Rachael Ray

Disclaimer - If you are not a parent this is tedious post - please don’t fault me:-). We are currently experiencing a serious battle in our house and I am reminded again of how foolish I was to think the hard part of raising my three kids was the baby/toddler stage. Ha. As a quick reminder, my kids are 12 (daughter), soon-to-be 11 (daughter), and 9 (son). My two girls are complete opposites in nearly every way, yet still very close and basically best friends. We moved to a bigger house when I was pregnant with my younger daughter because we wanted our kids to have their own rooms. Another decision we made was to give our younger daughter the biggest (kid) [...]...

Have you ever wished that when you went out to dinner, or visited a new town, you knew where to find a restaurant that served healthy food? Well that’s the information that the Clean Plates website provides, and now they’ve published The Clean Plates Cookbook, full of healthy recipes — many of which are contributed by their favorite restaurant chefs. Above: Kale Salad recipe, by chef Hadley Schmitt of New York’s Northern Spy Food Co. restaurant, from The Clean Plates Cookbook Most healthy cookbooks have an outlook on eating that relies on one exclusive theory, such as veganism, raw food, the Paleo diet, etc. But the author of The Clean Plates Cookbook, Jared Koch, is a nutritionist, and he has a different [...]...

My husband swears somewhat frequently (maybe he doesn’t necessarily think so but the rest of the family does). He inadvertently peppers his everyday conversation with off-color language, and will come out with an expletive if he is cut off in the car, he drops something, etc. I rarely if ever swear and have through the years consistently shushed him when he swears in front of our kids. He doesn’t even know he’s doing it. The good news is that from what I can tell, my kids don’t swear - I haven’t caught them using this language when talking with their friends or thinking it’s cool in any way. (I was telling this story to a friend recently and he said his father [...]...

Here in NYC, the weather hasn’t been so great these past few days. In fact, as I type this, the East coast is prepping for Hurricane Irene. I have to admit, I haven’t jammed my cupboards with water and batteries but I tell you what, I am definitely stockpiling ideas and activities to keep my two very active boys busy while we hunker down. Regardless of the weather in your neck of the woods, it’s always a good idea to have a few indoor activities at the ready should you find yourself stuck inside.  After all, finger paints and play-doh only go so far. Am I right? At almost 3 years old, my son is typically occupied by any given activity [...]...

Pancakes have always been my son and my “special thing”. He’s 2 1/2 now and we’ve been making them together every Sunday morning since before he could talk. It’s our time to bond and it’s an activity that we both look forward to every weekend. Pancakes are a great recipe to try with kids because they require a lot of measuring and mixing  plus, time spent in the kitchen together with your kids is a great way to connect. Each week we try and whip up a new flavor but no matter what variation we come up with,  we try to make them on the healthier side using half whole wheat flour, half white flour and some wheat germ. However, this [...]...

My 7 year old son is practically a model child at school. He is considerate to others, helpful to the teachers, raises his hand, eager to please, the accolades from the teachers go on. He loves school and recently told me he wished he went to school 7 days a week. My 7 year old son is not, however, a model child at home, especially of late. He fights with his sisters, throws tantrums that I haven’t seen since he was two, he doesn’t listen to me, he talks back to his father. How can this be the same child? Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde has entered the scene. When he misbehaves at home I will often ask him “Would you [...]...

My younger daughter has started referring to herself as “the middle child” on a regular basis. She brings it up all the time and peppers her conversations with, “…since I am the middle child,” or “you should feel sorry for me because I am the middle child,” etc. I am amazed as we have never referred to her as the “middle child” (she is flanked by her older sister and younger brother) - she is simply one of three kids. When my husband and I were in the midst of planning our family (haha - if you can call it that) - he wanted two, I wanted four, three was our compromise - I was insistent on the fact that there [...]...

My day-5 fifth grade daughter is not exactly making a smooth transition to upper school. She has more metal in her mouth than I can believe even fits - a palate expander and top braces. One of her wires has popped out and while I have shoved it back into place and think it seems fine, my daughter is mortified and I have yet to connect with the orthodontist. This year is a big change at school for her as she needs to move from class to class and has to keep all of her belongings in her locker - I am picturing papers flying down the hall, if her at-home organizational skills are any indicator. When I picked her up from a fifth grade orientation [...]...

My ten year-old daughter is at sleep away camp for two weeks for the first time this summer, and while in the weeks leading up to her departure I was focused solely on her, now that she is gone I think the rest of the family may be experiencing more of an adjustment than she is. Whenever anyone asked her how she felt about going away to camp, she would aways reply “excited and scared,” which was a pretty accurate description of how I felt too. Excited for her that she was embarking on this new adventure where she will hopefully meet new friends, have new experiences, and have some time that is all about her and not her and her two siblings. [...]...