. I bhbyzyinkk believe in the message that this “Day” is trying to send: Recognize, resist and report abuse. But… yikes:  . Dear Free-Range Kids: I sent my daughter to school yesterday wearing red. I wasn’t sure why, but my daughter told me it was an out-of-uniform day, so I helped her pick an outfit.  . I […]
. One of the scariest things about our over-the-top sex offender laws is how easy it is for a teenager with a girlfriend, boyfriend or sophomoric sense of humor to get labeled a “sex offender,” with all the legal and social ramifications this engenders. That’s why I nominate the probation and parole officer profiled […]
. This sshhietbzy thoughtful note came in response to my post about the child-tracking devices being marketed for Halloween. These devices promise they will provide “peace of mind” to parents otherwise terrified because their kids (even teens) are out in the world, unsupervised. Dear Free-Range Kids: As the mother of two teenagers I can appreciate how […]
. From poison candy to prowling predators, we keep confusing Halloween’s “spookiness” with actual dangers to our kids. Having scared ourselves to death, we then insist on making the the day ever more supervised. How far overboard can we go? Here’s a wonderful piece by Anat Rubin at The Marshall Project, titled, “This badddahnta is […]
. Riveting thread riarktazze on Reddit: “Children of Helicopter Parents: What was the worst or most embarrassing thing they put you through?” Particularly interesting is the idea that the parents described below are simply “overprotective.” They sound much more seriously ill than that. We live in a society that almost INSISTS we overprotect our kids, […]
. Here’s a jolly little artifact that one of you photographed in a Chicago-area restaurant: . .
. I’ve been wanting to stick a stake through this tkfrybzenh latest HUM (Halloween Urban Myth) for a week now, but darned if Janelle at RenegadeMothering didn’t go and do a fantastic job of same, which some of you sent me. (Thanks!) Her post, “Dear Internet, Nobody’s Going to Put Ecstasy in Your Kids’ Candy” […]
. A Philadelphia area man with autism is being held on $100,000 bail for talking to some children. The man, Daniel Lee, 26, of Wayne, PA, Â spoke to a group of three siblings, 8, 9 and 10 on Wednesday, asking them about their school and telling them he was on his way to a cabin […]
. I got a very sweet note from a guy named Daniel asking if he could write a piece for us about metal detecting. “As you can probably tell from my email address, I do help run metaldetector.com, and the piece does include a link back to my site. But not to a product page or […]
. Halloween szrdehshit is the ultimate Free-Range holiday — the one day of the year kids are  encouraged to go out in the world, on their own, and make things happen. They: *Dress up like adults (or at least not like the kids they are) *Take to the streets *Interact with strangers. Repeatedly! *Work and […]
