Category: Friday Features

Friday Features: ME!

Home / Friday Features / Friday Features: ME!
by Luschka

Ha – Yes, I’m being totally cheeky and featuring myself today. Well, not myself, so much as asking you to do me a huge favour and vote for me. 

We’ve been nominated in two categories in the annual MADS blog awards and I’m totally thrilled! Last year and the year before we were nominated in just one category, so this is already a step up!

To give you a bit of background: Over 3,000 parenting blogs were nominated in the various categories, and the blogs with the most nominations in each category were shortlisted – so to make it to the top handful in two categories is pretty big and I’m over the moon!

These shortlisted blogs are now put to a public vote, and the one with the most votes wins. Apparently there have been over 50,000 votes so far, which is pretty incredible, seeing as you can only vote once!

I’m pretty rubbish at this self-promotion thing, so I haven’t contacted my local radio station and news paper to get them to write about me and ask people to vote, and I’m not going to, but since you’re here, I though I’d ask you!

Win or lose, I’ll still be here, plugging away, and I’ll still have my opinions, and my photos and my competitions and my girls… but with a win, maybe I can convince hubby that I really do need that new camera I’ve been lusting over! But then, finally having a ‘winner’ badge for one of the categories wouldn’t hurt either! And we’re pretty sure this is the last time I qualify for best pregnancy blog too!

So… if you’d like to vote for us for best pregnancy blog we’d really appreciate it. I’ve written a plethora of posts around gentle birth, preparing for a birth, preparing an older sibling for a new arrival, preparing an older sibling for the actual birth and there are even a few birth stories on there too.

We’d also appreciate a vote for best baby blog because, well, isn’t Aviya just beautiful? No, I’m just kidding. I’ve been told that people really like the letters I write to Ameli and Aviya each month, and then there are all the new baby pictures in the weekly Mamatography posts too.

Well – I hope you’re convinced, and I do hope you’ll vote for us!

(Voting closes at 5pm on the 6th of June and you can only vote once. Winners will be announced in September)

Friday Features: Vibrant Wanderings

Home / Friday Features / Friday Features: Vibrant Wanderings
by Luschka

Melissa from Vibrant Wanderings has a lovely blog. Perhaps I feel so even more strongly right now, because she’s started a series on preparing for your second baby – something that still resonates strongly with me. I read her posts now and still find new ideas and new suggestions in them, and although we have our second child now, it’s never too late to evaluate your situation.Read more: Friday Features: Vibrant Wanderings

Friday Features: “Boobie Time”

Home / Friday Features / Friday Features: “Boobie Time”
by Luschka

Boobie Time is, as the name suggests, a blog about breastfeeding and babies, and a bit more on the side. Written by Lani, mother to B, it is a blog which, unsurprisingly focuses on breastfeeding, children and birth – all things that are pretty relevant to me and my life right now!

Read more: Friday Features: “Boobie Time”

Friday Features: “I Thought I Knew Mama”

Home / Friday Features / Friday Features: “I Thought I Knew Mama”
by Luschka

I Thought I Knew Mama is written by one of my NPN Volunteer friends and it’s an amazing resource to keep bookmarked and keep scanning for those topics that tickle your fancy. Charise writes about many things pertaining to motherhood, parenting and growing into the role of attachment parent and conscious inhabitant of the planet. Her blog is inspirational, informative, and really very friendly.

On Thursdays you’ll find the Green And Natural Mama link up, with such topics as What is BPA? Why is it bad? What can I do? And practical posts, such as 10 Ways to Keep Your Toddler Active This Fall or 5 Easy Ways for Pregnant Women to Reduce Their Exposure to Chemicals.

Another superbly useful category on I Thought I Knew Mama is ‘Growing Greener’, with frugal ways to living a greener life, such as the post on 3 Items in your Kitchen Pantry that will Clean Your Face Naturally and 3 Natural Cold and Flu Remedies.

You’ll find an abundance of healthy and delicious looking recipes, and insightful thoughts on Natural Parenting.

There is actually so much I could share on I Thought I Knew Mama, but really, the best thing you can do for yourself is to pop over hand have a browse around. You’ll probably learning something, even though you may not know it at the time, but either way, you’ll not regret the time you spend there!

Friday Features: “Manic Mrs Stone”

Home / Friday Features / Friday Features: “Manic Mrs Stone”
by Luschka

I adore the Manic Mrs Stone.

She’s one of those women who is everything I will just never be. She’s creative, artistic, exudes confidence, and is beautiful to boot. Actually, there’s a word for women like her: feminine. It’s a trait I envy in women. And one I have no idea how to emulate.

Mrs Stone is actually Elisabeth, a mum to one, married to her hubby since they were 17 years old. They had their first daughter soon after, and are currently expecting their second (due in March). Elisabeth had a c-section with Eden, and is working towards a planned VBAC this time round.

Elisabeth is a really talented photographer as you can see from the incredibly beautiful maternity series of photographs – see what I mean by feminine? There’s also her Kid Stuff series, with favourite fashions and gorgeous style, all photographed in the same amazing way.

For some pretty awesome inspiration, you can browse through the Nature Activities or Crafty Living – if you’re on Pinterest, you’ll want to get your clicking finger ready for those.

Having turned Vegan six months ago, Mrs Stone is learning how to cook vegan food, and shares some of her gorgeous recipes on the blog. There’s actually so much on this blog, if I started pulling up individual posts, I’d be reproducing the whole thing. Just check it out. You really want to!

You know you find those people in your life who you kind of wish you could be? Well, in a totally non-creepy, non-stalker way…  the Manic Mrs Stone is one of those people for me!

Friday Features: “Anktangle”

Home / Friday Features / Friday Features: “Anktangle”
by Luschka

Anktangle is another fab blog on my feed and one I’d love to share with my readers. Anktangle is written by Amy, a Registered Nurse turned Work from Home Mama to Daniel, who is soon coming up for his second birthday.

Daniel has Sensory Processing Disorder, and Amy writes about sensory processing and its impact on their family life. She also writes about all things Attachment Parenting, and has a Foodie Friday series on healthy eating.

I particularly love the story of Amy and Jaymz’ wedding – in a Starbucks! Like I needed more excuses to love Starbucks?

There’s an incredibly moving post about milk sharing, and Amy’s involvement in breastfeeding a baby whose mother was in hospital and who was refusing a bottle.  Amy received a lot of questions about her cross-nursing experience and shares them in this post.

There’s also a fantastic flow chart of how to get out of conversations you don’t want to be a part of in the post Explain, Smile, Escape.

I like Anktangle, because it’s an easy to read blog, full of the beauty of a real parent, in a real world, and while Amy strives for certain things in her own life, she isn’t preachy and isn’t judgemental in any way.

I hope you like it too!

Friday Features: “Mothers of Change”

Home / Friday Features / Friday Features: “Mothers of Change”
by Luschka

Mothers Of Change is a website that is run and maintained by a group of mothers with a vision of improving maternity care for mothers and babies in Canada. While their vision is specific to the women of Canada, their thoughts and insights are relevant to every birthing mother/child dyad and I spent a lot of time on their blog during the final days of my pregnancy, reading everything I could.

Mothers of Change see their mission simply as one of providing education and information to expectant and new mothers and everyone else involved in the business of childbirth and to research and facilitate communication about mother’s experiences of maternity care.Read more: Friday Features: “Mothers of Change”

Friday Features: “Hybrid Rasta Mama”

Home / Friday Features / Friday Features: “Hybrid Rasta Mama”
by Luschka

Jennifer writes the blog Hybrid Rasta Mama. As her site has recently undergone a massive redesign and is looking all fresh and brand new and sparkly, I thought it would be the perfect time to invite you over for a cuppa. Well. You’ll have to bring the cuppa, but feel free to have a look around – I’m pretty sure she won’t mind.

Jennifer describes herself as “a hybrid parent. I take a little of this, throw in a little of that and blend it all together to create a parenting style that is centered on what my daughter needs from me in order to flourish as a human being.”

She is a believer in natural living, healthy eating and some parts of Steiner/Waldorf education – again, taking what works for them, and leaving what doesn’t.  Jennifer and I will rarely end up at the same parties, however, as she loves Reggae music, something I can only handle with large amount of Rum (in cocktails, preferably 😉

Hybrid Rasta Mama rose to blogger fame recently when her article 80 Uses for Coconut Oil, which was later updated to 160 Uses for Coconut Oil, went somewhat viral on the web. I think a big jar of Coconut Oil is in my shopping future.

Jennifer also has super healthy recipes, and if there’s an ingredient you don’t know what to do with, ask her, and she’ll find something good for you!

There’s a great summary of what Waldorf education is, as well as a long list of Steiner/Waldorf resources, and much more to glean from her welcoming pages.

I hope you enjoy your visit!

Friday Feature: “Wise Way Tribe”

Home / Friday Features / Friday Feature: “Wise Way Tribe”
by Luschka

**I’m scaling down to one blog feature a week for a little while, so as to take the pressure off during this having a baby/baby moon phase.**

I love Wise Way Tribe. It’s such a refreshing blog, and Elena’s self-depreciating tone always makes me smile. It’s not that she has a low self-esteem or anything, it’s just that the way she sees the world and comments on it is so amusing to me. Not necessarily funny, but amusing. There’s defiance, whistfulness, longing and passion in her writing. Her blog posts are generally short reads, succinct and to the point. Sometimes they’re about nothing particular. Nothing other than how she’s feeling – which of course has value in and of itself. Other times they’re about things she feels strongly about, like breastfeeding being a right, not a choice or ear piercing.

Elena is an adult educator, just like me in life before children, and I love reading about her joy and passion in helping people who want to learn something learn it. There’s such a difference between teaching people who have to be there and teaching people who want to, and Elena’s posts on the matter spark a memory in me – I loved the feeling at the end of a class when people left happy. It’s why I’ve started up teaching again, albeit a very different subject and audience.

Elena also has an introspective mind, and she seems to read a lot. Her musings on these and other things often come out in her Speaking of Spirit series, which are like bitesize tasters into other ways of thinking.

Again, I find it refreshing and stimulating, and think if you stopped by for a visit you’d agree.