Re purposed Laundry Rack
How to Turn a Crib into a Laundry Rack
I once saw a picture in a magazine of the perfect clothes drying rack that I wanted for my laundry room. I passed it to my husband and said, “make this happen…. Please!”
Based on a set of free plans from the Home Depot website, he was able to replicate the design. These plans are no longer available online, but I did find something similar on HGTV.
Instead of building the structure from scratch, we used the side of an old crib that we picked up on the side of the road on big garbage day.
1. Cut the crib piece in half. You’ll know have two pieces that will need to be framed off. A 1×1 piece of pine will work for the frame.
2. Place the two crib pieces side by side.
3. Build a frame that will go around the two crib pieces. The measurements in these plans might be off depending on the size of your crib pieces. 1×3 for the frame will work.
4. Attach the crib pieces to the frame using hinges
5. Mount the magnets and the chains
6. Attach to the wall!
This is definitely a well-used addition to our laundry room. The magnets hold it flat against the wall when not in use, so it doesn’t take up any space. It’s a project using recycled materials, so you can feel good about that, too!
So, when you are cleaning out your basement, or on next big garbage day, find an old crib and turn it into a great feature for your laundry room!
Thank you to my awesome handy-man husband for making my laundry room dreams come true! And, for also doing the laundry much of the time!
If you are confused by any of these steps, of need some pointers, email info@valleyfamilyfun.ca!
What have you used to dry your clothes on? Leave me a note
Looking for other ideas of what to do with that old crib? My sister’s neighbour made this baby gate out of an old crib! 
Adventure Climbing Gym, Greenwich
Adventure Climbing Gym
Greenwich, NS
To cap off March Break, my friend and I decided to take our four boys (two 6-year olds, and two 7-year olds) climbing at the Adventure Gym in Greenwich. In exchange for some comps, I told the owner, Jon Foster, that I would share my experiences at the climbing wall. I have climbed before. Or, I should say, I attempted climbing before when I was a teenager.
Once was at a rock wall at a festival in Wales, and the other was actual rock climbing near Halifax. I was not very successful, but I did love repelling over the cliff top!
I just hoped that my boys had better climbing genes than I did! And, did they ever!
The Adventure Climbing Gym is located in Greenwich on Highway 358 towards Port Williams right at the old railway tracks. It is about a two minute drive from Exit 11 on Highway 101. Easy to find, and easy to get to.
We were greeted by Jon and his staff – who didn’t seem overwhelmed by four hyper-active, excited boys coming at him!
Each child was given a pair of climbing shoes. They run small, so ask for about two sizes above their regular shoe size. The room is compact, which is great, because it made it easy to watch all of the children at once. There is also a seating area for parents to sit and relax.We were not able to do this, as we were spotting and helping the children all the time. But, someday!
The wall is 15ft high, keeping it at a safe standard height for bouldering (climbing at lower levels without a rope). The flooring consists of 6 inches of foam layered at different densities then on top of that are 8 inch thick memory foam mats that are 8’x8’ so they cover most of the floor again.
These mats can be dragged around under where the kids are climbing for extra protection. I cannot tell you how much the boys loved climbing!
They said it was the highlight of their March Break and are already asking to go back again.
Climbing is about problem solving, using your body strength, and feeling proud at what you accomplished. They tried different routes, parts of the wall and cave, and didn’t stop for a full hour. They were completely exhausted.
Although the two 7-year olds were much more confident and capable, the 6-year olds still had a lot of fun, too. There is one section of the wall built for children with easier steps, including a crocodile feature.
I even managed to get up this section. Luckily, the camera’s battery died before we got a picture, though! Jon says that there have been 4-year olds climbing, but I would not take an average child younger than 6 as they don’t yet have the strength, courage, or length to reach.
We will definitely be back. Now that the boys know what to expect, and feel more confident, I know they will improve each time we go. For me, I will be happy to stay on the ground and let them have all the climbing fun!
The Adventure Climbing Gym also offers birthday parties. What a great and unique way to keep a group of kids active and entertained! When you go, wear loose-fitting clothes, and make sure to bring a drink. The cost is $12 per person for a day pass (and you can stay as long as you want) and $3 for shoes.
For our first time, an hour was sufficient for our crowd! Even if you are just curious, stop in to the Adventure Climbing Gym and peek your head in at the amazing set up. You will want to try it!
The Adventure Climbing Gym is great family fun! More information What are your climbing experiences?
You Can Teach an Old Dog New Tricks
You can teach an old dog new tricks
**This article is a re-print of one that I wrote six years ago for the Valley Shopper. It is reprinted with permission**
Meet Gracie. At the time, she was a three-year old German Shepherd – Blue Tick Hound cross (she’s now about 10). She was found roaming around Annapolis Royal. My husband David and I gave her a new lease on life by adopting her from the Companion Animal Protection Society (CAPS) in Annapolis County. Now, we are about to do it again.
Gracie has always been a nervous growler. This is manageable with adults, but when she started to growl at our then year-old son, we consulted our book, Child Proofing your Dog by Brian Kilcommons (it’s a marvelous baby shower gift!). In it, the author says that any time a dog growls at a child, you must get help immediately.
But we didn’t know where to turn for this help. Then friends of ours told us that in England they had used a dog behavioralist to deal with some problems with their new pound-rescue dog, Willow, with great success. We had never heard of such a profession before. We decided to consult with the bigwigs. This is where Cindy Cavanagh, a professional canine consultant with Keep it Simple Dog Training came in.
1. Do Your Research: According to Cindy, the number one reason dogs are given up to shelters is because of behavioral issues. With a little work, however, many of these problems are either avoidable or can be fixed. First, before you get your dog, do your research. How much exercise does this breed need? Is it good with children? Popular culture is not a good guide either: Disney’s 101 Dalmatians portrays the breed as cute and cuddly, when they can actually be quite aggressive.
2. Spay or Neuter: Kings County Animal Control Officer Darlene Millett says that pets need to be spayed or neutered. “Ninety-nine per cent of bites come from un-neutered male dogs because of their higher levels of testosterone.”
3. Take Obedience Classes: “you need to be committed to obedience classes,” says Darlene. “Dogs learn the most in the first year, so they need to be in a class by three to four months old.” Cindy also says that it is “early socialization skills that help dogs the most.”
4. Research the Facility: If you are adopting an older dog, research the facility where the dog is housed. A shelter should be able to tell you the dog’s history (as much as is known), and whether it would be a good match for your family. Breeders should know the entire history. “If you don’t like what you see, or you are not allowed to see the dogs, this is a warning sign. Leave,” says Cindy.
5. Look at Diet: If you are having problems with your dog, Darlene suggests looking at its diet. “Not all food agrees with all dogs, just like with people.” Some dog food is higher in energy, protein, or sugar which might cause the dog to become hyperactive or aggressive. Darlene tells of “one family that had a dog for seven years which constantly destroyed the house. They were ready to put the dog down. However, after changing its dog food, they called me after 24 hours saying it was now a completely different dog.” This dog’s life was saved. Darlene recommends that if you are going to try changing dog food, substitute in some of the new food each time over several days, so as to avoid digestion problems for the dog.
Advice for Us:
After spending over an hour with us, Cindy gave us some great tips for dealing with our growler Gracie. These apply to any dog.
1. Supervision: “When it comes to dogs and children, supervision, supervision, supervision is key. Leaving a dog alone with a toddler is like leaving a toddler alone with a pair of scissors.”
2. Make a Safe Place: Gracie needs to have a safe place where she can go to escape the toddler. “Place a baby gate across a doorway, and make the space beyond hers, and put in toys and treats,” says Cindy. “Praise the dog constantly. Praise her for not reacting to or avoiding the baby.”
3. Work on Obedience Training: “A dog that can immediately sit or lie down, even with distractions, will respond better in an emergency situation.”
4. Involve the Children: When children are old enough, have them help with giving the dog commands, so the dog will learn that the child is dominant.
“I can’t guarantee that by making these changes,” says Cindy, “that the dog will absolutely change, or will not bite. It’s a lot of work, but you need to try. Dogs make dog decisions, so we need to give them the tools and make decisions for them.”
If you are having trouble with your dog, consider your own behavior to make sure there isn’t something else you could be doing. Does the dog need to be spayed or neutered? Does it need more exercise? Better training? A new diet? There are many resources available, so be sure to talk to your local vet. You might just be able to save the life of another dog.
If you would like an in-house consultation and you are in the Annapolis Valley, Nova Scotia, contact Cindy Cavanagh at c.cavanagh@ns.sympatico.ca or through Keep it Simple Dog Training at 902-542-4637. Cindy also offers dog obedience classes and will soon be offering canine massage! Otherwise, contact your local vet for some suggestions.
What are your experiences with your dog? What worked or didn’t work?
Our family loves shelter dogs and think they can offer so much to your home life. Give a dog another chance by adopting from a shelter.
Need more reasons? Here’s a post all about why you need to have a shelter dog in your life.
Learning with Goldfish: Edible Math Activities
Edible Math Activities with Goldfish Crackers
When Campbell’s so generously mailed me a box of their Goldfish crackers to sample I couldn’t waste the opportunity to turn it into a learning experience!
Here are a few math activities that you can do with children using Goldfish crackers. An activity is always a lot more motivating when there is a snack involved! I used these activities with my sons aged 6 (grade primary) and aged 7 (grade 2). These ideas can be adapted to suit the age and ability of your child.
1. Basic Equations – Write out a few equations and have the child use Goldfish to figure out the answer.
For my older son, I gave him multiplication questions and he made sets to figure out the answer. For my younger son, I drew a cute picture with basic addition and subtraction questions for him to figure out using the Goldfish as a visual.
2. Ice cube Tray and Dice Game – Place an empty ice cube tray on a piece of paper and draw a box on the paper beneath each section of the tray. Give the child a die. Have her roll the die. Whatever number comes up, the child then takes that many Goldfish and places them in that section of the ice cube tray. Have the child write the number on the piece of paper in the appropriate box. As a bonus question, have the child add up all the boxes for a grand total.
3. Blind Taste Test Survey – Set out a bowl of each type of Goldfish cracker. Show the children which flavours there are. For this, we used pretzel, vanilla cupcake, whole wheat and rainbow flavours. Blindfold the child and have him guess which Goldfish he is eating.
Level up: We took this activity one step further. I wrote each boy’s name along the top of the paper with a “YES” and “NO” beneath it. After guessing which Goldfish he was eating, we made a tally chart of whether he was right (YES) or wrong (no). At the end, I taught them how to make a bar graph and pie chart to represent their responses.
4. Tic-Tac-Toe: Give the children two different types of Goldfish and draw a tic-tac-toe board for them to play on.
Not a lot of direct learning, but it sure is fun!
5. Complete the Pattern: Put different types of Goldfish in bowls and have the children make up patterns using them.
For this, I had each boy start a pattern and have his brother figure out the pattern and complete it.
6. Colour Sorting: For this, we used a snack pack size of the rainbow Goldfish. Give each child a packet of rainbow Goldfish and a piece of paper. Along the top of the paper write the four colours: red, green, yellow and orange. Have the children sort the colours of the fish and count how many there were of each colour.
We then compared the two different snack bag contents and as a bonus added up the number of fish in each bag. And yes! They were different! (Although, I’m sure that a few were sneaked before counting!)
7. Survey of Favourite Goldfish: Set out a bowl of each type of Goldfish. At the end of one piece of paper write “Like the most” and at the other end write “Like the least”. On another sheet of paper, list the types of Goldfish you are using for the activity.
One at a time, have the children test each Goldfish and place the bowls on the first paper in order of what they like the most to what they like the least. For our activity, we used four types of Goldfish. Therefore, the “most” was awarded four points, and the “least” one point, with the others getting two and three points in between.
We then wrote that number of points beside that type of Goldfish in the list. For example, Thomas liked the pretzel Goldfish the best, so it was given four points. The vanilla cupcake Goldfish were given three points, the rainbow – two and the whole wheat ones that he liked the least were given one point. All three of us did this.
The total points for each type of Goldfish were added up, and for us, the vanilla cupcake Goldfish was the clear winner!
Our family loves Goldfish and we had great fun testing the new flavours (especially the vanilla cupcake ones). I highly recommend testing, and maybe trying a few of these learning activities with your kids!
Can you think of other learning activities that you could do with Goldfish?
Fun with Food Shapes
Teddy Bear Egg/Pancake Rings by Norpro
With Shrove Tuesday right around the corner we wanted to try some cute teddy-bear shaped pancakes for the kids.
The package says: Cooks perfect bear shaped eggs and pancakes. What could go wrong? Plenty – you’ll see!
Using the recipe on the back of the package, I mixed the batter. It was much thicker with more bubbles than I was used to using.
I followed the directions and sprayed the rings before use, added the batter and waited for the pancakes to cook. That was the problem. They were so thick that they didn’t cook all the way through.
I had to use two spatulas to try to flip them – decapitating one bear in the interim!
I felt that my finished product should have been featured on Pinterest with a “NAILED IT” post next to it! I didn’t give up, but tried the next time with pancake mix.
Because the batter wasn’t as stiff as before, when the ring was removed, the batter ran over.
Take 2: Using Eggs My husband made the omelet using the recipe on the back of the package. His turned out much better than my pancakes, with only some egg running off – which he was able to trim off.
Overall: Give this product a miss.
For the amount of effort and the final result, it wasn’t worth it. Instead, stop in to Absolutely Fabulous Bed Bath and Home in New Minas and check out their wide array of cookie cutters. Cook a regular pancake and cut it out with a cookie cutter to have a shaped breakfast! As they used to say on Street Cents: Norpro’s Teddy Bear Egg/Pancake Rings are “For the Pit!”
Heart-shaped Egg Mould by Kitchen Craft
When Cathy from Absolutely Fabulous handed me a mould that would shape my hardboiled eggs, I couldn’t believe that it would work!
I had to try it out. Boil an egg. Peel off the shell. Place the egg in the mould and snap on the lid.
Place the mould in a bowl of cold water for about 15 minutes.
Open and voila! It’s a shaped egg. It’s that easy!
When I served the boys each a heart-shaped egg for lunch they were so excited! “Mommy, this is the coolest thing ever!” “Can we have this lots more?”
Since then, I’ve included heart-shaped eggs in their school lunch (instead of a sandwich along with some cheese and crackers) and use them as a topper for a spinach salad.
OVERALL: This is a fun product that I will definitely use a lot. It would also be worthwhile to buy two moulds so that it is faster to make more eggs, as each one takes 15 minutes.
This product retails for $8.99 at Absolutely Fabulous in New Minas. Absolutely Fabulous Bed Bath and Home is located at 8927 Commercial Street across from the movie theatre.
Stop in! They have everything to meet your bed, bath and home needs! Live! Love! Local!
What fun-shaped food experiences do you have?
Accentuate your Curves
“It’s a great day to be at Curves!” When both of my boys started school this year, one of my goals was to get in shape. Living a five-minute walk from the Kentville Curves, I had no excuse! I do not like big gyms and I get bored working out. Curves had everything I was looking for. I started last October, and I feel great. I’ve lost weight, my muscles are stronger, I’ve made new friends, and I am meeting my fitness goals. When I started, I would say “it’s better than sitting at home at my computer.” I knew I was getting a workout, but I wasn’t sure how much. That was until Jillian Michaels came into my life. Not having a TV, I had to Google her to find out that she was the fitness trainer on the reality show The Biggest Loser. However, much nicer. This is a new program that has been instituted in all Curves. In 30 minutes, you go around a circuit alternating between hydraulic weight machines and floor work. There is a video with Jillian Michaels playing and she instructs you to the exercises you do between machines. This is the best workout I have had in a long time. For the first few weeks, I could barely sit down as my muscles hurt so much. Now, I am so much stronger and healthier, and I love going. These videos change once a month, so it keeps you on your toes! It appeals not only to the 20-40somethings, but also to the 70-80s that are at the gym. The great thing is that you can do as little or as much as you want – or none at all. And, it only takes 30 minutes of your day. It’s better than sitting at your desk! In fact, before I wrote this post, I decided to get re-measured. I’ve been going to Curves three times a week for four months.
In four months I’ve lost: – 0.5 inches off my arms (0.25 off each) – 0.75 inches off my waist – 0.5 inches from my abdomen – 0.25 inches from my waist – 1.5 inches from my thighs (0.75 off each) Overall, that’s down 3.5 inches! Imagine what another four months will bring!
It’s Prom Time!
Right now Kentville Curves has a special on for high school or university/college students. You can get a 4-month membership (regularly $129) on sale for only $99 + HST. Imagine how great you’ll feel in just four months. I did! This offer is only available at the Kentville Curves in Nova Scotia.
Give it a Try!
If you have never tried Curves, or used to be a member, it’s worth coming back for your free week trial to test out the new Jillian Michaels program. The staff are great and ready to train you when you come. Make a commitment to yourself! Kentville Curves is located at the lower level of the Cornwallis Inn with lots of free parking! Or, to find a Curves near you call 1.800.CURVES30. CURVES WEBSITE NOTE: Kentville Curves is also featured on the Kentville video about quality of life. Here’s a screen shot with me working out at Curves! **I am a member of Curves. Kentville Curves has also paid for an advertisement on Valley Family Fun. All opinions are my own.** Tell me about your experiences!
