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Breakfast

What do your kids typically eat for breakfast? Mine like pancakes, waffles, cinnamon toast, and French toast. No – I don’t make those every morning, but they do eat at least one of those each morning…gotta love Eggo 😉

So when I read about the benefits of cereal for kids, I was momentarily upset with myself that we’d gotten into the frozen-toasted breakfasts. Until I remembered that the kids eat cereal as a snack pretty much all day. Fruity Cheerios (known by Burke as Rainbow Cheerios – formerly known as All Colors Cheerios) are a favorite in our house. Gotta love Cheerios!!

I received the following information (and vouchers for 4 boxes of free cereal – woot!) from MyBlogSpark and General Mills.

Did you know that ready-to-eat cereal eaters consume less fat, less cholesterol and more fiber than non-cereal eaters? Cereals also deliver important vitamins, minerals and other essential nutrients, making cereal a top source of key nutrients in children’s diets.

Other cereal benefits:

  • Ready-to-eat cereals, including pre-sweetened cereals, account for only 5% of sugar in children’s diets.
  • Ready-to-eat cereal is the No. 1 source of whole grains in a child’s diet today.
  • More frequent cereal eaters tend to have healthier body weights and lower Body Mass Index measures.

Studies also demonstrate the benefits of eating breakfast. A 1998 study showed that children who eat breakfast tend to perform better at school. Compared to children who skip breakfast, children who eat breakfast score higher on tests, are less likely to miss class or be tardy, have fewer reported discipline problems, and make fewer trips to the office.

For more information about kids and cereals, visit Cereal Health and Wellness.

Did you know that General Mills announced a commitment to further reduce sugar in cereals advertised to kids under 12 to single digit grams of sugar per serving? They’ve already been reducing sugar in cereals while increasing key nutrients, such as calcium and vitamin D, and providing whole grain.

Pretty cool, right?

Even better? A coupon for $1 off cereal from MyBlogSpark and General Mills.

Toy Review and Giveaway!

Sorry, this giveaway is now CLOSED.

Yesterday, MyBlogSpark.com and Hasbro sent me 2 toys to review. (You can see Burke and Marjorie testing them out in yesterday’s post.)

The Elefun & Friends collection, which includes Elefun, Hungry Hungry Hippos, and Gator Golf, provides a great way for parents and their kids to enjoy silly, active playtime together.

We received SCATTERPILLAR SCRAMBLE and GIRAFFALAFF LIMBO. The kids started out with Scramble and then went to Limbo and then came back to Scramble. Both games are for kids 4 years old and up.
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In SCATTERPILLAR SCRAMBLE kids do their best to balance marbles in the hands of one very wiggly caterpillar. Kids have fun dancing along to the music with Scatterpillar in this fast-paced marble game. The first player to securely place all 8 marbles in Scatterpillar’s hands wins. SCATTERPILLAR SCRAMBLE was named the 2009 Preschool Game of the Year by Creative Child Magazine.

Burke and Marjorie started out with this one…and quickly got frustrated because the Scatterpillar moves so much. However, they did come back to it when we talked about how it takes practice and that if they kept at it they’d be able to do the game in no time. I think part of their frustration was that the marbles would get away from them. Mike fixed this by putting the Scatterpillar in a box top – no more runaway marbles!

As the kids practiced, they actually got pretty good at it. They never really played the game, but they had fun putting marbles in Scatterpillar’s hands.

I liked this game because it teaches kid persistence and hand-eye coordination. It’s also fun to watch the Scatterpillar dance around.

GIRAFFALAFF LIMBO is the crazy new game of “how low can you go?” Spin the dial to try one of the 6 limbo styles: classic limbo, crab walk, crawl, giraffe walk, bend forward or backward. The game’s built-in sound will play an encouraging song as preschoolers try not to bump into Giraffalaff. If he’s knocked over, he´ll roll on the floor in laughter. The player who passes under Giraffalaff at the lowest level wins.

This one makes me laugh. Every time you knock the giraffe off the poles, he laughs…and it’s infectious. And I like that it gets the kids up off their butts and active! I don’t quite understand why the giraffe is up-side-down (apart from, you know, gravity), and it makes the limbo-er have to go very low, but it’s for kids, so I suppose that’s okay. (You won’t catch ME trying to go under that thing though!)

Burke and Marjorie had fun running around and ducking under the giraffe, but didn’t quite get the “spin and do the funny walk” part of the game. We’re working on that. They were really digging the music though – and doing well taking turns walking under.

Now for the Giveaway part.

Would you like your own Giraffalaff Limbo and Scatterpillar Scramble games to enjoy?

There are multiple ways to enter – you do not have to do all of them to be entered!

One entry each for the following comments left. Pick and choose the ones you want to do, but please leave a separate comment for each option – makes for easier random.org picking. 🙂

  • What is your favorite children’s toy? (And if you’d like to state why, I’m curious about that as well…but that won’t impact your entry 😉 )
  • What is your child’s favorite toy?\

You can also get more entries (1 each) if you:

  • Blog about this giveaway and link back to me (let me know with a comment please)
  • Tweet about this giveaway (please let me know with a direct link in your comment)

You have until Midnight on Monday, October 12th to enter. Random.org will choose the winner and I’ll post it on Tuesday the 13th.

But Wait! There’s More!

Once you’ve purchased (or won!)  an Elefun & Friends game, Kids can also experience the fantasy world of Elefun & Friends online by visiting www.elefunandfriends.com and entering the special code that can be found inside each Elefun & Friends game box. Once the code is entered, kids can access The Tangled Tale, an Elefun & Friends animated short. This entertaining tale features Elefun on an adventure to untangle a kite string, which ultimately leads him to the true meaning of friendship. The Elefun & Friends online experience also lets kids play games and sing along to songs like “Friends’ til the End” and “Follow that String” that help remind children of the importance of fun and play!

Coupon, Coupon, Coupon: visit http://bricks.coupons.com/bstart.asp?o=59048&c=EL&p=ERf0P5lm to download a printable coupon for $4 off any Elefun & Friends game! This valuable coupon offer is valid until December 31, but it´s only available for download through October 31.

Giveaway: Yoplait Kids Get Active Prize!

Sorry, this giveaway is now CLOSED.

Look what arrived on my doorstep from MyBlogSpark yesterday:

yoplait34

A free sample of Yoplait for Kids yogurt
and a Yoplait Get Active prize pack!

Just look at the COOL stuff in the Get Active prize pack! There’s a beach ball, a jump rope, a water bottle, a soft-sided insulated lunch box, a Frisbee, trackball, paddle ball, and a coupon for *FREE Yoplait Kids yogurt!!

*Apparently this coupon offer for a free six pack of Yoplait for Kids yogurt is not valid in some states, including Idaho, Louisiana, Nevada, New Jersey, North Dakota and Tennessee. Sorry 😦

My kids were so excited. First, yogurt is one of the only healthy things Burke asks for…and then requests more of when he’s polished off the first container. We always have kid’s yogurt in the house. And then both Burke and Maggie were calling “dibs” on the stuff in here, so you can see how desirable it is to kids. Although, I have to admit that Mike and I were excited too because we both had trackball sets when we were growing up. LOL

The best part? I get to give away THREE of these to my readers!! How do you enter to get one, you ask? Lots of ways! You’ll get one entry for each of the following if you:

  1. Leave a comment on this post telling me your kid’s favorite yogurt flavor.
  2. Leave another comment telling me what you do as a family to keep active. (Please keep it separate from the above comment so it’s easier for me to count!)
  3. Twitter about this giveaway, then come back and leave another comment with a direct link to the tweet.
  4. Blog about this giveaway – with a link directly to this post, then come back and leave another comment with a direct link to the post.

(Feel free to use this link: http://tinyurl.com/dzl54p for numbers 3 and 4 above.)

You have until midnight on Monday, March 30th. Random.org will choose the winners and I’ll announce them at some point on Tuesday, March 31st.

P.S. If you don’t win one of these prizes, you can still go here to print a coupon and learn more about Yoplait for Kids.