It’s hard to beat those cute little jars of baby food when it comes to convenience. But if you’ve got the time and inclination, you don’t have to be Rachael Ray to make your own.

The tools of the trade are few:

• a blender (better still, a hand-turned baby food grinder)
• extra ice cube trays for freezing
• a steamer (handy for cooking vegetables to a soft texture while maintaining as many nutrients as possible)

From there, it’s really a matter of prepping the food (washing, peeling, slicing, as necessary), steaming or cooking, grinding it to the right texture for your baby’s age and development, and then feeding (adding breast milk, formula, or water as necessary for the right consistency) or freezing it.

As your baby gets older and relies more on solid food instead of breast milk or formula for nutrition, it’s increasingly important that she eat a wide variety of foods. So when she’s ready for more complex multi-ingredient fare, it’s useful to have a few resources on hand.

TIPS & NOTES:

• If you plan to make your own baby cereal, check with your pediatrician. He or she will want to make sure your baby is getting the same key vitamins and minerals that are found in fortified commercial infant cereals.

• Prep carefully. Scrub fruits and vegetables with a vegetable brush under running water and rinse well. Trim any hard or potentially choke-able pieces (stems, skins, pits, and seeds from fruits and veggies; skin, bones, and extra fat from meats).

• Don’t feed babies who are less than 6 months of age home-prepared beets, carrots, collard greens, spinach, or turnips. They are high in nitrates and can cause a type of anemia in young babies. (Commercial baby foods of these varieties contain only traces amounts of nitrates.)

• After freezing purees in ice cube trays covered with plastic wrap, transfer them to freezer-safe containers or plastic bags, and label the contents and date.

Remember those days when your ‘barely-toddler’ infant would take a hold of a stack of books and would ooh and ahh and the brightly colored pictures? If you answered yes, believe it or not, this is actually the beginnings of getting your child interested in reading. Literacy is the single most important skill a child can learn and yet there are so many that either simply do not enjoy recreational reading or will only do the bare minimum required by their teachers. Although raising an avid reader isn’t an easy task, it is still quite possible to do. With these simple tricks and tips, your child will begin seeing reading as an enjoyable pastime rather than grueling work.

Choose Learning Materials that Match Your Child’s Interests

Children feel accomplishment and empowered when they pick and choose what they read and when they read. A great trick would be to get reading material that matches your child’s interests and place them on their desk, in the livingroom area, etc. These materials can include anything from the newest installment of Twilight, to magazines, and comic books.

Sign Your Kids Up for a Library Card

Another great way to raise an avid reader is to get your child a library card in his or her name. Libraries are an inexpensive alternative to purchasing books that your child may or may not finish reading. If you do get your child a library card make sure you encourage them to use it by scheduling weekly library visits. One quick note here though, always make sure you have time for your child to peruse through the books and take their time picking out what they want. Visiting the library in a time-crunch spells disaster because there are just too many options for such a small amount of time.

Pick Up a Book & Read

If your child truly does not seem to be interested in reading you can always try to teach by example. When a child sees that a parent enjoys reading and takes time out of their day to read, it becomes more interesting to them. Children don’t like to miss out on anything that seems like fun, especially if an adult is doing it. Additionally, getting involved in bedtime stories can be a great way of peaking your child’s interest in reading. Make it fun, have them ad lib what will happen next, make funny character voices, do anything creative you can think of to get them to play along.

Deciding to become pregnant and start a family is a huge step in every couple’s lives. Most physicians agree that when a woman comes into their office for a pregnancy test, the results usually come as a surprise to their patient. These patients state they weren’t planning on having a baby and/or weren’t ready yet. Because of this the physician needs to begin the patient on vitamins immediately to ensure a healthy pregnancy. In contrast, deciding to become pregnant gives the couple a head start in ensuring that the pregnancy goes smoothly and that the baby is delivered happy and healthy.

With the right kind of preparation on your, you can give your baby the best start toward a healthy life. The months that you plan for your pregnancy give you time to prepare your body and make any necessary lifestyle changes. You can eat nutritiously, cut out alcohol and tobacco use, begin an exercise program, get your weight under control and talk to your doctor about any other medical concerns you have.

If you are considering having a baby and starting a family, the quick tips below can get you off to the right start.

• Exercise regularly.
• Find out if medications you take regularly can be decreased or discontinued. Ask your physician if they are safe to take during pregnancy.
• Get your weight under control. Pregnancy is not the time to lose weight.
• If you need X-rays or medical tests, get them done before trying to get pregnant.
• It’s a good time to control or to eliminate tobacco, alcohol or drug use.
• Decide who will deliver your baby.
• Check on your insurance coverage for pregnancy.

Paying attention to these details before you get pregnant makes your pregnancy safer and more enjoyable.