Never grown anything that I can recall. But at Let Grow we have a very short explanation about growing “micro-greens” — a clever name for, basically, baby plants that you can harvest before they get bigger. It looks so easy even I — not only not a “green thumb” but basically a thumb-free person — am considering giving it a try. In 2 weeks you’ve got something edible! Here’s the post with all the instructions. The video (made in conjunction with Birds & Blooms Magazine) is below. If you or your kids DO become micro-gardeners, let me know.
Author: lskenazy
“Is there a way to stop always worrying my kids?” is the question I address in today’s “Ask Lenore” blog post, which begins: Short answer? No. Long answer? Noooooooooooooo. Read the rest here, by “brave” me. (Ha!) As I go on to say: No one is as self-directed, well-behaved, and uncomplicated as you think your friends’ kids are. No one is as perfect in private as public. And no one who’s a parent (or even a “parenting expert”) has gotten to this point without amassing a giant pile of worries. These worries are like the evil twins of Happy…
We’ve got a great piece over at Let Grow pointing out that when Baby Jessica fell down a well in 1987, a nation banded together. “But today,” writes Katy Anderson, the mom of 3 boys, “I can’t help but think there would be an immediate collective outcry of, ‘Where were the parents?!?'” Her piece is JUST GREAT: When did it become socially acceptable to blame any accident that befalls a child on parental negligence? Have we completely given up on giving parents the benefit of the doubt? Society today demands a kind of hypervigilance with parenting. It feels like it’s…
Not that 2020 has that many highlights, but doing Dax Shepard’s “Armchair Expert” podcast was one of them for me. What a smart, funny, thoughtful guy — an anthropology major! (Which explains why he brought up hunter/gatherers.) Over at Let Grow we boiled down his parenting practices, including my favorite: His refusal to pretend to be fascinated by every little thing his daughters do, because he doesn’t want to give them unrealistic dating expectations: “There’s no dude out there that’s ever going to stare at them knitting and be thrilled.” You can read the rest of Dax’ words of wisdom…
Want to save kids from rape and molestation? Me too. Unfortunately, instead of going after actual sexual predators, some police officers have discovered that it’s easier to just trick people. These cops go on adult dating sites, pose as grown women, find lonely guys, flirt, and then claim they are actually underage. But the photos they send of “themselves” depict real women in their 20s. When the mark arranges a date, the cops arrest him as a predator. These stings are the subject of a remarkable piece in The New York Times Magazine by Michael Winerip. I highly recommend reading…
…constantly praise his daughters. It’s all there in a rollicking 2-hour conversation we had on his “Armchair Expert” podcast. WOW DID I LOVE DOING THAT PODCAST! Hope you love it too. Click here to hear it!
On my “Supervision Not Required” Podcast This Week: Are Kids in Other Countries More Independent? The short answer is yes, often, but in surprising ways. I talk with Christine Gross-Loh, who has raised her kids in America and Japan, while also traveling the rest of the globe. In Japan, the parents don’t worry about kids eating too much candy, in Guatemala kids don’t tune out when the teacher is talking to someone else. But most interesting to me is Christine’s theory about why we Americans are constantly telling our kids to share — a tic which turns out to…
What do kids with approximately 127 hours of free time a day, thanks to COVID, do? They get creative. They also seem to get out the X-Acto knives. (Yay!) We harnessed this kid superpower by holding a Let Grow Cardboard Contest, and are pleased today to announce our winners. Check them out by clicking here. Below is our Grand Prize Winner. One of those guitars is real, and belonged to Anaya’s grandpa, RIP. The other is one Anaya made out of cardboard to honor his love of music (and her).
A study of 1,000 kids aged 13 and 14 in England found their anxiety levels dropped when in-person school closed. Reports the BBC: Researchers compared findings from a survey taken in October last year to answers given by teenagers in May this year. Both girls and boys recorded decreased levels of anxiety during that timeframe. In October, 54% of 13 to 14-year-old girls and 26% of boys of the same age said they felt anxious. When surveyed in May – several weeks after schools shut to most pupils and nationwide lockdown restrictions came into force – the proportion dropped to…
Good news, parents: If you let your kids wait in the car for less than 10 minutes on a cool day—doors locked and fan on—a caseworker and sheriff are actually not allowed to come to your home, threaten to take your children away, and strip search the kids. These very basic rights were just vindicated the hard way: by a Kentucky mom in federal court. Holly Curry sued the cop and the caseworker, insisting that the day she was investigated for child abuse, the two authorities so wildly overstepped their bounds that they should not be afforded qualified immunity. In…