Style Lush

In the trenches: Flying with a lap child and sibling

By Elisabeth

This past week, my family and I spent eight days in Oklahoma for the Thanksgiving holiday. That was probably the last time we'll fly with my youngest on my lap since his 2nd birthday is in April, but I wanted to share with you a secret trick I used to make our journey a little easier. (It's not fool-proof, but it's better than nothing.)

My middle child is 4 1/2 years old and can fly without any kind of harnessed car seat, BUT he is still young enough to be eligible for one, if needed. Well, in our case, I did use one for him, but just for the take-off and landing. (We used a 5-point harness Sunshine Kid booster*. Using just a booster seat would not work under airline guidelines.)

Once we were in the air and they announced we could use all portable electronic devices (HALLELUJAH!) I took him out of the car seat and placed my 19 month lap child in the beautiful and glorious apparatus. He was LOCKED in and not squirmy as all get out. I've got bruises to show for it!

What did I do with the other kid? Well, I gently shoved him in between my husband and me and made our row of three, a tight four. If he were younger, or less narrow in the hips? there would be more room for everybody involved. (Who am I kidding? My son and I shared a seat while my husband played a video on his IPad with plenty of room to let it all hang out. Plus, my 7 year old was sitting in the row beside us, on the aisle and made friends enough with his row mate, that he began playing on her phone after she offered it to him!)

Now, of course, my 2nd child wasn't in a seat belt while all of this is going on, but for the duration of the time my infant spent in the car seat, he watched a show quietly and fell asleep for 45 minutes.

When they announced we were on the descend, I switched the kids back to their original seating and all was right with the world.

It's the little things, I tell ya.

So, if you're traveling for the holidays or know someone who is, with two or more small children, including a lap baby, you might want to consider bringing that heavy, annoying car seat. It can save marriages.

 

{photo credit: me}

(*This photo was taken from another flight when we had purchased a seat for him. He slept for 30 minutes during the 5-hour flight and spent most of his time in our arms in the galley. Money well spent!)

Reader help: Toddler-safe stocking hangers

By Manda

After nearly 8 years of loathing, my husband will be overjoyed to find that our stocking hangers are about to meet their end. Minutes after we got out our Christmas decorations this year there was a yanking incident that ended in a nearly-broken face on our 4-year-old. Our 2-year-old, who copies everything his sister does, is determined to injure himself as well!

We have these "NOEL" holders, which are of the Target variety and only slightly weighted. Heavy enough to hold an empty stocking, easy to yank off, and yet just dangerous enough to cause injury. GENIUS. Can you tell this was one of my pre-kid decorations?

(Not pictured: copious amounts of those 3M sticky thingies and clear packing tape.)

And so, I implore you Dear Readers, is there an attractive, yet SAFE way to display stocking on mantels without hammering nails into the wood? Bonus points if the stockings will hang filled, which is my husband's Christmas pet peeve.

H&M Clothing for Kids

By Tara

I'm pretty sure it's toddler law that clothing is not allowed to last longer than a month or two, at least in my house. Three wearings into a pair of jeans, and the knees are shot. One trip to preschool, and whatever t-shirt I've put on my kid will be stained beyond repair. Those sweatpants that fit last week are capri length this week.

It's obnoxious.

So, I'm pretty happy that H&M, my favorite trendy/disposable clothing store, makes an adorable children's line.

Pink Knit Dress

Tulle Skirt

Knit Dress

Ruffle Collar Jersey Dress

Twill Pants

Most of the items fall in the $10-$15 range, which I appreciate. And they also have an impressive selection of tights and leggings in the store, of which my daughter is now the proud owner of something like six pairs, mostly because I can't say no to cute tights or leggings. And really, why would I want to?

Nothing on the site is available for online purchasing, which is sad for me, since I do my best work online, but, still...I can make it worth my time to hit the mall every once in awhile, I guess.

DIY Star Wars Snowflakes

by Leah

My husband is a strict observer of the "No Christmas Decorations Until December 1" rule. It's too bad for him that he married me, then, since I'm equally devoted to the "Get Them Up While You Can Because Your Life Is Crazy" doctrine, which usually means taking advantage of the long Thanksgiving weekend to deck the ever-loving crap out of our halls.

This year the prospect of one special winter craft ("winter"! not necessarily "Christmas"!) may have softened his obstinance a little. Ladies, gentlemen, spouses of geeks, and moms of little boys in particular, I present to you the Star Wars snowflakes:

The 2012 collection is available as free PDF downloads here, and last year's are here.

Who doesn't want to tape Billy Dee Williams to their living room window for the entire neighborhood to see, amirite?

The designer, Anthony Herrera, suggests using an X-Acto knife for the fine details, so this isn't an activity for little kids, but that doesn't mean they won't ooh and aah over their parents' skillful rendering of a prismatic paper Yoda. Awesome you will be.  

Creative Christmas Countdown 2012

by Hillary

Advent calendars featuring Christmas-themed activities instead of candy are nothing new around these parts (check out posts by Jen, Jennie, and Lawyerish for more inspiration.)

The Creative Christmas Countdown 2012 by Creative with Kids is a little different (and a lot exciting!) Twenty-four bloggers have put together an advent calendar of Christmas-themed activities and art projects. All you have to do is subscribe to the countdown via email and you'll receive a daily email with a brief description of the day's activity.

Supply lists will be emailed the last week of November so you can be prepared for the first Christmas activity on December 1st.

Do you do activity advent calendars or do you use candy to countdown the days to Christmas? My mom sewed beautiful advent calendars for me and my siblings. She'd fill them with toffees and hang them on the wall. I used to sneak bites of my siblings' candies and then wrap them back up and put them back in the advent calendar half-eaten and sticky. I can see the benefits of an activity-based advent calendar, is what I'm saying here.

{Photo credit: creativewithkids.com}

Family Vacation: Legoland

By Leah

We just got back from Legoland and, always the intrepid Style Lush reporter, I'm here to share what I learned in case you or anyone you know is considering a trip there. (Note: This is all about Legoland in California; I can't speak to the one in Florida.) Here are my tips and impressions:

• Everyone we talked to--online friends, IRL friends, the pilot on the plane--told us that my son, at age almost-four, was the perfect age for Legoland. They were right. Younger kids are too short to ride all the rides and older kids might think a lot of the attractions are a little babyish, but my son loved everything in the park and was juuuuust tall enough to ride the biggest rollercoaster, which was as awesome as it was shocking because it was pretty intense. Kids age three to about eight or nine seem to be the target audience.

• I don't know what the park is like during other seasons, but going on Saturday in early November (before all the Christmas stuff gets into full swing) felt like a sweet spot. The park wasn't crowded, and all of the lines moved quickly but one (see truncated screed below). The weather was pleasant--a little chilly at times, but better than burning hot--and none of the water park stuff was open, which means we were able to focus on just the main area (and not have to worry about bringing an extra set of dry clothes). The one minus about going in fall was that the sun set at 4:30 and the park closed at 5, giving us only 7ish hours to explore the park (which sounds like a lot but it went really quickly). I wish we'd had another hour or two, but I also wonder if that would have put us into overtired-meltdown territory, so maybe it was a blessing in disguise.

• Get the apple fries. They're like cooked apples wrapped in churros dipped in whipped cream made in heaven, and they are to die for. (Thanks for the tip, Miranda!)

• Go clockwise through the park. This will put the gentler rides at the beginning and the bigger rollercoasters at the end. It will also put you near the food court at around noon. (The Burger Stop in Fun Town has great cheeseburgers, and Fun Town Hot Dogs serves insanely hot chilis, if you're into that sort of thing.)

• Do MinilandUSA last. We could have spent hours there, but the kid would have been crazy-bored, so it worked out well to do it at the end of the day, when my son's energy was waning, the light was fading, and the park was closing down, meaning we had to move through the displays pretty quickly instead of staring in awe at each one for ages.

• Don't wait in line for the Sky Cruiser. I could go on and on about this, but let's just say the line is THE SLOWEST EVER and the ride is dumb and a waste of space, the end.

• On some of the rides that tend to have longer or slower waits, there are areas stocked with Legos so the kids can build and play while the parents stand in line. This is flat-out GENIUS and something that should be done at every amusement park the world over.

• If you only have one day at the park, don't spend the money on combo tickets that include the aquarium and/or waterpark. It took us a full day (7+ hours) to get through the main park, and we only rode one ride twice (The Dragon rollercoaster, which was my favorite). There's more than plenty to do at Legoland proper for one whole day.

• The tickets are pretty pricey at about $75 for adults and $65 for kids between 3 and 12 (cf. $90 and $80 for Disneyland). We won ours in a promo contest and, after the first few little baby rides, were congratulating ourselves for not having paid for such a dumb park, but by the end of the day, and after seeing how much fun my son had and how he really was at the perfect age for it all, we decided it was worth the asking price (although we were still glad we hadn't paid for tickets and could therefore spend more money on apple fries).

Anyone else been to Legoland and have info to share?

DIY Costumes

By Beth

Look, I know this is two days late, but I am so stinking proud of my Halloween costume innovations this year that I have to post them in the vainglorious belief that they are good enough for all you nice people to remember for next year.

Also, I should point out that my son wore a fully store-bought costume at every opportunity this Halloween season.  I'm not crafty at all by nature, which likely explains why I feel the burning need to toot my own horn ever time I pull off something remotely homemade.

Ok, first costume.  We went to a Halloween event with a heavy Star Wars theme (ah, don't you love how geeks celebrate holidays, you should see what we do for Thanksgiving) and the children looked like this:

Han Solo there came from Amazon and a generous aunt, but Leia was all mama ingenuity.  The hair is all her own, with help from a pair of socks that I rolled up one on each side then clamped the ends together with a hair tie and pulled the hair around to cover.  The gown is my old white bathrobe worn backwards that I hemmed to fit in ten minutes and then bleached, washed and dried in the 30 minutes before we left the house when I discovered some huge nasty stain from years in the closet on the back.

Next up, and you will only get this if you have seen the most recent movie version of Narnia and which I relied heavily in Google image to design, is the White Witch:

Also known as one yard of fake fur cut down the middle for half of its length plus six plastic Christmas icicle ormanents hot glued onto a piece of floral foam.  Still, I was proud of it.

Ok ok yes, I am inordinately impressed with myself.  Now would you please make my day and link me to your own homemade costumes?  I'm feeling inspired to inflict my non-craftiness on both children next year and it is never to soon for inspiration.

(Photo credit: me)

 

Late to the party: I'm finally reading The Harry Potter books

By Manda

Well, I'm about to show my cards here but ... I watched all the Harry Potter movies without reading the books first. I KNOW! I'm awful! The first Harry Potter book came out in 1999, and back then I was a too-cool-for-everything college student who was up to her eyeballs in Chaucer (that she only read MOST of, let's face it). What I mean is, it was after my time. Harry Potter wasn't on my radar until the first movie came out in 2001, and even then I didn't see the movie until way, way later ... was it 2004? I have no idea. But when I saw it? I LOVED IT. And even though my husband was teaching a young adult literature class at the time that featured the first novel, and even though I have had books 1-5 sitting on my book shelf for nearly 7 years ... I never read them. What a shame!

I finally read book one when I found out the entire Harry Potter series was featured on the Amazon Prime Kindle free lending library (because let's face it, until I got my Kindle just over a year ago I was not reading enough!). I do not hesitate to say that I have not enjoyed a book that much in a long time! And since I couldn't borrow another book for another month on my Kindle? I got up and walked to my bookshelf and plucked out the second one. And then the third. And now? I'm on book four!

I read a few chapters here and there when I have time, and I really look forward to my reading time. In my opinion as an English major (hey! They hand out diplomas to people who MOSTLY read their Chaucer! Woo!), they are very well-written and very entertaining. And you know what else? Even though I imagine the actors' faces when I think about Harry, Ron, Hermione, Hagrid and Dumbledore, the rest has been easy for my imagination to paint. I don't feel trapped by the fact that I saw the movies, you know (which is probably also a credit to how the movies were made for people who loved the books first!)?

There is something just comforting to me about these stories. Maybe it's that we always break the movies out when the weather turns colder, usually with a cup of hot tea and the Scrabble board. Maybe it's that Harry is so much fun to root for. Maybe it's the holidays at Hogwarts or the butterbeer ... whatever it is, it's magical. Yep. I said it.

What are you enjoying revisiting this fall? Are you a muggle who loves Harry Potter?

(image via Amazon.com)

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

By Beth

A couple of weeks ago, my little family was sitting around the dinner table talking about the books we liked, and my husband and I were running through the books we had read as kids when I suddenly remembered Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and bolted from the table to order it from Amazon that very second.  No, it couldn't wait, and no, I couldn't get it from the library because we needed to own it and no, I don't know how I forgot about it for seven entire years of parenting.

Oh Charlie.  Oh Roald Dahl.  James and the Giant Peach!  The BFG!  Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator!  But Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is the one, the classic, the book that had my seven-year-old standing on her bed cheering.

I used this as a read aloud for the above mentioned seven-year-old, although I think she could have read if herself without too much difficulty.  I think there are enough illustrations and humor that I can make a good attempt at reading it to my four-year-old as well.  At least, I plan to force the four-year-old to sit through it just so I can read it again for the upteenth time after an hiatus of too many years.

If you have allowed this delightful children's classic to slip your mind, I recommend you find a copy as fast as you can and giggle through it with the kids in your life.

(Image credit: amazon.com)

Cute Lamp for a Child's Room

by Lawyerish

The reading nook in my daughter's room has needed better lighting for ages now, so finally I bit the bullet and shopped around for a lamp to put on her low bookshelf. I didn't want something overly cutesy, since ideally it will stay in her room for years to come; but I also didn't want it to be a generic bedside table lamp. 

After much searching and consternation, I found the Lolli Living Spindle Base, which comes in an array of colors, and has a bunch of lovely shade options.

Check it:

I went with the white base and the blue zig-zag shade, and it looks way cute in her room (ignore the adorable goofball modeling her Halloween shirt):

(Photo credits: amazon.com and author's own)