Online Games For Kids

With holiday vacations right around the corner, trying to find something to occupy your children's spare time that is fun for them (and educational) is sometimes a challenge. In today's technologically proficient world, it is important to teach your children computer skills. I have selected some free quality sites that have online games. These sites are grouped based on ability level. Have fun!

Toddler

PBS
This site features games, music, and coloring pages. PBS Parents has information on child
development, crafts/activities, fitness, nutrition, how to talk to your children, and birthday
parties.

Fisher Price
There are games for infants, toddlers, and preschoolers. There is also information on this site
on toys (of course!), babygear, an age appropriate playtime guide, play tips, crafts, and
information for grandparents.

Prongo.com
This is a good site for children learning to use the computer. It is geared for children from 3
years of age and up. There are matching games, a shape making game, and children can
create their own fish tanks or dinosaur parks. Pringo also has jokes, e-cards, and tips for
parents regarding children and internet use.

Sprout
This site has games, videos, recipes, crafts, coloring pages, and other activities (children can
also learn yoga and sign language). The games are based on the shows aired on the Sprout cable channel.

Nick Jr.
Games are categorized by age (2-3, 3-4,4-5, and 5-6), theme, and show. There are a wide
variety of games to choose from such as adventure, arcade, letters and spelling, puzzles,
numbers and shapes, music and moves, matching and sorting, dress-up, art, sports, puzzles,
and stories.

Elementary-Middle School

Kaboose
Games included on this site include math, science, language, geo-history, sports, art, music
maze, mind, board, card, and arcade games.

Kinderweb
This site is geared towards older toddlers and elementary age children. Games focus on math
skills, matching/identification (alphabet, animals, and numbers), and telling time.

Fun Brain
This site has math, word, and arcade games for children. There is also a reading link where
kids can read popular stories such as Diary of a Wimpy Kid play Mad Libs.

Nick Jr.
See above. (Nick Jr. is geared towards 3-6 year olds. I haven't included the information on
the regular Nickelodeon games site because the games featured there are not really
educational and some of the shows reference adult topics and humor).

Scholastic
This site is not necessarily the most educational site for online games but it is one you can trust your young ones to visit. They have arcade, puzzle, and writing games. They also have quizzes, polls, and e-cards.

Education Place
Education Place is from Houghton Mifflin, the makers of school textbooks. Edugames featured include creative grammar games such as Wacky Web Tales (kids supply certain parts of speech to create a creative tale) and Power Proofreading (children proofread scripts and other writings from HME-TV Station, GeoNet (based on the National Geography Standards), and Spelling Match (lets children match letter patterns and word parts to spell words).
Note: Fake Out and Brain Teasers are no longer available.

The Problem Site
This site has word games, daily puzzles, math games, strategy games and quests, problems and brainteasers. This site also has a Jr. site for younger children with a game on colors, shapes, and sizes. Other games include estimation, spelling, and a tile game.

The Kidz Page
The Learning link contains all of their educational games which includes math and numbers, word, spelling (matching of words and pictures), sudoku, memory and logic, and online mazes. They also have educational game printouts. There is also a Music Match Game for children who are learning how to read music. This site contains board, strategy, word, arcade, sport, card, and memory games. This site also has coloring pages of vehicles, people, animals, and holidays. They also have activity pages and virtual coloring (basically online coloring pages, which is pretty neat). Puzzles and clip art can also be found on this site. The toy/movie link has other activities for children such as Dress the Baby, Pumpkin Dress up, and Sticker Stamps (all of which are under toys). That particular link also has movies, music, and stories children can choose.

Prongo.com
See above

mrnussbaum.com
This is an excellent site and would be a useful homework or study tool. This site has math, social studies, language arts, and science games. This is a very comprehensive site as far as the skills it covers. It also has a page relating to how teachers and parents can use the site.

High School

Nobelprize.org
This site has games based on the areas in which Nobel Prizes are awarded. These games are geared towards older kids. Examples of the games you will find here include The Immune System Game and The Lord of the Flies Game.

Edheads
This site has educational games that were created to meet state and national standards. Activities include Deep Brain Stimulation, Design a Cell Phone, Virtual Knee Surgery, Weather, and Simple Machines.

Prongo.com
See above.

The Problem Site
See above.

mrnussbaum.com
See above.

Meetup

Do something • Learn something

Share something • Change something

Are you looking for other people who share an interest or a particular hobby such as sports, scrapbooking, or even reading? If so, check out Meetup.com. Meetup is an online network of local groups. They have 5.7 million members and almost 60,000 local groups. These individual groups are devised of people who share common interests.

Click on "Find a Meetup Group" and enter your topic or interest, your country, and your zip code. If you find a group that your interested in, sign up with Meetup (it is free), and then join a group. I recently had a friend who used Meetup to find a mom's club in her area.

Useful Exercise and Nutrition Website

Finally, I have found a diet website that is not asking for money and is useful. Last year my New Year's Resolution was to join the local Y and get into shape (i.e. back to the size I was in high school). I would drop my several month old daughter in the gym's daycare and have some "me" time. Working out was a good energizer after a night of little sleep. It was also the limit of my socializing (until later when I wisely joined a local mom's club). I worked hard and was five pounds from my goal for the year when I found out I was pregnant, again. Surprise!

I exercised until my 8th month of pregnancy when I stopped (mostly because I think I made the one instructor nervous and I was getting a little too clumsy and out of breath). I could have walked on the treadmill but what fun is that? Since it was late spring, I figured walking outside would be more fun (and cheaper) so I gave up my membership.

Since my second daughter's birth I haven't set foot in the gym much less even attempted one sit-up. With the whole swine flu concern, my pediatrician nixed putting the girls in the gym's daycare while I exercised. With a two year old and a three month old, I haven't even attempted to exercise at home because putting a DVD on and exercising just doesn't seem appealing.

I stumbled across a website called SparkPeople. It is free to join. It is for people trying to lose weight or who are trying to have a healthy lifestyle. SparkPeople formulates weekly meal plans for you based on your goals. You can input your food for the day (if you don't follow the meal plan or you can choose to pick certain things from the plan) and the site tallies up your calories, fat, carbs, and protein. You can also choose to track over 75 other nutrients and they will tally them up for you daily and weekly.

The coolest part for me is that you can print out exercise demos and a weekly exercise plan. The exercise plan is generated just for you based on your goals and the equipment you have at home. There are also demos of the exercises so you can see if you are doing them correctly. There are message boards and SparkTeams to join. You can help motivate others and have them help motivate you to stay on the path to lose weight. You can also create your own homepage or blog. There is also the capability to print reports such as daily nutrition feedback, daily/
weekly /monthly/calories burned, daily calorie differential (calories eaten versus calories burned), etc. You can do all of this without pulling out a notebook, a pencil, and a calculator.

I'm No Julia

I read the book Julie and Julia about two months ago. I liked Julie Powell's sarcasm and sass. The biography of Julia Child was interwoven with the story. I was surprised at the outspokenness of Julia Child and her humor. It made me more curious about her life. I know she didn't enter the world of French cooking until her 30's and that she seemed to have a zest for life. I reserved her biography at the local library since the book was checked out. It seems I am not the only one who has a newfound interest in the life she led.

When it comes to cooking, Julia Child I am not. While reading Julie Powell's book, I thought, "I could do this". I had grandiose visions of whipping up some of the simpler French dishes, just to say that I did. Yeah, right. That lasted for about a week after I finished the book and then the desire to do so vanished without me attempting even one recipe. I once heard or read someone say that you are not a true cook if you need a recipe. I guess I'm not a true cook then.

There are a lot of good recipe sites out there. Here are some of my favorites:

Recipe Sites (Quick, Easy, & Cheap)
Kraft
$5 Dinners
Betty Crocker
A Year of Slow Cooking
I can't wait to try the apple butter recipe. Stephanie O'Dea who writes this blog is also coming out with a cookbook.
Top Secret Copycat Recipes


Healthy Eating Recipe Sites
Weight Watchers
Cooking Light
Taste of Home
They have a Healthy Cooking Magazine.
Southern Living
They have a "Healthy and Light" page. I have their Southern Living Light and Easy Comfort Food cookbook which I love.

Coupon Savvy

Here are some tips to get the most savings:

1. Sometimes it pays to wait to use certain coupons. If you don't need an item right away, wait to use the coupon. Check your local store circulars. A week or two after the coupons come out, local grocery stores may have a sale on the items you have coupons for. (See #3)

2. Check out the Internet. There are a lot of good sources that have free printable coupons.

• Redplum
• SmartSource
• Coupons.com
• FreeFlys (has a large list of coupons but also has free sample offers)
  
• Individual companies websites (such as Betty Crocker and Target) often have free printable coupons
  

3. Check out sites that list the sales at local stores and then tell you where to find additional coupons for extra savings. They do your work for you.

• BeCentsAble (you don't need a subscription to view the grocery gathering section that lists blogs to check out that detail the savings for local stores in your area)
  
• RefundCents (you need a subscription but it is only about $1/month to view the online material)
  

4. Join a company's club (Gerber, Similac, Enfamil, and Huggies) to receive free coupons and offers.

5. Check out blogs online for online coupon codes or free offers.

• Saving Cents With Sense
• Confessions of a Thrifty Momma
• Scoring Deals
• Deal Seeking Mom
• A Thrifty Mom
  

6. Get together with friends to share/exchange coupons or to exchange information about where to get good deals.

7. Take advantage of stores that double your coupons up to $1.00.

8. Of course, checking the Sunday paper for coupons is also an excellent way to get coupons.

Mambo to Your Local Grocery Store

If your a fan of organic products, you know that you often have a higher grocery bill. There is a site called Mambo Sprouts that offers free printable coupons on organic products. You can also sign up to receive their free coupon mailer and newsletter three times a year. They also occasionally send out free samples for people to try. When you sign up you can choose to receive just the mailer or you can also sign up for email alerts for new coupons and offers. The website also features printable coupons, recipes, articles, contests, and activities for kids.

Recycle With Freecycle

As a fan of CraigsList, I keep hearing about another site called Freecycle. It works much like Craigslist except all of the items listed are free. You can post items that you want or you can offer items.

Parton Me

Everyone knows who Dolly Parton is so no introduction is needed. She is known for something other than her double Ds. She started a reading program that has expanded across the USA. A friend of mine who is a former children's librarian told me about this program. The program is called Dolly Parton's Imagination Library. It is not available in all areas across the country-only if your local community funds the program. You can enter your zip code to see if your community participates. If your community does, you can sign your child up and at no cost to you, they will send your child a new book every month. The first book your child will receive is the children's classic The Little Engine That Could and the last book that they will receive when they turn five is Look Out Kindergarten Here I Come. What a great way to promote literacy!

BZZZZZ

For a few years now I have participated in Bzzagent. It is an online site where you can sign up to try out new products. All you have to do is buzz (or tell your friends and family) about your experiences with the product. Then, log onto the site and post what you said and everyone's reaction (ie. Would they buy the product?). It's easy and takes a small amount of time. You can gain MyPoints which can be redeemed for gift certificates. My favorite part is that you get to try new products (often just as they are being launched into stores). This year alone I have been part of the following campaigns: CoverGirl Outlast Lipstain, Pledge Fabric Sweeper, Palmolive Pure + Clear, Afrin PureSea, Children's Claritin, got2b smooth operator smoothing lustre lotion, Neutrogena Pure & Free Baby Sunblock SPF 60+, OFF, Windex Outdoor All-in-One, and Fruit2Day. You get free coupons for products or you get the actual product in the mail to try. Sometimes you'll also get samples to pass out or additional coupons. Keep in mind you have to work your way up the honeycomb to get the best campaigns. It's all about word of mouth.