Importance & Benefits of gardening

Gardening with kids is a great outdoor activity which allows the whole family to participate. Selecting your flowers and vegetables, making the earth and planting and harvesting, gardening with kids could be a wonderful way to spend time with your child/children and a healthy hobby which all can enjoy. Working in the garden, helps a child build all senses and children learn to work together and share.
Now a day, children spend more time sitting in front of their computers & TV than playing outdoors. A study by the California Department of Education, kids' fitness levels may affect their performance in school. The Study done by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found exactly the same results on academic performance. The study revealed that increased amounts of physical fitness translated into higher academic achievement. The benefits were most evident in tough subjects like math scores. It is also found that girls at a higher fitness level had better achievement than boys.
Does your child consume the recommended five servings of fruits and vegetables each day? We have known for years that fruits and vegetables provide essential protein, vitamins, minerals, and fiber that keep us healthy. According to the nationwide nutrition survey research, daily consumption of fruits and vegetables decrease risk of stroke, cancer, and heart disease, improved memory and lower blood sugar levels. So why not try this.
Following are the Benefits of gardening with your children:
• Social and Life Skills
• Science
• Relaxation
• Environmental Awareness
• Quality time with family
Following are some tips for gardening with your children:
• Before you start, Study what kind of climate you have. Once you know your zone, you can find out and choose what plants to select.
• Allocate a place where your child will be gardening.
• Guide them about the importance of quality soil and soil preparation.
• Before starting a garden with your children, the first thing you should do is remove any large debris, rocks, and branches.
• Let the kids lay out the shape of the garden.
• Ask your kids what kind of plants, vegetables or flowers they like to plant and let your kids pick them out.
• Explain them what will work well in the garden and what won't.
• Let them help in the seeds selection and blossoming plants at the nursery. Let your child do the money calculations.
• Depending on your kid's age, let him dig, weed, or watering. This is a great way for your child to explore.
• Get them their own gardening gear. Nothing will motivate your little gardener more than having their own little shovel, gardening gloves, watering pail, and colored rubber boots.
• Plant some quick growers to keep the child's interest or purchase plants from garden center.
• Watch plants breed and enjoy time together in nurturing nature.
Gardening with children could benefit both children and adults and it's all about having fun and learning together. Gardening & nature are great stress relievers, enhance the environment, develop individuals, and build communities.

We at toyscamp have a range of gardening supplies for kids

Toyscamp Coupons to share

For your upcoming holiday gift needs use following toyscamp coupons for diffrent purpose:

use Toyscamp coupon code "PTHNK09" to receive FREE SHIPPING on orders over $49 and above at http://www.toyscamp.com

use Toyscamp coupon code "10OFF009" to receive $10 off on orders over $50 and above at http://www.toyscamp.com

use Toyscamp coupon code "5OFF2009" to recieve $5 off on orders over $30 and above at http://www.toyscamp.com

Time for Lego Advent Calender

We at toyscamp have always been big lego fans. we like to build them, suggest them as gifts and always wait for the new ones to come out. Lego is a number one recognized brand in the world and we know that they keep up to it.

The one product we always anticipate is the Lego Advent Calendar. They come up with new advent calendar almost every year.I highly recommend this. I have a 7 year old and a 11 year old and bought this for the first time last year and my kids went crazy. They loved waking up every morning and making their lego for the day before going to school - it was so nice to see big smiles on their faces before leaving for school. The pieces you get are really neat and can be used all year long...I will purchase this every year until the kids tell me otherwise. GREAT HIT in our Toyscamp family.

For more info click here Lego Advent Calender 2009

Essay Writting Contest

After the reaction of my kids of the first day of school, I decided to start a contest for essay writting for Toyscamp, Inc. To enter the contest a child just has to to submit an essay of its experience of the first day of school. Would like to see how children express the experience and what they like and dislike about the first day of school!

Schools First Day

Wow on Thursday both my kids start school!!! and i got both of them cute backpacks from toyscamp . Well both of them are a little nervous. The older one starts middle school and is anxious about lockers, changing classes, and a new large school. The younger one is just anxious if the teacher would be Fun. Well i have tried talking to them about not being nervous and going easy but would like to see how other moms handle this!! Feel free to post your thoughts....

The Winter Months with Kids

This winter has been really colder than usual. Cutting down the skiing weekends due to the cold not sure what activities to do with the kids. My older one is lately actually getting interested in cooking and so I have decided to teach him some basic cooking. He can usually come up with good Nachos in the microwave but i think he is a little young to handle the stove yet so I try to stick with simple oven recipes. So if you have any good kid friendly recipes let me know. Till then i got some kids cooking aprons and mitten and a recipe box for him. They were good and quick on shipping the item.

I went shopping outside on my lunch break and I realized the cardio isn't worth the hassle. I ventured out to toy stores, department stores, 99 cent stores and everything in between and every time I reached for a box of jolly-good-times for the kids' Holiday Party, my hand hesitated: Am I getting a good deal? Do other parents like this make-at-home kit? Will this entertain thirteen children on a sugar high? So, of course, I did what any exhausted mother would do after work, picking up her sons, feeding them and taking them to soccer practice and feeding them again. I ate and slept. Well, for ten minutes. Then my husband needed to eat and my sons wanted to eat again and my youngest one wanted to dazzle me with his admittedly impressive addition skills. Finally, with the house quiet except for occasional squeaks and giggles coming from the boys' room, I did my kind of shopping: with hot chocolate, a toasted bagel and in a padded chair. I surfed through millions of toy sites and online shops selling everything from Little Einsteins Christmas Wish (ironic, no?) to entire Santa's workshops bigger than my house and read more product reviews than I would have liked. Finally, glimmers of hope. I came across some creative DIY toys that were perfectly priced and culturally encompassing that seem like they could hold the interest of a gnat for hours. I'm loving the Two Square Plates and Memory Tiles because my oldest one likes to have a blank canvas to create on rather than working with something already cut out for him. And I know all the kids will love the Holiday Cards and it's something we can do with them. Plus it'll be a nice break between the 8 dinner courses. Let's see, three toy projects for thirteen kids? Probably not enough. Darn, guess I'll have to plop myself in this comfy chair and make more hot chocolate tomorrow...