Son #4 recently transitioned from a crib to a big boy bed. Well, it wasn’t so much from a crib as from a travel yard. We sold the crib at our moving sale, because he would have needed it for only a few months post move. Anyway, I digress. As I was saying, he just moved up to the bottom bunk of his big boy bed. He was thrilled to be like his brothers and all went smoothly for a week or two. Then, we rocked his world… [more]

Here’s a quick look at our favorite posts from one year ago this past week:

» Weaning and Worrying

» Button Cell Batteries (More recently: Button Cell Battery Safety)

» Through the Eyes of a Child

» Phone Number for a Five Year Old

» Eight Year Old Attitude

And this is what was happening over at FiveCentNickel over the same period:

» The MoneyBlogNetwork (It’s been a year!)

» How to Build a CD Ladder

» Scammed out of $15k

» Kill-a-Watt

» Using Retirement Funds to Pay for College

Raising4Boys participated in two carnivals this week. Here they are along with links to our posts that were included in each…

The Best of Me Symphony included “Dealing With a Finicky Four Year Old Eater.” Also included was “Reward Credit Cards - What’s in My Wallet?” from fivecentnickel.com.

The Carnival of the Vanities included “How to Install a Child Safety Seat That Won’t Budge.”

Son #4 had some “intestinal distress” on the drive back home from Disney World. Since we had been visiting Florida, I hadn’t packed very many pairs of long pants. As we drove further north the weather became very chilly. Unfortunately for him, he had exhausted his supply of long pants because of the illness. What to do? I decided to use my big cozy sweatshirt to keep him warm. I turned the sweatshirt upside down, stuck his little legs in the arm holes, and pulled the rest of the sweatshirt up and over his body. It worked perfectly! He had a warm and cozy “bunting” to snuggle in for the rest of the journey. (And thankfully he didn’t soil the sweatshirt.)

“What a difference it makes to come home to a child!” -Margaret Fuller

This is kind of cool, and definitely worth checking out… You can get a free, autographed picture of your favorite Disney character by writing to:

The Walt Disney Company
Attn: Fan Mail Dept.
500 South Buena Vista Street
Burbank, CA 91521

The only catch is that you have to make your request via snail mail — no electronic inquiries allowed. But if you have a Disney fan in your family, this could make for a fun little surprise that’s well worth the price of a stamp.

I’m not sure how long the entire process takes, so plan ahead — especially if you’re planning on giving the autographed picture as part of a gift.

Here’s a quick look at our favorite posts from one year ago this past week:

» And Now He’s Four - Birthday Party Revisited

» A Lesson in Empathy

» Braces for an Eight Year Old

And this is what was happening over at FiveCentNickel over the same period:

» The World’s Most Affordable Alarm System

» Avoid Costly Home Insurance Mistakes, Part 1 (Part 2)

» Flexible Spending Accounts, Braces, and a Debit Card

Talk about having egg on your face… After making a huge splash with their study on infant safety seats, Consumer Reports has just withdrawn their report. According to Consumer Reports:

We withdrew the report immediately upon discovering a substantive issue that may have affected the original test results. The issue came to light based on new information received Tuesday night and Wednesday morning from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) concerning the speed at which our side-impact tests were conducted.

For their part, the NHTSA is “fairly certain that the crash speed [at which] Consumer Reports conducted the tests was really closer to 70 to 80-miles per hour.” If this is true, it means that the side-impact tests were carried out at roughly twice the intended speed.

Interestingly, Consumer Reports is still standing by its front-impact results, which it insists were performed at the intended speed. Given this, it seems that there are still some pretty severe problems with infant safety seats in this country, although they may not be as bad as originally believed. Consumer Reports intends to repeat the tests re-issue their report as soon as possible.

[Source: ABC News]

Raising4Boys participated in two carnivals this week. Here they are along with links to our articles that were included in each.

The Best of Me Symphony included “Don’t Let Your Kids Get Ahold of Your Checkbook.” Also included was “My Best and Worst Money Moves” from fivecentnickel.com.

The Carnival of the Vanities included “On Sleeping Bags and Barf Buckets.”

The epidemic of childhood obesity is daunting. At Son #1’s basketball game the other night there were two portly brothers sitting on the sideline, watching the game, and drinking Coca Cola. At half time, they went over to the drink machine (located in the gym!!!) and bought themselves a Powerade to wash down their Cokes. I guess the only saving grace is that their little brother was playing basketball at the time. Maybe the family is trying to make one small change at a time. Who knows? [more]