Tag Archives: chicken

Skewer It!

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I’ve found a new way to entice my toddler to eat… He’s definitely entered the “picky” stage where he will not eat everything in front of him, but rather pick and choose what he deems “appetizing.” There really seems to be no rhyme or reason as to what he will eat and it’s almost like a flavor of the day/week where his favorite foods seem to be on his “what’s trending” list!

So, what happened was… I had brought home my leftovers one evening, and among the items were a couple skewers of chicken. I sort of held the skewered meat up toward him to see if he showed interest… and sure enough, he “bit” it! Then, with each bite he would proclaim, “I did it!” since he was able to feed himself by biting off chucks of food from the stick.

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Naturally, my next move was to buy a bag of bamboo skewers! The good thing is skewers are inexpensive, and you can stick just about anything on them. So, we did some beef kabobs with mushrooms and I also did a mango and grape medley! **Note – skewers can have a sharp end, so supervision is a MUST when serving a toddler food on a skewer.**

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Now, it wasn’t total success, but I do think he managed to eat more of the food then he would’ve normally eaten for the simple fact that it was on a skewer. I’m not saying it will work for every baby, but it’s def worth a try. I think it gives them a sense of empowerment to feed themselves, and also be in control…plus it’s fun! I couldn’t get enough of his “I did it” statements as he happily chowed down with his skewers!

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Zoo Animals Party Theme

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This past weekend we celebrated my baby boys birthday at the Virginia Zoo! I had originally had a whole ‘nother theme idea to celebrate their joint party, but after we moved and chose the Zoo for the celebration location…it only seemed right to make it a “ZOOper Birthday” bash!

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My uber creative super designer sister Adrienne whipped up these fun in-theme birthday party invites..I didn’t want anything too “babyish” with the animals and this worked perfect! And — the great thing about having a party at this zoo was that included in the “fee” were the room rental, private animal encounter, table clothes, plates, cups, pizza and drinks…all I really had to do was bring a cake, but…of course I decided to do a little bit more! 😉

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I decided I’d do one decorated table and found a zoo animal party theme style online to get the coordinating tablecloth, centerpieces, banner, etc… Since it was Isaiah’s 1st birthday, I had a fun “Chalkboard Poster” printed up (ordered on Etsy, printed at Costco) …did one for Raef last year, a nice keepsake to hang in the bedrooms after the party. Then I found cute animal print frames to put each of the boy’s photos in.

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Aside from the favor bags which I handed out as my guests were leaving, I wanted to have fun in=party distractions (need those for the little ones), and setup a “Party Animal Gear” area where they could choose from an assortment of animal clappers, animal face “masks” party blow outs and of course the classic party hat!

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Apparently the “zebra” face was the most popular, but the animal faces came in monkey, elephant, tiger, lion and giraffe too!

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My little Isaiah was fine rockin’ the traditional party hat with his giraffe shirt from Gymboree!

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For dessert I did got a chocolate chip message cake (it was a big hit) and I had cupcakes with zoo animal picks and animal print wrappers. I also found the cutest animal print candles too!

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Part of the party package was a private animal encounter for the kids. We had a rat snake, bunny rabbit, centipede and the chicken pictured. It was nice a nice educational presentation with a zoo educator and the kids could ask questions and had the opportunity to pet the animals too!

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Finally the favors…I came up with these great little colorful canvas bags with animals on them, stuffed them with boxes animal crackers, zoo coloring books and crayons, animal print sunnies and an animal-themed beach ball too! All in all it was a roaring good time…Happy Birthday to my little guys!!!

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