Filed under: Toddler, Preschooler, Television, DVDs and Videos

Pancake Mountain is a children's television show based in Washington, DC, created by filmmaker Scott Stuckey. The show has appearances by musicians such as Ian MacKaye of Fugazi, Thievery Corporation, Steel Pulse, The White Stripes, Henry Rollins, Jenny Lewis and others.

Regular Pancake Mountain characters include an irascible goat puppet named Rufus Leaking and a superhero, Captain Perfect, who is not perfect but "tries to do his best each day." Like other children's shows, there is dancing and music and learning opportunities, only with this show, "M" is for "Mohawk."

If Barney has got you down, a serving of Pancake Mountain might just be to your taste.

(Photo of Rufus Leaking courtesy of pancakemountain.com)

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Filed under: Kidwear, Recalls

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission has announced the recall of about 16,200 Boys' "Warmest Jackets" from Gap. The drawstring at the waist has a toggle that could become snagged and pose and entrapment hazard to children.

The jackets are hooded, zip up the front and have a drawstring waist. They were sold in navy and gray and in multiple children's sizes. The words "Gap Outlet" are printed on a label at the neck and Style number 513573 is printed on a white label sewn into the jacket behind the size and product care label near the neckline.

The jackets were sold at Gap Outlet stores nationwide from September 2007 through December 2007 for about $50 each.

If you own one of these jackets, you are advised to stop wearing it immediately and return it to any Gap Outlet store for a full refund. If you return the jacket before April 30, 2008, Gap Outlet will give you a little reward in the form of a $5 appreciation card. Otherwise, you can keep the jacket and remove the drawstring to eliminate the hazard.

For more information, contact Gap at (888) 747-3704 between 9 a.m. and 9 p.m. ET Monday through Friday, Saturday 12 p.m. through 7 p.m. ET, and Sunday 12 p.m. through 6 p.m., or visit their Web site.

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Filed under: Moms, Parent rants, 6-7 years, Monitoring your kids, In the News

While not quite as bad as Wanda Holloway,the Texas cheerleader mom who ordered a hit on the mother of her daughter's cheer-leading rival reasoning the thirteen-year-old would be so bereft after the death of her mom, she'd drop out of the competition, Priscilla Ceballos is pretty awful in her own way.

Ceballos, the mother of a six-year-old girl, helped her daughter craft an essay that won the little girl a makeover that included a blonde Hannah Montana wig, as well as the grand prize: airfare for four to Albany, N.Y., and four tickets to the sold-out Hannah Montana concert on Jan. 9 and contained the heartbreaking opening line: "My daddy died this year in Iraq."

There is only one tiny little problem, her daddy DIDN'T die in Iraq this year, or any other year.

"We did the essay and that's what we did to win," Priscilla Ceballos, said in an interview with Dallas TV station KDFW. "We did whatever we could do to win."

The sponsor of the contest was Club Libby Lu, a Chicago-based store that sells clothes, accessories and games intended for young girls withdrew the prize Saturday and awarded it to another contestant. It didn't identify the new winner.

"With this decision, we hope to revive the intended spirit of the contest, which was designed to make a little girl's holidays extra special," Club Libby Lu Chief Executive Mary Drolet said Saturday.

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Filed under: Health and Safety, Moms, Brands

Several months ago, I read this post by ParentDisher Sandy Maple about the dangers of lip-balm addiction, and I remember thinking, "Boy, I'm glad I don't have that problem!"

Which are, of course, those famous last words. Six months later and I have 3 tubes of lip-balm stashed in various places: my purse, my car, in the bathroom. It's not just any lip-balm, it's Burt's Bees Lip Shimmer, and it has vitamin E! And sunflower oil! And a lot of other stuff I can't pronounce!

So, in all truthfulness, my lips now seem drier than ever. I can't decide if my lips are over-moisturized, as the article in Sandy's post suggests, or if it's just a particularly dry winter. Do you have any experience with lip-balm, or lip-balm addiction, that you'd be willing to share?

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Filed under: Celebrity babies, Celebrity kids, Celebrity parents

Parade.com had a huge pop culture poll and the results are in. It gives a good gauge of the stupid crap we are all filling our brains with in order to drown out annoying crap like having to pay those Christmas bills. But oh, how I love me some lists. (Yes, I will say that over and over again until mid-January, because I'm like that.)

Question 7 on the poll was "Who is the most adorable celebrity baby?" Well wouldn't you know it? Little Miss Violet Affleck, adorable blend of Ben Affleck and Jennifer "Alias" Garner, (pictured right with wee Violet in mum's belly*) beat out the likes of Suri, Shiloh, Dannielynn and Kingston. I'm thinking people voted along the lines of "Parents who annoyed us the least in 2007," but that rules out Kingston Rossdale, whose lipstick-laden mum has had everyone bopping their heads these past two years. Surely no one has a beef with Gwen Stefani, do they?

(Which leads me to believe that nobody remembers Daddy Rossdale's huge-in-the-90s band Bush X. Yes, I actually bought all their albums back in the day because I was hot for Gavin Rossdale. Call the hipster police.)

* I'm not showing celeb kid photos anymore because it's kind of bothering me the way that these children are being stalked by the paps. (Yet I'm writing a hypocritical celeb kid piece. Hmmm...)

Anyway, let's have our own poll.

View Poll

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Filed under: Lifestyle, Adventures in Parenting, Creative projects, Photography

This Christmas, my husband Tom's gift to me was a digital camera. I've been a longtime admirer of the photography on blogs such as Confessions of a Pioneer Woman, Dooce, Chookooloonks, and Superhero Journal. And all of these women are generous in sharing their preferences in equipment and techniques.

I've read through the instructions that came with my new camera (a reconditioned Canon Rebel XTi), I've stared at it from a distance for a loooong while, and finally, when I'd decided to make that first step and begin, you know, actually taking pictures with it, I couldn't get it to "go." Turns out I'd left the battery in the charger on the kitchen sink.

So, I'm wondering, do you have any advice for a beginning photographer? Are there any sites you love, or any books you'd recommend? As you can see, I need all the help I can get!

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Filed under: Health and Safety, Lifestyle, Media

The British Department for Children, Schools and Families says that parents and caregivers should suppress any "natural instinct" they possess to stop little boys from playing with toy guns.

According to the organization, role-playing helps to foster conditions that helps boys learn and become engaged in activities that might help them in future educational environments. The Department goes on to say that simulated gun play in boys is fostered in large part by images they see in the media, and by imagination fueled by video games and superheroes that they see every day. Toy guns can be perfectly acceptable play aids, they note, if young boys are also taught that it is not OK to hurt one another. Teachers, according to the article, disagree, noting that guns symbolize aggression.

I'm with the teachers, here. A gun has one purpose: to seriously hurt another being, and I think telling a child that it's OK to play with guns but not to hurt anyone is sending mixed messages. If a little boy wants to imagine he is a superhero, what's wrong with superhero goggles or gloves, or...I don't know, a light stick? It's not like the boys are brandishing gums, pretending they're making marshmallow pie or performing eye surgery. We wouldn't let our little boys play with a fake blood-covered machete (as long as they didn't hurt anyone with it), would we?

I know that little boys do tend to flock toward toy guns -- I've seen it myself. But I wonder if that's less due to "instinct" than to what they are seeing on the television -- and to what extent we as parents are responsible for protecting them from that.

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Filed under: Television, Weird but True

Have you ever wondered if something you purchased might have been returned the the store prior to purchasing it? I always look at the packaging when I buy something to see if it was repackaged or might have possibly been returned. I have stood in the return line behind people returning the items that were obviously used and then returned. A friend of mine forwarded me this story she saw on the news and I am still in shock. Apparently, a JC Penney store sold a vase that had been returned by someone who had used it to hold cremated remains.

Ashley Pulkins received a set of vases from her mother for Christmas. When she removed the vases from the box, they were very dusty. Upon further inspection, she found a label from Mission Crematory, stating they had contained cremated remains from July 2007.

File this one under "Some people have a lot of nerve." How in the world can someone empty out a vase after cremating someone, box it back up and then return it to the store? I am appalled, especially for the memory of the person who passed away whose name is now all over the news. How ironic that the word "dignity" is on that cremation certificate.

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Filed under: Size Six, Newborn, 0-3 months, Infant / First year

My daughter turned four months on Christmas Day. While she's still an infant, it does mark the end of her super-sparkly newness. Since we've decided to end our baby-making days, it's bittersweet when I fold up the onesies and sleepers of the early weeks to hand them off to new mom friends. Here are the six things I will miss most.

1. Breastfed baby poop. With solids a couple months away, the days of oohing and ahhing over grainy mustard excrement are almost done. I will miss the molten lava explosions, no matter how disgusting they are. I'll take a breastfed baby's poopie diaper over the "preschooler-who-refuses-to-potty-train' diaper any day.

2. Milk breath. Also with the introduction of solids will be the loss of that dreamy milk breath -- not to be confused with I-just-spit-up sour milk breath.

3. The inability to move. There is something so comforting about putting the baby down (keeping safety in mind) and there she stays until you come back for her. Now that she's Mrs. Wriggly Grabby Hands, interested in all around her, those days are done.

4. Falling asleep anywhere. I know the experts frown on this, and we definitely don't do it anymore, but the early days of a teeny baby falling asleep on your shoulder are just heavenly.

5. The Swaddle. The swaddle was a life saver for us in the early days. Our spirited baby got frustrated quickly when her brawny limbs were flailing about and the swaddle provided the comfort needed to get her to fall comfortably to sleep. Now that she's getting her swarthy self out of her wrap, I am already starting to miss the swaddle magic.
6. The Romance. "Oh look honey, we made a baby and isn't she just the most spectacular thing?" Sure, that still occurs to us, but once the novelty is erased by the need for sleep schedules (and desperate need for sleep in general) you kind of miss the innocence of new parenthood.

What do you miss about newborns?

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Filed under: Newspapers, Recovering from birth, In the News

Oh how I love me some lists! This is my favourite week of the year for scouring every major paper and trashy magazine to read the best of everything over the past 12 months.

So match that with my love affair with words and imagine my excitement at this New York Times article on sparkling new words we've been creating and using in 2007. I knew about "lolcats" and "bromance" but 2007 being the year of maternity and newborn-ness, I am ashamed to say my new word count is slacking.

Have you heard of a "mom job"? According to the piece, it's "a package of cosmetic surgery procedures that will reduce the visible effects of childbirth, like stretch marks or sagging." Sign me up! My body after two kids is... um... interesting, to say the least. I wonder if Louis Vuitton wants to brand the sag bag I used to call my stomach. At least the logos would hide my stretch marks...

Maybe if I start dropping hints now, I can get a mom job for Christmas next year.

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