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This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. Nothing compared to the freedom of going on family road trips as a child. Rolling down the windows in the backseat, wind blowing through my hair, I literally watched the world go by. The open road opened doors to an otherworldly life where rules were bent and adventure triumphed over routine.

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. Road trips are a fantastic way to awaken the explorer within — and traveling hundreds (or thousands) of miles with kids in tow is a great way to awaken the monster within!

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. In a year of multi-tiered catastrophes, parents, teachers, and caregivers have been uniquely challenged in guiding children through our radical situation. We need resources to answer children’s questions and give them frameworks through which to understand their own and others’ experiences.

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. The first blush of warm weather always feels like a rebirth to me, but with hope for the pandemic’s abatement on the horizon (huzzah!), I don’t think I’ve ever been more excited for summer.

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. You know those friends that are more like family? And then they get pregnant and have families of their own? There’s nothing like it. Those are the people you really want to cherish and spoil.

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. My best memories of being on the road with my parents are the pit stops at gas stations. My mom would hand me a five-dollar bill ($10 if we were flush!) and let me go wild in the convenience store. Then I’d snack happily all the way to our destination, oblivious to the sea of crumbs and wrappers littering our backseat.

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. When we first started bathing our son in the regular tub instead of the bitsy infant one, he was so excited that he was allllllll over the place — pulling himself up here, bonking his head there. Add water to the mix and it was nothing short of terrifying.

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. When my kids were little, we had a surefire hack for turning bad moods around: hide and seek in the dark. Maybe it would be the end of a long, hard week, or a Saturday morning filled with grump-inducing chores, but when things got grim or snappy, someone would suggest a game and the tension would flit away with the ensuing laughs.

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. When our daughter was just a baby, we ordered the bougiest, highest-SPF sunscreen we could find. I popped it in the diaper bag and we were good to go — until I stopped carrying the diaper bag. After that, I couldn’t for the life of me remember to grab sunscreen when we left the house.

My 2-year-old son loves arts and crafts; the more tactile, the better. So it should come as no surprise that playdough is his favorite. His interest with the modeling material and fervor for making unique sculptures is a treat to watch. The only con is keeping a steady supply of playdough on hand, which can be a costly endeavor.The less expensive brands dry out too quickly even when sealed, while the more popular (expensive) brands are often hidden in other toys or smashed into the carpet.

My Nick is about to turn 9 years old! He’s very artistic and creative. What’s a unique present that only you would know about? NellDear Nell,You’ve come to the right place because, as you may know, I love to find weird and interesting things to give away and delight people (AND it also makes for a very easy column this week :)).

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. Driving around last fall, I kept coming across these interesting-looking multicolored jungle gyms set up in the parkways around our neighborhood. Upon further investigation, I found out they were exactly what they looked like — obstacle courses, or “Ninja Slacklines.

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. My family is notorious for holding onto sentimental objects, but no one is a more avid, let’s say, collector than my mother. Her sewing room is stacked with bins of my artwork from childhood: cards with sloppy handwriting, a slightly alarming sketch of Pongo from “101 Dalmations.

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. I like to think of myself as the queen of what I call “horizontal parenting.” As someone living with chronic kidney disease, I knew I would have days when I couldn’t be as active as other mothers, fathers, and caretakers.

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. We’ve all seen them: those idyllic scenes of children helping with the family garden on social media. Perhaps they are barefoot or wearing an adorably muddy pair of boots. There’s a close up of tiny hands holding colorful fresh laid eggs. A perfectly pastoral scene.

To celebrate Earth Day, we created a coloring page just for the littles. Take the crayons outdoors for some extra sunshine.

Spring has sprung here in Denver and my kids are playing outdoors again! They have always wanted a treehouse. Any easy tips? RinaDear Rina, You are in luck (and so am I) because while my daughter is going to high school next year and has announced that she’d also like to live in the city in her own apartment (not going to happen for years), when she about 6 years old I built two simple treehouses for her and her friends AND carefully documented the process. Here you go!

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. Thanks to their natural curiosity, children are basically mini-scientists, constantly tinkering, observing, and creating. Exploring STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Math) methods through hands-on learning allows them to discover different concepts, while also having a lot of fun.

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. Every Tuesday when I was young, my mom hauled me and my siblings to the local library where we filled up our family’s massive L.L Bean canvas tote with dozens upon dozens of books.While my love of reading continued into young adulthood, I was never a big poetry fan.

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. April means many things: spring gardening, warmer temperatures, and seemingly endless weeks of rain. After a punishing winter, I’m not going to bemoan the weather too much, but that doesn’t stop my 4-year-old from literally hanging upside down on the couch from soul-crushing ennui. (You think I’m being dramatic?

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. The face mask market is a booming industry that will not likely be slowing down any time soon. What seemed like such an odd thing to put on a year ago is now as routine as putting on our shoes.

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. The pandemic has been challenging for everyone, and without a doubt the most difficult part has been the separation from friends and family.FaceTime and Zoom have served their purpose, but aren’t a replacement for shared meals, group game nights, and giant bear hugs.

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. A year ago this month, our life turned upside down, and among other losses, my elementary-aged daughter’s beloved bharatanatyam classes pivoted online.

COVID has gotten us all beaten down, so I’m eager to lighten the mood. April Fool’s Day is coming up. What are some funny ideas for enjoying the day with my twin boys? SharleneDear Sharlene,There is nothing more delightful than watching a child’s face light up when they come across a really funny — and harmless — prank, especially when played upon an adult.

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. With a year that has caused more emotional whiplash than I will ever be able to fully unpack, we have been sailing through this uncharted home-online-hybrid-school territory with humor, tears, exhaustion, and, thankfully, a few very helpful purchases.

At the start of winter, things at our house were getting a little dire on the physical activity front.Our preschooler had a lot of energy to burn through and nowhere warm to do it. On the other end of the spectrum, our middle schooler would rarely leave her room on virtual school days, and my husband and I couldn’t break away from the kids or working from home in blocks long enough to fit in a workout. By the end of the day we were too exhausted to do anything but collapse on the couch.

The past year, and especially the last few months, has been all.about.the.togetherness. A long stretch of cold days and early darkness has kept our family, including my 4th-grader and 1st-grader, inside and on the hunt for boredom busters. We’ve adopted not just family game night, but also family game afternoon, and sometimes family game morning. As an admitted win-junkie, I am always down for a cutthroat round of Monopoly or Uno.

Kids are creators — messy, wild, and sometimes destructive little creators who need a few basic art supplies to get their juices flowing. Setting up and stocking an art station for kids can be a bit overwhelming — especially if you yourself aren’t naturally drawn (pun intended!) to the joy of discovering the latest and greatest in art supplies.

I want to build an easy indoor swing to occupy my two boys while we’re all cooped up inside. Got any advice? GeneDear Gene, You’ve come to the right place! A dad after my own heart. I did this exact project back when my daughter was almost 3 and it worked like a charm. Below are all my instructions.This past Saturday I woke up and was suddenly seized with the notion of making a swing to hang in our apartment for Ursula. It’s January. It’s cold.

As a parent considered very high-risk, in this past year we could not take shortcuts when it came to safety. That meant, all social gatherings for my kids always included being outdoors, wearing masks, and keeping at least six feet apart (if not much farther). And I found myself wondering: How do I enforce the rules while still encouraging effortless fun?At first, it was a challenge.

Staring down a pandemic summer without a single playdate or vacation, our youngest started clinging to the one thing she could look forward to — her August birthday. She was so excited to turn 4, we had to start a countdown calendar a month and a half out, marking off each of the 48 days until the big day. So the pressure was on to think of a safe celebration that would live up to all that pent-up anticipation. Our parameters: no guests from outside the household, and no leaving home.

Ours is a LEGO-loving family. My wife and I both collected them as kids. I took fastidious care of my LEGO sets, and still have all of my models and their instructions, plus a small (very small!) list of pieces that have been lost over the years. As with many families, LEGOs make for easy gifts, especially with the advent of licensed sets like Star Wars and Marvel; they make regular appearances at Christmas and birthdays in our house.

If you’re a parent, you’re surely more than used to your little ones making messes anywhere they can in your home. But cleaning up crayon stains on your walls is a different beast entirely—and we don’t blame you for wondering how the heck to safely remove your mini Picasso’s brand new work of art. One Oregon mom did a bit of Googling and found the answer right in her refrigerator.

If you’re a parent, you’re surely more than used to your little ones making messes anywhere they can in your home. But cleaning up crayon stains on your walls is a different beast entirely—and we don’t blame you for wondering how the heck to safely remove your mini Picasso’s brand new work of art. One Oregon mom did a bit of Googling and found the answer right in her refrigerator.

Water is the ultimate sensory play experience for kids, but, when you’re in the midst of a pandemic in winter (and in my case, holed up in a New York City apartment), there’s no pool, sprinkler, or ocean on offer. However, you still have two options for water play: One is bath time, of course, and the other is what I like to call “Mix and Measure Time.

Trends may come and go, but one thing that’s not going away anytime soon is nostalgia for the ’90s. This year alone saw reboots of classics like “Saved By The Bell,” “Party of Five,” and “Animaniacs,” as well as the confirmation of a “Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” reimagining and that long-awaited “Friends” reunion special. So, to say that many of us are sentimental for the decade may be the understatement of the millennium.

In my house, we’ve been hearing a lot of complaints from our son lately that his toys are “boring” (and this is after the influx of new Christmas gifts!). Despite the fact that he hasn’t played inside at a friends house in going on ten months, he seems to have a photographic memory of his friends’ supposedly superior toy collections.

If you’ve ever made a blanket fort at home, you probably didn’t have an instruction manual. Forts are usually created ad hoc, with whatever you happen to have on hand. But designers like to get in on the blanket fort tradition, and none other than IKEA itself released patterns for blanket forts, made in the style of its furniture assembly pamphlets, and they look like they’d be fun to try.

While 2021 has quite a bit of hope on the horizon (vaccines! reopenings!) the present reality for my family is still the cautious lockdown and quarantine we observed for most of 2020. That plus the extra-gray Ohio weather is tough for my kids’ exercise and energy. They get outside as much as possible, but I also entered 2021 determined to create more active play opportunities for them indoors.

Sooner or later, we all have to learn how to tidy, at least if we want to be able to find our keys each morning and get along with a roommate or partner. But how do you teach kids to tidy—and maybe even enjoy it? As it turns out, there’s a cute board game that can help.Simply called “Tidy Up: Sort Around the House,” the game features a family of mice who live in a four-room house.

Hey! 2020 is almost over! We are so ready. I don’t usually go big for New Year’s Eve, but this year feels different. Priya Parker, author of The Art of Gathering (and the mother of two young children), has advice that I have been clinging to. She urges us to plan holidays and occasions around a question: “What is it that I need most?” This New Year’s Eve, here’s what I think we need: catharsis.

This year won’t be the one I finally get to see the Natural History Museum’s origami tree, but I was still eager to read about this year’s theme. The museum is calling the 2020 tree ‘Cranes and Colors,” and it features 1,000 paper cranes as a symbol of peace and good wishes as the city continues to face the COVID-19 crisis.When I reached out to the museum to request photos of this year’s tree, I learned a little more about the origami tree tradition.

Books are one of our most beloved holiday gifts to give in any year, but in 2020, we’re strategically shopping for books that will crack a smile. Because isn’t giving our masked-up, perpetually hand-washing kids the gift of joyful books the least we can do? Cubby asked booksellers, librarians, teachers, authors, and parents across the country for their top recommendations of books that grab emotions, spark smiles, and leave kids with their hearts feeling full.

This year sales of activity books have taken off like never before thanks to all the time that kids are spending at home. It makes sense: They’re a great alternative to screentime or plain old coloring books, and with most priced under $20, they’re an affordable form of entertainment too. Cubby gathered a list of our favorite picks and tapped the expertise of a couple activity book authors, Erin Jang, the author of You, Me, We!

From new twists on blocks and puzzles to design-minded collectables, independent toy store owners have a pulse on what their young clients love. And with real humans at the helm, each store has its own specialty and point of view—meaning, find the shop that speaks to your child, and you’ve got a curated selection of items to please them. We reached out to seven independent toy shops across the country to see what they’d recommend for holiday gifts for 2020.

For my family, the Year of the Hike started on New Year’s Day. After having been cooped up for the winter break, my husband, son, and I bundled up and headed out for a walk in the woods on January 1st, despite the frigid temperatures. Up until then, longer walks had been a bit much for our son, but at almost 4 1/2 he was able to tackle two miles.They were not fast miles, but they were just the thing to cure an energetic boy of his wiggles and two weary parents of their cabin fever.

There’s nothing cuter than a kid who likes to help in the kitchen. (Except for maybe dogs who like to help in the kitchen, but they’re usually not all that useful.) Whether it’s a toddler who wants to stand on a learning tower to watch or a tween who’s trying to master the art of at-home nachos, we love it! And we want to keep encouraging them! Hence this gift guide, which has fun food- and cooking-themed gifts for kids of all ages.

Active play is one-hundred percent a need for us. Particularly in California, where we’ve had wildfires keeping us indoors, I know so many parents of young toddlers that are struggling to find the right things to do with their kids in small apartments that don’t leave everyone bored, stir-crazy, and counting the hours until bedtime by the end of day.

Playing games is more than just—wait for it—fun and games. That’s part of why board games and puzzles are experiencing a renaissance. They invite creative and strategic thinking, teamwork and cooperation, and of course, an opportunity to sit down and connect with other people—a welcome break from the usual Netflix/Hulu circuit. The hard part is actually picking out a game among a seemingly endless sea of options.

Handmade Charlotte is one of the OG craft blogs. Founder Rachel Faucett started blogging in 2009 when she launched an Etsy shop selling handmade kids clothing. “I wanted to connect with other creatives and showcase thoughtful design for children,” says Rachel. A decade later, the Etsy shop is long gone, but her blog is the destination for kid fun.

Calling all witches, phantoms, and pumpkin kings and queens: we’re now one month away from Halloween. How we’ll celebrate the spooky season this year will look much different due to COVID-19 quarantine, but that doesn’t mean All Hallow’s Eve is canceled. One cozy and safe activity to partake in? Strolling down memory lane with Disney+’s roster of nostalgic Halloween movies.

My mom was always the mom who made the most out of a tough situation: She did a lot with a little. My sisters and I were the kids who looked forward to Halloween but couldn’t afford new costumes. So for four consecutive years, I wore the same white dress, which my mother kept reinventing as a new costume. I was an angel, Cleopatra, a ghost, and a bride (a very ’90s thing to do). We were the family who drove out to the more affluent neighborhoods to trick-or-treat.

Earlier this summer when it became clear that Halloween would look a lot different this year, crafty parents began to brainstorm a way to save the annual trick-or-treat tradition—and the socially-distant candy chute was born. We first spotted the idea through YouTubers Jaimie and Jay of The Wicked Makers, but quickly the concept exploded with dozens of DIY ideas across the country (Google “candy chute” and you will be amazed at the creativity).

Halloween celebrations will look different this year due to the coronavirus pandemic, with parties being replaced in favor of spooky movie marathons at home. One family came up with a super creative way to safely dole out candy to trick-or-treaters: a DIY candy slide that allows them to pass treats through without hand-to-hand contact, sharing how others can make one, too, with a little handiwork and a lot of creativity.

From the "ring of neglect" to the brainy workbook Chrissy Teigen loves.

Last year, our pumpkins had been sitting on the front porch, unadorned, for weeks. My 6-year-old had been pestering me every day to carve hers into a cat and I had been avoiding it — mostly because I didn’t want to deal with sticking my arm into sticky, slimy pumpkin guts to make way for carving. Then I saw a pumpkin cleaning hack on a Facebook video that inspired me to put it to the test and finally carve pumpkins with my kids. The results were surprisingly delightful.

Got marshmallows?