101 Creative Offline Ideas For Moms or Dads to Do With Your Kids This Summer - Book Review

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Book Review

For adults, especially those without kids at home all day, summer seems to fly quickly by.  But for those of you with young kids, it can really drag on for both parents and children when you start hearing them saying "I'm bored" as often as they are saying "I'm hungry." 

iPhone Photo by Janis Brett Elspas, MommyBlogExpert.com

The good news is that moms and dads of younger children don't have to dread the season of the year when kids are not only home for three months, but days are at their longest too.  Summer is meant for us all to enjoy, no matter how old the kids are and the new family-friendly book 101 Offline Activities You Can Do With Your Child, June 2011, is just the thing to make it happen this year.

Authored by Steve and Ruth Bennett who also brought us 365 TV-Free Activities You Can Do With Your Child, 1996, the brand new 2011 book is suitable for parents of toddlers and older elementary school students alike.  With kids so prone to whiling away the hours indoors on a computer this summer, more than ever, this book gives some easy ideas for parents to connect with your child at the same time you both unplug from the technologies that oftentimes keep you a part.

The unique picture and word format of the contents section at the beginning of the book makes this particularly simple for a toddler to actually choose the activity he'd like to do with mom.  Many of the 101 activities suggested in the book can even be done by older kids on their own, following the well-written, basic directions.  The amount of parental supervision will vary based on the activity, child's age, abilities, and motor skills.

To test this family fun guide out, I opened it at random to the page for Idea #6:  Big-Time Newspaper.  Any mommy blogger -- as well as non-blogging moms and dads -- raising future little journalists will enjoy this.  This project, which can be done at the kitchen table while mom cooks dinner, starts by covering the table with large sheets of paper.  Then, using crayons or washable magic markers, kids write the name of their newspaper in large letters to create the masthead at the top.  They can also try their hand at setting up columns and doing layouts as well as dreaming up headlines.

I liked this particular idea because it helps kids not only develop writing skills but also gives them a chance to tell stories about what happened that day in their own hand-written (not computer typed) words.  Throughout the rest of the book were a number of other equally engaging ways for parents and kids to spend some quality time together.  

With such of wide variety of 100 other clever choices there are all sorts of things kids can do at home indoors, in the backyard, and even while traveling.  The best thing of all is that none of the ideas suggested involves any sort of electronics or technology.  Not only that, they require just a few inexpensive items you probably already have on hand at home.

Talk about having a good, old-fashioned summer with your kids.  Can you imagine anything better for either you or your child to do together?

Steve Bennett is the founder of AuthorBytes a company creating sites and online collateral for authors and publishers.  Steve and wife Ruth's previous activity books -- 365 Outdoor Activities You Can Do With Your Child and 365 TV-Free Activities You Can Do With Your Child -- have sold more than 1 million copies.  Ruth, BTW, is a landscape architect specializing in parks and outdoor children's play spaces.

101 Offline Activities You Can Do With Your Child, $19.95 in paperback; $9.99 for the Kindle Edition, is published by BPT Press.  Available in either format on Amazon. 

Now it's your turn.  What ways do you like best to enjoy quality time with your kids away from computers and televisions during the summer months?  Would love to hear about what works for your family

FTC Disclosure:  I received a review copy of the book to facilitate this review.   MommyBlogExpert did not receive any payment or other compensation associated with this particular post.  See complete FTC Disclosure information that appears at the bottom of MommyBlogExpert's main page and at the bottom of every MBE post.

Ice Cream Social Celebrates Summer

Good Food

Above, here I am enjoying the start of summer and the fringe benefits of blogging about food with good friend, Cheri Liefeld of Adventures in the Kitchen.

The All-American Classic Summer Treat

MBE partnered with Dove Ice Cream for this story

Ask any group of American adults or kids, "What one food do you most associate with summer?"  Nine out of 10 of them will answer "Ice Cream!" with an exclamation point.  I know for sure, that I'm with the majority on that question, and most of you probably are too, so you might not find that statistic so surprising.

But, here's a few things you might not be aware of.  First, that California is the leading producer of ice cream in the U.S. with 136.5 million gallons made.  Also since 1984 when President Ronald Regan -- a Californian -- officially designated it, July has been recognized as National Ice Cream Month.  I'm a transplanted Easterner now living in L.A., so I'm proud of both those associations.

Thinking back to my childhood, I'm not sure if it was the 60s time period or the mores of living on the East Coast.  But, when I was a kid growing up in New Jersey I actually remember eating ice cream only in summer -- never during the rest of the year.

Unlike other kids back then, I actually didn't consider it summer when school let out the third week of June.  For me, the hottest season of the year began officially on the first day the Good Humor man's truck visited my neighborhood.  I can also recall that usually that same weekend the boarded up Dairy Queen on the main road through town would open up for the summer and it became a popular family destination on warm and humid evenings. 

A bit of trivia: Though widely available across America in modern times, Good Humor and Dairy Queen used to be regional brands concentrated primarily in the Northeast.

MommyBlogExpert.com

These summer rituals are my earliest memory of that frozen quintessential treat and one of the things I remember most vividly about my childhood.  To me, ice cream has always meant that the lazy days of summer are here!  Even after my family moved to the West, that love affair with ice cream continued.  In fact,  my very first job as a teenager was working as a server at Baskin-Robbins when I was in high school.

Fast forward a number of decades to the present.  Today, I still love ice cream as much as I did as a child and so does just about everyone else.  So, when Ketchum -- one of the largest PR agencies in the world -- and their client California Milk Advisory Board (CMAB) invited me to an event for food bloggers called the "Not So Old-Fashioned Ice Cream Social," they had my undivided attention from the get-go. And, guess what?  This soiree was purposefully planned to coincide with the first day of summer on June 21 which resonated with my personal childhood tradition!

Above is Chef Danielle Keene with me at the CMAB Ice Cream Event held in Los Angeles

The CMAB, by the way, are the people behind the bright yellow Real California Milk brand.  The event began with Danielle Keene, Top Chef: Just Desserts Season 1 finalist telling us about all the ways ready-made ice cream can be easily mixed with a variety of unlikely ingredients -- such as fresh ground pepper and smoked salts -- to inexpensively create some really original artisan ice creams of your own.  From my own experience and that of the other ladies who tasted some pretty unusual combinations served that day, I can assure you that the resulting flavors for amazingly scrumptious.  

Watch for another post soon with some of the recipes Danielle shared with us that will also include a fun giveaway contest. To inspire you, here's MommyBlogExpert's Original Chocolate Potato Chip Ice Cream.

The same day of the party I went home and created my own original ice cream that was off-the-charts delicious.   Breyers Mrs. Fields Chocolate Fudge Brownie Ice Cream with Whipped Cream and Lays Potato Chips anyone?  This really was good, and now my kids are asking me to make it for them, too!

Now it's your turn. What's your favorite brand and flavor of store-bought ice cream?  And if you are so inclined, what kind of really unusual add-in do you think are/would be really delish with it?

FTC Disclosure:  As mentioned in the above post, I was invited to the California Milk Advisory Board's Not So Old-Fashioned Ice Cream Social for bloggers covering food.  I also received a goody bag at this event with an assortment of ice cream themed gifts.  However, these did not influence my post in any way and MommyBlogExpert did not receive any payment or other compensation associated with this particular post.  See complete FTC Disclosure information that appears at the bottom of MommyBlogExpert's main page and at the bottom of every MBE post.

Are You a Mommy Blogger Like Me that Sometimes Procrastinates? Here's the Help We Both Need

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My triplets, who are now teens, often inspire my blogposts
Vintage family photo by Janis Brett Elspas, MommyBlogExpert.com

I’ve got a confession to make, I have not been following my own advice on how to write and publish at least one post per day. Chances are that among all you other moms who blog, that I have plenty of company on this little flaw.

Really, let's be honest.  I mean, how many of us actually have at one time or another intended to post daily, but then failed to follow through?  For sure, most of us (present company included) are juggling our self-made mom blogging empires single-handedly on top of having one or more children plus other family members and friends to keep up with. 

Much as we try and as hard as we work there never seem to be enough hours in the day.  We never seem to catch up with all we have and want to do personally or professionally as online writers. I’d even go so far as to call those of us with kids and active blogging careers super mommy bloggers on a tread mill that runs what seems like 24/7.

Life with a family certainly is unpredictable, with plenty of things happening that hit us by surprise.  But none of these obstacles -- minor or major -- have to stop us from publishing a blogpost each day, if we plan ahead and be a little more organized in our blogging schedules.

So, I’m experimenting with a new approach for the first time starting today.  It’s called NaBloPoMo, a motivational program that was spearheaded by the BlogHer women's blogging network that I have been a member of for just over two years now.  NaBloPoMo – which has actually been around for a while and is not really new -- is short for National Blog Post Month and it happens every month of the year.  

Simply described, it is boot camp for blogging women both with and without children who may be slackers like me, sometimes, but who hope to be Olympian bloggers by month’s end.  The premise is that you get to by on the month's NaBloPoMo blogroll for committing to publishing a post at least once a day.  There are no excuses for not posting daily if you participate, so it's probably a good idea to stock pile some posts for those days when you find yourself totally overwhelmed with life, not blogging.

If you’d like to get some tough-love motivation yourself, it’s not too late to join in for the month of July. In fact, the exact middle of year -- which is right now -- is as good a time as any to try this out for yourself. That’s because BlogHer is sponsoring a NaBloPoMo writing contest this month. 

I'm optimistic that this might be just the thing to whip me into shape.  To every mom who hopes to join me and post every day on either your personal or professional blog during July, I say “Go For It! I wish us all good luck in our lofty endeavors.”

Do you post daily on your mommy blog? Why or why not? What things motivate you the most to keep writing and meeting daily deadlines?  Share your thoughts in the comment section below.

FTC Disclosure:  MommyBlogExpert did not receive any payment or other compensation associated with this particular post.  See complete FTC Disclosure information that appears at the bottom of MommyBlogExpert's main page and at the bottom of every MBE post.