Food Labeling, You Should Let Your Kids Be Bored, and more
Randomness, for your Thursday.
New, Improved Food Labeling Bill
Food labels confuse a lot of consumers, and this confusion produces a lot of food waste (Is food still safe to eat after a "best by" date? Most people assume no, and throw it out.) Plus, so many states have different rules about food labeling, and that muddies the waters even further.
I feel like I keep hearing talk about label changing, but nothing has happened so far. However, there's a bill afoot that would clear up the confusion and simplify the way food freshness is labeled.
It was just introduced in May, and I have no idea how likely it'll pass, or how long it would take for the changes to be implemented, but I do love the idea of a simpler and more consistent method of labeling.]
(Hat tip to reader Savannah for sending me the article!)
Psychologists recommend children be bored
If you're feeling like you need to spend lots of time and money to keep your children entertained this summer, read this article, and you'll feel better.
Apparently, a little boredom helps kids become more creative and self-reliant:
“If parents spend all their time filling up their child’s spare time, then the child’s never going to learn to do this for themselves.â€
We've been using our new fire pit!
In April, when Mr. FG was gone for a week, Joshua, my dad, and I built a fire pit in our yard for a surprise. We had a lot of rain after we built the fire pit, but recently, we've had a run of good evening weather, so we've been using it a lot more.
Our oak trees drop a lot (a lot a lot a lot) of branches and twigs, which means we always have plenty of kindling to get our fires going.
We don't necessarily roast marshmallows every time...it's just that the fire makes a nice spot to hang out and spend time with each other.
I'm winning at the fun stuff on my bucket list.
I haven't been super productive this week...but we have hung out with friends a lot, we've been to the pool twice, and we went to a movie at the cheap theater too.
Maybe next week I can declutter. 😉
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I'll be back tomorrow with a menu/grocery post. Happy Thursday to you!
I always liked the line from South Park on the real danger of pot. "... pot makes you feel fine with being bored, and it's when you're bored that you should be learning some new skill or discovering some new science or being creative. If you smoke pot you may grow up to find out that you aren't good at anything."
As per food labeling, the only one I actually pay attention to is baby formula (which is the only one that means anything.) Everything else I use my eyes and nose to determine.
Yes! I think it's important not to have constant stimulation as a kid--you learn to do a lot more by yourself. In the summers we would just go sit outside--no entertainment from parents or iPads required. 🙂
And woohoo for a better food labeling bill! If only we could get something equitable to France's zero food waste law, then I would be a very happy camper.
Yes, I'm all for better food labeling! Right now, it's incredibly complicated. And I have fond memories of us sitting around a fire in our back yard (but being country folk, we just used the ground, not a fire pit) and watching our kids cook hot dogs or toast marshmallows, as we talked.
I remember being bored as a kid in summer, and my kids got bored in the summer. It happens. But, as pointed out, that's when the imagination kicks in. Inventing a new game, dreaming up another land and time and telling stories about it, making things out of sticks and leaves and acorn caps, making treasure maps for buried "treasure" that we could never locate again... that's the sort of things I, and later my kids, did to escape boredom. And there were always books, lots of books to read for long happy hours. I remember my mother, usually toiling away at housework when my siblings and I complained of boredom, saying to us many times, "If you're bored, think of something to do. If you can't think of anything, trust me, I can find something for you to do." Funnily enough, we always managed to come up with an idea on our own after that comment!
When my son was small, he used to ask to return from any vacation a few days early so that he had time to "do nothing" before school began again. I think he got it from me: even now I love being home puttering, reading, thinking... Doing nothing really isn't doing nothing, is it? Also,I do believe resourcefulness can be learned if kids are not having a catered activity service.
I love our food labelling laws in Australia. I look to the all the time.
I believe in boredom. My children learned to make their fun and now they are thankful for it.
I think it is so very important to have time to be bored. We all need that unscheduled time to allow ourselves to just be, to read, watch tv, sit in the sun, etc. Our youngest is home from college for the summer. She lived in her sorority house during the school year with 60+ other girls so there was always someone to talk to, hang out with, an opportunity to go do something. The first 3-4 weeks that she was home she complained incessantly about there being "nothing to do." I have noticed that in the past 2 weeks she has taken up reading again - - she's been to the library 2x and is on her 3rd book. Somehow I think she's found her way through that transition just fine and is enjoying her "alone" time again. For a parent, I think having to hear the complaining and stopping ourselves from doing anything about it for our child is the hardest part.
When I was young and got bored, I'd go to my mother and complain" there's nothing to do". She would then assign me something like scrubbing the toilet. I soon learned to entertain myself.