Rules for Exotic Pets and Children

Question: Are Exotic Pets Good for Kids?
Many parents consider getting exotic pets such as rabbits, hamsters, guinea pig, lizards, and turtles for their kids. But are exotic pets a good choice for children?

Answer: The short answer: it depends. While there are definitely benefits to pet ownership for kids, parents of younger kids (e.g. preschoolers) may want to think twice about getting an exotic pet for their kids, simply because it may be hard to find a pet that is a good match for young kids. Even with older kids, it can be a challenge to find the right kind of pet. Whether an exotic pet of any sort is a good choice as a pet for your kids depends on several things:

*maturity level of the children
*the type of exotic pet
*expectations for interacting with the pet
*how much parents are willing to take on for basic care and supervision
*concerns over diseases

Handling Pets can be a Challenge for Young Kids
Young kids tend to want to hold pets, and a lot of pets will resist this -- and unfortunately they sometimes bite or scratch in an attempt to get away. Young kids may also accidentally hurt small pets with inadvertent rough handling; preschoolers may not have the fine motor skills needed to handle small squirmy animals. And of course, any child needs to be supervised when handling any sort of pet.

Choosing Exotic Pets for Kids
There are some pets that are good for kids, and some that are not as suitable. Rabbits, for example, are often considered kids' pets, but they often do not like to be held and can kick and scratch in protest. My picks for the best pets for kids can be found in 7 Exotic Pets for Kids, but even these may not be good choices for very young kids.

Expectations for the Pet
Whenever a pet is chosen, it is important to make sure the pet is likely to match up with your expectations, and this is a very important with kids. Do you want a pet to cuddle? Or a pet to simply watch and observe? If you are looking for a pet to handle, consider if your kids may be frustrated if it takes some time to tame your pet.

Expectations for Care
Find out what care a potential pet is going to need, and be sure you can meet their needs over their lifespan. As parents, be prepared to take responsibility for the primary care needs of the pet, especially for younger kids. Even for older kids, you may need to check in daily on pet care tasks. Also think ahead: for pets with longer lifespans, parents may also end up as primary caretaker for pets as kids move away for college or jobs.

Disease Concerns
Exotic pets, like any pet, can carry diseases transmissible to humans. Because young kids have developing immune systems and a tendency to put their hands in their mouths often, they are more susceptible to picking up germs from exotic pets. Good hygiene practices generally prevent diseases from pets, but are harder to manage with very young kids. You might want to consult with your pediatrician to discuss the risks (the American Academy of Pediatrics has made a recommendation that families with children under 5 avoid reptiles, amphibians, chicks and ducklings, rodents and ferrets).

Basic Rules for Pets and Children
Ultimately, the decision to get an exotic pet is up to each family. No matter what pet you choose, there are some basic rules for keeping kids and pets safe:

*children should always be supervised when interacting with pets
*hands should always be washed well after handling pets (or their equipment) - parents should *help or supervise children under 6
*do not kiss pets
*make sure kids do not put their hands in their mouths after handling pets
*keep pets away from food preparation and eating areas
*keep pets healthy
*keep cages clean
*do not bring wild animals home as pets

read more...

Ways To Make A Small Dining Room Look Larger

The dining room comprise of one of the most important spaces in your house, as it is the place where all the members sit together as a family and share their meals. However, many homes suffer from the problem of a small dining room, which makes eating experience less enjoyable than it should be. Do you know that it is possible to create space in a room, without actually rebuilding it? No? Then reading this article is a must for you. Go through the following lines and explore simple ways to make a small dining room look larger.

How To Make Your Dining Room Appear Bigger

Carefully Choose The Color
If you have a small space for the dining room, color is the first aspect that you need to look into. In fact, the color of walls as well as ceiling can go a long way in determining the visual size of your room. While a dark bold color will make a room much smaller than it really is, a lighter one will go a long way in opening up the space. Select the color that you want to paint the room in and then go for a light to medium shade in the same.

Mirror Tricks
One of the best accessories that you can use to make your small dining room look bigger comprises of mirrors. They create the illusion of space and expand the overall space of the room. Buy two or three large matching wall mirrors and place them in such a way that they fall across a natural source of light, at a distance of approximately six inches. As the light falls on the mirrors, it will get amplified, making the room appear larger.

Treat The Window
You can easily make your dining room look bigger by going for big windows therein. At the same time, instead of bulky dark window treatments, go for the light and airy varieties. In this context, sheer nylon panels or light-filtering roman shades will serve your needs perfectly. In case you can do away with the privacy aspect, opting for lightweight scarf valances is a good idea. In other words, sheer window treatments can help expand the space in your small dining room.

Using The Right Furniture
If the size of your dining room is not too big, it is advisable to exercise due care while selecting furniture for the same. The first thing that you need to do is get rid of large bulky furniture, even dining table, as it wastes useful space. For instance, you can opt for a dining table with a leaf for expansion. As and when you want, bring the leaf into the room and increase the seating space. This way, you will avoid blocking the space unnecessarily.

Lighting Is The Key
Lighting is one of the significant elements that you can play with, while trying to make your dining room appear bigger. You can always go for recessed spot lighting, which is visually appealing and helps open up a space as well. Another option is to go for torchiere light, which bounces light off of the ceiling and back down on the room. Then, you can take into account skylights and solar tubes, natural alternatives that also add space.

Some More Tips
--Keep your dining room completely clutter free. Many-a-times, it has been seen that a fairly large dining room looks extremely small only because too many unnecessary items are kept therein.

--While deciding the color scheme for your dining room, make sure to go for lighter color in context of the ceiling and flooring as well.

--Going for a glass table, instead of a wooden one, also helps creates the illusion of free and open space in the dining room.

read more...

Tips For Growing Herbs Indoors

Herbs, valued for their exotic flavor, pleasing fragrance and, many-a-times, medicinal properties, have been used by people since ages. Apart from cooking and medicine, they find a use in spiritual endeavors as well. In case you are a regular user of herbs, why not grow them yourself? If, by any chance, the absence of a garden is stopping you from the same, we have the perfect solution for you. You can start growing herbs indoors as well. How? The tips given below will help you know that.

How To Grow Indoor Herbs

Supplies Needed

-Fish Emulsions
-Flowerpots
-Herb Plants
-Planting Containers
-Potting Soil
-Sand
-Screen Mesh
-Seaweed Extract
-Mushroom Compost Makers


Instructions

-In order to grow herbs inside your house, you will first have to choose the perfect location for the same. Make sure that place has good ventilation, but does not receive direct drafts. At the same time, it should not suffer from great fluctuations in temperature

-The location that you choose for the herbs should receive at least 4 hours of direct sunlight in a day. You can also supplement the same with fluorescent lights, if necessary.

-Now that you have the best location in your mind, it is the time to choose the herbs that you want to grow therein. This will require you to determine how you want to use the herbs - for cooking, making potpourri or enjoying their foliage and fragrance. For the purpose, you can study books about herbs and browse through catalogs.

-The herb selection made; now is the time to go to a nursery that specializes in herbs and buy plants from the place. In case you get a bit confused, take the help of the nursery staff, which will mostly likely be knowledgeable as well as helpful.

-Get containers in which you will plant the herbs. They need to be 8 inches deep and 6 to 8 inches across. In case you want to plant a number of herbs in the same container, make sure that it is big enough to allow 6 to 8 inches of space between the plants.

-As the next step, start preparing the container for the plants. For the purpose, you will need to arrange pieces of screen mesh over the drainage holes of the container.

-Next, mix premium-quality, well-draining potting soil with coarse sand and mushroom compost.
-After combining the two, place a layer of the same over the wire mesh.
You will need to ensure proper drainage for the herbs as well. This purpose can be achieved by setting the containers on a tray that has been filled with gravel.

-By now, the container has been prepared completely. So, you have to set the plants inside them, making sure to place them at the same depth as they were growing in their nursery pots.

-Watering the herbs will be the next step. As for the regular watering, stick to a good soaking once or twice a week. You can stand each pot in about an inch of tepid water, till the soil gets moist, but is not saturated.

-When your herbs are growing at an active pace, you will need to feed them once in a week. For the purpose, make use of seaweed extract or fish emulsion.

-You have successfully grown the herbs indoors. Now is the time to harvest them. In order to do this, clip only the outer leaves or sprigs (as and when you need them), leaving plenty of vigorous growth on the plant.

read more...

How To Create A Kitschy Kitchen

People generally long for a big, beautiful and modular kitchen. However, there is also a segment of people who want to re-create the nostalgia-filled old style of their parents and grandparents, in their kitchen. As the retro style is back with a bang, with the kitchen being an integral part of it, creating a kitschy kitchen has caught on with the trend. There are a lot of people who are not clear with the concept of kitschy kitchen and want to know more about it. Let us explore a few tips to how to create a kitschy kitchen, which will let you enjoy all the modern conveniences, while going for a retro look.

Kitschy Kitchen Decorations

Repaint Your Kitchen
Start with repainting your kitchen, using bright colors to give the retro feel. You can use the bright sunshine yellow of the 1960s or the avocado green of the 1970s, thus creating the flavor of that particular era, inside your kitchen.

Get Hold Of Old Kitchen Appliances & Accessories
Check out the attics at your relatives' place. You might, fortunately, get some kitchen appliances and accessories, which may not be of a use to them. However, they will surely be a treasure for you and you will able to make good use of them, in your kitschy kitchen, giving it the perfect 'old feel'.

Use Crazy & Themed Accessories
Choose a theme on which you want your kitchen to be based. You can also combine various themes, in order to get a wilder look. Buy all themed accessories, like rooster cookie jars, cactus cookie jars, frog shape pitchers, rooster teapot and other similar items. Place them all across your kitchen and enjoy the crazy appearance.

Add A Bit Of Silliness
Give your dining table a wild look, just like your kitchen. Set the table with unique theme or figurine salt and pepper shakers and napkin holders. Put cartoon-ish oven mitts and pot holders to enhance the look of the stove area. While creating kitschy kitchen, you should remember that being stylish is not desirable. It’s all about feeling and enjoying the good ol' times.

Decorate The Walls
The kitchen walls should be decorated in a way that accentuates the old feel. You can use retro advertising signage, which can be found at antique shops. Visit some pop culture specialty shops and choose from the range of retro signage available there.

Stick To Your Taste
One of the important tips, to create a kitschy kitchen, which you should keep in mind, is that you will be the one spending time in it. So, enjoy and have fun while decorating it. Make it the way you want, as it appeals to your taste. A kitchen should reflect your personality. Enjoying the look of your kitchen and the time spent there should be the main motive, while decorating it.

read more...

How To Grow Strawberries in an Organic Garden

Fresh strawberries are at their best when an organic gardener grows strawberry plants in a garden free of chemical fertilizers and pesticides.

Fresh organic strawberries from the home garden are far superior to the bloated supermarket variety with little fragrance and a white core. Strawberry plants take little care once established, and can produce baskets of berries for years.

Choose Strawberry Varieties
Before an organic gardener shops for strawberry plants, he must consider disease resistance, growing region, and whether to purchase June-bearing or ever-bearing strawberry plants. Gardeners in hot, humid regions can grow ‘Titan,’ which resists leaf scorch. ‘Earliglow’ is an excellent choice for gardeners in the Midwest and Atlantic regions, as it is not only cold hardy, but resists gray mold, verticilium wilt, red stele disease, leaf spot, and leaf scorch. Gardeners seeking ever-bearing strawberries can plant ‘Hecker’ in the north or ‘Tristar’ in the south.

Prepare the Garden to Plant Strawberries
Strawberry plants thrive in well-drained soil with a pH between 5.0 and 6.0. If the soil pH is above 6.0, acidify it naturally with compost and leaf mold. If the soil is below 5.0, add limestone to raise the pH. Choose an area of the garden with full sun and good air circulation to reduce disease problems.

Plant strawberries in the spring as soon as the earth can be worked, setting plants 18 inches apart in rows spaced at least two feet apart. Wide rows allow strawberry plants room to develop new runners.

Organic Strawberry Plant Care
After planting strawberries, add a layer of organic mulch to retain moisture and to keep soil from splashing on ripening berries. Many organic gardeners prefer to mulch strawberry beds with straw, but dried grass clippings or pine needles are also suitable choices.


The fertilizing regimen for strawberries centers on whether the plants are June-bearing or ever-bearing. Ever-bearing strawberries need a constant supply of nutrients to produce flowers and grow berries, but June berries only form new buds for the following year in late summer. Therefore, feed ever-bearing strawberries throughout the growing season, but fertilize June-bearing strawberries in August. Gardeners can fertilize plants with a side dressing of dried blood meal, rock potash, and bone meal.

At the end of the season, the strawberry plants will send out new plantlets on runners. In this way, the strawberry patch is self-perpetuating. Remove nonproductive plants at the end of each growing season, and allow the runners to replenish the garden.

Organic Strawberry Pest Control
Slugs, aphids, spider mites, and birds like to feed on strawberry plants. Place beer traps around plants or sprinkle diatomaceous earth to kill slugs. Attract beneficial insects that have an appetite for aphids with nectar-rich flowers, like sweet alyssum. Spider mites are most problematic in hot, dusty regions, so regular irrigation discourages them. Use bird netting draped over jar-topped stakes to deny birds the first berry harvest.

read more...