We allow my four year old daughter on the internet.  Yes, we are right there and monitor what she is doing.  She is only playing games on Noggin or Disney Playhouse.  However, I do worry about when she gets a bit older  Did you know that:

• 41% of unwanted sexual solicitations, 29% of unwanted exposure to sexual materials, and 31% of harassment occurred when children were online with their friends. (I can believe this due to the IMs I get.  I have it listed in my profile that I married, and I still get IMs from men wants who knows what).
• Law enforcement officials estimate that more than 50,000 sexual predators are online at any given moment.
• 1 in 5 youth ages 10 to 17 received a sexual solicitation or were approached online.

These are just a few of the scary statistics out there.  I like to think that I am always going to know what my kids are doing online.  However, I know that isn’t always going to possible.  That is where GuardChild comes in.  It does exactly what you think it does.  Its all about protection, education, and community.  You are able to protect your family by blocking pornography, stopping online predators, and monitoring instant messages, blogs, chat rooms (AOL, MSN, and Yahoo) email, and even what your child is doing on MySpace.   You also are able to join the members community which will give you hundreds of articles, parent resources, educational sites, and family-friendly entertainment sites.  Lastly, there is community. Guard Child has a blog that allows you to share concerns and successes, learn from online safety experts, and contribute articles, advice, and questions.

The saying that it takes a village to raise a child is still true. Things have changed so much since I was little. I can only imagine what it will be like in a few years when Madison will be trying to hide what she is doing online from me. However, I do believe in being proactive and software like this is exactly what you need.

The Discovery Channel is awesome.  I have another show on there you have to watch.  It’s called When We Left Earth, and it is all about the space program.  You get to watch the real footage from when man first went into space, and when he went to the moon.  I know the next show is going to show the Challenger mission.  The reason I find this so interesting is that I wasn’t even born in the time frame of the first two shows.  It is one thing to read the history in a book; it is another to actually see it unfold in front of you.  You can feel the tention in the room while you are waiting to see if they actually make it into space.  They even interview the people involved now to tell you what they thought back then.  The technology they had back then (there was no such thing as dell memory chips) is just mindblowing. It is hard that they made it into space with what they had.  I accidentally caught this one night, and I am glad I did.

I happened to catch Ocean’s Thirteen the other night on HBO and ended up staying up half the night.  I am a huge fan of the Ocean Trilogy, and this movie does not disappoint at all.  Basically, the boys shut down the venture of a backstabbing hotelier (Al Pacino) because the guy double-crossed the Reuben (Elliott Gould).  By the boys, I mean George Clooney, Brad Pitt, and Matt Damon, Elliott Gould, Don Cheadle, Shabao Qin, Casey Affleck, Scott Caan, Bernie Mac, and Carl Reiner.  Without giving too much away, I want to say that Ocean’s Thirteen is more like Ocean’s Eleven.  It has the fast pace needed to keep your attention yet you know the guys won’t be looking for jobs in San Francisco. They should be set for a while again.

Have you ever heard of The Space Turtle before?  If you love reading short stories, this is the site your should check out.  I cannot believe how witty and interesting these stories are since they are so short.  However, they suck you in and you’ll find yourself on this blog an hour later still reading.  This is one of the best examples of creative writing I have seen.  The theme for this site is very plain.  However, you don’t want the distraction of a loud template.  It would take away from the focus of the blog:  the stories.  If you have several hours and want to read some really good writing, make sure you check out The Space Turtle.

You wouldn’t think it would be very difficult to be able to find Workbenches or design tables for homes. However, it is. Since Bill often brings prints home to work on, it is hard to find a big enough table for him to work on. A table that you can change the angle would make his life even better. Formaspace has exactly what we need at a decent price. It also is super easy to get a catalog. It is one of the first things you see on their site. You are also able to design your own bench. If you are in the market for this, I would definitely check out Formaspace!