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Spiderman Birthday Party

September 27, 2019~ Etc., PARTY

 

 

Spiderman birthday party

Learn how to throw this Spiderman party, keep reading below!

All the links to the printables are at the bottom of this post.

 

My son really wanted an at-home birthday party, even though I tried to push for an outside party like Nickel City where I don’t have to prep or clean up and just have to bring cake and some vegetables and fruit and the place serves pizza and drinks.

So I hired my 10 year old daughter as my assistant as we went shopping together and she made the 3-D buildings and also the Spiderman! The spiderman she added was done at the very last minute, when I told her I felt like something was missing. Then she went and printed a black and white Spiderman and attached it to a white string and it was perfect! I would have never thought of that myself so I was so impressed with her creativity.

We got most of the party supplies from Zurchers but all the links are at the bottom of this post. 

 

Spiderman birthday party

Spider web printables one | two

spiderman party

Using 3 black foam boards, I traced a cityscape with a pencil, then cut it with an exacto knife. For the buildings, we used the 12-pk. soda can boxes and covered it in paper, then added windows.

spiderman party

Spiderman birthday party

spiderman party

spiderman party

spiderman party

spiderman party

We had to have a lot of fruit and vegetables for the Superheroes that came to our party!

spiderman party

Bagel bite pizzas were a huge hit

spiderman party

I made the black spider web for the centerpiece with black construction paper, using this tutorial 

spiderman party

We played 3 games for the Spiderman party. The first game was we set up a security system with red crepe paper streamers where each Superhero had to go through the “red lasers” without touching or breaking it.

spiderman party

spiderman party

The second game was a “Spiderman web shooting fight” where each Superhero got a web shooter(silly string covered in Webshooter printables one | two) and had to fight each other. Team one got red, team two got the blue web shooters.

spiderman party

spiderman party

spiderman party

The third game was a pinata, of course! As requested by my 6-year old because what kid doesn’t love a pinata?

spiderman party

buy Spiderman loot bags here

spiderman party

I made sure to mix in a lot of toys along with candy in the pinata. 

spiderman party

After the games, he opened all the presents. The kids love this part of the party as much as the birthday kid. The cutest part was when my son’s little crush asked him, “Why aren’t you opening my present?”, without skipping a beat my son said, “I am saving the best for last.” A smooth operator!

spiderman party

Then we finished the party with his favorite cake, an Oreo ice-cream cake. His older sister has had this same cake for her birthday parties every year in the last 5 years and it’s his favorite too. Easy for me since I didn’t have to make it!

 

Table decor:

Red tassel banner/blue tassel banner (the tassels are pre-strung so I took the tassels off and combined both color tassels in one-string together)

Red rock candy

Cityscapes – I used 3 black foam boards and traced a cityscape with a pencil, then cut it using exacto knife

Buildings – using 12-pk. soda can boxes, we covered it in paper and added windows

Spiderman in action – printed a Spiderman in b/w and tied a white string to the top of the building 

Spiderman party package printables for water bottle wrappers, food labels and cupcake toppers(but they have a ton of other printables like banners, thank you tags, mini favor bags)

Webshooter printables one | two

Spider web printables one | two

 

Pinata:

Pinata from Zurchers

Spiderman loot bags

Spiderman yo-yo’s

Spiderman mega mix party favors

 

 

All the Spiderman decor, tablecloths, silly strings, tabelcloths, Spiderman utensils and plates, pinata toys and candy are from Zurchers. They have SO much more in store than what’s listed on the website, I love going into the store, they have so many cute stuff and it’s a one-stop-shop for all party things. Thank you to Zurcher’s for providing all the party supplies!

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My Top 10 Tips for Switching up Your Food Without Sacrificing Taste

March 5, 2019~ Etc.

This post is sponsored by fairlife ultra-filtered milk, and as always, all opinions and writing are my own.

 

cute family having a picnic outside in the park

 

With the beginning of the year past us, how are your new year resolutions coming along? I know a lot of us make new healthier goals when a new year comes around and we get pumped up at the start of January but as months go by, our motivation might start to dwindle and we are not as dedicated to our goals. But I want to share with you my top 10 tips for switching up your food without sacrificing taste that you can do in your life that don’t feel like you are losing anything! Not sacrificing taste is a very important factor to me, as I hardly ever buy fat-free options since they never seem to taste as good. But the 10 tips I share below, the food tastes just as good, if not better!

 

 

10 Healthier Food/Health Swaps Without Sacrificing Taste

  1. Choose fairlife ultra-filtered milk over regular milk. Why? It has 50% less sugar and 50% more protein than regular milk. Our family prefers its delicious and creamy taste, and we think you will too!
  2. Use an air-popper and an air-fryer. With this simple switch, you will be saving hundreds of calories! There is no need to put in any extra butter or oil with these air-machines, but it tastes amazing and I can never eat microwaved left over fries again after trying them in an air fryer!
  3. Spray the pans with pan spray. A tablespoon of olive oil is 120 calories but an olive oil pan spray is only 5 calories, saving you 115 calories.
  4. Get thin-crust pizza instead of hand tossed crusts. They can be 1/2 the calories of a hand tossed pizza without sacrificing any taste!
  5. Use a spiralizer. After purchasing tens of already-spiralized zoodles, I looked online to find out that a spiralizer machine is much cheaper than I imagined it to be! A cup of zoodles is only 19 calories while a cup of noodles is 200 calories so this swap will save you 181 calories.
  6. Get your burgers protein-style. I get my burgers protein-style(burgers wrapped in lettuce instead of buns) anyway because they just taste so good! I prefer them over buns that leaves me feeling heavy afterwards. 1 lettuce leaf is only 4 calories while a hamburger bun is 120 calories.
  7. Oil & balsamic dressing over processed dressings. The taste of oil & balsamic dressing is so good, this might not even be an issue for many, but I think it’s a healthier option than the highly processed dressings with additives.
  8. Chew your food more and eat slower. I am the slowest eater and have always been told that that’s a good thing but I never really knew why it was a good thing. But studies show that people who eat faster consume more calories. Remember that feeling of a food coma where you are eating just fine but all of the sudden a feeling of intense fullness hits you out of nowhere, leaving you with a food coma? You won’t get that if you eat slowly.
  9. No mindless eating. Instead of eating while reading a book or watching t.v, or even talking with friends, be mindful of what you are eating, how it tastes and pay attention as you savor each bite. Enjoy your food! If you are occupied with doing something else while eating, are you really able to savor each bite and appreciate it’s flavor?
  10. Don’t go grocery shopping when you’re hungry. I can attest to this from my personal experience, when I am hungry when I am grocery shopping, I buy a lot more snacks and fast foods that are easy to prepare or eat, many of them that are rich in sugar or fat. Going grocery shopping when your stomach is content will help you in making healthier food choices.

 

If you have any of your favorite ways to switch up food without sacrificing taste, please share in the comments!

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Distractions

November 27, 2018~ Etc.

 

This post is in partnership with fairlife and all opinions are my own. 

Over the summer, I felt slightly distracted but now that the kids are back in school, its busier than ever and it’s hard to be distracted due to the many family activities we have!  To make sure everyone is healthy enough to keep up with all of our daily activities and demands, I ensure that they have the best nutrition that real food can provide, including fairlife ultra-filtered milk.

 

 

My kids just know it tastes really good and they prefer it over any other milk but little do they know that fairlife has 50% more protein, 50% less sugar and 30% more calcium than regular milk. We always make sure we have at least two cartons in our household at all times because they go through it so fast, one is never enough!

Especially my daughter, she loves to drink it after soccer practice and games so it’s now part of her routines. I’m so glad we’re partnered with fairlife because having a delicious milk that’s also nutritious is a win-win for me and my children!

 

 

And a big win for me is that I’ve been able to keep up with the crazy schedules but I’m looking forward to the next break when we can all take a breather. Whew!

 

 

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Amazing Cyber Monday Sales!

November 26, 2018~ Etc., SHOP

From now on, I am going to just wait until Cyber Monday to shop, I’ve noticed most stores have even better discounts for Cyber Monday than Black Friday!

Target is having an amazing deal of buy one, get one 60% off PLUS 15% off on top of that! So I am going to get some of these cute active wear, hoping it’ll motivate me to exercise more. Haha. Only if it was that easy!

 

ANTHROPOLOGIE is having a 30% off EVERYTHING!!!  plus free shipping over $100

 

Old Navy is having 50% off entire purchase! 

 

HM EVERYTHING is 30% off!  I bought a bunch of clothes for my kids, such cute clothes!

 

Loft is having 50% off EVERYTHING plus free shipping

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If Your Child Struggles to Read, Read This

November 13, 2018~ Etc.

 

THEN

This photo was taken right when my daughter started wearing glasses, which was back in 2014 when she was just 5 years old. Looking back, she probably needed glasses sooner than that but we were pretty clueless when it came to eye health and vision care so it didn’t even cross our minds to get her an eye exam. It wasn’t until she got a vision screening at her school in Kindergarten and they informed us that she needed glasses that we took her to get a comprehensive eye exam!

 

VSP Vision Care, the largest not-for-profit vision benefits provider in the U.S, and market research agency YouGov recently released some very interesting findings that show just how many people are neglecting their eyes, because we don’t know how much our eye health is tied to our overall health and don’t realize the importance of getting an annual eye exam (even if you don’t wear glasses or contacts). Let me know if this study below nails you on the spot, like it did to me. Guilty, guilty, guilty on all 3 for me, oops!

  • Eight in ten parents (83%) agree that a regular eye exam helps kids do their best in school, but four in ten (41%) wait until their child complains about their vision to schedule an eye exam.
  • Only one in ten parents (12%) knows that children should have their first eye exam at six-months of age.
  • Parents worry twice as much about their children’s dental problems (15%) than their vision issues (7%).

I had no idea children should have their first eye exam at only 6 months old, did you know that? And I took all 3 of my kids to a dentist before the age of 2 but never even thought about taking them for an eye exam. I wish I knew this sooner but that is why I am passionate about raising this awareness because most people still don’t know but once you know better, you do better.

NOW

4 years later, we take her to get an eye exam every year to make sure her prescription glasses are up to date and we thought we were doing great with her vision care. But little did we know about a thing called vision therapy, and I am assuming you haven’t heard of it either because every mother I’ve talked to has never heard about it either. So let me tell you our experience and I hope it helps you!

Our daughter has always struggled with reading. She was still young so we didn’t worry too much about it at first but year after year, she was always put in the reading program for kids who weren’t up to reading at their grade level. So by the time she was in 3rd grade(last year), I started to seriously worry and stress about it. I mean, I am Asian after all where an A- is an Asian F, so this was not acceptable! She is a very bright, intelligent girl so we felt more frustrated and helpless, since we didn’t understand why reading was a struggle for her. We thought it was just due to the lack of practice so we read a lot more with her, had her read more on her own, had her practice blending sounds and doing reading games on the computer, but it wasn’t getting better.

Feeling totally at a loss, I posted on my Facebook asking if anyone knew of a reading tutor or some kind of a reading program that would help my daughter to read. Then my neighbor who saw my post texted me and asked, “Have you heard of vision therapy? My son is doing it right now after hearing about it from a friend whose son struggled to read and it turned out that his brain and his eyes needed a restructure in order to work correctly together.” I thought what? What the heck is she talking about? So I asked her a few more questions and honestly, the term vision therapy was so foreign to me, I was still so confused of what it was!

I took my daughter for a free consultation and it ended up being a life changing decision for her my daughter and I am so glad my neighbor told me about it! The doctor performed many tests at the consultation to see if she would be a candidate for vision therapy. One test that sold me was, my daughter put on these special glasses that measured and followed the movement of her pupils, which showed in red dots on the computer screen.

Before having her read, he had me look at his eyes when he read a page in a book and asked me how his eyes moved. I told him it went from left to right, then left to right, and over again. He told us that is how our eyes should move. He then had my daughter read a page from a book and then showed us on the computer how her eyes were moving, with red dots pointing to the words of where her pupils were looking. To my dismay, her eyes moved all over the place! Instead of moving left to right, it started from the middle, end, beginning, then end, middle and end, then beginning, end, middle, middle, end and beginning. There was no pattern and she was going back and forth on the letters over and over again.

My daughter loved going to therapy too, they did yoga exercises (helps you to balance your body which helps your brain and eye coordination), played computer games that exercised the eyes and the brain, and other exercises to prove the eye-brain connection in order to make eye movements easier and more efficient.

 

I am so passionate that every child should learn to read because if you can’t read when you are a kid, you lose a lot of confidence and by 4th grade, if you don’t read well, you get so behind in school. Because up to 3rd grade, they focus on reading. But starting in 4th grade, that’s when their studies get intense and they stop focusing on reading but really start to learn about all the other subjects in depth. You might get made fun of, get behind in school, can’t learn because you need to read in order to learn anything else in school, then what are you going to do? You are going to feel incompetent, insecure and stop focusing on school.

While vision therapy really helped my daughter get to where she is with her reading, her initial eye exam really was the first step addressing the issue. So if you have a child or know of anyone (kids or adults) that struggle with reading, recommend them to see an eye doctor first and then consider finding a clinic that offers vision therapy.

 

Vision care is so essential for overall health and wellness and right now is the perfect time to enroll in vision care, where most enrollment periods are in late summer to fall. If you don’t sign up during the open enrollment period, you can also sign up at other times if you experience a life change such as marriage or childbirth. Click here to find out more about eye health and VSP Vision Care.

 

This blog post is sponsored by VSP® Vision Care, the leading provider in vision care and coverage, providing access to care for more than 88 million members. Visit SeeMuchMore.com, or talk to your employer to enroll with VSP this open enrollment season.
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Hello! My name is Sarah and I am so happy to have you here! Here you'll find DIY sewing, DIY home building & decor, honest and vulnerable posts of motherhood and snippets of my family. We are building our dream house and will update you regularly on our whole process from start to finish and I am also starting a mother-daughter sewing series. So I hope you stay awhile!

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