Archives: December, 2006

I am signing off now until the New Year because I leave for my Christmas holiday with the family tomorrow. Have a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

I will leave you with a video of Once in Royal David’s City sung by King’s College, Cambridge to get you in the mood:

For a new take on a very traditional toy, have a look at the SwitchPitch from Hoberman. It is a ball that changes colour whilst in mid air. (Suitable for kids aged 4+). Price approx. $4.95.

It will certainly make juggling shows more fun!

With only 5 days left until Christmas you might be struggling to find the right gift to buy. If you are searching for ideas, check out the Gift Ideas Generator.

You just click on your budget, the age of the recipient, the character of the recipient and their gender and the site will suggest a whole range of possible presents together with the shops where you can buy them.

There is a thought provoking article over on Parenting Ideas about the importance of teaching children commitment.

The main theme of the post is that you teach kids to commit by teaching them that they must attend, eg karate lessons, even if they don’t feel like it. This has certainly made me question my outlook. The post generally makes sense to me but from certain experiences I have had it does not always ring true.

I have been a bit slow posting recently because I am busy turning my house upside down, making room for the baby and generally reorganising. During my clear out I came across an interesting article by Miranda Ingram from The Times (dated 2004) that I cut out. It is all about the need to let children do things for themselves. Whilst it is tempting to help kids because it is so much quicker, they will never learn how to look after themselves if they are perpetually “babied”.

The article lists the tasks that a 10 year old should be able to do by themselves:

McDonald’s is trying to turn over a new leaf by installing special gyms for children. The latest “R Gym” is being tested in one of its branches in California. The “R Gym”s include:

-stationary bicycles hooked to video games
-obstacle courses
-aerobics exercises

The idea is that children will be burning off the calories as fast as they are eating them.

However, according to Kelly Brownell, director of the Rudd Centre for Food Policy and Obesity at Yale University:

“The number of calories that a child is likely to burn in one of those gyms is quite small compared to what they can eat, even in a small meal,”

There is an interesting article over on Raising Kids about children being conditioned to become young consumers by huge marketing campaigns from toymakers. The article reports the findings of a survey carried out by Think Tank Compass.

It makes quite alarming reading. Apparently:

One of the worst offenders that the survey’s authors identified was the giant American corporation Wal-Mart. This year the company took the basic Christmas list to a new level, asking kids to enter their parents’ email addresses and then pick items from a moving conveyor belt on the firm’s website. The list of items chosen by the child is then emailed to the parent.

Well, ok, that is stretching it a little bit. The Mall of Emirates in Dubai has created the most amazing snow play area which is surprisingly realistic. It is a bizarre concept but from the video it seems very popular:

The Hole - video powered by Metacafe

I have just been reading about the Intellicot from Cencio. The story behind it is as follows:

Intellicot was founded by Paul Byass, Adam Treen, Peter Lea and Johnathon Peaty who met at Coventry University while studying Industrial Product Design.

The intelligent cot is the result of a final year design project by the four designers, who realised that the nursery furniture market was in desperate need of some inspiration.

The design is quite futuristic and the features include:

1. Video Monitoring
2. Automatic Rocking
3. Electronic base raising system
4. Air Circulation
5. Safety Window
6. Storage

Have you ever worried that when you breast feed you might pass on any alcohol you are drinking to your baby? Well, now two entrepreneurs from Austin, US have created Milkscreen. To use it, you just place two drops of breast milk on a strip and wait two minutes. If the strip turns green, there is alcohol in the breast milk.

You can watch the full news video here

According to Dr Martha Schmitz:

“The concern about breast-feeding with alcohol is to the baby’s motor development. Their motor development may be somewhat delayed. In other words, they may walk a little bit later.”