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These guys are too geeky to believe, but it puts my great dad credentials to shame when I see guys building custom stuff like this for little kids. Add this to the list of home projects I know would add immeasurably to children’s memories, but which I lack the competence, or motivation, to ever bring to completion.
This is one tiny video game machine.
I’m happy to report that our new app that helps dads find local activities via their phone is off to a great start. We’ll be launching the iPhone version as soon as Apple gives the green light.
Check out some of these positive comments:
This is a great app and is very useful, but didn’t recieve 5 stars because it seems to be focused on San Fransisco when I use it
Unbelievable, makes finding fun ideas so easy along with directions and everything u need 2 know. Sorry dads, i’m a mom using this 
This is a really good app. Now I have a place to find different activies do with my kids. For sure a Man Secret!!!
I never knew half of this stuff was around! Mums world take aid from this also. But its best kept a guy secret!
I feel guilty i havent done 95% of the stuff this app says i could be doing with my kid right now!
i live in philly and i didnlt know half of the places here i could take my kids. love it love it love it! 5 stars
[From Ratings and comments about GreatDad - Powered by Aloqa for Android]
We’ve been in France this week and I’ve been chasing my kids around in the house where we’re staying to get them to turn off the lights as they go in and out of rooms. While French kids, like kids everywhere, are lazy about recycling and other conservation moves, for some reason, everyone here treats electricity like a running faucet. They just wouldn’t leave a room without turning the light off. My kids keep all the lights on everywhere as if we were in the middle of a night game at Yankee Stadium.
No amount of haranguing to them, or my wife, seems to make any difference. They just say, “yes, Dad” and move on to the next brilliantly lit room.
Here’s an idea some PR flack sent me this morning though and it’s a good enough idea to pass on, playing as it does on dad’s desire to cut back on costs and energy waste, teach good habits, and involve the kids.
“Moolah Maker” is the name of website with a tool to help you set a family goal for energy savings. By entering your energy bills, the site sets a family goal and creates a contract between you and your kids. Apparently, the kids/parents interface is a little hokey with a lot of “hey dude” lingo, but the idea is a good one since kids always want to earn some cash and this doesn’t take a lot of energy they could be using to swing the Wii controller. This project might make getting the monthly utility bill a family bonding experience.
[From the Energy Circle Moolah Maker website:
Kids are the greatest power source on the planet.
Unleash that force, save the earth and reap some profit. It’s easier than you think, and more important than ever. Together, kids and parents across North America are making a deal to use less and save more. Go ahead, shake on it.
The site lists a bunch of tips for energy savings:
Tips for Saving (and making more $) fast:
* Get an Electricity Monitor. There’s no better way to save than to see your usage in real time.
* Use smart strips. Slay the entertainment center and computer vampires. Smart Strips rock.
* Ditch your incandescent bulbs (say it isn’t so… still have some? Not good.)
* Hang a clothesline. (big savings, and excellent fodder for neighbors). Dryers eat Benjamins.
* Use low-flow showerheads. Hot water takes heat. Kids like long showers. Use less.
* Fill up the dishwasher. (Hallelujah! It uses less hot water than hand-washing)
* Chill out with fans, not the AC. A little breeze makes it feel 4-8 degrees cooler.
Tips for Going Deeper
* Figure out your baseload—the stuff that’s on 24/7. Does it all need to be? Find out.
* Hire a Certified Professional Energy Auditor. And take notes. Find out how to lower energy costs quickly and efficiently.
* Get programmable thermostats and compromise a degree or two (way easy, double smart)
The Eyeclops Bionic Eye SE is out at $40, so if you’ve been waiting for an affordable version of the video microscope for yourself, or another budding scientist in the house, now you can jump in. This is a super cool device that allows you to point a lens at anything within reach and see images at 200x power.
This might be billed as a toy, but it’s a pretty powerful device for looking at anything right up close, including a coin, your finger, or a strand of hair. And, the images really bring that 42″ TV to life.
We have plenty of other gift ideas for dads in general, but here are two good gifts for divorced dads, probably from friends or family interested in supporting dads’ relationships with kids who may not even be in the same city. Both are also wonderful presents for dads who “can’t be there” whether due to business travel or military service.
The first is the Vidtel telephone service. Vidtel is finally the telephone of the near future that AT&T promised to us at the 1964 Worlds Fair. Vidtel, using broadband (cable or DSL) connections, finally makes good on that promise.
Because it’s broadband, rather than POTS (plain old telephone service), the picture quality and voice are as good as any online connection using Skype or one of the many online video chat services. The big difference though is that the connection is made using what looks to be a traditional telephone. This means that any child can answer the phone, and even dial from it, making connection possible without an adult to set the connection up.
Vidtel is a bit expensive at $14.95 per month for each phone (other Vidtel payment plans available). At this price, it’s not for everyone, but in our tests, it does what it promises to do: makes it easy to make video calls, inlcuding video voicemail. For a divorced dad who doesn’t want to go through a ex-spouse gatekeeper for every conversation with his child, this might be a good solution.
Additionally, the Vidtel has an auto-answer setting making it possible to be used as a room monitoring device. We’d counsel against using this for spying, but there are very real situations (new babysitter) where this might be handy.
The ease of use of the Vidtel system also makes this a good choice for older grandparents who may not be able to use computer videoconferencing.
The second is the etendi BRIDGE,, available at etendi.com. BRIDGE is a website that provides a closed environment for families to communicate without fear of outsiders and open emails. The users of BRIDGE can only write, share photos, look at a shared calendar and see video of the specific BRIDGE users in their group. This makes it perfect for kids who might be too young to have their own email.
The desktop if set up for sharing photos and there’s even a shared whiteboard where you can imagine dads able to help on math homework. This is certainly not “ideal,” but changing family situations demand technology solutions, never to replace real dad time, but far better than no contact.
Key for dads right now: the service is FREE for four or fewer users. So dad and up to three kids can communicate. A more extensive plan is available for larger families and more users.
BRIDGE was the winner of the GreatDad Recommends program and MrDad Seal in 2009. 
Today’s Twitters are often tomorrow’s quitters, according to data that questions the long-term success of the latest social networking sensation used by celebrities from Oprah Winfrey to Britney Spears.
Data from Nielsen Online, which measures Internet traffic, found that more than 60 percent of Twitter users stopped using the free social networking site a month after joining.
[From Many Twitters are quick quitters: study | U.S. | Reuters]
I tried it, found it interesting, but ultimately frustrating. I found lots of people doing kid stuff, writing blogs, selling gear. However, whenever I reached out to them with specific questions, I think they were overwhelmed with tallying their followers or lost in a pile of 140 letter haikus, because almost no one responded! And, these were legitimate business inquiries from people who said they wanted to hear from any time in their “thanks for following me” messages.
Has your experience been different? I’d love to know. I’ve read other articles on this now, and I’m a short-seller on Twitter, though our blog does post to it. Let me know your thoughts in comments.
Load it with the right apps and that shiny iPhone can come in handy for a great many things, including parenting. Your smartphone won’t change a diaper, but it can definitely help out with organization, stress management, and keeping family members entertained.
There are loads of apps in the App Store designed specifically for kids and parents, but surprisingly, we found the best family tools to be nonspecific to the parenting genre. Here are our top 10 iPhone app picks for parents, and how they can be adapted to make motherhood (or fatherhood) a less-complicated experience.
PC Magazine’s top iPhone apps for Parents might disappoint you. It’s more like 10 random iPhone apps for “people,” including a grocery list maker, photo sharer and a recorder. There was literally not one app specific to babies or kids. What kind of iPhone app would you like to see (or pay for) if you could have it? Poop and pee tracker? Baby Gap finder? Doctor finder? GreatDad news reader?
Please put ideas in comments.
A pox party is a party held by parents for the purpose of infecting their children with childhood diseases, most commonly chicken pox.
Would you, could you infect your child with a disease, to avoid the controversial avoidance of childhood immunizations?
For some reason, perhaps because of the title, I thought Eagle Eye was a simple film about a drone surveillance airplane gone mad. There is a drone plane or two, but the movie is so much more than that. Directed by D. J. Caruso from a story by Steven Spielberg, and starring Shia Laboeuf (Transformers) and Michelle Monaghan (Mission Impossible 3), Eagle Eye is a high tech conspiracy movie that plays on your worst fears about how computers track our everyday move. It pits two unwitting innocents against the Department of Homeland Security when they are set up to be the agents of an assassination plot. Without giving too much away, this movie draws on the best of 2001, The Parallax View, and War Games.
The pyrotechnics here are stunning with some new car chase scene ideas you have definitely not seen before. A chase scene in the baggage handling routing system of an airport will have you twisting and turning as the main characters ride conveyor belts like a beaten up piece of old uggage. This is a movie that will keep your attention just because it does a few things not seen before
Dads will enjoy this action thriller, but Eagle Eye is not a movie for young kids. There is no sex and very little profanity, but there is a tremendous amount of chaotic violence and heart-pounding chase sequences. The plot action also involves death threats on a mom and her son if she doesn’t participate in the action.
We do it. Our family computer sits in the kitchen, screen toward the crowd. I never have to worry about where my daughter is surfing, or what she’s looking at. Of course, she’s only 8. This will change at some point, but I think the findings of this are obvious, and projectable to other areas. My general parenting guideline for my four and eight year old is that supervision at all times will avoid a slough of problems. For example:
I suppose with kids as young as ours, this is probably very easy advice to follow. So far, I find that they like boundaries, as long as they are consistent. My daughter even reminds other parents that she’s not allowed to watch certain shows. Don’t get me wrong; I don’t think we’re perfect parents, but we do try to stay as involved as we can and as present as we can. Obviously, as they grow, they need more independence, but each time you leave them alone to wander the internet, or watch whatever they want to watch, you take the risk that they will see things beyond their limits.
This would mean family computers being sited, wherever possible, in communal areas of the home rather than in children’s bedrooms or their parents’ private studies.
The review will also say that parents must bridge the technological “generation gap” by making sure they know as much about the internet and video games as their computer-literate children.
Mrs Byron, who is expected to publish her findings on Thursday, has talked to children, fellow psychologists, parents and industry experts after the Prime Minister expressed concern last year at the impact of violence seen by young people. While she is likely to recommend that rules on the certification of video games be streamlined – and made simpler to understand – she is expected to argue that there are benefits for young people from some games.
[From Computers should be kept out of kids's rooms - Telegraph]
