A family "connects".

It’s Sunday afternoon in the family room. Mom and Dad are on their laptops. Working, or performing one of the many other tasks that have migrated from the real world to the screen world: shopping, corresponding, planning a vacation. The six year -old is on Club Penguin. The four year-old is tracing letters on the iPad.  The toddler is happily popping virtual bubbles on Mom’s phone.  Sound familiar?

This is the scene in many family rooms around the country (and probably, the wired world).  In yesterday’s New York Times, Alex Williams called it “A wholly different form of quality time.”

I’m not sure I agree. Do you?  Continue reading »

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Quality time?

I have to admit that whenever I read something about how great family dinners are I nod and cringe at the same time.  On the one hand, of course it’s great to sit down every night together.  On the other hand, I can’t always take the pressure.

With the publication of Laurie David’s new book, The Family Dinner: Great Ways to Connect with Your Kids One Meal at a Time we’ve had a lot of chances to read about how nice they are.  And they are! Ellen Galinsky, President of the Work and Family Institute,  wrote this week about how kids don’t remember the big fancy birthday parties as much as the regular rituals of Sunday pancakes. Which I believe, but I don’t think the pancakes are the meat here (forgive me). The larger point here is about connecting, not cooking. Continue reading »

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If you’re anything like me, you don’t get to spend anywhere near enough time with your kids and when you are with them, it seems like you’re always just shuttling them to and from piano lessons, dance classes, and so on — anything but spending quality time together.  I know the rare occasions when I’ve been off from work and the kids aren’t in school, we have a wonderful time together going for a picnic or visiting a museum or just sitting and watching the waves together.  It sure seems like I spend less time with my kids than my parents spent with me — but is that really the case?

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I don’t know how other parents do it.  It seems like I barely have time to get the kids off to school before I need to be at work and then, even not taking time off for lunch, it’s nearly bedtime by the time I’ve put in my eight hours and made my way home.  We never have enough time for playing games or working on projects together.  But what’s a parent to do, short of discovering a previously-unknown rich uncle?  We’ve got bills to pay; kids aren’t cheap!

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I admit I’ve been on a horrible, rotten, no-good As-Seen-On-TV kick recently, searching for the next miracle product to do more stuff in half the time. Deep down, I know most of these things won’t work, but I can’t help thinking the Slap Chop would make family dinner prep so much easier.

So I find myself drawn to Bendaroos, a children’s craft … thing. Check out the infomercial below. They are sticks coated in “magical wax” and can be shaped and formed into all manner of crazy creations. And then they can be bent back for use later! Plus, there’s no messy clean up!

See? Sucker. I’m even reciting commercial lines now. Continue reading »

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Early this summer, I took my daughters — 6 and 4 — on a bike ride in our urban neighborhood.  For the first time everyone was on their own two (or four) wheels — no one in a bike seat, trailer, or on a tandem.

Five minutes into the bike ride, I suddenly understood what a mother duck goes through all. day. long.  It was a constant struggle to make sure everyone stayed together, no one crossed a street before I got there, and no one was left lagging behind.  And this was with just two kids!

So I feel a little emapthy whenever I see a mama duck.  Keeping all those roving youngsters together is a tough job when you’re on your own.  One mama duck whose babies got stuck in a swimming pool got a helping hand from an unlikely source — a human and a patio chair.  Watch:

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