Online - June 14, 2007

Campy Behavior

Kids’ Summer Survival Guide

Between camp, beach trips, and long weekends away, your kids’ summers are about to get as packed as their suitcases. These sanity savers — along with a honkin’ bottle of SPF — ought to make their journeys easier.

Keep the little buggers occupied on the drive there and back with the new Happy Camper Play Scene from Mudpuppy Press. The 50-plus reusable stickers will have them anticipating their destination all the way there.

Want to rekindle their connection to the earth before they arrive? Course you do. So put a copy of Whole World in their lap. The gorgeously colored new book (complete with CD) spotlights our planet’s wonders and gives tips on keeping it healthy in an easy-to-enjoy format. (Plus, a portion of sales benefit global conservation, and the book is printed on forest-friendly paper.)

Once they get there, they’ll need a way to tote their tricks. Our pick? The new ocean stripe Dash bag by Skip Hop. When they’re done, you can use it as a diaper bag.

Want to keep outdoors-ravaged hair at bay? Those rats’ nests will never happen if you pop in one or two super-secure, cuter-than-cute, hand-stitched felt hair clips. Wash both girls’ and boys’ locks with the new all-natural Lice-Free Zone Shampoo from Circle of Friends — the classic camp epidemic won’t stand a chance.

Because that was so not the kind of communing with nature you were after.