Games

Being recent East Bay transplants via Los Angeles we find ourselves making tons of road trips down south to visit our dearly missed friends and relatives. With our two kids in tow for the long (boring) haul up the good ol' 5 freeway it's really easy to fall into the electronic trap.

We've talked about Make and Takes' genius velcro ball and glove catch game before which we love, love, love. Marie LeBaron is sharing more velcro-catchy goodness by offering a new twist to her original idea.

It seems rather silly to me that I've yet to sew a few bean bags for my kid. True I'm a sewing junkie who just so happens to own a sizeable collection of fabric. And true I have a very active 3.5 year old daughter who loves to catch, toss and balance all sorts of interesting things and true we own this CD.

I'm a fan of tricking kids into learning something...Disguising concepts that might normally be on the dull side (like spelling) in a heaping helping of yummy game-time fun.

You're half-way through summer vacation and by now you might have already blown through all the trips and activities you've planned with the kids who are slowly turning into couch cushions as things heat up outside. So now what? Hows about a homemade puzzle craft that will give those fine motor skills and brains a nice workout?

My 3 year old daughter seems to be more intrigued by real-life things she can manipulate than the small toy-store-worth of toys sitting in her room. And while the mountains of stuffed animals and miniature figures go untouched there isn't a cap in our home that doesn't get screwed to a plastic bottle, a penny left not clanking into a piggy bank, a pot and pan not hammered with a wooden spoon or a light switch not turned on and off and on and off and on and off and on and off...

In less than a month my 9 year old will be home on summer vacation for 10 long, hot weeks. And because we've dragged our feet deciding whether to send him off to camp he'll be home each day expecting to be entertained. Then there'll be the days when his buddies will be over from the crack of dawn until the street lights brighten the night sky and I'll want them out of my precious home for as many hours as I can get away with. Those days call for something a little more special.

We're in for one scorching summer. So what do you do with a house full of bored kids in desperate need of some exercise when it feels like the surface of the sun outside and there isn't a water oasis nearby?

It was my 3 year old daughter making a set of "Goldilocks and the Three Bears" stick puppets at our parent and me class that sparked the puppet craze in our household. Each night my daughter and her 9 year old brother started our bedtime routine with a reworking of the classic story using the puppets my daughter crafted and a few extra characters dug up from the bottom of her toy chest. My husband and I adored watching the two teaming up deciding who would work which puppets and thinking up witty story lines and dialogues complete with hilarious banter.

Put down that Wii-mote for a minute, pick up your imagination--and a twenty sided die! My son and I have recently discovered (for me, rediscovered) Marvel Superheroes: a pen-and-paper role playing game set in the Marvel Universe, first published by TSR (creators of Dungeons and Dragons) way back in 1984. The game was designed to let players assume the roles of superheroes from Marvel Comics, such as Spider-Man, Daredevil, the Hulk, Captain America, the Fantastic Four, the X-Men, and many others. Advanced versions lets you create your own superheroes.