Is your child having a birthday party, bar/bat mitzvah or other special occasion where he or she has asked for donations to a favorite charity instead of presents? If so, please contact Journal News reporter Hema Easley, who’s working on a story on that subject. You can reach Hema at either 845-578-2442 or heasley@lohud.com.

Thanks!

It’s been one year since Gayle and I began blogging here at Parents’ Place. Since then, we’ve been joined by dads Jorge and Len. During this past year, we’ve collectively written 312 posts. Best of all, the readers of this blog have made Parents’ Place a community by posting 1,283 comments. Wow!

Here’s a link to my first post, where I introduce Pumpkin and talk a bit about what we hoped to do with the blog. Here’s a link to Gayle’s first post, a story about parenting two “perpetually busy” sons that every mom and dad can relate to. Here’s a link to Jorge’s first post, focusing on his perspective as a single parent. And here’s a link to Len’s very funny first post.

For me, the year marks Pumpkin’s transition from baby to toddler. One year ago today, I wrote this post about how trendy embellished tops are a hazard for moms of babies because the small beads pose a choking risk. I was inspired after Pumpkin accidentally ingested part of my top. Today, 365 days later, Pumpkin no longer picks stuff off the floor and puts it in her mouth. She’s growing up. Thanks for sharing the journey so far. And please stick around — here’s to another thousand-plus comments by 2008!

Also, please take a moment to participate in a poll about which Parents’ Place features you like best. And tell us what you’d like to see in the next year!

If you have kids who love the outdoors — but need some prodding to apply sunscreen — check out my story about new strategies to avoid skin damage.

In my reporting, I learned that one of the most effective ways to protect your skin is to wear clothing with sun block built in. In Australia, where skin cancer is an even bigger health threat than here, clothing is more popular than sunscreen. Here in the United States, it’s just catching on. I became intrigued by the topic when I looked for a swimsuit for my daughter. I decided to buy one from L.L. Bean that covers up a good 75 percent of her body and features SPF 40 protection. Even so, and despite liberal and frequent applications of SPF 50 sunscreen on the exposed parts, Pumpkin finished last week’s vacation on the beach with tanned arms and legs. Her head, thankfully, was completely protected by a white hat with flaps that my sister-in-law bought from her dermatologist.

My story also talks about cute fish-shaped stickers from Huggies that sense how long you’ve been in the sun. When they change color, it’s time to apply more sunscreen. I brought them with us on vacation, but didn’t end up using them. I think they would be ideal for an older child who needs a gimmick to accept a second application of sunscreen.

I did take along Oregon Scientific’s Personal UV Monitor with Exposure Timer (pictured here at right). It is a pretty cool little gadget. I had to take some good-natured ribbing from my brother-in-law about using it. (“What’s the UV index, Julie?”) It seemed to work pretty well. On a cloudy day, it reported the UV index was low to medium. On a bright day, it was high. The only problem is that we weren’t that affected by these reports. After all, when you go on a week-long beach vacation, you tend to … go to the beach. And since I’m a sunscreen nut to begin with, I slathered us all up equally on the cloudy and sunny days.

The results from our poll on the topic found that most of you (82 percent) rely on sunscreen to protect your kids from the sun. Just two people said they use hats, long sleeves and other gear. Just one person admitted being a sun-worshipper who doesn’t worry about the topic.

Any thoughts? Have you invested in sun gear? What’s your sun-protection strategy?

So, here is a post I wrote a week ago Saturday morning, just before we left on our annual beach vacation. (I ended up not posting it that morning because I thought to myself, “Hey, maybe I shouldn’t advertise that we are going on vacation! Some crackpot could use this as an excuse to steal our vast horde of … well, not pricey electronic goods … but stuff. Definitely stuff.â€? Think I was being too paranoid?)

Hi Parents’ Place readers! Pumpkin, her dad and I are heading off to the beach any minute now. Really. As soon as we pack the car. (At the last minute. My sister-in-law, who is going, too, packed Thursday night!) And as soon as we take showers, get Pumpkin up and dressed. (And finish that last load of wash. Find my beach towel. Get the diaper bag ready. You see a trend here.)

Why is it that some parents are the kind with lunches packed the night before and I have to be the kind that says, “Oh well, that’s what rest stops are for?” My mom sent me an e-mail quiz this week that asked, “Are you a Martha or a Maxine?” alluding to the famous homemaking icon from Bedford and the comic crank of greeting card fame. You had to pick whether you were the type to make a cake from scratch or stop at the bakery, use an apple to keep potatoes fresh or buy instant and, well, you get the idea. I scanned it and said to myself, “I am a Martha!” Ha! Good one, Julie.

Picture this: A summer afternoon listening to the happy shrieks of your kids on the swing set in the backyard. Now picture this: Working on sales reports and staying in constant touch with colleagues. If you think the second scenario means you can’t enjoy the first, just talk to Brewster mom Chris Arnold. Chris has been a work-at-home parent since 2000. She’s a full-time IBMer and couldn’t be happier with the way her life and career are in balance. She meets her kids at the bus stop — and meets her deadlines.

Stories like Chris’s make a lot of moms and dads think: Could it work for me? The answer, according to experts and parents I spoke with, is probably — if you have the courage to ask for it.

Check out this story I wrote about how working from home is gaining more respect. At Armonk-based IBM Corp., one in five employees works from home. Here is a photo of Chris working in her backyard, taken by Stuart Bayer, a photographer for LoHud.com and The Journal News.

What makes working from home possible today for Chris and others is the prevalence of high-speed Internet connections and the way that so much of our work has shifted to the Web. I am writing these words at 10:20 p.m. at night from my home computer. When I’m done with this post, I’ll simply log into WordPress, our blogging tool, and upload it.

One of the most intriguing interviews I had for my story was with Kathy Kane of Mercer Human Resource Consulting. She said the new generation of workers in their early to mid-20s aren’t even asking permission to work from home: They are demanding it. “While they are not yet the ones having children or work-life balance issues, they just expect to be able to work from wherever, whenever. That’s the way they grew up. That’s the way they went to college. They are completely at ease with technology and embrace everything that comes with it,” Kathy told me. “They are different from their parents, or even from Gen X. They are not going to ask permission about telecommuting. They are just going to assume they can.”

And for all the baby boomer angst about technology forcing work upon our private lives, the new generation welcomes the integration, Kathy said. “The Millennial Generation wants to feel life has purpose and meaning. They are going to have a lot less problem toggling back and forth between work and personal life.” Taking a break to have lunch with the kids, for example, even if it means spending a few hours back in the home office after their bedtime, can be well worth it for some parents.

What about the moms and dads who read this blog? Do you work from home? Do you wish you could? Does your employer allow flexibility, or would this be considered asking for too much?

Last week, my husband and I were appalled after a reading a story that ran in The Journal News concerning a 10-year-old boy whose family says he was told he couldn’t attend Deer Mountain Camp in Haverstraw because he is HIV-positive. We thought it was awful that this poor child was being discriminated against, because of his health condition. And we thought that basically it was curtains for the camp, if the allegations were true.

The next day, I got a call from my 8-year-old son’s day camp: He collided with another kid in the pool and had a cut on his head. Lots of bleeding. Possibly stitches needed. The other boy’s tooth caused the cut, so it was to be treated as if my son were bitten, even though that’s not exactly what happened.

It wasn’t that bad a cut, but I took him to the Emergency Room at White Plains Hospital anyway, since it was lunchtime at the pediatrician’s office and no one would be able to see him for an hour. (What is that about? I didn’t know entire offices took lunch breaks at the same time.) Turns out that the cut wasn’t that bad and he needed one stitch, which the nurse practitioner kindly and aptly did for him. And then she gave me follow-up instructions: See the doctor, keep it dry, have the stitch taken out in 7 days, and then…”Make sure that the other kid was up to date on his immunizations and find out whether he is HIV-positive or has hepatits or anything else.”

I stopped cold and gasped. The nurse practitioner said it was unlikely that there was any kind of exposure, since the wound occurred in a chlorinated pool and that most camps make sure that kids are healthy and immunized before beginning camp. But immediately, I thought of the kid who wanted to go to Deer Mountain.

Suddenly, the Deer Mountain story didn’t seem like the open-and-shut discrimination case my husband and I thought it was when we first read the story. It’s a lot more complicated, obviously.

What do you think? Would you be concerned?

I use a debit card at the grocery store, charge the gas and only pay in cash if I’m forced to by a merchant (my tale of woe on this topic below). I even pay for small purchases — like an iced coffee at Cosi — with plastic (something my mother wouldn’t dream of doing). My habits have made me think about how today’s parents can make the concept of cash real to children who are more familiar with the idea of swiping a plastic card than counting pennies. I’m planning a story for this Sunday’s business section on the topic and would love to hear from other moms and dads about how you are helping your children learn about money and savings. Are you teaching them that it’s wise to save? Do your children have saving accounts or piggy banks? What strategies do you use around the house to help your children learn the value of money?

E-mail me at jalterio@lohud.com or give me a call at 914-694-5228 by Wednesday if you’d like share your story.

On a personal note, not carrying cash backfired for me last week. We were at the beach, and on our last day, I went out to pick up some Mexican takeout while Pumpkin had an afternoon nap. After ordering up, I proceeded to the cash register to pay and was surprised to hear, “Sorry, no credit cards.” Opening my wallet, I saw I had just $15 or so in cash — far short of the $34 bill. I had to get in the car, drive to the Wawa convenience store and hit the ATM. It was a bit of a hassle, and my burrito wasn’t as hot as I’d like when I brought it home. It brought home to me how much I depend on stores to take my cards — and what message I’ll be sending to Pumpkin by rarely using cash.

I hope to hear from you all to help make my Sunday story better. Thanks!

Back-to-school sale. Those four words fill kids with an icy dread and the hollow pain of loss – the loss of a summer that has barely begun. With just four weeks of summer vacation gone and another six remaining, my oldest son spotted a back-to-school sale at a local store this weekend past. And tonight we saw our first back-to-school ad on TV, a commercial that prompted a mix of disgust and outrage in my youngest son: “Why don’t they just start the ads before we start vacation.”

I know parents are supposed to love the idea of kids going back to school, but on this issue, I side with the kids. Summer should feel endless, even if a kid’s day camp includes not only sports but school work because he is dealing with a learning disability, or the teen is taking an art class and participating in a college-prep program.

I side with the kids on snow storms, too. I love them. Not the two-inch frosting that scare suburban schools int shutting, but the foot-and-a-half storms that cause television and radio to hyperventilate about the latest threat to the region’s survival. Of course, newspapers (and our websites) are guilty, too. How many times do people need to read about shoppers rushing to hardware stores to buy salt and shovels in anticipation of the storm. But now who’s rushing the seasons.

Get this: There’s a holiday for all of us who chauffeur kids around, pick out splinters and change diapers!

Sunday is Parents’ Day, a holiday that’s been celebrated in the U.S. on the fourth Sunday of July since 1994 – which, ironically is the year that I became a parent. Amazing how quiet the celebrations have been, isn’t it?

Anyway, this is the day for all of us—not just our kids—to thank our own parents, those parents who serve as Mommy and Daddy mentors to you, or maybe even your friends whose parenting skills you admire. No cards or presents required, just a simple “thank you” will do. But if you’d like to do more, click here to find out more about nominating someone as Parent of the Year.

And be really nice to all parents on Sunday. We deserve it!

It’s summertime and the living is allegedly easy, right? Then why am I so stressed?

Because while my sons are taking it easy, I’m becoming unglued about keeping any semblance of a schedule together. My boys, ages 8 and 13, are in day camp this summer. My older son takes a school bus there and back and my husband or I drive our younger son to camp. I alternate afternoon pickups with another mom/friend. That part works pretty well.

Where it all seems to fall apart is at home. In the mornings, the boys get up—with much prodding from us—only after listening to the alarm clock blare incessantly. And then they plod slowly about the house, taking forever to wash up, dress and eat breakfast. The morning usually involves them getting their lunch or snack together too, since they’re not so diligent about preparing everything the night before.

So what happens? I end up fussing about them being late, which results in my rushing to get ready in less time and feeling stressed about it all. And today, my older son, in his haste to make the bus, left his keys at home. And guess who had to make a dash home this afternoon to let him in (and then return to work)? Moi.

My husband and I admit some fault in this. Because it’s summer, we’ve relaxed the rules somewhat: They can stay up later and we’ve been letting them play video games and watch TV during the week. They’ve been doing some reading for school and my younger son has been working in the summer workbook we got for him. My younger son is an avid reader, so he’s already finished about four books and his written two of the three book reports that will be due the first day of school. My older son isn’t as voracious a reader, so he’s moving a little more slowly, usually picking up a book in the few minutes before he falls off to sleep. But that’s about it for brain exercise.

I hate to swing the parental hammer on them, but I feel like I’ve got to restore some sense of order at home. How do you let your kids relax—but not too much—during the summer?

My youngest son asks me to lower or, better yet, shut off the music in the car when we pull up to the dropoff point for his summer day camp. (I’m usually listening to rock, or blues, R&B, bluegrass or some combination of the preceeding. Or else jazz on WBGO.) Isn’t it great to know that your music embarasses your kid in front of his friends?

At age 12, my son doesn’t always get all the subtlety of music. For more nearly two years, he would confuse Bruce Springsteen, Paul Simon, Jerry Garcia and even Elvis Costello with Pete Seeger.

That stems from a dramatic tale about Bob Dylan’s legendary appearance at the Newport Folk Festival some four decades ago when he outraged traditionalists by performing with an electric band some. According to the Martin Scorcese PBS documentary Bob Dylan: No Direction Home, Seeger was so upset when Dylan unleashed his electric blues that the folksinger/activist wanted to cut the cable to the amplifiers.

Seeger denied that story in the film, but it was a powerful image. So powerful, that my son often asked “Is that the guy who wanted to cut the cable,” after a musician on TV or DVD.

Then last week, PBS broadcast a special on Pete Seeger and his long-running effort to clean up the Hudson River, Til the River Runs Clear. Seeger and a friend founded the Sloop Clearwater Restoration, with the aim of sending thousands of children and adults onto the Hudson in the hope that they would fall in love with the river – and then see the need to clean it up.

Near the end of the documentary, Seeger likened his role to the farmer in the Biblical parable who sows seeds on rock, a well-worn path and upon fertile soil, where finally the seeds sprout and grow. Seeger talked about all the kids who sailed aboard the Clearwater and wondered what would grow in them from the experience. “I’m a sower of seeds,” Seeger said. To which my son said: “That was a pretty good speech.”

I don’t think my son will confuse anyone else with Pete Seeger again.

The much awaited vacation is here: We hit the road tomorrow morning for a lengthy drive down south. We have everything pretty well mapped out and most of the details worked out. Only two things still worry me:

First, how to keep two active boys strapped into their seats for hour after hour on the road? Since we have my 9-year-old and my girlfriend’s 3-year-old, we decided to break the 14-hour trip into two days. Frankly, my son should be relatively ok, seeing as how he’s got technology on his side: A laptop, and an ipod.

He’s also got a ton of books which he loses himself in, so he can read while we use the laptop to play DVD’s to entertain the 3-year-old. Of course, being an active 3, we’re going to have to make several stops to let the little guy stretch his legs and burn off some energy. I’m open to ideas here.

The second issue is packing. I’m a horrible packer, and will err on the side of taking everything in case I need something I hadn’t thought of. So I have a bag for my son’s clothes, a larger bag for my clothes, another bag with shoes, swimsuits, towels, etc. Then there’s my son’s laptop bag, his backpack which will be stuffed with books, and another backpack of CDs, DVDs. That doesn’t include my girlfriend’s bags. And the thing is I know I’m bound to forget something despite my ridiculous overpacking.

Now, there is a ton of advice online on planning family vacations. There’s “this one”:http://www.familiesonlinemagazine.com/school/family-vacation-planning.html or “this one”:http://childparenting.about.com/cs/familytraveldest/a/familyvacation.htm or “this other one”:http://www.independenttraveler.com/resources/article.cfm?AID=405&category=21. They all kind of run together in my mind, kind of like an online blurr. I even found “a packing list”:http://travelwithkids.about.com/cs/carplanetips/a/amusekids.htm that I sought out for help on some packing decisions for the kids. It basically told me to bring picture books for the 3-year-old. Duh.

So in the end, I think we’ll wing it. You have two intelligent parents with their hearts and instincts in the right place. That should be enough to get us to the beach well-stocked and in one piece. Still, I have this vision of pulling up, opening the doors and a pile of junk spills out. Then I’ll fish through it everytime I need something. As long as we’re at the beach for a stress-free week, who cares?

Here’s another hot weather story. Amid air pollution alerts and soaring afternnoon temperatures Monday afternoon, my 17-year-old son set off on his bike for a 5-mile ride to play basketball. And not hoops with friends, but a competitive full-court game.

He must have gotten heat exhaustion because he wound up vomiting at the end of the game and laid down alongside the court to recover. He later told me that he felt like closing his eyes, but was afraid that if he did so he would wake up in a hospital.

Of course I only pieced together this story, with some details coming from my wife, near midnight – after watching “The Bronx is Burning” (see my previous entry). Like many kids, my son gives out information on a “what-a-teen-thinks-a-parent-needs-to-know basis. So he slept through dinner after telling me only that he had felt sick while playing basketball and now wanted to rest.

Not that I would have been especially alarmed. He seemed to have gotten enough water to drink since the episode. I suspect the combinations of bad air and heat, biking and basketball andd perhaps not enough water caused his problem.

It’s not like I never did anythig like that. I celebrated my last day of undergraduate school on a mid-August afternoon playing tennis on a day when the temperature hit 102 F. Must have been dry heat. I guess all we can do is provide a little guidance and hope our kids will survive to adulthood when, with any luck, they may learn to come out of the mid-day sun.

Last Saturday, a friend and I took another friend out to celebrate her recent graduation from graduate school. She worked very diligently for this degree and completed it while working full-time and being a wife and mother of three young adults (including two college students). We were (and remain) extremely proud of her.

So the three of us set off for “Enhance Spa in Hartsdale,”:http://www.enhancespa.com/ where we were pampered with wonderful massages, peaceful music, aromatherapy and refreshing cucumber water. Then we headed to a local nail shop for pedicures and manicures. And then were off to a fabulous lunch, while looking at the Hudson. A glorious day it was for all three of us. And why, you ask? Because for the day, we each were without our children while all attention was focused upon us.

Of course, we adore the six kids that we have, combined. And we love our husbands, too. But as any parent will tell you, you’re a better parent when you’re allowed some indulgence time every now and then. That’s why a “recent post on MSNBC.com”:http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19510304/ sent me reeling. A new trend, supposedly, is to bring your kids along to the spa to let them enjoy massages and pedicures, too. WHAT? What is the purpose of going to a place of relaxation if you’re going to bring little children with you? And honestly, perhaps it’s different for girls, but my boys would much rather swim or play basketball than get a massage.

And, like one person said in the MSNBC.com piece, why would you give this to kids now? What else will they have to look forward to, if we indulge them so much while they’re so young? One parent said she rewards her daughter with a spa trip, because she’s a good girl. What happened to allowing them extra dessert because they’ve been good? Or a longer trip to the pool? Do all rewards for kids have to cost hundreds of dollars?

Call me a mean mom, but I’ll be avoiding any spa that caters to kids. That’s not relaxation, in my book. What do you think?

Like a lot of people, I sat down to watch The Bronx is Burning last night at 10 p.m., only to find the All Star Home Run Derby in progress. It kept going, going, going for what seemed an eternity, but was actually another hour. That, however, was late enough to delay until 11 p.m. – bedtime for my 12-year-old son – the first installment of ESPN’s version of the Jonathan Mahler book about the 1977 Yankees. Even though it’s summer my son still needs to get up early for summer camp. Of course he didn’t want to go to bed because he was eager to watch the crazy antics of this amazing team that I had told him about, a team that brought a World Series win back to New York after 15 years.

What were they thinking at Major League Baseball, ESPN, or whoever makes these decisions? You figure the two hours they had scheduled for Home Run Derby should have been enough time for what is supposed to be a simple and fun-side show to this evening’s All-Star Game. But like much of American sports, the Home Run Derby has become as bloated as a steroid-using slugger. And though Burning is a movie about baseball and not baseball, last night’s delay reminded of how baseball in general seems to be turning its back on kids and families. The biggest complaint I hear from people with kids is that so much of post-season baseball takes place at night, too late for younger children to watch. But somehow, Major League Basebal continues to get away with this family-friendly image.

So how late do you think tonight’s All-Star game will go? I’m betting 12:10 a.m. – unless it goes extra innings. No more bets after 9 p.m., please.