The I'm Bored Jar 2014 Style

The I'm Bored Jar is amazing! A school friend suggested the idea and the boys have loved it. The rules are: if anyone says 'I'm Bored!' they must take something from the jar and complete the task it sets them. The risk is that you HAVE to do what it says - one friend said she loved the Bertie Botts Every Flavour Beans element of risk and danger. And so do the kids.

Towards the end of term, it became apparent that the Jar hadn't really kept up with the boys and it was time to update and refresh the chores and tasks.

So, Facebook was consulted, Pinterest was ransacked and my brain went into overdrive. Many suggestions were great, but kind of missed the point. Ideally, the tasks will be things that the kids can get on with more or less unsupervised and with minimal adult input. This is because they will almost always suddenly appear and claim boredom JUST when you are at the crucial stage of cooking dinner, or about to phone the bank. So, suggestions that imply dropping everything and doing something WITH the kids, are for another day.  

The jar is meant to give us relaxed and happy days at home, without the expectation of organised and often expensive entertainment being laid on. At the same time, I can't expect my boys to just hang around randomly, not without expecting a LOT of squabbling and grumpiness anyway. And of course, they can just zoom around on bikes, and call for their friends and I will bring them to the playground etc. But, as I am now doing a lot of work from home and learning day by day how this will work now the kids are around all day, the jar will be crucial to a sane and happy Summer!

We now have a fully stocked jar, with loads of ideas suited to the age and stage of the 2 Keene-lings. 

 If you have a 7 or 5 year old boy, then this list could save your Summer. Many of these are easily adaptable for other ages and interests also, I am sure. For example, I mind 2 great kids every Thursday and the 9 year old girl pulled something out of the jar last week: write a letter to your favourite football player.  How unimpressed was she!  And how quickly did she change to being unbelievably impressed when I suggested she write to one of the boys from One Direction instead!!! She was soooo excited and wrote a letter worthy of a reply, while literally bouncing up and down in her seat.  I absolutely love the intense use of capitals and my favourite bit is where she tells Harry to 'send the lads a hug from me!', as though she has known them all very well for years! We looked up the band's management company and the letter has been posted. I hope Harry Stiles does get it and write back... If he does, minimum safe distance required due to the screaming that will ensue, or she might not be able to speak at all for a month. Either way, it would be pretty amazing!

So, here is the list - it remains open to new suggestions and ideas!

• choose a lego project and make it
• empty waste paper baskets
• look at your baby pictures
• make a playlist on Spotify
• make a card for anna and owen
• choose a famous football player and write to them, or draw them a picture
• draw a minecraft map, that you can make next time you play it
• choose a lego project and make it
• make a marble run
• make a road and train track
• paint a rainbow
• check the dryer and empty it if it is full
• go through the football magazines and throw away any that are too torn and ripped
• go through your money box and count what is in there
• go through all your socks and check they fit and all have a pair
• go through the craft book, pick a craft and make a list of what we need
• pick an activity book from Adam’s room and do 3 pages of it
• pick a recipe that you want to make and make a list of what you need
• choose a Bible story and draw a picture of it
• clear out the church bag completely
• make a sign that could go on your bedroom door
• choose a scene from Harry Potter and draw a picture of this
• wash the car
• cycle or scoot around Broomhall Glen and back home
• go through your pyjamas and check that they fit
• check your bedroom: pick everything off the floor and put it in the right place
• do a jigsaw puzzle
• go through the cars in the big blue box and throw away any broken ones
• go through the colours and check if any are broken and throw them away
• clean the toilet and sink in your bathroom
• write a news broadcast and video yourself giving the news. Tell least 3 news stories
• hoover mummy’s car
• write a short story, which must include the words: apple, frog and helicopter
• do a bumpy hand drawing (get Mummy to show you on Pinterest)
• make up a new superhero: give him a name, draw a costume and choose his 3 superpowers and draw his enemy too
• get Mummy to write a really long word and see how many shorter words you can make from it
• make a road track on the decking or in your room with masking tape
• make a fort and have a snack inside it
• make up a secret code and write a message to Mummy telling her what you’d like for dinner tomorrow
• make a pirate treasure map and see if Daddy can find the treasure you have hidden when he gets home
• Ask Mummy for the Letter Walk plate and go for it
• see if Mummy or Daddy have an old appliance that they will let you take apart
• choose a piano piece to practise so you can play a duet with Daddy when he gets home 
• Design and build an obstacle course for your brother to do, and maybe parents too
• Choose a Formula 1 Driver and write to them
• Design a football strip for Southampton 
• Practise level 6 flips on the trampoline
• water the garden with water from the butt - use watering can, don’t forget pot at the front
• go through yellow snack box, throw away any empty boxes or anything that has gone off 
• make a magic potion in the garden 
• go around the house and check for any cups or mugs to put in the dishwasher
• choose a story to read out loud and record yourself reading it
• go round the house and pick up all the books not in a book case and put them in the right rooms
• design the invitation to your birthday party later this year
• Choose a loom band design to make and make a new bracelet
• time yourself running a lap of the garden and then try and better your time
• Take a pencil for a walk on a piece of paper and then colour in the shapes: no pieces touching each other can be the same colour
• look in the recycling bin and use whatever you can find to make a rocket
• pull up all the weeds from the side of the driveway
• rearrange your bookcase by colour, to make a rainbow of the book spines
• rearrange your bookcase by author, alphabetically
• design and make a monster mask
• Think of 3 other ideas for the I’m Bored Jar!
• Add any football cards or stickers to the right albums if not yet stuck in

Tiny Surfers: Internetiquette for Kids and Parents

'Mummy, can I please be on Instagram?' If this had been a scene from a sit com, I would have spat a mouthful of tea across the kitchen at this point. My 7 year old wants to be on Instagram? Wait, my 7 year old has heard of Instagram and wants to post pictures? WHAT? Why? How?

It is truly astonishing how much kids pick up about things they don't actually use or have direct contact with. We must refer to things all the time, like our Facebook status, or sending email, that we don't really register as being taken in by little ears.

My friend got an iPad the other day and by the time she got to it in the evening, her 7 year old son had downloaded all her apps from her iTunes account, except for Facebook, '... cause I wasn't sure what your email address was...' 

We got both boys fairly cheap tablets that Andy picked up in Malaysia when he was there for work. Matthew took his and got started with some of the games that Andrew had preloaded. But within minutes he turned to me: 'Can I send messages to Jack on this?' And then: 'Can I have a password so no one else can go on this?' That would be a big fat NO to both of those questions! But we were surprised that he thought to ask them...

There is also a PlayStation in the living room and I was taken aback to come in and see Adam, 5, playing a match with 'some guy.' Um, pardon? Who? How? My solution to that one was to just turn the bloody thing off and to alter the access settings. Thankfully Adam was pretty freaked out by this and won't be trying this again - mainly cause the guy was thrashing him in their FIFA match...

Although we knew of course that we had to work hard to stay ahead of the kids in terms of technology, we had thought we would have a bit more of a cushion before they were snapping at our heels. And this is from a pretty IT savvy family. Andy works full time in IT and I am not frightened of it myself. But I have already had to hand my phone over to Matthew, when he was 6, so that he could find a particular app that I couldn't. And the boys discovered how to get onto YouTube through the PlayStation before I even knew that was any kind of an option.

We are helping out at a Parenting Course at the moment and the bulk of the course is dvd presentations from a great couple who are full of practical, realistic, loving and helpful advice. Last week's session was all about boundaries and they touched on the area of screen time and added the usual advice around kids' security on computers: keep the family computer in a central area in the home and then you can monitor what the kids are doing online. However, that is really quite outdated as advice goes as things have changed so rapidly in this arena. Now it is a matter of everyone being on their own devices, or perhaps multiple devices at the one time.


So, what's the best advice for a family with young kids? Here are the 4 main things I think it's worth taking into account:

1. Screen Time: limit this! Establish a culture whereby your kids ask you before they use technology and know that they have a certain time per day to play on screens. See also: http://sarahkeene.blogspot.ie/2013/07/screen-sanity.html

2. Have the conversation with your kids about the internet. In the same way we all find the right time and words to discuss Stranger Danger, the topic needs to be extended to the web. 'Never give your real name on websites', 'How to make a good password' etc. And set up the conversation to prepare them for the day when they come across something that you'd rather they not find online. Cause they will. Realistically, you can't stop that from happening - but you can influence what they choose to do next. 

3. Media Stacking is the snazzy term used for using more than one device at a time: watching Netflix while playing on a tablet and texting too. There is some thought that kids using technology in this way are losing the ability to focus on one thing at a time and that this is affecting the attention they can really give to films, books or other activities. I am not sure what I think of this, but it's an interesting idea and worth keeping an eye on.

4. Look at the devices that they use. There are actually a lot of settings on tablets and games consoles that implement security. Alright, today's kids will probably be able to circumvent these by the time they are 8 and  a half, but it's worth trying! And there are also a lot of great apps out there for parental controls. The best one I have found is Norton Family Security. It's great - you can tailor each child's access as you register them with this service. There is a free element to this, and then you can choose to pay as you need more detailed and specific requirements. It's well worth a look and fairly easy to set up. https://onlinefamily.norton.com/familysafety/nofToGo.fs The main thing I like about it, is that its number 1 recommendation for parents is that they have an open and evolving conversation with their kids about their online activities, thus bringing us neatly back to points 1 and 2.

It can feel very overwhelming, especially if you aren't at all techy. And very quickly terms like cyber bullying start to get chucked about, which can escalate fear and panic around this whole issue. I firmly believe that starting this conversation with your young children, who probably already know more than you realise they do, will give you a better chance of protecting them as they get older. I am not naive enough to think that my boys won't find porn or get silly or abusive messages from their friends as they get older. But I can give them a decent foundation in internetiquette, and hope this will help them negotiate this whole minefield, which is only going to grow in their lifetime.


One key message to take from this:  have the conversation with your kids, about safety, about screen time and keep this conversation open and developing as they get older. But, also, make friends with a tame geek and give them cake and beer at regular intervals so they can help you with this. I took this to the next level and married one. Now you know why I bake so often...

If Anyone Asks, We Are A Nice Normal Family

The first time I blithely agreed to play cards with Andrew and some assorted relatives, I didn't realise I was opening myself up to grave censure and critique. I thought we were going to play cards. But, as it turned out, we were going to Play Cards - something that was done nearly every Sunday and where an enormous amount of unspoken expectations and rules came quietly into play without me knowing this. Probably without anyone else knowing it as well, as they all just had an innate sense of this as 'the normal way' to play cards and 'the way we do things on Sundays'.

It was the first and last time I played cards with any Keenes-in-law or family branches thereof!  Not realising there were sacred rituals involved, I trampled all over them and was looked at aghast, like a cultural outcast, or at the very least, a fairly stupid person. Not that anyone there realised that's how they were looking at me, or how they made me feel! 

Any given family has their own family culture, whether they realise this or not. Values, norms, rituals and traditions are part of any household and shape the members accordingly.  Often you don't realise you are part of a very specific micro culture in your family. I guess kids assume that their family is the same as most others and that the way things are expressed or done in their house is the 'normal' way. Those first few playdates or sleepovers will soon change that...


When you end up in a relationship with someone and meet their family, it's probably the first time you are seeing another family really close up.  I was 19 when Andrew and I started going out and 20 when I first went to stay with his folks for a few nights. He was the same age when he came over to Holland to stay with us that first summer we were together. It's weird to feel quite close to someone and then to see them in their most familiar environment when you are beginning to establish your own mini culture together as a couple. It definitely helped us get to know each other better and understand some of each other's idiosyncrasies and assumptions.

One of my relatives-in-law was a good bit older when he became part of the family. He has opted not to really get to know or stay with anyone. There are some days I think he might have the right idea! On the other hand, it's part of who we all are, our family culture, for good or for bad, whether there was ever an intentional culture or not; or just a sense of 'this is how things are' and you only found out later that this was actually only true in your house.

The games that drove Andrew mad in my family home were all word related: Word and Question, Fold Over and Consquences were big favourites with us and I couldn't wait to introduce him to them. Well, he did NOT enjoy them and was made to feel equally foolish and as much of an outsider as I had with the cards scenario. There is a certain amount of writing and even rhyming in those games that just frustrated him and felt like work rather than a game.

So, very early on in our marriage, we made a solemn pact: he never has to play word games with my family and I never have to play cards with his. I am not saying this is the main reason we have been together for nearly 20 years, but it's definitely helped!

And now we get to create our own family culture! It's one of those things you might not know you have until you hear your kids jabbering away to their friends or their friends' parents and see the confusion and bewilderment on their faces. Then you realise you have normalised something that they now assume is universal, but no one else is really interested in!

A big part of Andrew's family culture is music. Both he and his sister played in the Hampshire County Youth Orchestra and this was a massive part of his teenage years. Play any piece of classical music and Andrew will more than likely have played it in some concert or band or other. When Matthew was born, Andrew's folks both said 'I wonder what he'll play', as one of their very first comments on meeting their grandson. It's a huge value to them, clearly.  Which is why it's exciting that Matthew has just started piano lessons, 5 weeks ago. After a good start, we had a dodgy week, after which I had to sit him down and explain why yawning loudly and incessantly for 30 minutes of the lesson was not very polite and why I was mortified listening in from the corridor. Bless him, he got the message and has been doing really well.

One of my favourite family memories is time spent at the dinner table playing: 'Think of a Question.' Mam and Dad used to ask us all kinds of questions!  Dad would generally go for general knowledge and the news headlines and Mam might get us to list our 5 favourite something or other. Capital cities, prime ministers, historical figures - all part of dinner time.  I remember fun, happy mealtimes, including some where we laughed so much that my sister fell off her chair. There was of course the memorable dessert flinging episode as well...  In my mind, this is linked to family question time; although the spoonful of pudding that my sister flung directly at my dad wasn't actually in answer to a question, it was definitely something that shaped our family culture and has gone down as a key family moment. As has his spoonful chucked right back at her. Ah, memories...

Imagine my delight when I went to collect the boys from a meal at Opa and Oma's house, to find they had been playing 'Hard Questions' at the dinner table. This has very quickly become a ritual whenever they are eating with Opa, especially. There is maths, there is geography, there is football knowledge and there is a load of fun and encouragement. It's brilliant!  The other night, I was blown away by some of the stuff the boys knew, or by watching them work out things they might not have known already. This is a wee culture they have with their grandparents and it is beautiful to see!

As for our family culture, it is partly just an organic process, but also one we need to be intentional in shaping. At the moment, it is drawing heavily on Angry Birds and Star Wars for its cultural references.  I would like to think we can up the standard soon - although I am quite proud to know as much as I do about Piggy Island, Pig Troopers and Ham Solo.