The Best (and Worst) Gingerbread House Kits

The Results All Parents with Young Children Have Been Waiting for: The best and worst gingerbread house kits of the season! I recently volunteered in a fifth grade classroom to oversee and help about thirty 10-year-olds who were instructed to bring their own gingerbread house kit and build a gingerbread house. They were given an hour to build their house (or train, or village—there was quite a variety), and what I witnessed immediately was that some kids quickly assembled their houses and arrived at the fun part, the decorating, while others struggled with a pile of frosting-covered gingerbread pieces that collapsed time and time again. So what could I do (besides try to help them, some to no avail)? The journalist in me circulated the room and took notes about the best—and the worst—gingerbread house kits. Here are the winners and the losers, with as much information as I was able to garner from the kids about their purchases: BEST: The top two winners of the day were: 1. Wonka Gingerbread Cottage Kit ($9.99), and 2. Tootsie Roll Gingerbread Cottage Kit ($9.99) These two kits are made by a company called Bee, and are sold at Ralph’s supermarket. They were almost identical to each other, and very easy to assemble. The children with these kits quickly put their houses together (make sure you knead the icing well before opening), and had a great deal of fun decorating them with the delicious candies included in the box. The houses stood firm and solid, and the kids were happy! GOOD: Bed Bath & Beyond sells the Create-A-Treat gingerbread house kit ($9.99), which was not only easy to assemble and decorate, but the strong, high-quality icing left one child with his hands almost completely clean! (Note: This house may also be available at Albertson’s supermarket.) Tied with the BBB kit above was Trader Joe’s Gingerbread House Kit ($7.99). This kit is very easy to assemble, and contains adorable decorations such as two little people made of colorful sugar, a tiny tree, and a little dog. The only drawback is that the icing mixture requires one egg white and lemon juice or vinegar. One parent brought a canister of store-bought icing, which worked fine as a replacement icing. AVERAGE: Create-A-Treat also makes a gingerbread train kit ($9.99). The train was fairly easy to assemble, but the children did not seem as pleased with the train as they did with the house. UNCHALLENGING (and therefore below average): Wal-mart sells the Wilton gingerbread kit, which contains a pre-assembled house that is, of course, easy to decorate. However, this “no assembly required” situation took the challenge out of building a house, and the children with this version ended up with too much free time on their hands. They spent the afternoon squeezing icing into their mouths (and subsequently driving their teacher nuts!). POOR: Target sells a gingerbread cookie house kit in a cute house-shaped box with a convenient handle. Several children were able to assemble these houses, but soon after they did, the houses collapsed. Some kids were persistent enough to keep trying. They received help from classmates and adults who came to the rescue with extra icing (the kit apparently does not supply enough icing, which is the key to effectively assembling any solid gingerbread house). Still, some houses never stayed together. Several students sat with their arms crossed in frustration. Target also sells a gingerbread cookie village kit. This version comes with many small pieces, some of which were broken. The village was decidedly difficult to assemble, and therefore disappointing. WORST: The two worst kits were Bed Bath & Beyond’s Elf on the Shelf An Elf’s Story gingerbread house and Wal-mart’s Wilton gingerbread deluxe kit. Ironically, these were also the most expensive kits ($14.99). The Elf’s Story gingerbread house contained big, heavy, awkward pieces. It didn’t take an expert to see that the roof pieces were entirely too large and heavy to be held in place by the smaller pieces that comprised the base of the house. I tried helping one student with this kit, and while she was incredibly patient, the house never stayed together longer than a minute before it fell down again. (One of the pieces was also broken.) Finally, Wal-mart’s Wilton gingerbread deluxe kit was the biggest—literally—let down of the day. The pieces were too big and cumbersome to stay together for any amount of time. And the little girl who was stuck with this kit was a perfectionist; the teacher had to explain to her that it wasn’t her fault that the house would not work, but rather, the faulty construction of the kit. The two most important tips are to buy a middle-of-the-road-sized house (too big or too small makes the assembly difficult), and use plenty of icing. Happy gingerbread house hunting!

Explaining Suicidal Depression to the Non-Afflicted

In the wake of Robin Williams’ tragic death, people all over the world are posting their thoughts and opinions about depression and suicide. Having spoken with several people who have never considered taking their own lives, who consider suicide to be the “wrong” or “weak” choice, and who advocate “just getting over” one’s sadness, I want to speak out for those of us on the other side, those of us who understand the weight and torment of suicidal thoughts. Professionals often say that depression is “anger turned inward.” Anger, of course, is a feeling that is typically triggered by some external event. Sadness is the same way. Depression, in my experience, is not only a feeling, but a condition—a long-term negative psychological state that carries real physical risks to a person’s life situation and well being. The most severe kind of depression—suicidal depression—can be likened to the condition of rage. Unlike anger, rage is not a fleeting feeling that just crops up after one negative experience. Rage is a deep-seated condition brewing within a person over the long-term. While anger might cause us to give someone the finger on the freeway, rage is what leads people to run someone off the road, or plot mass killings. For the sake of making a distinction between suicidal depression and sadness, I’m going to suggest that it is like comparing rage to anger. Rage often causes a person to inflict outward damage upon others. Suicidal depression often causes a person to inflict harm or even death upon him or herself. One is outward; the other is inward. Both rage and suicidal depression are deeply rooted conditions that a person cannot easily “just get over” without some form of help, be it counseling, medication, meditation, prayer, or some other long-term treatment or combination of treatments. The roots are too deep to be yanked out, and it doesn’t help when someone says, “Just get over it” or, “Everyone feels depressed from time to time.” If you have not been suicidal, I hope you never will be. It is arguably the most painful condition that a person can experience—the desire to leave this world. Suicide is not selfish, nor is it an act of cowardice; suicide is a last resort to escape an unbearable kind of inner agony and hopelessness that seems, to the sufferer, permanent and untreatable. A wise person once said, “We cannot judge what we do not fully understand. We do not fully understand anything.” I think, in the case of suicidal depression, and even rage, none of us has full understanding. But we can breed compassion.

The Value of Saying "No" to Our Kids

If I can offer one piece of sanity-saving advice to parents of young children, it is this: Say no. Say it early, and say it often. The 21st century has seen remarkable changes regarding the dynamics of parent-child relationships, at least in the middle and upper classes in the United States. This shift might cause some of us to ask who’s really in change: the parents, or the kids? As parents are busier than ever, striving to achieve the life-work balance, our children are doing more and asking for more, on a daily, moment by moment basis. I see many parents—myself included—become pushovers as their kids beg for new toys and more play dates. We cannot seem to handle their discomfort with the word “no,” and so we let their constant begging push us into a reluctant “yes.” Most of us are exhausted from the constant social engagements we agree to, and yet, when we could cut ourselves a break by turning down certain activities, we often don’t. Then we wonder why our kids act spoiled and entitled, while we feel tired and underappreciated. Let me explain with a brief story. I remember one Saturday in October, three years ago, when my daughter was seven. She has always been advanced in her artistic abilities, and that year, a drawing she created was chosen by a local organization to be entered into a contest. The only requirement for entry was that she show up at 10AM and paint a replica of her drawing on a storefront window in the business district of our town. Paint, buckets and brushes would be provided, along with a pizza lunch. They gave the contestants five hours to do the work. Well, if you can imagine a seven-year-old trying to cover an entire storefront window with an elaborate Halloween-themed painting, you might understand what we were up against. Not only that, but we were invited to a birthday party that afternoon from 1PM to 5PM. I had already told my friend that we would be there, but we would be late, and we would have to leave early, because we were invited to yet another party—a Halloween party—at a friend’s house down the street. Now, I will say, it’s always an honor when friends and acquaintances want to include my daughter and me in their special festivities. For this reason alone, I used to say yes to everything, no matter how tight my schedule, and despite my introverted personality. And this party in particular seemed like one we shouldn’t miss—complete with pony rides and a petting zoo. But when I heard my friend’s disappointed sigh that we would be restricted on both ends of the joint birthday party she was hosting for her two children (which meant purchasing not one, but two gifts, under my tight budget—that’s fodder for another essay), I thought, “Why doesn’t she understand?” What I should have thought is, “Maybe I’m doing too much. Maybe it’s time to just say no.” Once the Halloween painting was finished, my daughter and I went home to clean ourselves up and change for the birthday party. And when we decided it was time to leave the birthday party, we went home and changed again, into our Halloween costumes. Before we left for the party, I remember guzzling a diet Coke and telling my daughter, “I need a few minutes to myself. I’m tired.” And instead of taking a nap, I proceeded to hula-hoop for fifteen minutes in the middle of our living room, in order to get re-energized for our third big event of the day. At the end of all this madness, I was exhausted, trying to subdue my irritability from feeling rushed, overbooked and over-socialized. Compounding my own feelings, my daughter grew angry and yelled at me when I said it was time to leave the Halloween party. I resented the fact that her seven-year-old brain didn’t see how much of myself I had sacrificed that day, to keep her active and involved within the community and with her friends. She, of course, was too young to understand why she was angry at me. Quite possibly, as most parents might guess, her anger was an expression of overstimulation and fatigue. It comes down to a very simple concept: Kids these days are not learning how to be bored. They are constantly surrounded by screens of all kinds—iPhones, iPads, iPods, video games, television. They are inundated with invitations to parties and are overscheduled for extracurricular activities. The greatest gift we can give them, and ourselves, is a healthy, regular dose of downtime to become friends with silence and inactivity. That, in my opinion, is the surest way to secure a sense of peace within ourselves. Recently, while attending the annual fundraising festival at my daughter’s elementary school, I overheard another parent discussing her plans for the day. The mother of two exclaimed, “Oh gosh, look at the time. We need to go. We still have two birthday parties to go to—one this afternoon, and one tonight.” I wanted to interrupt that mother and save her. I was tempted to say, “Why are you torturing yourself? Don’t do it. Go home. Relax. You have a long way to go in this parenting thing, and the sooner you learn how to say no (and I recommend making it an unqualified, simple, “N-O”), the sooner your kids will learn how to adjust to boredom, and to accept the way the real world works.” Of course, I kept my mouth shut. I didn't know the woman well enough to offer advice, and maybe she enjoyed keeping a busy weekend schedule. While every family is different, I believe that in general, we are doing our children a grave disservice by saying yes to every social invitation that falls into our lap. I’m reminded of the Rolling Stones song, “You can’t always get what you want.” When we say yes to our children too much, they start believing that they can get what they want, and that our sacrifices are limitless. We are perpetuating a cycle that becomes addictive to our kids. At the end of the day, when we realize we have done too much and given too much, we only have ourselves to blame for failing to draw healthy boundaries. By contrast, when children hear equal amounts of “no” and “yes,” the “yes’s” become more meaningful, and the “no’s” easier to accept. I think that by striking a balance, we can avoid spoiling our children, while maintaining our own sanity in the process. What could be more valuable?

Why Anger Hurts - And How to Heal

How many times have we been told that anger only (or mostly) hurts the person who is angry? Or that we should forgive others for our own sake? Anyone who's ever been angry, or frustrated, or held a grudge, which is pretty much 100% of the human population, knows that negative emotions hurt, emotionally. But are there other proven, perhaps long-term physical effects of being angry, or negative? Think of a car that is constantly being driven too fast, taking sharp turns without slowing down. Or a dishwasher that is always full, always running, the water temperature set on "hot." We would expect these machines to experience stress in some areas, to wear out from all the pressure, right? Well, the same could be said about the human body if it's frequently tuned to red: anger, or some similar upsetting state. According to Ted Zeff, PhD, author of The Highly Sensitive Person's Survival Guide, "When you become upset with someone, chemical changes occur in your body. When you are feeling resentment and frustration, stress hormones activate the central nervous system and you eventually become habituated to increased muscle tension, heart rate, and blood pressure." In the short term, these conditions might not seem terrible, but consider what happens when our body's hormones begin working against us. Zeff says that a stress hormone called "catecholamine," which is similar to adrenaline, is released during acute anger. An excess of this hormone produces apprehension, anxiety, and fear. When catecholamine increases the heart rate, cardiac problems can result. In addition, when a person is upset in terms of anger, frustration, or resentment, there is an excess of cortisol in the blood stream. This hormone, when present, actually increases agitation, while decreasing serotonin--the hormone that helps us feel calm, happy, and fulfilled. Therefore, becoming intensely angry on a regular basis is like adding fire to fire; the more angry a person feels, the longer they will feel angry, and the harder it will become to put out the flames. Finally, Zeff states, in a chronic angry state, our endorphins, which create a sense of joy, literally dry up. Chronic anger, then, can lead to depression. No doubt, when someone's actions or words upset us, it is easy and natural to become angry. We're only human, after all. However, anger is, quite literally, bad for our health. Many experts tout the benefits of practices such as meditation, yoga, and exercise, to stabilize our emotions. But sometimes, especially for those of us who struggle with intense, chronic anger, this advice is too generic. For those of us who are tired of chronic negative states, those of us who wish to avoid letting anger affect us or our relationships for too long, Zeff suggests the following scripted "heart-centered visualization" meditation: "Think of a recent experience when you felt hurt by another person and became angry. Is your attention focused on your head or your heart? Now breathe deeply and slowly into your belly. Focus on the air filling your abdomen and slowly exhale. Now shift your awareness to the left hand...left elbow...left shoulder...left side of chest into your heart. Feel your heart expanding with love. Deeply experience the peace and harmony in the stillness and calmness of being centered in your heart. Next visualize a positive experience that you've had with the same person. How did you feel toward that person then? Take plenty of time to really visualize their good qualities. Ask yourself, can you let go of the anger? Will you let go of the anger? When will you let go of the anger? The heart knows only love and will always let go of anger. Keep returning to the heart until you have released the anger. Once you have released the anger, you have shifted from a head-centered judgmental framework to heart-centered, caring love." Of Zeff's script, certain skeptics (like myself) might ask, "If the heart knows only love, why does anger make the heart race?" My proposed answer is this: The heart WANTS to know only love, and by depriving the heart of love even for a minute while anger takes a hold of us, our heart grows frightened, like an infant suddenly yanked from its mother, yearning for the familiarity of comfort, of peace, of love. Our hearts don't desire to be overwhelmed with anger anymore than our lungs want to be clogged with tar, or our livers flooded with alcohol. So the next time someone angers you, consider trying the above meditation, or at least looking closely at how anger affects you. I know I don't like the way anger hurts my body, which is why I chose to study this topic. We are a world plagued with anger and hatred, and as Ghandi once said, "If we follow the belief of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, the entire world would be blind and toothless." I already have poor eyesight and bad teeth; at this age, I would be wise to focus on nurturing my heart.

Life Lesson #147: Let Go

This push-and-pull effort, this calculating, this predicting--this attempt to control all the little details--it is dangerous, at best. It is a disease lurking on the outskirts of sanity: A guaranteed, slow, painful death. For there is no control of anything in this life, only the illusion of control, and we strangle ourselves daily with the cords of this illusion. To let go is to untangle ourselves, to set ourselves and everyone around us free, so that we might do more than exist; we might live.

Power Cleaning: Tips for sanity in the home office

"Out of sight, out of mind." Perhaps this is the adage that makes or breaks it for anyone daring enough to work from home. (Yes, I know you out-of-home workers are cringing, saying how jealous you are, that you wish you could roll out of bed in your pajamas and crawl to your desk with your cup of coffee and begin work without a commute. But in truth, working from home, like everything in life, has it's own unique pro's and con's.) Those who commute to the office each day leave their chores behind. I've never read a study that compares the productivity of an office worker versus a home office worker, but my guess is our productivity is, if not less altogether, at least less consistent. Why? The answer just might lurk somewhere within those nasty window smudges that glare at us all day long, because whose responsibility is it to wipe them away? Ours. This morning, my cluttered apartment was mocking me as I attempted to compile a list of research questions for an interview I had scheduled at 11:30. I thought to myself, as I think every...single...glaringly cluttered and smudged day: "How can I focus in this place?" Today, instead of spinning in circles--literally or figuratively--I performed an experiment. "Fifteen minutes," I said. I walked to the kitchen and set the timer on the oven for twelve minutes, knowing I would need about a three-minute warning, that I could not just drop my mop and my can of Lysol as soon as the timer beeped. I'm no stranger to power yoga, or power walking, but power cleaning is a new concept for me. I set that timer, and quickly tackled the messes that were the most nagging, the most immediate, the most obvious. In twelve quick minutes, I managed to put away my daughter's Barbies and morning craft projects, run the trash out to the dumpster, wash our breakfast dishes, Windex my bathroom mirrors, and disinfect the kitchen counter tops. At that point, the beeping ensued. I rushed to the bedroom and put away half of the folded laundry, saving the rest for another day's fifteen minutes of power cleaning. And then I sat down on the couch and wrote this sloppy blog post, which I refuse to proofread; that might take another twelve to fifteen minutes. If you've done any power cleaning today, please don't blog about it. For life's sake, get on with your life. :)

Brainstorm Walkrain

What is it about walking that stirs the brain, resuscitates memory?