We Can't Have Nice Things

Jimmy on the Carousel

Kid has boundless energy. I'm exhausted.

My mom and Ellie at It's a Small World

Ellie is wearing the Cinderella dress that my mom made her.

In line for Disneyland

Already has his mouse ears on.

In the battle of Ellie vs. pancakes...

Ellie is victorious!

Ellie loves Christmas movies and Christmas music, so tonight we're watching "White Christmas" with Bing Crosby, Danny Kaye and Rosemary Clooney. The song "Snow" should really be a holiday standard.

Tooth extraction succeed

via succeedblog.org

Ellie has her first loose tooth. Maybe I need to go buy an RC car.

The Fresh Beat Band

I keep seeing ads for a show on Nick Jr. called "The Fresh Beat Band" and thinking that the giant white guy looks like Hoyt from "True Blood" 

See for yourself.

Ellie reading "Where The Wild Things Are"

She's now reading books all by herself.

Won't someone think of the children? No, seriously.

My wife and I are really careful about what our children watch on television. We avoid anything that is too scary or disturbing for our five-year-old daughter or our two-year-old son. This is a lot more challenging than it sounds. Both network and cable TV is filled with ads that are completely inappropriate for anyone under 52, much less a kindergartener and a toddler.

Tonight we had a close call with nightmareland when I left the Monday Night Football game on in the living room while I went in the kitchen. Usually we never leave the room without turning the channel to the Food Network (the only channel we've found that doesn't show scary commercials) but the football game was really exciting and I hadn't wanted to miss any of it. I was in the kitchen playing with my son when I realized that Ellie was in the living room and I didn't know what was being shown.

My wife walked in just in time to see that they were showing a commercial for a horror movie called Pandorum. Fortunately, Ellie's back was to the TV and she didn't see any of it, but that's not the point. Remember, this was at 7pm Pacific Time on ESPN. Watch these two versions (I'm not sure which one of these was playing tonight) and tell me that they're not completely inappropriate for kids:

And this isn't even the worst of it. A few months ago there was a commercial for a movie called "The Strangers" that gave me the heebie-jeebies so badly that I couldn't stand to watch it.

So here's my question: are we a couple of Maude Flanders-types who stand up in the town meeting and yell, "won't someone think of the children" or are we right that commercials have gotten way too scary?

Fathers are special

Nothing says "special" like the bargain bin at Borders.