Author Archives: Brian Welch
Halloween is such a great time to be a kid. It’s a great time to be an adult for that matter but a certain part of the magic is lost as we get older. As Halloween approaches, I always try to get into the mood by watching some scary movies but most are way too scary and graphic for my children. So, to get my kids in the spirit of things, I started looking for scary movies for them that they could watch leading up to Halloween without scaring them half to death. I am sure many of you reading this article could come up with a list of your own Halloween Movies for your kids. They would probably consist of some great movies you saw as a child and watched as you grew up, but I thought it would help some parents if we came up with a comprehensive list.
This is where the caveat comes in! When it comes to holiday movies, most families have their favorites. If your movie didn’t make the list, don’t be offended. I probably just didn’t know about it. Please help us make the best list possible by posting your favorite Halloween movie in the comments section below the article. We will do our best to add it to the list.
So, without further adieu, here is our list of the BEST Halloween Movies for Kids! (in no particular order)
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It’s The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown Available From: Amazon Format: DVD Price (at time of article): $14.99 This one is such a time honored classic, how could we not start the list off with it. I was a big fan of the Peanuts when I was a kid and mourned the loss of Charles Shultz when he died. It is one of the best Halloween movies around as Charlie Brown gets rocks in his trick or treat bag, snoopy falls asleep and Linus waits patiently (kind of) for the great Pumpkin to arrive in the pumpkin patch. Like all of the Peanuts movies, it sends a great message to kids and is a great kids halloween movie. You can buy it by clicking The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown |
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Casper the Friendly Ghost Available From: Amazon Format: DVD Price (at time of article): $9.99 I grew up watching the Casper the Friendly Ghost cartoon and it was always one of my favorites. I was ecstatic when they created a live action movie. The actual movie is just called Casper, I always add “The Friendly Ghost” because that is how I always think of him. It’s a perfect movie for Halloween and your kids are sure to love it. You can buy it by clicking Casper |
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The Monster Squad Available From: Amazon Format: DVD and Blu Ray Price (at time of article): $8.99 – $14.99 I couldn’t possibly make a list of the best Halloween movies for kids without including the Monster Squad. This was my all time favorite monster movie when I was a kid. I first watched it on a Boy Scout camp out and just fell in love with it. It’s a movie with Dracula, Frankenstein’s Monster, The Wolfman, The Mummy and The Gillman all seeking out a powerful amulet. Only the Monster Squad, a group of determined kids, can stop them. You can buy it by clicking The Monster Squad on DVD or The Monster Squad on Blu Ray |
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Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad Available From: Amazon Format: DVD Price (at time of article): $11.99 This movie is actually a fairly new addition to my families collection of Halloween movies for the kids. The movie makes up two shorts, The Wind in the Willows and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. It was originally released on the big screen in 1949 but until recently, was not available on VHS or DVD. It was the 11th animated feature that Disney released and we love it. You can buy it by clicking Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad |
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Monster House Available From: Amazon Format: DVD and Blu ray Price (at time of article): $12.99 to $19.99 The 5th movie in our Best Halloween Movies for Kids list is Monster House. It’s about a group of kids who believe a haunted house that is planning on eating all the little kids that come to trick or treat at it’s door. They do an amazing job making the house one of the actual characters in the movie. It can be a little intense and scary at times so I don’t recommend this for younger kids. You can buy it by clicking Monster House on DVD or Monster House on Blu Ray |
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Escape to Witch Mountain Available From: Amazon Format: DVD Price (at time of article): $7.99 Here is another movie that I loved as a kid. By today’s standards, the effects are nothing special but back then they were amazing. It’s another classic from the brilliance that is Disney. It features two little kids, a brother and sister, with mysterious powers, who are on the run from someone trying to exploit them as they make there way to witch mountain. All sorts of adventures happen along the way as the movie builds to a great sci-fi ending. You can buy it by clicking Escape to Witch Mountain |
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Wizard of Oz Available From: Amazon Format: DVD and Blu ray Price (at time of article): $14.99 While not strictly a Halloween movie, I LOVED Wizard of Oz as a kid and it has Witches in it so C’mon! This move absolutely belongs on the list of the best halloween movies for children. Not much explanation is needed for this classic, it’s a musical that just about everyone loves no matter what there take on the musical genre is. It’s a must watch for Halloween and is typically the one we use to start off our Halloween season. What better way to get into the Halloween season then watching a witch get crushed by a house! You can buy it by clicking Wizard of Oz on DVD or Wizard of Oz on Blu Ray |
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Simpsons Treehouse of Horror Available From: Amazon Format: DVD Price (at time of article): $7.99 Okay, so we all know this isn’t for younger kids. Heck, it’s not something I would let my own kids watch but I have sat down with my nephews (much older than my kids) and watched it with them and it was great. I love the Simpsons. More accurately, I love the older Simpsons which is what this is. It’s a collection of some of the best Treehouse of Horrors episodes. You can buy it by clicking Simpson Treehouse of Horror |
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Nicktoons Halloween Tales of Fright Available From: Amazon Format: DVD Price (at time of article): $11.99 In this day and age, there is just no getting away from Spongebob and some of the uber popular Nicktoons cartoons that our kids just can’t get enough of. We bought this DVD for our kids last year and they love it. It’s packed full of Halloween themed episodes from my kids favorite cartoons. You can buy it by clicking Nicktoons Halloween Tales of Fright |
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The Little Vampire Available From: Amazon Format: DVD Price (at time of article): $7.99 This is a surprisingly good movie for kids and parents alike. It’s a movie we picked up for the kids thinking they would love it around this time of year but it’s not one we expected to enjoy ourselves. It’s not a movie we would watch without the kids but isn’t it always a great bonus when you can enjoy the move alongside your kids? I made this selection the last pick in our best Halloween movies for kids because it was such a surprise. You can buy it by clicking The Little Vampire |
I can’t believe Harrison, my oldest boy, is going to Kindergarten in one week! If you read my last post you know there are a lot of changes going on. Shortly after Kindergarten starts, we are going to be moving to a brand new house, a brand new school district and a brand new Day Care. It’s a lot of changes for these two little guys to deal with. Luckily, our new school district is letting Harrison start even though he won’t be living in the school district for a few more weeks.
I spent part of today looking for tips on getting kids ready for school and I found this list of articles to be pretty helpful. Have any tips of your own? Please share them in the comment box below.
If you have been reading this blog for any length of time you may have read one of the posts about the years we spent fixing our credit, the months we spent slaving away fixing up our house and getting it ready for the market and then finally listing it for sale. It’s only been on the market for 2 months but all that work paid off. I am very happy to report that we have accepted an offer on our house and will close in time for Harrison to start Kindergarten in our new school district.
That was a big concern of ours. Harrison isn’t as sociable as his younger brother and we really didn’t want to have to start him in one school district and then pull him out and have him finish in another school. I know at that age it’s not a big deal but as parents, we didn’t want it. We wanted Harrison to start on even footing with the rest of the kids.
In this current housing marketing, we couldn’t be happier with how quickly our house sold. We live in a semi-detached house on a busy road. It’s a great starter home but still, being right on a major road, we had our work cut out for us which is why we put so much effort into getting it to look as good as it possibly can. Based on the feedback we received from the people who walked through the house, it definitely paid off.
What was even more special is when we got the news. We were on vacation with my wife’s family when our Realtor called. We were down in North Carolina at the Outer Banks. It was great, throughout the week people came and went but most of the immediate family was there. Her Mom, her sister, her sisters children, her cousins, her aunts and uncles, it was great. Some husbands would find that to be a nightmare but I love her family and get along quite well with them. My own parents didn’t get along with their in-laws and I always hated it. When I met my wife I told her pretty early on I wouldn’t get serious with anyone if I couldn’t get along with their family. Luckily for both of us, we both get along with each others family splendidly.
So, what does that have to do with us selling our house? Well, we are buying my Mother-In-Laws house and what is even more special is most of the houses in the area are the relatives we were on vacation with. Stephanie comes from a good farming family. They aren’t all farmers but some of them bought pieces of the farm property and built houses so they all live on beautiful pieces of property surrounded by loved ones and country landscape. We got to immediately celebrate the news with the person we were buying the house from and our new neighbors all at once. It was great and everyone was so excited.
I can’t wait to move on to this next chapter of our lives. Let’s just hope everything goes smoothly with settlement.
I have been running this site for nearly a year and for some strange reason it has taken me all this time to review one of my wife’s favorite items; The Learning Tower.
I used to be a regular attendee to Toy Fair in New York for the ecommerce company I work for. It’s an event for anyone in the toy industry (sellers, buyers, reporters, etc…) and my wife would typically take off for a few days and come with me. She would help me navigate the huge convention hall, take notes, and just act as my assistant. In the evening, I would take her out to a nice dinner and we would enjoy the city. It was always a great couple of days for both of us.
Toy Fair is massive and there are things hidden away in aisles where you wouldn’t typically expect to find them so we would hit every aisle and every booth to make sure we didn’t miss anything. That may not sound difficult but Toy Fair is HUGE!!! It takes up the entire Javits Center in Manhattan as well as several other buildings down town. The business I am in sells licensed and pop culture items so it’s actually a pretty small segment of the overall toy market but part of the fun was the challenge of hitting everything to make sure we didn’t miss anything.
The first time we went, my wife was pregnant with my oldest son, Harrison. We had a lot of fun going through the baby and little kids sections even though it had nothing to do with why we were there. We got to see stuff we might want for our son before a lot of it was released to the market. We also got to see stuff that was already on the market that companies were trying to push to new buyers. It’s a unique situation where you get to talk directly to the company and in the case of smaller companies, directly to the owner/creator.
One of the items that really interested us was the Learning Tower by Little Partners. The product had been around for a year or so before we ran into it at Toy Fair but our excitement was fresh as we had never seen it before. The Learning Tower is the perfect kitchen companion for anyone that likes to cook with their children. It’s not just for the kitchen but that seems to be it’s most popular application. It’s the ultimate step stool that brings your children up to counter height and keeps them there safely and securely.
Nothing at Toy Fair is for sale to the the general public, meaning, you can’t walk through, hand your card to someone and walk out with it. Buyers can put in orders for their companies but the products are shipped to the company/store they were bought for and not available to walk out with. I tell you this simply because if it was possible for us to leave with a Learning Tower that day, we would have.
My wife LOVES to cook and bake and always fantasized about cooking with our children. In addition to loving to cook, she is also a safety professional. Her job is to make sure the workers at the company she works at, work safely. The need to keep everyone safe is a big party of who she is and one of the things I love about her. The Learning Tower appealed to her need to keep her soon to be born child safe and her desire to have our little one active and in the kitchen helping Mom cook.
It’s so much more than a step stool, it’s an adjustable platform that safely brings your child up to counter height. It’s most popular application is in the kitchen but it can be used anywhere. It’s very well constructed and the platform can be adjusted so it continues to become useful as your child grows. It can hold over 200 lbs and has plenty of room for a second little one if you have more than one child. My 5 year old and 3 year old share it with no problems.
What makes this item even better is you can buy accessories that make it more functional. You can get a kit that turns it into a puppet theatre in minutes or a chalk board that hangs off the side for arts and crafts. It comes in 9 different finishes so there is sure to be a design that matches your decor.
At nearly $200, it’s not cheap but we believe it’s a great investment. We have had ours for 4 yeas now and it gets uses all the time. It’s very common for used Learning Towers to sell on ebay and Craigs List for $100 so it holds it’s value really well. When our boys outgrow our Learning Tower we plan on selling it on Craigs List to recoup part of the expense of buying it but even if we didn’t do that, we have have more than gotten our moneys worth with this item.
We recommend Heirloom Wooden Toys if you are looking to buy one. You can check it out on their Learning Tower Page.
The Learning Tower got some media attention a few years ago when it was featured on the Rachael Ray show. Check out the video below
It’s important to me that my children grow up to be tolerant and accepting of others. We have come a long way as a species but discrimination of all kids still runs rampant and will never go away. I firmly believe that acknowledging that it will never completely go away is the first step towards teaching your children to love, respect and tolerate the differences around them. There will always be people that pick on or dislike other types of people for irrational reasons. Whether it’s because they see a weakness they can exploit, a difference that makes them scared, a color that they aren’t used to or a way of life that seems weird to them, people are always going to discriminate, sometimes without even realizing they are doing it.
So, how do we teach our children to not be discriminatory if we believe that sometimes these reactions are normal? I think that is one of the reasons why I use the word “tolerant” because it seems like a reasonable goal. It’s natural for people to react to other people in certain ways based on their experiences in life. It’s natural for the small shy kid that used to get beat up by the giant guy down the street to be leary and want to avoid people that fit the profile of the giant guy that beat him up. It may not be rational, just because one giant guy liked to beat up little guys, doesn’t mean they all like to but that doesn’t make the fear any less. As a personal example, I am not small but I was the geeky awkward kid that got beat up and picked on and at the age of 34, I still get intimidated by people that remind of the bullies that used to pick on me in High School. I believe, the key is to teach our children to understand this basic concept so when they get past their initial fear or discomfort, they can approach and treat the other person as another human being. I am using a fairly generic example but the same concept can and does apply to sex, age, race, religion and cultural discrimination.
My kids are only 3 and 5 years old and I am delighted by the fact that they rarely notice differences in people. They have friends of many different races and of both sexes and have never once appeared to have cared that their friends skin was slightly different. I think discrimination is something we learn over time from our life experiences and from the people around us that influence our thoughts and guide us in life.
However, just because they have not yet reached an age where they have started noticing differences or acting/thinking about the differences they do notice, doesn’t mean we can’t start teaching our little ones about tolerance and respect for others.
Recently, I have turned to the animal kingdom to show my children two very simple lessons in creatures that couldn’t be any different yet they accepted and loved the other creature without question. Animals are amazing for many reasons but one of the things you rarely see outside of the human species is that they don’t act cruelly towards others. Sure, there is plenty of death in the animal kingdom but it’s for a purpose. The two videos below warm my heard and make my kids laugh. They show that differences don’t matter and instant connections are possible and wonderful things.
The Orangutan and the Hound
Dog and Elephant Friends
Fisher-Price is looking for the next great dirty diaper disposal system. Could you be the person to invent it? They want you to put yourself in your own shoes and envision the best diaper disposal system that you can think of. The main catch, they have to be able to make the product and sell it in Wal-Mart for $30 – $60.
The chosen design will get a minimum of $2500 upfront + a percentage of sales for 20 years or a buyout. That’s a pretty sweet deal if you are good at coming up with ideas. But act first, the deadline is Monday, August 1st at Midnight. You can check out all the details at Edison Nation.
