Parenting Children

We live in a quiet neighborhood filled with retirees and older families. Our house is situated on the corner of a cul-de-sac and it is a great neighborhood to live in. Except, that motorists decided they don’t like to sit at the lights on the highway by my home and instead use my street as a cut through.

Now we have a lot of traffic most of whom do not obey the 25 mph speed limit. We, as a neighborhood, have had meetings with the town council, had speed bumps installed and even begged for police to patrol our street. Some of those things helped, but none have been a solution.
We thought of buying a sign like this one to put at the end of our driveway, but never did. Then I came across a story of a man in Ohio who wanted to slow traffic down in his neighborhood also.

Mike Wood put cardboard children near the road by his home to slow down motorists. It worked, people even yelled at him to watch his kids so close to the road. One motorist even stopped after realizing the kids were not real and ordered one to slow traffic by his own home.
Mike originally made these realistic cardboard cut-outs to sell to grandparents. Since the media got a hold of the story, Wood said he is now getting calls from police departments and neighborhood associations across the country.
He now sells the cut-outs for $60.00.
I think I will buy one and see how it helps the traffic on my road.

Would you think twice about the speed you were driving if you saw a cut-out like this one? Do you think this is a good idea for parents who want to protect their children who are playing outside?

cardboard cut-outs to slow traffic, parenting, kids playing outside, outdoor play, outdoor safety, slowing traffic, kids at play

Mattel is recalling more toys today due to lead in the paint on the toys and expanding another recall they have of “magnet” dolls.
The first is the car “Sarge” from the movie Cars.

The magnet toys include “certain dolls, figures, play sets and accessories that may release small, powerful magnets.” The majority of the 18.2 million magnetic toys subject to the recall are no longer on store shelves, the company said, and newer toys have been designed to retain their magnets.

You can find all the information on these recalls on Mattel’s site.

toy recalls, Mattel, Mattel recalls, recalls, toys

As a child I loved amusement park rides, the free fall, the triple loops backwards at 60 MPH, all of it. As I got older I got more and more scared of rides. I wouldn’t go on fair rides, because how well were they set up and who is operating it? I was scared of big roller coasters where I used to be fearless. Then I get stories like this and I remember why it is good to be scared sometimes.

A family fell out of a ferris wheel ride and died in South Korea. The seat swung upside down and riders fell 65 feet to their death when the windows fell out of the car.

that is my worst nightmare. I think I will stick to the swings at the park from now on!

amusement parks, rides, amusement park fatalities, parenting, kids, teens, parents

Since we have had many tooth related talks in our house lately we are more aware of brushing our teeth well and trying to relay that to our children. Of course my children are too young to brush their teeth by themselves just yet, but even I have a hard time remembering just how long I have been brushing my teeth. Are you supposed to brush for two minutes? One minute?
My electric toothbrush has an automatic turnoff and now here is sort of the same idea to get kids brushing.

Toothtunes is a toothbrush that plays your favorite music in your head for two minutes, the recommended time for tooth brushing. You can even pick from your favorite songs. For $9.99 it won’t break the bank either.

If this doesn’t get kids brushing, nothing will!

kids, children, parenting, parenting children, toothbrushes for kids, toothtunes

parenting, kids, babies, parents, parenting children, families

Now that I have children I want to make their memories special, something that they can look back on and laugh and remember how loved they felt. My children are only 4.5 but already we have packed in memories and I try to keep everything documented in case they can not remember, pictures, video, this blog. When they are old and gray I want them to remember all the fun we had together, snapshots of a life filled with love and fun.

My favorite childhood memories are ones that my family is all together. When the electricity would go out and we would all huddle around the kitchen table and play a board games and eat soup. Long, leisurely days at the beach swimming in the waves and looking for shells along the surf.
All piling into the car to go get ice cream after dinner on a hot and steamy summer night.

I want that for my kids. We eat together every single night. That is something my family always did and I want to continue to do that. Catch up on everyone’s day, plan weekends and reconnect. We also try and take day trips together. My husband will take a day off of work and we will go to the zoo, an amusement park or hike in the woods. We play board games with the kids, who can play Memory a record amount of times in one day.
I hope that this time we spend together can continue for all of our lives. I would love it even when they are adults and have their own busy lives if they stopped by once a week, sat around the kitchen table with some soup and a rousing game of memory.

This post is brought to you in conjunction with Parent Bloggers Network & EA’s Wii-Boogie, a family gaming experience. Shake it. Sing it. Create it.

wii boogie, parenting, parenting children, family time, childhood memories, family, kids, parents

At the auditions for American Idol 7 in Dallas Texas on Tuesday, a women went into labor. She went up and sang for producers when she realized she was in labor and starting her contractions.
“I kept singing. One of the judges gave me her seat! I told her I had been there all day, and nothing was going to stop me from singing. I hadn’t been there all day for nothing!”

That baby was lucky for her because she did get a golden ticket to the next round and then rushed over to a hospital where she delivered a son. The best yet? She named him after the show, her son is named Jamil LaBarron Idol McCowan.

That should at least earn her a ticket to the next round!

source

American Idol auditions, American Idol, pregnancy, labor, going into labor, strange baby names, baby names

Women who were obese before they became pregnant had a higher rate of children born with birth defects including missing limbs, malformed hearts and underdeveloped spinal cords a new study shows.

In 2003 and 2004, 51 percent of U.S. women aged 20 to 39 were overweight or obese, putting them at increased risk for chronic diseases, infertility, irregular menstruation and pregnancy complications.
Although obesity may not be the cause, it could be the diet of obese women or the way they chose to diet.

Doctors urge women who are overweight to lose weight sensibly and without compromising vitamans and minerals a women needs including folic acid before trying to conceive.

pregnancy, trying to conceive, conception, obese women, birth defects

There is one thing I think all kids like at any age and that is water. My kids are no exception and they love to pour water from container to container, that is why they love to play “tea party”.

This tea set for kids is perfect. It is colorful and just right for little hands. It is a 13 piece porcelain set for $17.99.
Make a day of it and have a picnic and some tea with this cute set. This porcelain set comes with includes: a basket, 4 sets of spoons, forks and knives, 4 sets of mini cups and saucers, 1 teapot, a sugar pot, a milk jug, 4 napkins and a tablecloth.
Invite some friends over (even dolls!) cut out sandwiches with cookie cutters, read a story and then have some tea.

Adorable and fun for kids and their parents!

tea set, tea set for kids, tea party, toddlers, kids, children, parenting, SAHM, parenting children

I recently wrote about how my daughter at 4 years and 6 months old had a loose tooth. Last night that tooth fell out!

This was a surprise me because although it was loose, I thought I had a much longer time before it would be loose enough to fall out.
I had nothing prepared!
When I was little, my tooth fairy left us silver dollars, a tradition I wanted to continue, but I didn’t have silver dollars just laying around and of course her tooth falls out on a Sunday night with no prospects of getting any!
How much money do you leave for the tooth, especially the first?
We decided on ten dollars for the first tooth, so my husband had to go out and break a $20.00.
How much do you leave for all the other teeth that are going to fall out?

Do you keep the teeth that fall out? It seems gross to keep teeth that fell out but since we had a tooth box that the kids got when they were first born, I decided to keep that first tooth in the box and date it. After all as a teenager I kept a wisdom tooth I had pulled in my purse to gross people out with, so maybe she would like to do the same in the future.

This was all new territory for us as parents, and now we have a very happy girl walking around with a fist full of dollar bills and is every bit as cute as she was yesterday with one less tiny tooth.

parenting children, parenting, parents, tooth fairy, tooth fairy money, kids, loose teeth, loose tooth

We all know there are crazy people in this world, but I think there is no one more crazy then Michelle Duggar the mother who just had her 17th baby. That’s right, I said SEVENTEEN.

Surely you have seen the Duggar shows on TLC? They live in Arkansas and have (now) 17 children, they live in one big house with various stoves and washing machines and Michelle home schools all of the children. That means, that she doesn’t ever get a break, especially from being pregnant, since she has had 17 children starting at age 21.

Thier newest daughter is named Jennifer to go along with the “J” theme they have with all of their children’s names. The children include Joshua, 19, John David and Janna, 17, Jill, 16, Jessa, 14, Jinger, 13, Joseph, 12, Josiah, 11, Joy-Anna, 9, Jedidiah and Jeremiah, 8, Jason 7, James 6, Justin, 4, Jackson, 3, and Johannah 19 months.

The older children have a “buddy” where they make sure a younger sibling is dressed, cleaned, fed etc. That makes it easier on the mom, but still I wonder what Jim Bob Duggar does to pay for all the food they eat, the clothes and their 7,000 square foot home. Just keeping my two kids in granola bars has proven to be pricey!

So what do you think is this lady crazy or just the most patient, organized woman in the world?

Duggar family, Michelle Duggar, big families, parenting, parenting children, moms

Fisher Price is recalling millions of their most popular toys because of too much lead in the products, including Sesame Street, Dora and Diego. If you have purchased any of these toys from May 2007 until August 2007, contact Fisher Price at (800) 916-4498 anytime or visit the web site at www.service.mattel.com.

For a complete list of the toys, check out the press release.

toy recalls, recalls, Fisher Price, toys

here is a version of I spy that every child at any age should enjoy. Make a I Spy bottle.
This is what you will need:

An empty plastic bottle
A bunch of little items, like a candle, paper clip, beads, hair clip, button etc. (anything that will fit into your bottle)
Rice, sand or colored sprinkles
Tape
1 piece of paper
Funnel

-Make a list of your items

-Add your items to the bottle and then the rice, using a funnel. Leave some space at the top so the rice has room to move around when looking for the hidden items.

-Tape the lid on tightly.

-On the bottle, tape a list of the items to be found in the bottle. Have the kids scratch off everything they “spy” in the bottle. .

This would work with the tiny animals they sell at the dollar store, then you can draw a picture of the animals on the list so kids who cannot read yet can play!

car games, rainy day games, rainy day crafts, crafts for kids, games, kids, children, rainy day ideas, moms, sahm

For the entire month of August, anyone who comments on any 451 Press site can win a cash prize of $300, $200 or $100! The more you comment the better your chances are for winning, so tell a friend and comment away!

5 minutes for Mom and Best Buy are teaming up together for a great giveaway. They are giving away a $799.99 Insignia® 37″ Flat-Panel LCD HDTV!!!
How great is that, now go over and enter.

www.loveshakbaby.com is also having a giveway. Two winners will each receive a $250.00 gift certificate for Gymboree, my favorite children’s clothing store. Go check it out and enter!

We are inundated with Lindsay Lohan news these days. Obviously she is a troubled young woman with problems that make her feel like she has to grab on to various addictions and bad habits. What I feel uneasy about is the media constantly blaming of her behaviors on her parents.

Now, don’t go crazy just yet, I know her parents fall a tad short of the parenting of the year award. They seem to love the fame and the money their daughter brought in for them. They obviously had a volatile marital relationship one that was brought out for the world to see, damaging them as well as their young children. The mother, Dina, seems to love the press giving them a “statement” every day about her daughter, she seems the kind of mother who wants to be the cool, hip one that wants to be a best friend. She could be a friend, but what any child really needs 100% of the time is a mother.
The father has been in and out of jail and does not have much to do with his daughter at this point although he loves to go on Larry King and put in his .02.

What I find to be silly is the constant blame on the parents despite teh fact that Lindsay is 21 years old. She is an adult, a grown woman.
At what age do you have to stand on your own and make your own mistakes without having the “bad parent” excuse? I think Lindsay’s problems are partly bad parenting but mostly a young famous girl in Hollywood problem. Too much fame and money and access to bad people with bad habits.
A young women who has made poor choices. Is that her parents fault? Do parent’s responsibility for their children’s decisions end at the age of 18?

I would like to hear what you think of the blame put on Lindsay’s parents, do you think they are entirely at fault for their daughter’s problems?

Lindsay Lohan, Dina Lohan, parenting, parenting children, teenagers, teens, kids, parental responsibility