Tuesday, November 3, 2009

Critics corner

I realized that my recent posts have been rather complainy, so I thought I should mix things up a bit. I decided to do this despite the urge to pontificate on 3.5 year old tantrums and the one I just experienced 5 minutes ago which leaves me totally dumbfounded and worn out, but I think I'll pass this time on being complainy and pessimistic and grumpy. Just this once.

We have spent SO much time at home the last 5 weeks. So much of this time has been spent in front of the TV. Watching Nick Jr., formerly Noggin b/c according to her, PBS is so for little kids. We have seen every episode of every cartoon, multiple times. I thought I would do a little "critics corner" of the children's programming.

Wow Wow Wubbzy--our favorite by far. Lana totally loves Wubbzy--thinks he is cool. She loves Widget, Walden and Daisy and all of their attributes. Lana will even quote it in her real life. "That wasn't supposed to happen" or "grapetty grape juice" or "kickity kick ball" are lines I hear often. She is glued to it as I type. I think it teaches some good lessons overall.

Olivia--I love the theme music, so catchy and peppy. Olivia reminds me so much of Lana. Precocious, creative, bossy. Plus, I love the way the pigs walk--so refined!

Yo Gabba Gabba--I'll admit, when I first saw this show, I thought you know the people who make this show are on drugs. This is like the Telletubbies for older kids. But then it started to grow on me. I like the music and the lessons put into songs--like "too much candy's gonna make you sick" or "don't bite your friends" or "there's a party in my tummy, so yummy, so yummy". DJ Lance is pretty weird and the characters are bizarre, but I am definitely starting to love Yo Gabba Gabba.

Wonder Pets--Ugh, I hate this show--its so annoying. I don't care about the team work crap, the whole talking like its an opera and the speech issue on Ming Ming just irritates me.

Dora--I like Dora fine, but is it me or is everyone yelling their lines in this show?

The Upside Down Show--I like this show for the creativity and imagination. I just wish it wasn't on at bedtime--its too manic for bedtime. Those dudes are seriously nuts. Seriously.

Ni Hao Kai Lan--we love this for obvious reasons. Lana knows a bit of Chinese and its reinforced in this program. She can relate to Kai Lan. I love it that someone is always having a tantrum or a bad attitude and yet the rest of them are trying to problem solve.

I am so glad Halloween is finally over so that we can get some new episodes to watch. I know I am rotting Lana's brain by watching so much TV, but with the new baby and our self-imposed house arrest and then the illness, we have been parked in front of the TV for a month. I wish it was summer still! I miss summer.

5 comments:

Joanna said...

LOL! Perfect timing on this post since I've been home with Michael for the past two weeks. I think I may have threatened to make soup out of Ming Ming the other day. Andy and I do some serious distracting to get Wonder Pets off the TV.

Wubzy, on the other hand, rocks. I love that little dude.

I'm still not sure about DJ Lance. That dude is just messed up.

LauraC said...

Hey not sure if you have Netflix, but it is SO WORTH IT to have access to all the kids dvds. Right now the boys love the They Might Be Giants dvds. It's nice bc the dvds are generally 60-90 min instead of the 20 minutes on Noggin.

The other thing I wonder is whether you can let up on the house arrest a little? I was about to go POSTAL being stuck inside with two crying babies all day, nothing made me more depressed. It was heat of summer, like 95 every day and taking them out for a walk was not an option. Anyway we spent some time nearly EVERY DAY at Target. I pushed the boys around and when one got cranky, I would take them out and cuddle them.

Bonus is the snack shop there has all kinds of chips and snacks for $1, and then you can let Lana play in the toy aisle all while Lacey is strapped into stroller away from germy people. Even the Christmas aisle keeps my kids entertained for an hour!

And when the boys were crazy toddlers, I had a whole routine of hitting Target then pet store bc the boys loved seeing the animals so much. And free! And relatively germ-free compared to children's museum or library.

DesiDVM said...

haha you are seriously reading my mind sometimes. J is at daycare today (yay Wednesday!) and I caught myself flipping through channels and watching half an episode of Yo Gabba Gabba BY MYSELF.

Also I second the Dora/Diego thing. J LOOOOOOOVES those shows but they are ALWAYS! YELLING! THE! QUESTIONS! At least Diego teaches them about wildlife conservation, kind of.

Maria said...

Julie- as to your comment on the smoking thing, we have drilled it into them so much that Allie actually said to someone who was smoking outside of a store, "you're going to die soon!". If I was the person, I think I would have put it out. I didn't turn around to see...

jessikahsd said...

Ok, so I have to admit I have never seen these shows but your review reminded me of a celeb gossip story I saw the other day (yes, I am still addicted to gossip sites all these years later) about how Brad Pitt dressed up as DJ Lance from Yo Gabba Gabba for Halloween and then got invited to be on the show, so maybe you'll get a celeb cameo on there one of these days - you can check out the "article" here: http://www.usmagazine.com/celebritynews/news/brad-costume-2009311