Notes from An Overprotected Childhood

Hi Readers: This letter is from a woman whose mom was way more helicopter than most — an extreme case. Nonetheless, it’s a cautionary tale and she sent it here to endorse the Free-Range movement. Here’s wishing the writer, and her mom, a very happy and  liberating 2010. – Lenore Dear Free-Range Kids: I really [...]

Driven Crazy by Pregnancy Perfectionists (Especially On The Web!)

Hi Readers! Let us help this mama-to-be, who is being driven crazy by all the obsessive, micromanaging pregnancy advice she’s getting from all sides, especially her cyber-friends. What I try to remind folks — pregnant and not — is that if humanity required perfect on the part of its parents, there would not BE humanity. [...]

A Happy Holiday Story!

Hi Readers — This just in! A lovely story. Be of good cheer — it’s happening! — Lenore Dear Free-Range Kids: This happened to me the other day. I was talking to a co-worker about how, as a child, my parents would send me to spend my summers with family in America… alone. I was [...]

Merry Christmas — And A Present!

Hi Readers! This photo montage has been making the rounds. Thought I’d share it, too. I’ve seen it headlined, “Why Boys Need Moms,” and, “Why Boys Need Parents.” (As opposed to the post two below this one: Why Boys Need Lawyers.) Enjoy, but don’t bother to tell us that not all these pix are in good taste. [...]

Controversial? Us?

Hi Readers and gollllly. Here I thought we’d cornered the market on commonsense. But according to the megasite Babble — and its wonderful list of the 50 top mommy bloggers — Free-Range Kids is the “Most Controversial” parenting blog of 2009. If you visit the Babble list, please feel free to click on the “I Like [...]

If You Don’t Want Your Kid To End Up on a Sex Offender Registry…

….please read this amazing letter to the editor that ran in the Eastern Arizona Courier the other day. So glad it was forwarded to me. Voila: Dear Editor: I am writing this because I am tired of seeing young men’s lives destroyed. Young men, there’s a real danger out there you need to be aware [...]

O Octomom, O Octomon (Sing Along!)

‘Tis Christmas Carol parody season. Here’s one of mine, below. For more — including “Text My Cell” to Jingle Bells, and “Frosty the Outsourced Snowman” —  check out ParentDish.com and Creators.com, my two other gigs!  (And I won’t tell you which one has the Tiger Woods Greensleeves song, “Whose Texts Are These?”) — Lenore THE OCTOMOM [...]

Don’t Meth With Texas

Watch out, kids! Drug dealers are coming to your schoolyard to hook you on Strawberry crystal meth Pop Rocks! That’s the rumor going around Texas that has the PTA there so alarmed that it is warning parents to instruct their kids  not to eat, well, strawberry-flavored meth. Or grape meth. Or peanut butter meth. (Think [...]

When Science Becomes So Safe That It’s Boring

Hi Readers! We’ve come a long way since the days when you could buy your kid a chemistry set with radioactive ores. Maybe too long.  When science is no more exciting that watching oil and vinegar separate, we end up with bored kids. That means a few years later we end up with an ignorant population, [...]

No Recess Under 32 Degrees? Because Kids Freeze Like Water?

Hi Readers — Got a notice from our school last week: No more recess when it’s freezing outside — 32 degrees Fahrenheit — or when the wind chill takes an above-freezing day and makes it FEEL freezing. Now, as a kid growing up in Chicago, this was my dream policy. (Yes, even as a kid [...]