Okay, so we’ve established that painting your own crosswalks is a terrible idea, but there are other ways to decorate your driveway and the street in front of your home. If you’re a kid, anyway. Or very eccentric. Chalk can get expensive, though, especially if your kid shares with the entire neighborhood. Is there a cheaper way to get it? Yes, there is. [More]
Printing Error Turns Pixar Kiddie Pool Into Informational Image On Bad Touching
By May 20, 2013
What should be a happy photo of a mom hanging out in the yard with her two boys in their cool new Pixar-themed pool is horribly, terribly, tragically transformed into something much darker, all thanks to an apparent error at the printing press that managed to slip through unnoticed. [More]
How Unscripted Are Those Kids’ Responses In The AT&T Ads?
By May 10, 2013
We’ve certainly made no attempt to hide our distaste with some of AT&T’s business practices, but we are all stupidly charmed by those seemingly improvised AT&T ads in which youngsters in a classroom respond to questions like “Who thinks more is better than less?” But considering how amusing some of these ads can be, we’ve been curious about just how scripted those kids’ replies are. [More]
5 Airports Where Being Stuck With Your Kids Might Not Be An Absolute Nightmare
By May 2, 2013
While none of us at Consumerist have kids — that we’ll legally admit to — we’ve traveled with other people’s youngsters, and we’ve watched in jaw-dropped horror at the antics of some bored, confined children at airports. Thankfully, there are some airports that provide a place for traveling terrors to blow off steam without irritating grumpy grown-ups like me. [More]
Grocery Store Workers Replace Child’s iPad After It’s Stolen Inside Store
By April 9, 2013
While his mother grocery shopped, someone stole an iPad out of the hands of a 6-year-old boy with Down syndrome. The store’s security cameras didn’t capture anything, and the only information the family had was the testimony of his twelve-year-old sister, who also has Down syndrome: “The blonde lady took it.” The story could have ended there, and made everyone sad. Mean person steals expensive but important educational tool from special needs child. Only that wasn’t the end of the story. [More]
Lunch Ladies Teach Middle Schoolers About Debt, Trash Their Lunches If They Owe Money
By April 5, 2013
It’s never too early for kids to learn that living in revolving debt is bad, but how you get that lesson across is a tricky thing. For example, let’s say that you’re the contractor that serves school lunches in a middle school, and you take away the trays of children whose parents owe the lunch vendor money and toss a few dozen perfectly edible meals in the trash. This would be a bad way to teach kids about debt. [More]
Warning: Kids Might Eat Expanding Polymer Balls That Look Like Candy
By April 3, 2013
Here’s the thing: if you make something that’s brightly colored and looks like candy, kids are going to eat it. Water Balz and other similar expanding, water-absorbing polymer toys seem pretty fun, and are also bright and shiny and look like candy. The problem comes when a pet or a child who is too young to understand gets hold of one of these delicious treats and eats it. [More]
UPS Fails To Use The Buddy System When One Of My Packages Wanders Off
By March 20, 2013
When two items go out together as part of the same shipment, should they necessarily stay together? Nowal’s parents got her twins a table and chairs for their birthday, which shipped out in two packages. The toddlers celebrating their birthdays might understand the buddy system, but UPS doesn’t: even though the two packages shipped as a two-package shipment, one box arrived on time while the other disappeared into the bowels of the UPS system because of a damaged label. [More]
eecb: toddler editionThe Honest Toddler, fictional brat and online darling of parents and humor fans alike, recently pleaded with the mysterious figure who is the CEO of Juice to start lying to his or her customers already. Why are parents so concerned about sugar and corn syrup, anyway? “‘Is it 100% juice?’ It’s 100% something!” [The Honest Toddler]
Mom Claims 4-Year-Old Found Drugs At Chuck E. Cheese’s, Manager Wouldn’t Call Cops
By February 19, 2013
A mother in Illinois says her young daughter found an unexpected gift baggie while attending a birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese’s. Making matters worse, the mom claims that the restaurant’s management refused to notify the police for fear of being shut down. [More]
Should Diners Be Rewarded For Well-Behaved Kids, Or Should That Just Be The Norm?
By February 5, 2013
We’ve seen the joy that can spread when restaurant employees type in an personalized discount on diner’s receipts — perhaps complimenting the customer or simply giving a discount to wish a mother-to-be luck. In another recent case of a generous restaurant server, the worker gave a family $4 off the bill for having “well behaved kids.” Sweet, right? Or should it just be expected that if you’re dining out, you keep your kids under control?
Kids’ Dressers Recalled Following Deaths Of 3 Toddlers
By January 30, 2013
The Consumer Product Safety Commission has announced recalls for two separate kids’ dressers following the deaths of three toddlers possibly resulting from the furniture falling on the children. [More]
‘It Really Is A Business’: Why Taking Your Own Santa Visit Pictures Makes You A Cheap Jerk
By December 26, 2012
Last week, we ran a post with advice for families bringing kids to visit Santa, written by a former mall Santa who got the job despite being skinny, thirtyish, and Jewish. He explained how to keep your children from melting down on Santa’s lap. One former elf, who we’ll call “Holly,” took offense at one of that particular Santa’s tips for saving money, and wrote in to explain how things worked at the mall where she served as “elf,” or manager of the Santa set. The main thing she wants our readers to know: if you don’t buy any photos and insist on only taking your own, you’re a Grinchy jerk who is figuratively yanking money out of every employee’s pockets. [More]
Food Companies Have Figured Out How To Market To Kids: Smartphones, Duh
By December 21, 2012
If you’re suddenly hearing things from your kids like, “Mommy, can I please have a [insert food item child has never, ever asked for before]?” just look at the piece of electronic gadgetry in your child’s hands. Food marketers have wised up to the fact that kids these days are getting smartphones younger and younger, and subsequently becoming glued to the devices early on. Ah, nothing like a captive audience to get your ad campaign across. [More]
Spangler Candy Company Delights Autistic Child, Comforts Struggling Family
By December 10, 2012
At this time of year, Spangler may be best known for their candy canes, but they’re also the company behind cheap, tiny, flavorful Dum Dums lollipops. Normally, these candies come in a large bag of assorted flavors, which the discerning candy-eater will then paw through to find the cream soda-flavored ones. What you may not know is that at the company’s web site, you can find tubs of single flavors. When Rebecca learned this, she ordered up a few for her son, who is autistic and has obsessive-compulsive disorder. A single container of his favorite flavor? Perfect for him. Rebecca wrote to the company to tell them how happy this product made her son. Then they wrote back. [More]
NJ Lottery: Gambling Addiction Is Not A Merry Holiday Gift For Your Child
By December 10, 2012
Sure, you can’t take your favorite 10-year-old niece with you to your favorite casino to feed electronic quarters into a dazzling slot machine until her eyes glaze over and she enters a gambling-induced trance. That’s generally illegal. What’s perfectly legal, though, is buying her a nice pile of instant lottery tickets to play. You have to be 18 years old to buy scratchers, but not to play them. Which is why the New Jersey State Lottery and the state Council on Compulsive Gambling put out a statement this week warning that giving lottery tickets to kids might just win them a lifetime of gambling addiction. [More]
Kmart Goes Above And Beyond To Help Mother Of Triplets
By December 5, 2012
Having one young child can be a hassle (or so I read on Facebook every day), but having triplets makes everything that much more complicated. So it was a great relief for one Consumerist reader when her local Kmart went out of its way to help her in her search for three car seats. [More]
JCPenney Shuts Down Portrait Studio Due To Broken Camera, Forgets To Tell Us
By November 28, 2012
We keep hearing about how desperate JCPenney is to get customers and their wallets inside the doors these days. Well, they’re not going to get reader Kristen and her family’s money anymore. It’s too bad, too: Kristen and Mr. Kristen have twin babies. Do you know how fast kids outgrow their clothes? In duplicate? They had made an appointment at their local JCP’s portrait studio, and found the studio abandoned. The ostensible reason: the camera was broken. You’re running a portrait studio without a backup camera? [More]
