Saturday night, we headed downtown for Venetian Night with the kids and a couple we have gotten to know here who don’t have children (but like them). Taking four kids out to a packed downtown event is pretty much always nerve-wracking; doing it with other people, especially newish friends, is even more so. What if the kids act up? What if we have a meltdown on the El platform or in the middle of a busy street? What if somebody takes off or screams bloody murder? What if our crew is totally overwhelming and noisy?

As it turned out, we took two busy trains, walked through hordes and throngs and crowds of people, dealt with a deli that was almost completely out of food, walked many more blocks to find a spot on the grass, watched 20 minutes worth of (fantastic) fireworks, and then went home–and, besides a little whining, the kids were totallly fine through it all (perhaps shocked into cooperation due to all the chaos). Though we were, of course, somewhat distracted by trying to keep tabs on everyone, we were able to enjoy the gorgeous summer night and the company of our friends, who turned out to be very cool about handling the downtown chaos with all our kids in tow, (even though I think sometimes they weren’t sure how we could possibly be keeping track of them all).

Sometimes we avoid taking them downtown because it seems like such a hassle overall, but even just getting there is part of the experience for the kids: the “twain” ride, which thrilled my two-year-old; the crowds of people downtown, which intrigued the olders:

Isaac: Mom, this looks just like a scene out of a movie about New York City!
Me: Maybe you could say that New York City movies look just like a scene out of Chicago!
Isaac: Good point.

And boy, did they all sleep well that night.

Yesterday was my birthday. We went out to breakfast at a local diner, then headed home for me to start my day of doing absolutely nothing–the ultimate gift. My kids and hubby gave me a sweet little gift package with some lotions and balms and things (I am a sucker for little bottles of lotions and balms and things!) and, drumroll please, season 2.5 of Battlestar Gallactica. (As a general rule I don’t watch a ton of sci-fi, but one of the first shows I remember loving was Dr. Who, and so far the two dramatic series I’ve been most addicted to were the X-Files and BSG. I guess I’m a sucker for a good storyline and drama. And aliens and robots.) And then we wound up watching eight episodes in a row, because OMG, how can you stop when there’s a half-Cylon baby on the way and political unrest and cliff-hanging battle scenes and flashbacks that you aren’t really sure are flashbacks? Reluctantly, we turned off the TV at about 2 AM, vowing to watch the remaining four or five episodes this week.

Too late a night, too early a morning. Off to try to wrangle lunch and maybe take a trip to the grocery store. And then come home and come up with some story ideas to pitch. It can’t be all fireworks and sci-fi around here, after all.

This is my latest column, but it’s something that’s been on my mind a lot lately so I wanted to re-post it here.

When my 8- and 10-year olds were 3 and 1, we lived on the third floor of an apartment complex. That meant that every time we wanted to go outside, I had to schlep two kids up and down two flights of stairs, plus another flight of stairs on the outside of the building.

If we were going to the pool, I also had to carry towels, floaties and other water gear. If we were going for a walk, I had to get the stroller down those same stairs.

And I did this several times a day, every day, because my kids wanted so desperately to be outside. They’d stand with their noses pressed against the sliding-glass door overlooking the courtyard, looking depressed. Or they’d go out onto our little balcony until they made me too nervous because they seemed to be plotting a way to jump over the edge.

Something has definitely changed. As my kids have gotten older, they seem to have lost the drive to go outside. Not only does it almost never occur to them to go out of their own accord, but they frequently act as though I’m torturing them when I boot them out the door.

I know I’m not alone. Think back to your childhood: like me, I’m guessing a lot of you ran out (or were thrown out) the door shortly after breakfast on a sunny summer morning, not to return until lunch (or for a Popsicle break or to beg for ice cream money). Then you were back out until dinner.

After dinner you might get a couple more hours of play, finally turning in when your parents called you at dusk. Mosquito-bitten, scabby-kneed and filthy, you’d stumble home just to start it all again the next day. And if you were like me, you loved it that way.

But plenty of research has shown that not only do kids not play outdoors nearly as much as they used to, that that lack of physical activity and connection with nature is having a negative effect on their physical and mental health.

So what’s happened to kids? Why don’t they want to play outside?

A few theories have been thrown around. Kids are less likely to be at home during the day now, and are more likely to be in child care or after-school activities. When they are with their parents, their time is likely to be scheduled with sports, lessons and tutoring. That leaves less free time for riding bikes or playing kickball.

And you can’t underestimate the pull of the screen. Sure, when we were kids, there were cartoons on Saturday mornings and after-school specials to watch, and the occasional Disney movie that would keep you in on a Sunday night. But there were no 24-hour kids’ channels, no Internet, and not quite such an extensive array of game systems to keep you glued to a screen for most of the day.

The truth is, we parents are to blame for a lot of this. We let the kids zone out because it’s an easy way for us to keep tabs on them, we don’t want to argue with them. And it feels “safer” than letting them roam around outside.

We let them stay in because that’s where WE want to be - glued to our laptops and favorite programs. Kids aren’t just naturally losing the drive and desire to be outside. They’re learning it from us.

What’s the answer? There are a lot of little changes I’ve been implementing in our house to get the kids back into the great outdoors, but I’ve discovered that though I can lead the children to the yard, I can’t make them enjoy it when there’s nobody out there sharing it with them. The only way to do that is to get other kids playing outside, too, and make it seem like the happening place to be rather than in front of the computer or TV.

And the only way to do that might mean unplugging MYSELF, heading into the front yard with them, getting to know the parents in my community, and helping to create the kind of neighborhood I want my kids to grow up in.

It might mean going more than an hour without checking my e-mail sometimes, but I think I can deal. Our kids don’t know what they’re missing, but we do - and we may be the only ones who can help them discover it again.

What do you think? Are your kids playing outside less than you’d like? Have you come up with any creative ways to get them out the door again?

I’m leaving tonight for my week-long journey cross-country with the Mom Road Trip.

Here’s what I’ll miss:

*Impromptu hugs from my four-year-old
*”I love you, mommy!” from my two-year-old
*A much cooler, “Love ya, mom” from my bigger boys
*Early-morning snuggles…sometimes with all four of ‘em at once
*Watching the two little guys play together. Half the time I can’t even make out what kind of crazy game they’ve come up with.
*Watching the older two talk in circles around each other. They spend 90% of their waking hours together–fight bitterly sometimes, but are crazy close just the same. I know each one would be lost without the other.
*My two-year-old’s cheek on mine.

What I WON’T miss:

*”Mommy, he called me “poopy”
*”Oops–Uh, Mom? You may want to come look at this mess…”
*The morning scramble
*The last ten, hellish minutes of bedtime when everybody is trying to revolt before they finally give in and pass out.

Notice that my “what I’ll miss” list is longer than my “what I won’t” list. But, I’m looking forward to the break anyway!

I have a post up over on Yahoo’s Shine! about my (finally, successful!) search for a non-clunky, smooth-riding double stroller.

When I was ten years old, I chased a grown woman six blocks (she on bike, me on foot), then demanded she give me back my (stolen) bicycle. I did this not because I was a particularly brave or confrontational or athletic kid (nope, nope, and NOPE) but because there was no way my parents were going to get me a new bike just because I’d been dumb enough to leave mine laying in the driveway. I don’t see a lot of similar appreciation for things in my own kids, and it bugs me. Read my post at Chicago Moms Blog for the whole story!

Isn’t it funny how you forget what “HOT” really feels like? (Kind of like how you forget what labor really feels like until you have that first “fo’ real” contraction and you say “Ohhh, yeah. THIS again.”) Here in Chicago, today was the first bona fide HOT day of the 08 spring/summer season. This morning it was only about 63; now it’s 86 and feeling hotter by the minute. I just took a shower, and my hair is drying curly in the heat (hey, it’s actually not looking half bad, either…). The boys have a couple of friends over, and they’re sitting on the back deck yakking about God knows what (I can’t understand their language half the time). The windows and doors are open and there’s a nice breeze blowing through the dining room. And I just went into the fridge and was reminded that my dear husband made Jello Jigglers before going to bed last night.

jello jigglers, glistening in the sunlight

Life is good.

I went to the boys’ end-of-year school awards ceremony today, which was a) long and b) long and c) punctuated by my wiggling toddler yelling “WANT TO HEAR CHICKEN SONG!” (his name for Weird Al’s latest “Polkarama” medley). When it comes to this kind of thing, I’m rebellious at heart, and honestly I find the whole awards-ceremony-for-elementary-school-kids thing a little overblown, but all in all the ceremony was pretty cute and at least made an effort to be inclusive. In the lowest grades, every kid got a certificate, which was nice. In the upper grades, all the kids seemed to get something in the end, but the actual awards were a bit more competitive.

As for my family? No kid went away empty-handed, but only one of their awards seemed to be based on an actual achievement–the Major Mathematics award, granted to my second-grader, AKA the family acheiver.

The other two?

William, who’s four, was part of the class where every kid got a certificate. For something, no matter how, well, nothing it was. In his case, the certificate read “This Certifies That __’my favorite part of school is when I get to go home’__”

Very true. A joiner he is not. Nor, apparently, a lover of school. His teacher has a good sense of humor.

Jacob, who’s in fourth grade, got an honorable mention in the “Brought most Box Tops for Education to School” contest. (I think he was fourth. His entire class consists of about 10 kids). The funniest thing? His grandmother actually collected those and put them into his backpack with a note reminding him to turn them in. Jacob had almost nothing to do with it, beside unzipping his backpack that day.

It may not have been a hard-won victory, but Jacob was thrilled with his award trinket. And our family left together, a happy and victorious bunch.

We may not be actual winners around here, darnit, but at least we’re easy to please.

Long weekend. Short week, filled with too many commitments. No time or energy for a post today, but I’d love you to read my latest Mama-Rama column, about kids and social media.

Our fabulous babysitter* is better than me at a few things: consistency, routine, and getting Owen down for a freaking nap. Sure, some of it is probably out of necessity–she has three kids of her own, and when she started taking care of Owen, her youngest was four or so months old. She said that it didn’t always go so smoothly, but that she spent the first few weeks establishing a consistent bedtime ritual the kids could get used to. I can only imagine that without a firm routine, naptime at her house would resemble a pack** of drunken squirrels trying to escape a burning tree. But from what I’ve heard, it sounds like it goes off without a hitch. And I’m more than a little jealous.

That’s not to say that our house is total chaos. But, we’ve given Owen some leeway–probably more than we should have–when it comes to how/when he goes to sleep, so on the occasion that I really NEED him to go to bed at a predetermined time, it’s almost impossible to pull off. When our sitter told me that, at her house, Owen not only goes down for a nap willingly, but actually yells “Yay! Naptime!” and puts himself in the bed, my curiosity was more than piqued. I decided to get to the bottom of it by consulting Owen himself, and this is a transcript of the conversation we had.

ME: Owen, Melanie (sitter) says that you take good naps at her house!

OWEN: Yeah! Melanie has house!

ME: (realizing I have to break this down a little) Right. When you’re at Melanie’s house, do you take a nap?

OWEN: Yeah! Tessa takes naps! (Tessa is her three-year-old)

ME: And Owen, right?

OWEN: Oh! Yeah! Owen (unintelligible) every day!

ME: Okay. Melanie said that you say “yay” at naptime and get right up in the bed.

OWEN: I say YAY!

ME: Right, you say “yay”. Do you like naps?

OWEN: I play with Tessa!

ME: Uh-huh. So, (changing tactics), why do you like your naps so much at Melanie’s? Do you like your bed there?

OWEN: I have a bed!

ME: Right. Where is the bed?

OWEN: I eat a cheese sandwich!

ME: Yes, you eat a cheese sandwich before bed. What do you do after you eat the cheese sandwich?

OWEN: You make me a cheese sandwich?

ME: We don’t have any cheese. (lie). Now listen, this is important. Do you think, next time I tell you it’s naptime, you could say “yay!” and put yourself to bed?

OWEN: I say “YAY!”

ME: Yes, you say yay! When I say naptime, you say “yay” and go put yourself to bed!

OWEN: Oh! Ohtay! Put myself in bed!

ME: Okay, Owen. Guess what? It’s naptime!

OWEN: Um, no.

Sigh. I guess this bedtime situation is going to require some hard work of my own, not just riding my sitter’s coattails. Oh well, it was worth a shot. And an important reminder: don’t ever entrust a 2 1/2 year old with relaying important information. Unless it involves cheese sandwiches.

*I can’t bring myself to call her a “nanny”, though maybe that is more accurate as she takes care of Owen for three nearly-full days each week? I dunno–what’s the difference between a nanny and a sitter; the actual job they do, or the effect the parent hopes for when he/she refers to them by either name?

**I’m not sure that squirrels actually run in packs. Maybe it’s gaggles.