Filed under: Places to go, In the news

A New York lawyer is suing Delta airlines for a cool million for allegedly destroying what was supposed to be a fun family vacation and return to their ancestral homeland of Argentina.

In the suit, Richard Roth claims he deserves monetary compensation after he, his wife, mother, and two teenage children were stranded in a Delta airport for three days. The group was without their luggage for five days, and racked up a bill of over $21,000 in hotel rooms that went unused at their final destination as well as for replacement clothing and other expenses, and received rude treatment from Delta employees.

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Filed under: In the news, Media, That's entertainment

When my daughter had a chance to bring her favorite book to preschool, she didn't hesitate. She grabbed Olivia by Ian Falconer from the hundreds of other books on her shelf. There's something about Olivia that kids really relate to, whether she's scaring away her little brother, getting put in time out, carrying around her beleaguered cat, or changing her clothes for the millionth time.

In the early part of next year, kids will be able to see their favorite character come to life on the popular children's channel Nickelodean, in 26 new animated episodes. The animation, done by Brown Bag Films, is done in eye-popping 3D CGI -- a lively and colorful way to showcase this pig with flair. There's little doubt that the series is going to be a huge hit with the under-6 set.

According to his website, Falconer says that the inspiration for Olivia came from his experiences with his own niece (also named Olivia). Perhaps that's why his beloved character feels so real, to parents and kids alike.

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Filed under: Kids 5-7, Kids 8-11, Teens & tweens, Money & work, Education

Despite growing up in an accounting office, I never really learned about money as a kid -- I learned the hard way later on. First, it was a department store credit card, followed by an American Express card. That made it easy to buy expensive gifts and treat my friends a lot. And I bought CD's and recording gear and computers and the next thing I knew, I had thousands of dollars of debt piled up. So what happened?

Stephen Epstein knows. He had a similar experience, finishing college four thousand dollars in debt. Now, he runs a company called DollarCamp, providing "financial survival training" for youngsters around the San Francisco Bay Area. And that's probably a good thing -- a survey conducted by Capital One Financial Corp. found that while eighty percent of parents felt they were good role models, financially, only nineteen percent had discussed budgets with their kids. Thirty-six percent had not talked about money at all.

Epstein points out some common mistakes parents make when it comes to kids and money, the most common being not teaching kids about credit cards, including the effect late payments have on their financial future. He also warns against bribing kids with gifts and money: "Parents who buy their kids lots of gifts complain that their kids don't know the value of a dollar. How could they?" I've seen that a lot with kids whose parents bought them a car -- they then go on to trash it or even total it without worrying about it. Easy come, easy go.

Here are some more tips for teaching kids to successfully handle money, culled from around the internet:

Continue reading Raising financially savvy children

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Filed under: Eating & nutrition, In the news, Media

My five -year-old loves Cheetos; when he gets the chance to choose a treat, he will skip past the cookies and candy in the grocery and beg for a bag of the orange-covered corn puffs. Usually I oblige, but lately I've been rethinking that, not so much because I worry that the orange stuff will give him cancer or stunt his growth (both entirely possible I suppose) but because the Cheetos "Orange Underground" ad campaign offends every fiber of my being, as a parent and a person.

You know these ads -- the one I see the most frequently shows a woman in a laundromat putting a Cheeto into the dryer with someone else's whites. She is being egged on by the Cheeto Cheetah, who is downright creepy with his sunglasses and his Barry White voice. Other spots encourage similar "Random Acts of Cheetos," which are essentially just malicious vandalism perpetrated with snack food.

Snack food, I should add, that is marketed primarily to kids.

Bob Garfield at Advertising Age sums up the RAoC ad campaign this way: "Get it? Alienated teenagers and young men chafe against authority. So frustrated and resentful are they about their humiliating powerlessness, they tend to lash out -- or at least fantasize about lashing out -- at the powers that be. That would be mainly parents, teachers, principals and bosses, but anyone and anything will do." Garfield goes on to say, "But it's not just that this campaign is mean-spirited and reckless and generally contemptible. It also ultimately makes no sense. Where does a multibillion-dollar division of PepsiCo come off dissing The Man? Dude, PepsiCo is The Man."

I'm not a huge fan of junk food for kids in the first place, but this particular marketing campaign strikes me as even more dangerous than the Cheetos themselves. What say you -- are you put off by marketing like this, or is it just a commercial?

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Filed under: Image of the Day

Don't worry, little dude. I still get this way and I'm 33 years old. Be strong, be strong. Thanks to Sherlockonline for this heartbreaking (yet a little bit comical) shot.

If you'd like your own picture featured here, simply upload photos into our group Flickr Pool - We'll highlight an image every day. Remember: we're on the lookout for shots with interesting backgrounds, cool angles, or original composition. Be sure to read the intro on our main Flickr page for more information and limit your uploading to 5 photos per day.

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Filed under: Just for moms

We live in an age of Miracle Creams, designed to fix anything that ails you; we also live in an age of celebrity obsession, where you can track the loves and losses and beauty secrets of famous people in amazing detail. So of course we're all obsessed with what precisely it was that Cate Blanchett was rubbing on her belly when she was pregnant because WHERE ARE THE STRETCH MARKS?!? She doesn't have any that I can see.

Apparently, this has less to do with getting your hands on the right product and more to do with things like genetics and weight gain, at least according to the experts. In an article in today's New York Times, the American College of Obstetrician and Gynocologists tells us that we can rub whatever we like on our pregnant bellies, but we can't stop the stretch marks.

Sigh.

According to the Times, "Stretch marks occur when skin loses its elasticity, usually from rapid weight gain - a common occurrence, alas, when one is with child. But research has also shown that genetics and race play a role in stretch marks." So if your mother had stretch marks, you will likely have them too, and if you are a woman of color, your odds of winding up with permanent reminders of your pregnancy etched across your belly and thighs are greater than if you are Caucasian.

But the experts also say that while you can't PREVENT stretch marks, it doesn't really hurt to try. Rubbing fancy creams on your belly while you wait for the baby to grow keeps skin hydrated and makes you feel better, and really, the feeling better is probably the most important part.

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Filed under: Teens & tweens, Places to go, Life & style, Celeb parenting, Rumors, Behaving badly, Weird but true, Kid decor & style, That's entertainment

According to Perez Hilton, who seems to be on the cutting edge of celebrity happenings as well as fashion, rap star and sometime actor LL Cool J is set to design a line of clothing. Like many a star before him, Mr. Cool J has endeavored to create a line of clothes, this time for department story Sears. the only difference? His line is for CHILDREN!

According to LL, since he was raised by a "matriarch" and has a wife and three daughters, he knows what women are looking for. At least in terms of clothing. I think he knows what I'm looking for, too, but it has more to do with shirtless than shirts. On the very downside of all this, LL wants to make the clothes "relaxed and sexy." Sigh. LL, women may want to look sexy, BUT NOT CHILDREN!!!!!!!!!!!

The line should incorporate elements from LL's personal life, including tattoos and lyrics to his songs. I can't trump what Perez has to say about the song "I Need Love Girl" (you'll have to check it out) but all I can think is: What next? A onesie that says "Doin' it, and doin' it and doin' it well"???

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Filed under: Life & style, Celeb parenting

It seems like only yesterday that Karenna Gore got married, helped stump for her father in his run for the presidency, and gave birth to Tipper and Al Gore's first grandchild on the 4th of July. So it was a bit of a shock to read Gore Schiff's recent interview with Cookie magazine and realize time hasn't exactly stood still for this busy woman.

Karenna, oldest daughter of former vice-president Al Gore, is a lawyer, the author of Lighting the Way a book about women who helped shape modern American, and works with the Association to Benefit Children, all while balancing being a mother to three children: Wyatt, 8; Anna, 6; and Oscar, 1.

Continue reading Karenna Gore Schiff interviewed in Cookie magazine

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Filed under: Just for moms, Kids 5-7, Kids 8-11

If today were a book it would be Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.

I woke to a puddle of puppy pee waiting by the back door. Bailey, the guilty party, doesn't like to be out in the rain, and it's been raining rainy-rain for 3 days straight, now it's number 4 and the forecast is for more "precipitation," which why don't they just go ahead and call it what it is: the crazy-making, stuck-indoors weather that causes the puppy to whine and the kids to throw Lego's at each other.

Inside, everywhere I turn there are projects to finish and work that needs to be done. It's beginning to feel to me like a silent reproach. If I could work faster, be better, be more; if I didn't need sleep or those pesky things like baths and teeth-brushing, I'd have it all done by now! The final straw: I slammed the hinky door shut (which is the only way it will close when it rains) and I smashed the tip of my thumb in the door jam.

The rains have brought more than precipitation--they've brought the gray cloud of unhappiness, and it's settled in around all of us. I see it in my children--the petty fights ("Mommm! He LOOKED at me!") and the weepiness ("No goldfish crackers? Why don't we have any goldfish crackers?")--and it feels as if I should know how to fix this; I should have a magic Mama-Wand that I wave and poof! Everything is all-better.

When my children were babies and the gray cloud of unhappiness descended, I'd put them in a bathtub of warm water and we'd play with the pirate ship, or the whale that spouts a tiny arc of water, or the froggy mama and her 3 babies floating on their lily pad home. The rhythm of the gentle splashing and the warmth of the steamy air soothed all of us.

When they were bigger, I'd pile us all in our old king-sized bed (which we no longer have) and load its edges with mountains of picture books. We'd read the day away, laughing at King Bidgood or wondering about Stellaluna or Ping or that silly Sal, who thought a bear was her mother, until soon enough, we all felt better.

Now that the twins are almost-5 and Carter is 9, it's more complicated. The problems aren't as black-and-white as they used to be--teething, hunger, boredom. Now we're more in a gray area--preteen emotions, communication problems, 3-way sibling relationships. What used to work doesn't anymore, and the one-size-fits-all cures are harder to come by.

I'm called on again, as I have been so many times as a mother, to rethink our situation, to reshape it, to recreate. To figure it out. On days like today especially, I don't feel up to the task. I feel convinced that anyone would be better at this, anyone else but me. I feel the weight bearing down on me--the responsibility for these lives I'm trying to shepherd, its seriousness, the gravity.

Because it all feels enormous and overwhelming, I do the opposite. I decide the only cure for gravity is laughter. I spread the picnic blanket in front of the television, put the popcorn in the microwave, dig out the bottle of ginger ale which is kept in reserve for sore throats and other such emergencies, and settle us in with a movie from my childhood, which is soothing to me and impossibly funny and ancient to my children: Dr. Dolittle.

Dr. Dolittle talks to the animals in bubble language, or cow language, or Great Pink Sea Snail language. He makes me wish I could talk to everything, and that everything could talk to me, too. That everyone could tell me exactly what they mean, and what they need, and that I would understand completely.

Finally we come to the end of the day, which has not been a success but not a failure, exactly, either, and there's this--my middle son Avery notices the red welt on the tip of my thumb, where it was smashed by the warped door.

He points to my thumb, his eyes full of tender concern. He touches it gently, then bends his head, and gives it a tiny, soft kiss. He does it all without saying a word; there is no need for words.

And here's the thing: it really does feel better. For a moment, the kiss of a little boy heals everything, like magic.

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Filed under: Health & safety, Eating & nutrition

Did you know that Diet Coke isn't the healthiest beverage choice for your kids? No? Well, surprise, surprise, it isn't. At least it wasn't. It seems that Diet Coke -- a staple in our house -- contains sodium benzoate, a preservative that prevents mold. Unfortunately, it can also damage DNA and lead to hyperactivity in children.

Coca-cola, however, has decided to stop using the chemical, also known as E211, in its drinks due to consumer demands. E211 will be gone from all Diet Coke by the end of the year and from other drinks as soon as possible. As yet, the company has not found a suitable replacement for its drinks with a higher juice content such as Fanta, Dr Pepper, and Sprite. E211 is not used in regular Coke.

Peter Piper, a professor of molecular biology at Sheffield University, found that E211 can alter parts of DNA that may be linked to cirrhosis of the liver and Parkinson's disease. In addition, researchers at Southampton University have linked sodium benzoate to hyperactivity in children. Whether or not these findings are accurate, they are certainly cause for concern. Our kids don't drink sodas, but if they did, this might be a good reason to put a stop to the practice.

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