I remember the days when the television was NOT the first option to keep children occupied. Back then, there were so many things that children could do in their spare time and not bother mommy or daddy. Today, it is sad to say that many parents (and even nannies) turn to the black box to keep the children quiet and behaved. Now I am not saying that the TV is all bad. We do have a lot of good shows for children, and with DVDs being the norm, we have even more choices on hand.
Still, I am a firm believer in engaging children in other activities and not letting the TV run their lives. While I find the TV useful and entertaining, I also think that children should be exposed to many other activities. There is a whole world of ideas and values to be learned in so many other ways, don’t you think? So, here’s a list of my alternatives to watching TV.
Stickers! There is no doubt about it – children LOVE stickers. Both boys and girls have this thing for stickers so you really should stock up on them. There are a lot of stickers that you can buy in bookstores – whenever you see some that you think your children would like, just grab a bunch. Also make sure that you have a blank notebook where your children could put the stickers. Otherwise, you might end up with stickers on the walls, on the furniture, and even the fish tank! To encourage creativity, tell your children to make up their own story with the stickers. Another idea is to buy sticker books. They have all sorts of themes – dinosaurs, gadgets, and more. Choose the ones that will interest your children and bring the books out when necessary.
Match colors…sock colors, that it. With several children in the house, I have tons of socks to pair up after washing. Instead of doing it myself, I can actually enlist the kids’ help. Toddlers who know the basic colors are excellent helpers. Just ask them to pick out matching pairs and put them together. Older kids will even be able to wrap or bind them up together. That’s killing two birds with one stone, don’t you think?
Audio books! I love to read and I love listening to audio books. I think my children should have the same passion as well. With any mp3 player, they can listen to all the stories they want. It’s better than TV because listening to stories can help sharpen their imagination as well as their comprehension skills.
So what’s on your list of activities?
It’s been busier than usual, what with the school runs (oh why oh why did I join the PTA?), activity runs, Mommy-and-baby classes, renovating our new house, buying food, cooking the food…you get the picture. So I decided to take a breather yesterday and spend a couple of hours on ME, having a much needed wax and mani/pedi. It did wonders for my Halloween-weary soul, so please Make the time for yourself, Moms!
Anyway, after my rejuvenating little spa session, I decided to go full-steam-ahead with my Halloween party planning (a tradition I started with a good friend last year), with a mantra to keep in mind:
Keep it Small and Keep it Simple!
Last year, we went all out, spent far too much money and even if the kids had a fantastic time, we guiltily knew that they would have had an equally fab time with less of pretty much everything. And that goes for our planning time too!
So this year, here’s what we’re doing:
1. The E-Invites – Why waste trees, time and money when you can send a totally free, totally cute e-invite in no time at all? My internet savvy sister directed me to this terrific site, which enabled me to make the most adorable e-vite in about 15 minutes (check out the image I used above). It allowed me to access the email addresses from my account, and does RSVP-ing too- so easy! Oh, and most importantly we kept the number of guests down – 15 or less, including our own.
2. The Decor – This was an easy one – use last year’s!! Borrowing is also an option, as I’m sure you’ll friend plenty of relatives or friends willing to part with a few pumpkins, spiders and the like for one afternoon.
3. The Food and Drink – The kids would rather play games, do activities or simply run amok, so we kept food simple with 2 dishes and a drink each to provide. Another good reason to do it with a friend! Much as I melt at the scary cuteness in dishes like these, we’re keeping the spooky food theme to a minimum, because some of the smaller and fussier kids probably won’t get it or worse, eat it! Also, most of our very nice Mom friends sent their kids with something anyway, like last year some kids arrived with a couple of boxes of pizza, chocolate cake and little bags of treats!
4. The Activities and Games – This is the part my kids most look forward to, and can also be the most emotional! Since the ages of kids will be varying from 2-7, we picked just 4 games, two of which are “team” kinds, so the big ones can help the little ones rather than them winning everything! Spooky twists on old classics are the key here, like the “Black Cat Boogie” (musical chairs) and “Skeletons and Pumpkins Hunt” (scavenger hunt, but in the dark!). A couple of activities like pumpkin decorating (real or less messily done as a craft with cardboard and paint) and/or party masks are fun too especially for those kids who shy away from competitive games. This happily doubles up as something they can take home! I also like to have a “quiet” area, with a nice Halloween video playing and a few toys, coloring pages (print out 3 or so yourself and photocopy) and cutting pages, for the littler ones or kids just needing a breather from all the excitement.
I get newsletters from a lot of places, and admittedly I mostly just skim through them, only really clicking through if I find something especially interesting – like the other day! In my Fisher Price newsletter was a link to their 50th Anniversary toys, toys from my childhood.
If you grew up with Fisher Price toys like I did, I urge you to visit this page, I honestly got incredibly excited remembering the beloved toys my sister and I once played with for many happy hours. One thing I wasn’t aware of was how the “Little People” toys of today evolved from the ones we played with in the 70’s. My kids have the Christmas sets, which they love playing with, but the characters just don’t have the same appeal. They look too much like cartoons in my opinion (which I admit is completely biased!).
The first “house” I had was this yellow house you see above. I still have it in storage in my Mom’s house but sadly it’s pretty war torn with the pieces all disappeared – boo hoo. Fisher Price now has a “50th Birthday” version, which is just a few “retro” figures in a tin which vaguely looks like the original. A poor substitute, I think! They could have at least made replicas of the original people.
Other favourites which tug at my childhood heartstrings are the Sesame Street “street”, pictured at the top of the post and the airport just above. I could go on, and go the extra mile by actually purchasing these toys on Ebay (tempting, if it weren’t for the exorbitant prices), but for now I’ll just have to be content to look wistfully at these online photos.
For more memory tripping, check out this 1977 Fisher Price catalog, which I think is meant to be a bit of a joke, but for a seventies kid like me, is another lovely walk done memory lane.
We just got back from a perfect beach holiday over the Easter break. Well, it was nearly perfect as holidays-with-kids go if I don’t count:
1. Squabbling between my 4 and 7 year old over so many things I can’t remember anymore.
2. My accident prone 4 year-old’s scraped and bleeding big toes – where he scraped it, we have no idea.
3. 1-year-old Wills getting cut on the lip a grand total of 3 times. He learned to love ice and I found a “cool” way to distract him for a while on the high chair (pardon the pun) – a cube of ice!
4. Our “Marley-esque” Basset hound Wendy going on a destructive spree and chewing 3 bedspreads and a chair, not no mention several toys and my husband’s favourite sandals.
But that aside, my husband and I both agreed that it was one of the most relaxing and lovely holidays we’ve ever had. The kids were outside most of the day, swimming and playing – happily NOT on the DS, Wii, Gameboy or logged on to Nick jr.. Dad had real quality time with them as did I, and we had several family games (amazingly no cheating occurred) of Star Wars Monopoly, Guess Who and The Game of Life, Moms fave which, to my disappointment was too long for my kids (for now). They loved Guess Who, another one of my sister and my favourites. We discovered it on holiday in Paris when we were kids, and I think it was called “Qui est-ce?”. Gosh, how we loved that game, and I think the French did too. Here’s a hilarious video I found of the “Guess Who International Tournament”.
Little Wills is now 14 months (where does time go?) and toddles about the house like the full-fledged toddler he is. With his cherubic golden curls, sunny personality (he screams with delight when he gets excited) and amusing “toughness” (if you take the object of his fascination away he gets angry!), he’s a joy to have around and wherever he goes people can’t help but smile.
It’s his 2nd Easter now, the last one he was a newborn and hardly noticed, but this year his eyes (and hands) are darting around the house, mostly at the Easter decorations that we just put up yesterday. As we are a family big on holidays (it makes life more enjoyable), we have 4 Fun Easter Activities lined up for some quality time with the children.
1. Bake an Easter Bunny Cake – This recipe from Betty Crocker is the cutest and will get the kids excited and hopping around like bunnies for sure. It uses a cake mix and ready-made-frosting so it suits Moms who don’t have the time. If I’m feeling energetic by Saturday, I’ll do it from scratch – time consuming, but a much healthier option!
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All kids love Disney whom we have all been witness to has grown from one theme park to a huge corporation that all kids see as the place where dreams are made of. Another fact about Disney, we as parents know that stuff we see, hear and read about that comes form them are wholesome and educational for all ages(even you parents).
We might have outgrown our love for Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck but they are part of kid’s fantasies and pop culture that they are forever part of history as some of the most recognizable cartoon characters of all time. Thinking of a gift for your child? Why not consider getting some of the best Disney tshirts around to suit their choice of favorite characters from the cartoon classics as Snow White to Wall-E the robot who has caused many a tear with his unexplainable emotion hard to imagine from a robot who falls in love.
Recently, my sister sent me a link to download a new browser for kids, called KIDO’Z Browser.
My nearly-4 Ollie is budding computer geek, and would stay home and play on the computer or Wii all day if he could. After the long Christmas break it was a bit of a daily struggle to stick to the ” Friday rule” (which means he can only play on the weekends), but he’s a good little boy and now doesn’t make a fuss. Without much help from me, online he learned how to go through the bookmark folder I set up for him, with all his favourite sites like Sesame Street, Nick jr. etc. He even learned how to write his name on his own, and learn shapes, colors and so on, especially on Sesame. He never strays to “off limits” sites, nor does his sister, who also just sticks to their “Nat & Ollie” folder on my computer.
But I downloaded this KIDO’Z anyway, mainly because I trust my sister, who is good about giving appropriate, no viruses, non-spyware etc. things online (it won the 100% clean award!). And, it had really cute graphics!
Needless to say, both my kids LOVED it, as it is so easy to use. There is even a YouTube channel for kids videos, and they add new things regularly, which they claim are all child-friendly and safe (am still a little skeptical, so I check when I don’t know the site). Aside from a little bit of crashing the first day or so after I installed it on my Mac, we haven’t had any complaints.
It’s Daddy here. Apologies for that last post- not by Lara- just something I found in the drafts by an old author, as I’m supposed to be covering for Lara while she is away at the beach for a few days with some friends. Obviously, I haven’t done a very good job….:-)
Natasha, our six year old, and Oliver, our three year old, LOVE playing Wii. When Mummy is home and in charge, there is a very strict rule that Wii is only to be played on weekends and even then there are time limits. Well when Mum is away, we all come out and play! Parenting Daddy-style. The kids love it of course, as we stay up until the wee hours and they know it’s a one-off as Mummy would be furious!
I admit that it’s completely lame on my part. It reflects on my laziness to be more creative and proactive as a parent. It’s terrible, really, and I do get why. The kids should be outside running in the fresh air using their own imagination to play. And I should be laying down foundations for life that are not based on instant gratification. In my defense, I find it quite hard to be a single-parent to two young chidren (even if just for a few days) when they are so used to Mum being the central figure of discipline. This especially as it’s the holidays and they don’t normally have so much time on their hands. Plus there is little Wills to keep an eye on (who also seems to have an early affection for Wii himself!)
The latest Wii obsession of the kids and I is the Mii Golf game. It’s completely addictive and just an incredible amount of fun!
So here are five points that I have prepared in my defense, in anticipation of Lara’s wrath when she comes back tomorrow. It’s the best I could come up with!
1. Physical co-ordination
There is no doubt that the kids have gotten to improve some of their physical skills. Eye-had coordination for one- whether that be with their aim, timing or anticipation. Nat is naturally sporty and so has a very good eye for the ball already. But she also tends to be a bit clumsy, so Wii games do help learn her own strength and use more “touch” and deftness. Ollie doesn’t seem to have a natural eye for the ball, and Wii has improved his timing.
2. Learning to win & lose
This is a big one. Nat is incredibly competitive and has been ever since she could walk and talk. Especially against her little brother, who luckily doesn’t share the same character trait and is very sweet even if he doesn’t win. So if I take a shot for him and misses, he’ll say: “Don’t worry, Dad, it’s okay…” and have that cute look about him when I could just hug him to death! But going back to Nat, we are talking serious tantrums, sulking, crying and bad moods if she isn’t “the winner”. One might think that Wii would actually make this worse, but in fact Nat has started (very slowly…) to learn that she doesn’t need to win all the time and be more graceful when she loses. I can tell that it still hurts her like mad and she loathes losing, but the fact that she is now pretending not to mind as much is certainly a start in the right direction. And the other side of the coin is also learning how to win gracefully and in this respect Nat is much better than Ollie (probably as she has so much practice at it, as we let her win so much…), who does tend to gloat when he wins and say things like “I’m good, you’re bad, I’m the winner, you’re the loser, na, na..”. Again, from playing Wii, Ollie has started to learn that it’s not nice to gloat over your opponent when you win.
3. An introduction to business
With Mii Golf (& quite a few of the other Wii games) there is a lot of “stuff” that one wants to acquire. In this case things from the “shop” like the Dinosaur mask, the Amazon golf club, the Cat Jester or the Spook-a-Rama hat! And as one has to buy these with “coins” that you win by completing holes and courses, or one has to win them from another player when playing for “items”, a whole new realm of “trade” becomes introduced as a concept. Both kids learn the value of the coins that they have won and that they can’t afford to buy everything with them, so need to selectively choose. Plus they learn to attach additional value to the items they do own according to how hard they worked to acquire them, so it isn’t like a “pocket money for toys” lesson, as they have to also decide which items they care least about when betting them in a game (wait…am I encouraging gambling? Yikes!).
4. Patience & tenacity
A lot of the holes one has to complete in Mii Golf are pretty hard to do, even for me. The only way to master them is via trial and error, sometimes doing them over and over until you want to pull your hair out! Both Nat & Ollie obviously like to get immediate results when they play any game. And this is definitely one of Nat’s weak points when doing her homework, for instance. Unless the answer is obvious straight away, she tends to panic and give up, not wanting to solve the problem with more thought and effort (especially with Maths!). Weirdly enough, Wii has helped them both learn that “trying and trying again until you succeed” can reap rewards.
5. Teamwork
Quite often in Wii games, as is true in Mii Golf, one has to work as a team to win. In this instance, to beat Barker and win coins from him. With this set-up, nobody is a “winner” or “loser” and the kids have learned to use encouragement to help each other do well in order to defeat their opponent. So Ollie will say “good shot, Nat” even if she had in fact put the ball in the bunker! And Nat will instruct Ollie what he needs to do and so takes on the role of “teacher”. Practically every other game the two of them play (even if it’s just throwing around a ball) involves some kind of competition and thus a winner/loser, so I really like it when they play and and learn to work for each other.
As I said, pretty thin, no? I have surfed a bit trying to find some resources that might back up my “clutching at straws” excuses…
Kotaku has a neat post about the motor skills aspect.
Edutopia writes about the potential benefits of cooperation.
Gamasutra talks about the health benefits.
Evening Standard has a piece on how the Wii improves intelligence.
And some some other interesting reads:
How a University lecturer was paid £5,000 to study benefits of Wii.
Time asks if Wii really is good for your health.
And finally some childish streams of consciousness about Wii.
I fear none of this will suffice when Mummy returns and I’ll be in the dog house! And thus Lara will answer her own question on this blog and we’ll be subjected to an even stricter set of rules…:-(
The (mini) Donald
Halloween is huge in our household. Since the 1st of October, we’ve had our Halloween decorations out and increasing (who can resist a “Halloween Tree” I found at a sale last week? Picture a pumpkin on a spider web, black, with spiders, black cats and ghouls hanging from it- adorable!). There are orange lanterns with jack-o-lantern and witch faces dotting our house, giant spiderwebs with spiders, bats and bloody hands on our windows, a rather large “witch” wind banner blowing in the garage, an assortment of spooky garden stakes in the front lawn (with glow-in-the-dark eyes), and a “face” for our tree at the front of the house which makes it look like the apple-pelting ones in the Wizard of Oz.
We threw a Halloween Party last Friday after school. Nothing fancy, just games and snacks for around 15 kids, and potent Bloody Mary’s for the grownups courtesy of my hubby, who’s perfected the art of the Bloody Mary. My three went as Wizardess, Cowboy and Superman, and there was Darth, Sandy from Grease, a Pirate, a Mermaid, 3 Rambos, a Fairy, a Spider and a kid who boringly went as himself with his skateboard.
On Friday my kids have their second set of costumes (except baby Wills), Wednesday Addams and Peter Pan (a gift from my Aunt), and we’ll have a little pizza party at home after the Trick or Treating. Exciting! If you aren’t a Halloween-obsessed Mom like me, and still haven’t decided on a Halloween costume for your little ones, here are some of my favourites.
1. Donald Trump (pictured above) – You have to love the hair! This costume makes the Donald look absolutely adorable.
2. Fire Breathing Dragon – A crafty Mom can put this together easily, and create a fantastic magical costume sure to be a showstopper.
3. Baby Yoda- Ok, its not the most original, but when I see a little one in this costume it makes me melt.
4. DJ Lance- He’s the funky guy from Yo Gabba Gabba and if my 3-year-old son didn’t have a costume already, this would be it.
5. Sushi Roll – My 6 year old loves sushi, so again, if I didn’t already have 2 costumes for her, and if I got myself organized a lot earlier, I would have made this her costume for Halloween. Oh so clever.
Written by Lara on October 28th, 2008. 4 Comments »
Filed under Activities, Babies, Crafts, Fun and Games, Holidays, Inspiration, Moms, Preschoolers, Shopping, Toddlers.
I have a curly-haired, 7-month-old baby boy named William. Wills is one of those “angel” babies, who has been all smiles since day one, only cries when absolutely necessary and reaches all his milestones on time, with no trouble whatsoever. And when he started crawling a couple of weeks ago, it completely took me by surprise because this didn’t happen with my other children until they were 8 or 9 months.
With his new found mobility, Wills seemed to be getting bored with his routine, and I don’t blame him – who would want to go from the foam squares on the floor to the exersaucer to the sofa – so I thought it may be time to try a class at our local Gymboree, which luckily lets you try every class, in every level for free.
My 3-year-old boy already goes once a week for the art class which he enjoys thoroughly. It has to be said though, that with my #2, we tried Gymboree several times, from the time he was about 7 months on, with little success, only signing up when he was around 18 months as he refused to crawl and actually seemed quite annoyed by the whole thing until he was older.
So, as we made our way to the trial class I wondered, was Wills ready?
I remember the days when the television was NOT the first option to keep children occupied. Back then, there were so many things that children could do in their spare time and not bother mommy or daddy. Today, it is sad to say that many parents (and even nannies) turn to the black box to keep the children quiet and behaved. Now I am not saying that the TV is all bad. We do have a lot of good shows for children, and with DVDs being the norm, we have even more choices on hand.
