Dad Uses His Own Kid to Shield Self from Pepper Spray

Ahhh kids, so handy. There they are: plowing the fields, working seven paper routes to pay for your new HD TV and always at the ready to take a face full of pepper spray for dear old dad.

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Girl’s Message in a Bottle Follows Her Home

Eight-year-old Meagan Bilodeau was out on a cruise ship in the middle of the sea when her dad talked her into writing a personal message, sticking it into a water bottle, and tossing it into the ocean.  “I always wished someone would find my bottle if I sent one. If found, would you kindly write back to me? Please? Please? Please?” she’d written.

She imagined it finding its way to far off places — CNN reports the most likely destination was the U.K. — but something happened to throw that bottle off course and it nearly followed Meagan all the way back home.  Teddy Herrick, 11, found it while boating with her own family, just fifteen miles from Meagan’s home in Falmouth, Massachusetts.  Teddy lives in Colorado and the girls plan to be penpals.

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Theme Park Offers to Hypnotize Away Rollercoaster Fears

A British theme park convinced that too many parents are acting like fuddy duddies and spoiling the fun for their thrill-hungry kids has come up with a solution: a free session with a hypnotherapist. Continue reading »

Who Needs A Vacation?

Best Western wants to help your family summer at one of their many locations around the world. So they’re giving the winner of our August Photo Contest: Water Babies a $500 travel card! How do you enter this fabulous contest? Continue reading »

Now THIS is a Family Vacation

Some would call life with three kids a bit of a zoo. For the Taviano family, it really is.

Fifty-two zoos, to be exact, visited over a stretch of fifty-two weeks by the Ohio family of five. They started last August in Louisville and wrapped up their “Zoo Year” this week in Columbus, Ohio. Continue reading »

Girl Finds Out Family’s Dead Via Facebook

If you thought all those status reports with the final score of the game you TiVo’d was bad, just wait.  A kid who went to Europe on vacation logged onto Facebook to touch base . . . only to find out her entire family had been murdered.

Police now say the trip may have saved her life. Continue reading »

Americans and Their Family Vacation Issues

Kim Brooks recently wrote an essay — published right here on Babble.com — arguing that Europeans know how to take family vacations, while Americans still don’t have a clue. Her piece focused on the fact that in most European countries, employers automatically give their employees four — sometimes as much as five — weeks of vacation, which explains why so many people in the U.K., France, Hungary and other non-U.S. countries take off the entire month of August to revel in the pleasures of ambling summer days spent with family.

I think Kim is absolutely right. The fact that many companies here in the U.S. view vacation time as a luxury — often parceling out a mere week’s worth of days off until an employee has years of seniority under his or her belt — is wrong. But I think that’s only one part of what makes it so hard for many people in this country to enjoy family vacation time. It’s not just that we don’t get the time. It’s that we don’t know how to spend it.

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Dad Harassed for Daughters in Men’s Room

Who hasn’t been in this situation? Your child has to go to the bathroom, and the only one to take them is the opposite-gender parent. So which bathroom do you use?

If you’re Donovan O’Neil, you take your toddler daughters into the men’s room. After all, he’s a man. So why was he attacked by a security guard? Continue reading »

Taking a Nanny on Vacation: Smart or Tacky?

I have never taken a nanny on vacation. To my knowledge, my friends have never taken a nanny on vacation. But I have heard stories — rumors? urban myths? — about people who do this. Part of me has to admit it’s a pretty brilliant idea. But the other part thinks it’s one of the most pretentious, self-involved things a parent can do.

The genius of the nannycation is pretty obvious. Someone is there, 24/7, to deal with your kids when they’re fighting over where to go mini-golfing, insisting on splashing everyone within a 10-mile radius of the hotel swimming pool or begging for something to eat when you just want to bury yourself in “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.” If you and your spouse or significant other want to have a nice dinner alone one night? Done. If you want someone else to con the little buggers into brushing their teeth and going to bed while you enjoy peace, quite and  a glass of wine? All set.

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Parent as Packhorse?

I don’t fly (my husband refuses), but Lisa Unger’s frequent flier article over at the NY Times this week had me groaning in total agreement.

I too have plane shame - or the road-tripping parent’s equivalent. Where I once traveled with one bag in hand, I now carry six. And it’s all due to the three-foot-and-change person who travels with me. Continue reading »