DonorsChoose.org -- technology meets charity on a personal level

You may notice there's a new widget on my blog. I now have a Giving Page on DonorsChoose.org of my very own. I'm not doing this as part of a challenge (although they kind of forced me to join one, weird), I just want to try to pitch in and send some attention to teachers that I think deserve some help for their cool projects.

If you aren't familiar with how DonorsChoose.org works let me explain. Teachers post proposals with the help of the DonorsChoose.org people and you go search through them and find ones that you want to donate to. You are donating whatever amount you want to a specific teacher's project. You can sort and filter based on all sorts of things. I chose to focus on Special Needs classrooms that are serving preschool age kids. Once I had put a few of those on my page I got excited and added some more where the total needed is less than $100. That means that your $25 or $50 or $100 (or $5 if you're in a boat like mine) could complete the funding of this proposal and get the materials needed into those kids' hands. So please, take a minute and see if there is something that inspires you. Use my page as a starting off point or just go to DonorsChoose.org and search on your own.

I had heard of this website linking donors directly with teachers last year during their Bloggers Challenge. It fell out of my head until I saw an ad on YouData tonight. Go, YouData!

Dear President-Elect Obama,

Dear President-Elect Obama,
Originally uploaded by KYouell.
This is my contribution to the Message For Obama pool on Flickr. You can search for the tag "messageforobama" to see more.

Here is what the text says:

"She's 18 months old and typical. He's 3 years old, has Down syndrome and a heart defect that may require more medical intervention.

"I want her to be happy, healthy and independent. I want him to be happy, healthy and independent.

"I don't want her to have to take care of him when we are gone. To accomplish our goals we need *your* support.

"Please support Early Intervention Programs, Inclusion Programs, and help us get health care we can actually afford to use."

*****
Here is the rest of the message I wrote:

Some of us believe that abortion should not be illegal, yet we wouldn't dream of having one ourselves.

Some of us do the best we can, make a decent living and then get blindsided with medical bills and a situation that is hard to dig our way out of.

Even if I won the lottery and money was never an object for me ever again, I couldn't buy inclusion in our community for my son. That requires the participation of the community in welcoming him in.

Don't forget that some of the people that cannot (yet) speak for themselves are not babies that the anti-choice people are trying to speak for, but they are babies that are here, have loving families, and *still* need the help of society.

It's nice to finally feel good about the outcome of an election. Thank you for the hope you have kindled in my heart. Wednesday, 11/5/2008, felt like Christmas morning did when I was small. Magical!

My Intro to YouData

Way back when I learned about sk*rt from OMSH (you know, Heather, who commented once that she promises never to make me drink any Kool-Aid). Sk*rt eventually became Kirtsy, Heather became an editor, and I just don't go there often. I do get their emails every week or so and I certainly pay attention to contests. Especially contests where they are giving away a free laptop (it's over -- I didn't win). I was curious about this whole YouData thing and went to their site to learn more.

Well, the first thing you need to do is fill out some surveys about yourself. I'm a sucker for surveys. Just love giving people my opinion about things. So I signed right up and proceded to survey away. That took no time at all and then I could go look at some ads. Just some cute little banner ads in their ad viewer on the website. Boom, I had earned 25-cents. Not much, but more than I usually bring home. (Why, oh why, don't I get paid for each poopy diaper I change???) So, since it was a lot easier than changing a diaper and they promised to put a shiny quarter in my PayPal account, I was having fun. I clicked thru each banner to the respective advertisers' websites to earn some more change, 15-cents here, 17-cents there. The next thing I knew I had learned about Kiva.org and seen some scary (as in eww, I don't want to dust that) Halloween figurines and some crazy expensive baby furniture. Random surfing could have produced the same results. Pretty soon the kids needed me so I got off the computer.

I didn't think about it until a few days later when I got an email from PayPal saying that I've received $3. Huh? Sure enough it's from YouData. Well, thank you! So I instantly go back and view more ads and listen to the happy little ka-ching sound. I am loving YouData.

Polycarbonate vs. Polypropylene

I just heard through some mamas that I trust that it's a bad idea to put food storage containers in the dishwasher, as the heat can cause yucky chemicals to leach out. Eww. So, thinks I, I will get some glass storage for our leftovers. Haha! Thwarted the plastics industry. And lo and behold we have a Chefs Catalog just sitting around begging me to have a reason to look through it. So this morning I do.

They have 1 (count 'em -- one) listing for glass storage. And they have "poly" lids. Poly-what lids, I ask? A quick flip through the rest of the catalog shows that they have other storage that is polycarbonate (one of the options for that is stainless-steel containers but they still have the polycarbonate lids), and some cutting boards that are made from polypropylene. So I then asked myself what's the difference between polycarbonate and polypropylene, and are either one of them safe?

A quick read of the Wikipedia pages for both made me sure that polycarbonate was not something I wanted near our food. The polypropylene page wasn't so clear so I kept looking. I found a site called Safe Mama that has a tag for the listings about polypropylene. It looks to me like polypropylene is not a hazardous choice to be near our food. I still think I'm going to opt for the Anchor Hocking sets that have glass lids and leave all the plastic behind. I found that they have 3 sizes on Cooking.com along with a ton of other items like cookie jars and chalkboard jars (how cool!) when I searched the site for "anchor hocking storage." I saw the same 3 pieces sold as a set at my local grocery store so I'm going to compare the price before I buy, but this is what I'm going with.

Oh, one other thing I learned on those Wikipedia pages. Polycarbonate has a plastics identification code of 7 and polypropylene is a 5. Just so you can look at what you have in your cupboard and not wonder what it is. As long as there is a number inside of a triangle made of arrows, you can be sure of what you've got. There's even a Wikipedia page with a chart listing all of the codes and linking back to the pages for individual types of plastics.

Enjoy! And keep your food safe.

A reason not to Homeschool?

I've been daydreaming about homeschooling my kids since before I got pregnant. Now that The Biscuit is in preschool and hating it -- I have to stay with him the whole time or he's just a panic attack in the corner -- I'm fighting myself not to pull him.

Now I run across this story and it makes me think that what I should be doing is getting him out of the house every day at school time, even though school is only twice a week. Once he gets that this is the routine I know he'll be ok, but 2 days a week is not enough of a routine that he's going to grasp it quickly. Then we have breaks because I needed to go on a trip and we came home and got sick and it really makes less sense to him. I think that he thinks that school is over. Whew, got through that. Sorry, little dude. Not *even* the case. And I don't need you regressing when you are 25. Not that I blame the parents in the story. In their case I think I would have made the exact same choices. But it sure makes me wonder what I'm setting him up for if I don't get him up and outta here every single day.

Election Gas

Has anyone else noticed that as the election gets closer gas prices are coming down? I'm suspicious! Damn oil profiteers and their war and cronies and AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH!

I swear I'd have a stroke if I didn't have a blog to dump some of this frustration on.

Free Starbucks? Sign me up!

Thank you, Heather, for pointing me at this cute Lego photo of MommyKnows'. I had no idea that Legos came in those colors; they are still choking hazards for my kids. The super cool part is that the photo has a link to MommyKnows' blog and that has an post where she is giving away $10 Starbucks gift cards. Woot! Doubling my entry by telling you about it. Go comment and get in the drawing.

Buddy Walk!!!

It's this weekend in our part of the world. Come join us!

Sponsor me!

Join our team (Biscuit Patrol)!

Learn more about the local group your dollars will be supporting!

Find a Buddy Walk in your area!


Get off your duff and walk a mile with us!

Our Visitor

One of the highlights of our trip was waking up to a voice mail message on my cell phone from the alarm company. One of our motion detectors had gone off. I called them back and told them we were in California and asked could they tell me any more? Just that the police had been called and we were safe to assume that the police had found nothing since the police had not called the alarm company back. Yeah, right. So we called the police dept and got basically the same answer. The officer had found nothing. Had he looked in the backyard? Oh, of course, they always do that. Uh-huh.

As our trip continued we realized that the zone that had gone off was the one that is incorrectly labeled as a motion sensor and is really a door or window -- we couldn't remember which. Great.

So when we arrived home my husband walked all through the house and all around the house and found nothing. Ok, must have been nothing.

About 6 hours later (I think), after having been out in the mud room numerous times to tend to laundry, guess what flew from the mud room into the kitchen? A bat. That's right, a frickin' bat! We finally convinced it to go back to the mud room where we could shut it off from the rest of the house. Then my husband went around and opened the back door and eventually convinced it that outside was better than inside.

Good times. At least when the alarm went off it wasn't a false alarm. At least no one got bit. My advice is to not leave unscreened doors and windows open when packing a car at night for a trip. Or to get screens. I know I really want them now.

So I took this little trip...

to Sacramento. I went to a conference and my family communed with our extended families and their pets.

I got very little sleep starting with driving all night to get there. During the conference I either had a late night at workshops/meetings or stayed up late to get in some kid and hubby time. Then we drove straight back overnight. I'm barely awake and doing things.

In fact, I was just going to read 2 blogs and then get that load of clothes in the washer going as the presoak has had plenty long to do its job. What should I find but that Kathryn at Daring Young Mom has actually mentioned *me* in her post about laundry. So now that I've given her some linky love back, I'm off to throw some more clothes in with some Charlie's Soap (love, love, love, love). Then a nap.

Hahahahaha! Moms don't get to nap. :-(

PS -- Before I could hit post both kids were slipping on the Pergo floor. Why would that be? Could it be the spit and chewed up Goldfish cracker paste that must have appeared while I was typing? I can let you know that the Charlie's Soap All-Purpose cleaner (diluted 10:1) got that mess up with no problems. Other than me being disgusted, I mean.

Not Really a Formula Recall

I got an update that infant formula made in China may have excessive amounts of melamine. Yeah, the stuff they make bowls out of. We aren't supposed to worry because no formulas made in China have been approved for sale in the U.S. I thought it was interesting for this sentence:

Melamine artificially increases the protein profile of milk and can cause kidney diseases.

Whoa. Satisfies some of my curiosity about why Chinese products keep having these bizarre things in them.

HABA recall (old news)

I'm just getting caught up on my news from the gov't. We've been given several HABA toys as gifts. Ooh, they're wood! Ooh, they're from Germany, not China! Yet they are still subject to recalls. Just in case you are like me and think that you had found a "safe" brand of toy. Sigh.

CPSC HABA recall info with pictures.

Sewing Project -- kids' pants

I found this through Balancing Everything. It is a super easy way to make kids' pants out of t-shirts. Now I know what I'm going to do with all those t-shirts I bothered to pack and move up here even though I don't wear them. Hallelujah, I don't have to wonder whether to spend the Carter's Store gift certificate on day clothes or pjs!

Busy, busy, hard, hard.

That about sums up my life right now. I have 9 tabs open in Chrome (Google's new browser that I'm trying out) of things I need to do or write about. I also have a text file with the urls of 6 more. I think that I'll just go with a bullet list for now.

• I'm going to vote for Obama. Even though Gov. Sarah Palin also has a son with Down syndrome, I am not changing my support just for that. There's a lot more to a person than how many copies of his 21st chromosome her son has. Obama gives me hope, and I enjoy voting *for* someone instead of strategically trying to make my vote count. Blah.
• I'm not going to see Tropic Thunder, but then I probably wasn't going to anyway. But now I won't Netflix it.
• The Biscuit started preschool and he doesn't like it. Part of me really wants to say, "Fine we are homeschooling!" but I know we need to give it more than 2 days.
• The Buddy Walk is coming up! Go to www.buddywalk.org and put in your ZIP code to find one near you. Then go to it. We are in your community, don't pretend we aren't. This isn't a fund-raiser like Race for the Cure and others like that because we aren't trying to find a cure for Down syndrome. This is an awareness-raiser and funds stay local to help families in your community. Please, please, please go. Another more detailed post coming on this.
• Little Miss Cupcake had her first "poo art" as in playing with the contents of a blow-out diaper. I won't be making peas 2 nights in a row again for awhile. She likes them too much.
• Today I pulled out some clothes that I was saving for her next growth spurt and put her in a dress that was mine when I was little. Totally cool! So I'll probably do a post -- with photos! -- about that.

Now, off to bed with me.

Nononononono

I just counted and preschool starts in 3 weeks.

I'm petrified.

It has nothing to do with me going on a job interview in the morning. Ack! Look at the time! To bed with me already.

Mobile blogging

Looking for a claim token
-kyouell

Ignore that. Just setting up my phone so I can post from it if I want.

Ooh, Carriers Too!

There's a second give-away. Go enter. Now. Go!

Win the Essential Babywearing Stash from Along for the Ride (one Beco Butterfly, one Hotsling baby pouch, one BabyHawk Mei Tai, one Zolowear Ring Sling, and one Gypsy Mama Wrap)

Free BumGenius Starter Kit!!!

Yes, I mean those 3 exclamation marks. I want this kit so bad I could spit! So here's my blog entry promoting the contest so that I can get an extra entry. Crossing my fingers for me and my kids' bums!

Go check it out!

Win a Bum Genius 3.0 Starter Kit from Nature's Child - Wholesome Goods for Mothers and Babies

Rex Kwon Do

Diaper Saga

Haven't had much to say lately, but our dramas do continue. The Biscuit gave us a sign yesterday that he might be ready to start potty training: he pooped in his diaper then removed it, running around the play area with poop still hanging from his cute little butt. I have now determined that the sleeping bag we use as a giant floor cushion in that room does in fact fit in our washer and that the little flimsy drying rack I have can hold the weight of about 1/3 of said sleeping bag (the rest of it laying over the deck railing). Thankfully, (HA!) it was 101 degrees yesterday so the sleeping bag dried pretty fast.

On a side note, I'm now kicking myself that we rented a house with no a/c. I remember thinking that it was no big deal because it's freaking Oregon and since it's an older house there are all sorts of windows that we can open to get a breeze from whatever direction it is coming. Which *would* work great if a good half of the windows weren't painted shut! [kick, kick!]

We have been having a problem with The Biscuit's diapers leaking overnight so switched to a nighttime pull-up. Yeah, just because Kimberly-Clark says that it's just for nighttime doesn't mean it's strong enough to take him and all his milk drinking. I've gone ahead and ordered a custom-made $50 diaper for him through Tallulah Baby. That is a fully-loaded for nighttime, with some special adjustments for his particular body shape, diaper and a cover (and shipping). I'm looking forward to it!

We are using gDiapers with The Cupcake almost all of the time now. I'm going to invest in some prefolds (unbleached India prefolds if I can find them for a good price) to use as inserts in them instead of the gDiaper flushables that we are buying now. The next step is some BumGenius diapers which should fit both kids so that even when The Biscuit is fully potty-trained they will still work on The Cupcake. Trying hard here to make a wise investment, before taking reselling them on eBay into consideration. Somewhere in there we get to buy cloth wipes too. From what I've heard (and experienced with the gDiapers) it's extra yukky to try to separate those non-flushable baby wipes from what you are flushing and washing. I'm not ready to switch to the flushable toddler wipes yet, so I think we are just going to go ahead and go the cloth route. From what I hear flannel receiving blankets make great ones when cut down and the edges are serged, so that will be my first serger project. Just as soon as I get some power to my sewing area. Ah, old houses.

Oh, and for the people who are curious about diapers piling up and smelling, I can say that I am already over-caught up with laundry like never before. Basically I have the opposite problem in that I am usually wanting to wash diapers and scouring the house for things to wash with them. I've never been more on top of the laundry than I have since we started using the gDiapers for The Cupcake. So I really do think that's a fear, not an actual issue. Maybe it's left over from diaper service days, when you kept the diapers for someone else to pick up and wash?

Updated to add links. Doh!