Madumok

Making the Little Lies Count Restaurant Tactics from the Lively Little Campers I have always been on the fence about the whole lying to your kids thing. Ive read all the articles and I get all the arguments. I know the experts advise direct and simple truths in the face of all questions. It sounds all good until your 3 year old asks you exactly how the doctor is going to help get baby Wesley out. I figure by the time they are ready for that direct truth, it will be someone else telling it, and Im just fine with that. On the flip side, Ive never been the type of parent to make up stories in order to bypass the daily challenges of toddlerdom. Im not sure why this suddenly changed last weekend, but something came over me. Maybe it was just that I really wanted a wonderful seafood dinner, looking out over the bay as the sun went down, eating scallops and sipping a cold beer. My boys are not terrible in restaurants, but sometimes things can go haywire and someone can wind up under the table...

Most Improved in Cutting The Campers Create Art When the campers got their first report cards from preschool last year, their teacher noted that the fine arts was not necessarily their area of expertise. Although Jeremy huffed and puffed, this feedback came as no surprise to me since most artistic ventures in the home lasted about 7 to 9 minutes and ended with me scrubbing something out of a carpet or off of a wall. Well, preschool worked its magic, and the boys are now capable and willing to sit for long periods of time and create masterpieces. So for the first time ever, I packed a big bag of craft supplies for our trip to North Carolina. When the rain rolled in yesterday morning, the paper, scissors, crayons, and stickers came out.  The boys sat for well over an hour making invitations to their popsicle party that was to take place later that day. (I had brought those popsicle molds that you pour juice into and freeze. Luckily my boys never have anything like that at home so it ...

Monster Jam vs Lively Little Campers Spoiler Alert It wasnt even a contest I have a confession. I was one of those 28 year olds who swore I would never get sucked in to all that kid junk. You know the type--the non-parent who swears they will always be far too cool to play Raffi on loop in the car or stand with their head through the cut out hole of a wooden penguin at the zoo, acting all, yeah, haha,  I really look like a penguin . Im pretty sure I assumed (pre-children) that parents brought their kids to places like Storybook Land because they felt they had to. They were doing their due diligence, punching the clock, setting aside a healthy appreciation of irony, and grinning and bearing it. Then I had kids. I actually remember the first kid thing that we did as a family. My boys were only 7 months old and we took them on a train ride with Santa. Like they cared about Santa. They could have gotten  motion sick, for all I know. But guess what? Jeremy and I had a blast. I unde...