this industry: GuidoNussbaum and Stephanie Mulac.
They both have a huge experience in running giveawayevents… so what happens when they’ll team up?
That’s what they were asking themselves…
So we’ll see if they together can pull out theBiggest Giveaway we’ve ever seen…
… we’ll see…
… but one is for sure: They will definately pull outthe Biggest Social Marketing related event that has everhappened… worldwide!
So make sure you don’t miss this one… as you might know,Social Marketing is currently the Hot Topic on the net.
==> http://www.socialmarketinggifts.com/members.php?id=1097
See you there,
Dianne Murray