Then, COOK with them!! 

 I've recently come around to the idea that cooking can not only be fun, but educational.

Prior to this,  I hated cooking!!

Now, I know better!

After watching a few reality shows, such as Top Chief and Ramsey's Kitchen Nightmares, as well as The Next Food Network Star, I realized that cooking can be entertaining to watch.  I started watching a few of the food network shows, such as 30 Minute Meals with Rachael Ray and Emeril.  I found them both entertaining, but I didn't feel inclined to pick up a spatula any time in the near future.

Then, I stumbled across Alton Brown's Good Eats.  His blend of basic cooking facts and amusing cooking trivia/history really interested me.  I started watching all his shows and found myself wondering if I really could pickle my own beets...:) 

Next, I picked up a few cooking books, starting with Rachael Rays as I figured even I could devote 30 minutes to a meal. 

I watched Alton Brown cook with his nephew - children are more inclined to eat something that they helped fix themselves

I stumbled across Rachael Rays' Cooking with Kids.  When I broached the idea to my two older children, they were both excited by the idea.  Now, they're both Master Chief for one meal a week. 

My picky eater gets to pick something he is interested in cooking (and actually will eat).  My oldest is very adventurous - can you say sushi?

It's fun and does give you that one on one interaction with your children.  Eating is something we were going to do anyway!

I have to heartily recommend that anyone that plans on a trip in the Gulf South simply must make a trip to the New Orleans Museum of Art.

Currently, they have on display over 600 photographs of the Katrina disaster.  I attended yesterday with three of my four children. 

My two year old spent the time in the stroller telling me to "Go, Go".  :) Which was a little distracting.  Probably in the child under the age of five or six will be a little bored by the experience.

My eight year old son however was quite blown away, as was my tween-age daughter. 

The exhibit is remarkably powerful with photographs displayed from the floor to the ceiling.  Some are of artistically high caliber and some are just photographs, but the whole left me with an almost physical ache.

For me, as a New Orleanian, I know it had a VERY personal effect, but I cannot imagine anyone with an ounce of feeling walking away without an intense emotional experience.

The photographs range from such subjects as a body in the water to the mold covering a wall in the aftermath of the flood.

One family even sent in a plastic bag of ruined wedding photographs.  Some things simply cannot be replaced.

An added thought, if you are a Louisiana native, admittance to the New Orleans Museum of Art is currently free.

The museum is carrying a book with some 150 photographs from the exhibit in the gift shop so it may be worth your while to go to the noma.org online shop and purchase it.