How to Explain the History of Fourth of July to Kids

It’s a great occasion to grill on the BBQ, watch a parade, and enjoy fireworks. But beyond the fun with friends and family, have you ever wondered about the 4th of July, its meaning and historical roots?

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Le Top Darling of the Day: Reed

This beauty, Reed (2 1/2-years-old), comes to us all the way from a rainy day in The Big Apple. We are told by those “in the know” that she is one of the most stylish girlies in NYC – look out Suri! We can’t wait to see much more of her in the future. Congratulations to Reed on being our Le Top Darling of the Day!

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Tie-Dye Party for Kids – Great Summer Activity

Summer is here – kids are decked out in shorts, flip flops, suntans and are in need of summer fun activities that are great for at home or in the backyard. One great activity is tie-dyeing a t-shirt! It’s no wonder this 70s hippie fashion phenomenon has survived decades…it’s bright, buckets of fun and a great excuse to get your kids and their friends excited for a mini daytime party! Tie-dyeing is both a fun family activity and the perfect way to spruce up plain clothing without breaking the bank.

Even adults will appreciate that moment of anticipation just before the unraveling of rubber bands reveals their own vibrant creations.

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Le Top Takes: Out of the Mouths of Babes!

No, I did not say that!

Patrick, why don’t you want a wife?

Because they’re too bossy!”

– Patrick, age 5

Editor’s Note:
Please spread the giggles by sharing your funny quotes with us!

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4th of July Pudding Cups – Easy for Kids to Eat On-the-Go!

We will all be travelling in cars this weekend to various friends and families’ houses to celebrate Uncle Sam’s Birthday a.k.a. Fourth of July! These pudding cups are super easy to make, great to travel with and easy for kid to run and have fun with these in hand with their friends.  They are very patriotic and delicious!

INGREDIENTS:

• 3/4 cup each red, white, and blue melting wafers
• 1 pound cake (12 oz.)
• 1 cup sliced strawberries
• 1 cup blueberries
• 1/2 cup strawberry preserves
• 1 1/2 cups prepared vanilla pudding
• Whipped cream
• Red, white, and blue sprinkles

DIRECTIONS:

1. Place 12 foil cupcake liners on a baking sheet. Microwave red wafers in a bowl for 30-second intervals,
   stirring in between, until melted (about 2 minutes). Repeat with the white and blue wafers.
2. To make a solid-colored cup: Using a 10 pastry brush, spread one color of melted wafers across bottom
   of foil cup, then brush the color up the cup’s sides. For a striped cup: Brush stripes of alternating colors across bottom of cup, continuing up the sides.
3. Return finished cups to baking sheet and refrigerate until just set, about 3 minutes. Apply a second
   coat of melted wafers to each cup, matching its original color pattern, and return to refrigerator to set, 10 minutes.
4. Cut pound cake crosswise into 12 1″-thick slices. With a cookie cutter, cut a 2 1/2″ round from each slice. In medium bowl, combine strawberries, blueberries, and preserves.
5. To assemble, carefully peel foil from chilled cups. Gently place 1 cake circle into bottom of each cup. Top each circle with 2 Tbs. pudding; divide fruit mix among cups. Decorate with dollops of whipped cream, and top with colored sprinkles.

recipe from www.parents.com

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Casting Call Reminder

REMINDER! If you envision your child as a Le Top or Rabbitmoon model and live in the San Francisco Bay Area (California), then this is a second announcement that the deadline for submitting your child’s photo and information to our team is next Thursday, July 7th – just around the corner! Please email all information to acoutis@letop-usa.com. Casting (go-see) for our upcoming photo shoot is Friday, July 8th from 9am-12pm. See below for the complete details. We look forward to seeing your kiddos’ faces!

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Tips for Healthy Cooking for a Delicious 4th of July

I just returned from a wedding in Puerto Rico where much of the food was local fried plantains and sauce driven food – it made me think that we have our annual clambake this weekend in the Hamptons, and since that involves lobster and butter and hot dogs, I was trying to think of what other ways we could incorporate healthy cooking into our 4th of July family weekend.

Cooking healthy food for the 4th of July basically translates into reducing the sodium and sugar content, as well as the grams of saturated and trans-fats in your holiday meal. It also means adding vitamins and minerals by serving vegetable and fruit based dishes. Keep your traditional Independence Day recipes by making small changes to the portion size too!

Meat on the Grill
Place chicken and fish on the grill for healthier fare. The healthiest fish include salmon and trout because they contain omega-3 fatty acids which are good for your heart. Choose skinless chicken breasts instead of dark meat. Replace hamburgers with turkey burgers or vegetarian burgers.

Our "Ship Ahoy!" Nautical Sunsuit Top & Check Panty would be a perfect outfit for your little girl on 4th of July

Replacing Chips and Soda
Replace the chips and soda in your Fourth of July meal with healthier options. Instead of store bought potato chips grill steak-cut French fries brushed with olive oil to use with dips, alongside fresh cut vegetables such as carrot and celery sticks. Instead of soda, serve fresh brewed lightly sweetened iced tea with fresh lemon. Take out your blender and mix up fresh fruit smoothies with strawberry’s, peaches and other summer fruits.

Dessert
I am always a fan of “homemade’ baked goods and everything organic from scractch! Bake your own all-natural desserts this Independence Day instead of purchasing commercial baked goods. Use whole grain flour to add fiber and vitamins. Bake with egg substitutes to reduce the cholesterol content. Banana bread, carrot cake, fruit cobblers and oatmeal raisin cookies represent desserts on the healthier side. Instead of ice cream serve sorbet and low-fat frozen yogurt. Throw some fruit kabobs on the grill made with pineapple and plums.

Reduce and it Still Tastes Good
To make healthy adjustments to your favorite recipes, start by simply reducing the portion size. Cut a pie into eight slices instead of six and make smaller hamburgers. Remove the salt from recipes or reduce the amount by half — except in baked goods. For pasta salad and dip recipes that call for mayonnaise and sour cream, use low-fat versions or substitute low-fat yogurt for half the amount called for to preserve the taste of the full-fat version.

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What is humidity and a Learning Project for kids!

Here in New York it is SO HUMID – I tried to explain this to my niece and was having trouble. I know that New York City isn’t the only place it gets humid. I used to live in San Diego and it would be humid there or even in parts of the mid-west. Here is a mini explanation to tell your little one.

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Portable Pools Unsafe – New Study by the Journal of Pediatrics

Who here grew up playing in a portable pool at Grandma’s house? Raise a hand? I did! I personally grew up with a pool in my backyard, but remember as a child going to play at friends’ houses or Grandma’s house where there would be a portable pool to make the warm weather heat of summer a little bit more bearable. I live in New York now and even my nieces play in a portable pool on a city roofdeck because pools are scarce in the city…what was really shocking to find out this week was a new study that suggests portable or inflatable swimming pools are a greater danger to children than many parents likely realize, leading to one death every five days in the United States during warm months. The study, published in the journal Pediatrics, provides harrowing descriptions of 209 backyard drownings and 35 near-drownings that have occurred in portable pools from 2001 to 2009. Scarily, I found out this study is the first U.S. research to probe the role portable pools have played in deaths or near-drownings.

Researchers restricted their study to include wading pools less than 45 centimeters deep to inflatable and soft-sided pools measuring about one meter deep.

The study, published Monday, June 20, 2011 in the journal Pediatrics, found that 209 children died in these pools between 2001 and 2009. In addition, there were 35 near-drownings reported during the same time period. The researchers reported on accidents that occurred in water depths ranging from two inches to four feet. One accident involved a parent who fell asleep in a wading pool while holding a child. Other accidents occurred during lapses in pool supervision when a parent left to answer the phone or was distracted by yard work. Two 9-year-old girls drowned in an inflatable pool after becoming entangled in a pool cover. In another case, 3-year-old twins died after leaving their home undetected and jumping into a neighbor’s unsecured four-foot-deep portable pool.

According to the study, 94 per cent of children were under age five and 56 per cent of the victims were boys. The children were also more likely to be in their own yard when the incident happened, with 73 per cent of incidents taking place there.

In this Aug. 7, 2007 file photo, Todd Fuentes, 4, left, plays with Adrian Girald, 7, second from right, and Anthony Zollinger, second from left, as his father Eugene Fuentes, right, looks on in a portable pool in Brooklyn, New York. (AP Photo/Frank Franklin II)

“The anecdotal evidence was suggesting that because portable pools are readily available in many convenience stores and malls, and they’re relatively cheap, parents would pick them up, take them home, quickly assemble them, and all this would be done without a lot of forethought about the safety aspects,” said senior author, Dr. Gary A. Smith, director of the Center for Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus.

Why is there a trend in buying portable pools?
Portable pools have become a popular and affordable alternative to expensive in-ground pools or stationary above-ground pools. Unlike the fragile, inflatable pools of the past, portable pools today are sturdy and large, including some that can be filled with as much as water as a small in-ground pool. Large wading pools typically cost $100 or less, whereas very large portable pools can cost $1,000 or less. By comparison, in-ground pools can cost $30,000 or more.

The downside of portable pools?
The downside of portable pools is that they often lack the security fences and gates that most local zoning authorities typically require to surround in-ground and above-ground pools. Among the portable pool drownings that were reviewed by the Pediatrics study, at least 47 could have been prevented if the pool had been surrounded by fencing.

The researchers acknowledge that no single strategy can completely prevent a death or near drowning, and so advocate a multi-pronged approach. On the one hand, manufacturers should develop affordable safety devices for portable pools, including fencing, alarms and safety covers, which are common for in-ground pools. They also say better consumer-education programs are needed to make parents aware of the pools’ risks.

According to the study, children were under adult supervision in only 43 per cent of the cases.

In-ground pools must have fencing on all four sides, while portable pools can be put anywhere on a property, she said. In my opinion, many consumers assume such pools are safer because of their smaller size and that there is only a couple of inches of water, so it’s not that big of a worry. Portable pools can be extremely dangers and should be treated the same way parents see larger built-in backyard pools with the same importance of adult supervision.

“The thing about drowning is that it’s simply different than most other types of injuries, because if you fall from playground equipment, you usually get another chance,” he said. “With drowning, it’s quick, it’s silent and it’s final. That’s why it’s so important to prevent these events from occurring in the first place,” say Dr. Smith.

Note: Researchers obtained data for this study from the four U.S Consumer Product Safety Commission data banks: the Death Certificate file, the Injury/Potential Injury Incident file, the In-Depth Investigation file, and the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System.

Bottom line mommies and daddies? If you are going to use a portable or inflatable pool – you must be vigilant the entire time, never leave your child unattended and treat it as if it were an actual pool in your backyard. What’s an alternative? I loved sprinklers in the grass as a kid – shockingly they are really fun and kids always find a way to make a game or two of it in the summer heat!

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Le Top Darling of the Day: Tess

This gorgeous little buttercup, Tess (almost 9- months old), has been called “the happiest baby in the world”. Her favorite past-time is waving at everyone and saying “hi!” I’m sure she gets tons of smiles and waves in return.

She is the first grandchild and great-grandchild on both sides of her family. Wow! Her Grandmother loves to send her Le Top clothing including this one from a past spring  “Strawberry Fields” collection. Thank you grandma!

We are pleased to crown Tess the Le Top Darling of the Day!

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