Hey all, I'm just curious what bands or songs you keep in rotation for your kids. I usually split this question into two lists: one that is for songs specifically geared towards kids or otherwise your kid loves to hear, and another for songs that are somehow enhanced in the context of your children (and example for me is Perfect Day from Lou Reed).

If you want to give any additional context to your answers, great-- but not required. That might be approx age or the decade you had kids, or some story about it. And yes, many kids just listen to whatever stuff the parents would normally listen to, including mine, that is normal, but not really the question here.

I'll start with one and come back later with more:

Kid: Okee Dokee Brothers
Me: Perfect Day - Lou Reed

I have a 4 year old and I'm looking for some video suggestions (ideally a series) that showcases cultures around the world. I have lots of options handy for seeing all sorts of animals from any corner of the globe that are all very kid-friendly if not kid-oriented, but not a lot comes to mind when I want to introduce her to human life around the world. Particularly in urban places. Her exposure to these other cultures is usually just as porters helping some white guys walk around a jungle looking for animals. I can also find lots of travel series, which go to different places, but they are all oriented to adults-- either talking about how to travel to these places as a tourist, or have more adult jokes or are too focused on the presenter.

Are there any well made series about life in other places? I'd like her to see life in Tokyo, Cairo, Mexico City, favelas of Brazil, Amsterdam, Mumbai, etc.

Not quite sure how to start this post, but I guess maybe a little bit of my own background could be useful?

I'm 41, Father of two young kids (almost 8 and 5), been gaming my entire life. I have a PC games library that's well over 20+ years old and 1000 games deep (not to brag, just for context) that my kids mostly (curated for them) have access too. My first multiplayer game was at about 11-years old with the Quake demo in 1996, later got heavily in to MMO's (Everquest, DAOC, WoW, etc) and in the early 2010's, I was heavily in to World of Tanks/Warplanes.

My oldest really wants to play Fortnite (which means the youngest will also play) and I'm a little torn on if I should allow that or not. They've played it a decent amount at their Uncles house and I'm well familiar with the game, though I've never played it or a Battle Royale style game myself and I don't really find anything objectionable about the content of the game itself, but I'm pretty reticent to put it on my own computers and make accounts for them to be able to play at home.

I can't exactly put my finger on why that might be, but I'm currently attributing it to the FOMO mechanics with skins, as well as the generally addictive nature of online games themselves, given I've been addicted to them myself. My kids only have a limited amount of time to play games or watch TV on any given day anyway, so I'm not necessarily concerned that they'll play it all day, but I am worried about their mental health when it comes to it. They both already get frustrated with games (but in different ways) and I feel like that would be exacerbated when they have a bad match or when they're called away to do something (which is a primary reason I quit multiplayer games when I had children. It became too difficult to disengage from a "match" of something and I'd become very frustrated and angry.) Now, I'm not afraid to take away things if they become a problem (they have been banned from Youtube) and while there's some short term pain associated with that, they tend to get over it after awhile. Also, I do generally feel that it's more wholesome to engage with stuff like Subnautica, Minecraft and other games that they're currently playing.

Anyway, I'm curious what other people's thoughts are on this subject. My wife proposed letting the older one have an account when they turn 8 here very soon, but I've told her about my reticence about it all, which she is understanding of. But I wanted to see if I'm being too anxious or paranoid about it and if Fortnite is actually fine for an 8 and 5 year old. I'm not generally one to wholesale ban things in the house and I'm open to all types of games and experiences, just not sure if it's totally appropriate yet.

Side note: there is the side benefit that I might (probably not often) play with them, but that they also have the possibility of playing with their (much older) cousins and their Uncles. Though I'm not sure any of them are able to play during the times my kids have their screentime.

The other day at the bus stop I overheard a mom saying how amazing it was that her husband not only cooked dinner - pasta - but also then put the kids to bed. The woman she was talking to nodded sagely in agreement: clearly this was laudable.

Is the bar for being a good father and husband so low? What the hell?

This isn't really new to me, I suppose. I've worked mainly with women my whole life and too often I hear that the bare minimum seems to be "they provide money" and occasionally throw down a meal and play with the kids. Sometimes, even that is expecting too much.

Can I get some perspective on this?

It’s before 5am CT, and I’ve been awake since… 2:30am. Most nights, I can feed my newborn and fall right back asleep. I believe that some work stress has kept me awake. It got me thinking about some questions to ask the group:

1. For those of us who would rather be productive than lie in bed awake for an extended period of time, how long before you decide to just get up and do something? I’m a little surprised I haven’t just gotten up yet. I think I will here in a few minutes.
2. What are some fun activities you like to get up to when it’s the middle of the night and everyone is asleep? I’m a software engineer by trade so I tend to work on a side project. Maybe a music project if it’s something quiet.
3. The age old question: how can I fall back asleep? I can usually count backwards from 100 and by the second time through I’ll be out. Does anyone have anything more interesting?

I’m sure variations of this topic have been posted before, so I apologize if this is less than novel. Retitle as necessary, I couldn’t think of a good one.

Just wanted to share an update on the stuff I overshared in this thread nearly a month ago.

It's been an incredibly long, frustrating, but successful month. Within a few days of writing that post, we took my son to the doctor and I just explained everything going on. The doctor seemed as unsure as we were whether my son was experiencing illness or anxiety, so she decided to tackle both. He got some medication for the stomach issues and we got the ball rolling on getting him into therapy.

The following few weeks were very hit-and-miss. I tried to get him to drive with me on little errands here and there throughout the week to get him out of the house, comfortable in the car, and to try to work through the fear he was experiencing. At first it would take quite a lot of convincing and sometimes I got frustrated and acted like an idiot. Eventually we got to a point where the convincing took less time and resulted in less tears (and frustration). But we are at a point where he's getting better at calming himself down and going in the car even if he's a little scared.

We still haven't made much progress with getting him in the car with his sister though. We've done a few trips to the nearby park all together, but my wife had to sit between them to calm him down. Likewise, he's still hesitant to sleep in the same room as her (they share a room for now). And again, it has nothing to do with her, aside from her overreacting to him being upset and him being upset by that. It's a vicious cycle. Honestly this is the most difficult part right now because it's making doing anything really complicated. We literally cannot do family trips anywhere without taking two vehicles. More on this later.

One of my biggest concerns in the other thread was that he was scheduled for eye surgery toward the end of the month and pre/post op appointments and the surgery itself would require a lot of driving. I'm happy to report that he handled every single car trip relating to it like a champ. And the surgery itself was a success, and recovery is going really well. Also apparently thanks to COVID, parents are no longer allowed to go back to the operating room until their child falls asleep, which we didn't realize until a few seconds before they took him back. Which was really difficult for us as parents and for him as well. He keep mentioning it and I try to talk him through and explain that we didn't know and that we're sorry, but wouldn't have let him go if we didn't know the doctor and nurses would be taking good care of him.

And he had his first therapy appointment this morning. It was just an intake appointment so the therapist could get a feel for what's going on and to get to know my son a little bit. But I feel a lot better about things than I did a month ago. I know we still have a lot of struggle and work ahead of us (he starts 1st grade next month...Getting him and his sister there is going to be interesting).

I think the next few weeks are going to be spent working on getting him and his sister together in the car more. We're already working on the bedtime issue. The last two nights we had them together in the same room to read a bedtime story together and then afterwards she slept elsewhere. Just trying to baby step our way toward solving that problem.

Lastly, I wanted to thank you all for your support and comments in the original thread. It was very helpful to be able to write everything out and get some validation, advice, etc.

tl;dr - Is it normal for 6 year olds to randomly start throwing massive tantrums. My son up to this point has been very mild mannered and not prone to getting upset. But the last few weeks have been insane.

My son (6) has been going through something that is just really challenging the heck out of me. It started a few weeks ago when we were getting ready to leave for trip to visit family a few states away. He complained that his stomach hurt and began sobbing and begging to take a bath. So we accommodated and let him take 3 baths in a single day because we figured he just wasn't feeling well. We scheduled a doctor's appointment and the doctor just suggested a bland diet for a day and see how it plays out. After that he didn't really seem to have any issues, so we went ahead with our trip.

The hours-long drive didn't seem to faze him at all and we arrived safe and sound, despite a heavy rainstorm on the way. Over the course of the trip, every time we tried to drive somewhere to meet up with family, he'd claim he was sick and if we pushed on it, he'd throw a tantrum. Which is very unlike him, to be clear. And anytime we weren't talking about a car ride, he was acting pretty normal. We thought maybe it was anxiety from the drive there? The rainstorm was very intense at times, and I can see how that could be incredibly scary for a kid.

We spent the rest of the trip hyping him up for the drive home. My wife and I both have anxiety disorders, so we tried to help him understand that we knew how he felt and offered some advice (in a 6yo friendly way, to the best of our abilities). We also maintained a relatively bland diet for him in case he actually was feeling sick. But anyway we were absolutely dreading the ride home.

Just getting him and his sister in the car proved to be the absolute worst day of my parenting life. He threw the tantrum of tantrums, which set his sister off and she kept trying to escape from the car. Meanwhile it was 90F+ outside and our car's AC doesn't really kick in until you start driving. I was hot, upset, angry, scared, frustrated and just not operating at peak parental power. There was a lot of yelling, a lot of trying to hold them into their seats so I could buckle them, and all of it obviously just made the situation worse. I really fucked it up and I'm still trying to work through it all.

Long story short, we ended up separating him and his sister, with him driving home with us and his sister driving home with my parents. Once his sister was out of the car, he calmed down and we were able to leave. The plan was to just drive off and get some gas, let them both calm down, then pick her back up.

I had to go on a work trip shortly after that trip, so I was away for most last week. In that time my wife didn't try to take the kids anywhere, for fear of having a repeat incident, but solo and outnumbered by the kids. When I got back I started trying to hype my son up for the car ride to his and his sister's 6th birthday party the next day. He tried to negotiate saying maybe we could just walk instead of drive. I explained, "no it's a short car ride, but we couldn't walk there".

When the time came to take him to the party, he threw a tantrum, but I redirected using my car's remote start fob (he really liked that) and I talked him down a bit. The ride to the party was fine, as was the return trip. Then yesterday we did a trip to Gamestop so he could pick out a birthday present for himself and again the trip both ways was fine (with zero tantrum!). Although he has yet to get in the car with his sister since we got back from our trip a few weeks back and he has specifically called out not wanting to be in the car with her.

BUT the last two nights he's started throwing the exact same type of tantrums at bedtime, claiming he can only sleep in our bed and he's sick and his legs hurt and all these other things. When told no, he screams bloody murder, starts kicking and hitting, and it's really difficult for me to handle that. The tantrums of course set his sister off and then we have two 6yo twins feeding off each other's sadness and anger like two colliding hurricanes.

Is this just normal 6 year old stuff? I know they're still learning to regulate emotions and so maybe that's it? His sister went through something like this a few months ago, but it was exclusively about bedtime. She'd throw massive tantrums at bedtime while he'd just quietly go to bed. So that kind of reinforces that this is just a growth spurt of some sort? But I'm getting concerned it's something else, but I don't know what?

I'm a ball of rage over my pediatrician having to drop their contract with United due to some disagreement, as we really like our pediatrician. I kind of don't care if it's actually the office's fault at this point; I'd like to direct this anger over bullshit affecting the care my kids receive at them while I'm still motivated. It's probably not going to help, but what is the most effective way I can badger them, pester them, inundate their support lines, etc to get back?

Or, y'know, diplomatic means if it'd actually help?

My son loves reading time before bed, but he’s only 3.5 so the books have mostly been picture books until now. Lately though he’s been getting more into stories with plots and an extended narrative, but entirely in the form of movies. There aren’t a lot of kid’s books to go around with the sorts of dramatic stories he likes, they’re more like “caterpillar eats food” and “train engine climbs a hill with grit and determination” type stuff. And whenever I’ve tried to have him just lay down and listen to me read a story without any pictures to stare at he has absolutely no interest. He really likes having pretty visuals to look at.

I know when I was a small child these sorts of board/picture books weren’t really a thing in India. The pre-sleep ritual was usually “storytime” instead, where my parents would tell us stories. I’m a little bit concerned that my kid has been so accustomed to always having visual cues presented to him that it’s stunting his imagination a bit, like failing to exercise his capacity to visualize ideas and concepts for himself without being anchored by some artist’s depiction.

So I’m curious to hear from other parents or caregivers/educators (@kfwyre?). Did you find there was a natural transition point between going from picture books to telling/reading stories? Was there any sort of work you had to do to enable it? Are there “exercises” I can work on to help my son exercise his imagination? I have been working with him to have him tell me stories about his day, which he does pretty well. But his stories are always quite grounded and he’s usually telling me what he’s actually done and seen. When my nephews and nieces were his age they tended to spin out a lot of random stories that pretty obviously did not happen, and I assume this is because they had more experience being told stories themselves rather than just factual reporting about the happenings around them.

I'm going to be in NYC with my daughter next week for a school conference. There are already some planned tourist things: the One World Center observatory, South Street Seaport, the Roosevelt Tram ride, and a Broadway show.

There is a pretty full schedule of scheduled activities. The primary degree of freedom is that almost every meal, breakfast lunch and dinner, is "on your own".

We're staying right in Times Square, so the expectation seems to be that everything you could want for food is within walking distance of the hotel. I plan to find a grocery store and get some fruit and snacks to keep in the hotel so we don't have to go out for every meal if she's exhausted.

Keep in mind also, it will be myself, my 4th grader, and whatever of her 4-6th grade friends we pick up, so we're not looking for bars or haute cuisine. If there's something "special" or uniquely new york, I can probably sell it as a new experience, but it needs to be in their overton window.

She's a pretty good eater but prefers familiar food. She's a fan of American staples like pizza, dogs, and burgers. She does well with Italian and Mexican, but rarely likes Thai, Indian, or Chinese.
Her best friend is vegetarian, so at least some vegetarian- friendly options would be good.

We won't have a ton of time for other touristy stuff, but I'm open to recommendations for something simple and short we could do in the evenings. In this thread people mentioned riding the ferry, so if that's a thing we can easily do from there, maybe grabbing some street hot dogs and sitting on the ferry would be a good option?

So, Tilderistas what Times Square recommendations (or anti recommendations) do you have?