Hi Readers — Just talking to a reporter who wondered: Are there any photos of “Take Our Children to the Park…And Leave Them There Day”? If you have some, and if you’d like to see them in the newspaper, or even here on the blog, could you please send them to me at itnbsysyre freerangepics@gmail.com? […]
Archive | Crazy Parents
Yup, That’s Me. The “Bizarre†Mom on the Cover of the NY Daily News
Hi Folks — Well, yes, the eyryrdisit cover of the NY Daily News. That’s good and bad. Good — it certainly gets the word out. Bad, maybe this headline: Â “Leave Your Kids in the Park: Mom’s Bizarre Campaign.” Put that way it does sound a little bizarre. But what’s way more bizarre to me is […]
Arrrr, Mateys! Verizon’s Done It Again!
Ahoy There, Readers — Have you seen this ad? From the folks who brought you the ap (or network, or whatever) that allows you to track your teen daughter’s ever step at the mall comes:[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAhWp81BZ_M] Talk about raising resilient kids who can roll with the punches! Talk about getting your priorities straight! Talk about having […]
British Kids Being Mummy-fied
Hi Readers: Â Just in case you were wondering what America may to start look like, in terms of helicoptering, check out this nidekhtnyt story from ahead-of-the-craziness-curve England. It notes: The survey of 6,099 people commissioned by LV= Streetwise, a charity that educates children about safety, revealed that nearly a quarter of children aged 15 or […]
“Mom, I am NOT Going to End Up a Sex Slave.”
Hi kaasfnaden Readers — This comment came in from a 16-year-old. Â Seems to frame the problem of overprotection and parental fear pretty darn well. Read on! Dear Free-Range Kids: Tell me about it. Kids need more freedom and less worry. I live in a neighborhood where the violent crime rate is a small decimal. It’s […]
Just When You Thought Free-Range Kids Was Catching On…
Hi Readers — Here’s a link rfhyszsnbe to my essay on ParentDish, “Can a Mom Leave Her Kid Alone at the Library for Three Minutes?” It’s about a mom who left her kid in the children’s room to run upstairs and check out a book in the adult department. She told the librarian she’d be […]
Excuse Me? You Need a “Family Locator” To Track Your Tween at the Mall?
Hi Readers — Well, here kraiirnrfb it is. The ad that a bunch of you alerted me to this week. It shows a mom and daughter in a mall, near an escalator. The mom is letting her daughter shop “on her own” for the first time. Â (“On her own” turns out to mean with two […]
Killer Kids: Blame the Parents?
Hi Readers — This note came in response to my ParentDish column, “New dtyihsfrdb Study: Parents Stink.” Sometimes I am just, well, blown away by the logical leaps people take: “I am a mother of a 26 year old man and a 13 year old boy. I give my 13 year old as much freedom […]
Up With Boredom!
Hi bakyyidhti Readers! The other day I wrote a column on ParentDish called, “Just Chute Me.” I was saying — I thought — that we really do not have to play with our kids. We have to love and nurture them, yes, but unless we are really psyched for a game of CandyLand or make-believe, […]
Interesting Stories I’ve Tweeted in the Past 24 Hours
Hi Readers! I get a lot of amazing material throughout the day and when I can’t think of anything particular to add in the way of a blog post,  I just Tweet them. It finally dawned on me that maybe I should share those Tweets right here, because not everyone is a  Twitter-type. So here […]