We've covered quite a few stories here where a kid climbs into the driver's seat of someone's car and takes it out for a spin. Sometimes the kid is looking for chocolate. Sometimes it's an Applebee's fix. Other times, there is no destination in mind, just a joyride. Usually the ride - and the story - ends when the kid crashes the car into something. This ride ends that way, too. But unfortunately, this is probably just the beginning of the story for this kid.

Unlike the car-thieving kids mentioned above, the Longmont, Colorado boy who took his mother's van in the wee hours of the night isn't a toddler. He's a 12-year-old who police say was trying to prove to his 14-year-old friend that he could drive. Long story short, he can't drive and proved that by crashing the van into someone's garage.

He managed to back out of the smashed garage and flee the scene. He returned mom's van to her driveway and went back to his 14-year-old friend's house, where he was having a sleepover. Except somebody should have told him that you can't actually smash a car into someone's garage and think you can get away with it. Police easily tracked him down using the clues he left behind - a license plate at the scene of the crash and a broken windshield with bits of fence in it on mom's van.

Mom, being the registered owner of the van, got a visit from the police and she was none too happy. She immediately said she wanted to press charges and the kid was arrested that afternoon. He's now in the Boulder County Juvenile Detention Center facing a whole slew of possible charges: aggravated motor vehicle theft, driving without a valid license, leaving the scene of an accident and failing to notify police, and reckless driving.

Pressing criminal charges against your 12-year-old child may seem harsh, but I think this woman is probably doing the only thing she could do under the circumstances. A non-family member certainly would have pressed charges and the boy could have seriously hurt or even killed someone. I feel bad for this mother, but applaud her for exercising some tough love on a clearly out of control child. What would you have done?

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission has announced the recall of about 10,000 Taggies Strollin' Along Stroller Activity Bars due to a choking hazard. The importer has received three reports of the shiny material on the ear of the elephant detaching and children putting it in their mouths. Fortunately, no injuries have been reported.

Made in Hong Kong and imported by International Playthings Inc., of Parsippany, N.J., the activity bars were sold in specialty stores nationwide and online from February 2007 through July 2008 for about $23 each.

The recall involves multicolored, fabric and plastic stroller activity bars featuring a yellow giraffe, a purple hippo and a blue elephant attached to a 12" long elliptical base with straps that attach to a stroller. The Taggies and Earlyears® logo labels can be found sewn into the seam on the lower left front of the activity bar.

If you have one of these stroller bars, you should immediately stop using it and contact International Playthings for a free replacement toy. You can reach them by calling (800) 445-8347 or by visiting their Web site.

I've never liked the smell of incense and actually find it rather discomforting. When I was in high school, however, a lot of kids I knew liked burning it -- quite possibly as a means to cover up certain other odors they didn't want noticed by their parental units. It turns out, though, that they may have been better off taking their chances on getting caught.

According to a new study, burning incense is linked to a "statistically significant higher risk of cancers of the upper respiratory tract." In fact, those who burned incense continuously during the day were eighty percent more likely to develop cancer in the respiratory tract. These findings remained even after taking other factors into consideration, such as tobacco use, diet, and alcohol intake.

"This association is consistent with a large number of studies identifying carcinogens in incense smoke," the researchers note, "and given the widespread and sometimes involuntary exposure to smoke from burning incense, these findings carry significant public health implications." I would say that if you've got a teen who likes to burn incense, you might want to let them know about this study.

According to a recent report, infections may be the cause of many premature births. Studies showed the more serious the infection, the more likely the premature birth and the sicker the infant. Studies also reported finding bacteria or (yick!) fungi in 15% of the amniotic fluid of women who'd given birth prematurely. Premature children are known to have an increased risk of everything from problems breathing and underdeveloped organs to cerebal palsy.

Prevention, of course, is the key. Twelve percent of births in the United States occur before the 37th week of pregnancy. Just how many of these could be preventable? The team responsible for conducting the study of infected amniotic fluid now have their sights set on detecting the infection before preterm labor starts and treating it.

The researchers studied 166 samples of amniotic fluid from pregnant women during the period of 1998-2002. They detected 25 were infected with the bacteria, fungi, or...what might be a new organism (very X-Files). All 25 infected women went on to preterm labor. Fifty-three women in whom no bacteria, etc. was detected, were able to have their preterm labor stopped.

Pic by zakwitnij.

Is there a downside to breastfeeding? A new report from the New York Times might have you thinking so. In a recent article, several studies monitoring a lack of vitamin D in infants might support that breastmilk is not enough to prevent things like rickets in children. The biggest fear is that the deficiency is more common than previously thought and is going undetected. Breastmilk apparently does not necessarily provide enough of the vitamin to children.

Doctors, of course, are rare to say anything at all negative about breastfeeding. Unlike perhaps even fifty years ago, women are being told that they simply must breastfeed, that they are wrong for not doing so, and that breastmilk is the ultimate wonder food for their infants. This may well be true, but the medical profession that's been pushing breastfeeding down our throats has also admitted to knowing there is a probable link between vitamin D deficiency and diseases like diabetes and cancer.

The answer, of course, is not to stop breastfeeding, but rather to augment a child's nutrition by adding vitamin drops, or, my favorite, cod liver oil (yummy!). The other pretty obvious answer is that if a woman is deficient in something, so, too, will be her breastmilk. Mothers should be getting plenty of vitamin D themselves in order to pass on the right amount to their infants. That should be good news to those of us who are committed to breastfeeding exclusively for as long as possible. Both the American Academy of Pediatrics and my own pediatrician recommend supplementing with the vitamin D drops.

Thoughts? I for one drink enough milk while pregnant and nursing to keep a small dairy in business. Is it enough? Who knows. Did you supplement breastfeeding with vitamins for your infants or enjoy a little cod liver oil?

Pic by timtom.ch [surfin' USA].

Should he choose to, Jericho Scott could probably have a career as a professional baseball player. Only nine-years-old, the New Haven, Connecticut boy has a fastball pitch that has been clocked at 40 miles per hour. Unfortunately, it's that fastball that has gotten him banned from pitching for the co-ed Youth Baseball League of New Haven.

Scott's coach and parents say that he's being unfairly targeted and that league officials are picking on him because he turned down an invitation to join the league's champion team, which happens to be sponsored by a league administrator. League officials say Scott was banned due to safety concerns. Although everyone admits that Scott has never hit anyone with a pitch, league attorney Peter Noble says parents are afraid their kids will get hurt at bat. "He is a very skilled player, a very hard thrower," Noble said. "There are a lot of beginners. This is not a high-powered league. This is a developmental league whose main purpose is to promote the sport."

League officials have suggested that Scott play another position, pitch against older players or even play in a different league. But last week, Scott took the mound despite the ban. In response, the other team forfeited the game and walked off the field. This did not go over well with Scott's mom, who Noble says became irate and threatened league officials. "I have never seen behavior of a parent like the behavior Jericho's mother exhibited Wednesday night," Noble said.

The Scotts have gotten their own lawyer and are looking into their legal options. "You don't have to be learned in the law to know in your heart that it's wrong," attorney John Williams said. "Now you have to be punished because you excel at something?"

What is happening to Jericho Scott may seem unfair, but I don't know that I would characterize it as punishment for being too good. By that logic, forcing beginner players to face a 40-mile-per-hour fastball is punishing them for not being good enough. The suggestion to play with an older team seems like a good solution to this problem and I wonder why he doesn't take it.

It's a terrifying scenario, but given the ability, I think it would play out about the same for each of us. Wendy Nelson's ten-year-old daughter was playing at a local playground when a man tried to take her clothes off and abduct her. Mrs. Nelson was sitting on her steps while her daughter played with friends, but when she called for her daughter to come in, the girl came running home crying.

"She said, 'That man tried to take off my pants,'" Nelson said. The man also allegedly asked the girl to stay overnight at his house. Nelson went after the man and told him she was going to call the police; while she was walking away, the suspect attacked her with a knife, stabbing her twice in the neck. Nelson grabbed a piece of pipe and fought back. Her son, seventeen-year-old Brendon, came to help and was cut on the side of his head.

Mrs. Nelson managed to knock the man to the ground and, while her son took the man's knife, hit him twice in the head with the pipe. Police say the man will probably face charges after he gets out of the hospital. Nelson, too, may be charged, although that's not a consequence she worried about. "I don't really care because I did what I had to do," she said. I can definitely understand that and would have to say that if someone tried that with my daughter, chances are, they wouldn't get off so easily.

Every state in the U.S. now has what is called a "safe haven" law. Intended to prevent unwanted babies from being abandoned just any old place, the law allows desperate parents to leave their babies at hospitals with no questions asked.

Until recently, Nebraska was the only state without a safe haven law. But about a month ago, they passed their own version and added a unique twist. Unlike other states who are trying to protect newborn babies with the law, Nebraska wants to protect all unwanted children and therefore allows a minor of any age to be abandoned at a safe haven hospital. What's more, the law doesn't even specify that it must be a parent who abandons the child. Which means the babysitter, the neighbor or anyone else can surrender custody of a child.

Adam Pertman, a frequent critic of safe-haven laws is especially critical of this one. "Whether the kid is disabled or unruly or just being a hormonal teenager, the state is saying: 'Hey, we have a really easy option for you,'" he says.

So far, there has been no reports of children of any age being abandoned at Nebraska hospitals since the law went into effect.

It's the time of year when school nurses across the country are looking over student's immunization records to make sure they've had all the shots they need in order to attend class. But as we've discussed here many times before, not all students will be required to show proof of immunizations before being allowed in school. Every state in the U.S. allows students to skip the shots if their parents object for medical reasons and most states allow an exemption for religious reasons. And with the growing fears that autism and other disorders might be tied to immunizations, more parents are claiming those exemptions.

Skipping the shots may give some parents peace of mind, but it is also being blamed for the increase in measles cases. The first half of 2008 saw 131 cases of the highly contagious disease, compared to just 42 in the entirety of 2007. According to the Centers for Disease Control, 112 of this year's cases were in people who were either unvaccinated or had unknown vaccination status.

"At the national level, I am concerned about our situation," said Dr. Anne Schuchat, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases. "Every year, the U.S. experiences importation of measles. What is different this year is once it is imported, we are seeing it spread to more people, and most of that spread is to people under 20."

Dr. Neal Halsey, director of the Institute for Vaccine Safety at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, says that many parents who don't immunize mistakenly believe that the risk of contracting measles is very low. "That is, unfortunately, a false belief," he says. "It is important we maintain high disease vaccination. Getting vaccinated is the safest thing we can do for children."

Word on the street is that smoking in movies is causing teens to be more likely to light up themselves. In a report issued Thursday by the National Cancer Institute ads for smoking and depictions of smoking in film make teens more likely to smoke. The report also countered the tobacco industry's claims that the $13 billion (yes, billion, when we have people starving to death on the streets and can't pay our mortgages) spent on promotion was to increase brand loyalty. Rather, according to the report, the only thing it increased was someone's chances of smoking--especially if that person was a teenager.

The report considered over 1,000 studies of how media impacts use of tobacco. It also noted that three fourths of recent hit films contained smoking, and that particular brands were easily identified in a third of the films. Perhaps as a preemptive strike six of the major movie studios recently claimed they would add anti-smoking ads to the DVD versions of their films. This of course has little bearing on the teen who sees the film in the theater, where there will be no such warning (only that smoking is not allowed in theaters).

According to Dr. Janet Collins, who runs the chronic disease prevention and health promotion at the U.S. Center for Disease Control, smoking, tobacco use, the promotion of both, etc. is "an assault on the nation's health." The report, whose findings she supports, was issued in a timely fashion: the Senate vote to give the FDA control over tobacco regulation.

If you have a box of Pepperoni Hot Pockets in your freezer, you might want to pull it out and have a look at the box. Some packages of the frozen pizza snacks may contain 'foreign objects', which are most certainly not edible and potentially dangerous.

Nestle Prepared Foods Company has received complaints from four consumers who found hard red plastic pieces as well as some clear flexible rubber stuff in their Hot Pockets Pepperoni Pizzas. Roz O'Hearn, a spokesperson for Nestle, says they suspect these pieces might have splintered off from a testing device and become buried inside the product. Some of the pieces may have sharp edges and pose a risk of serious injury should you end up with one in your mouth.

In response, Nestle is recalling about 215,660 pounds of Hot Pockets Pepperoni Pizzas packaged in the 54-ounce, 12-pack cartons. Printed on the side of each carton is "8157544614D," "EST 7721A," and "BEST BEFORE JAN2010." These were produced on June 5 and distributed to retail establishments nationwide.

For more information, call Nestle at 800-350-5016.

Our friends over at MomLogic have broached a subject that many of us will soon be dealing with: getting the kids off the summer schedule and back on the school schedule. I don't know about you, but we have gotten so far off schedule this summer that I can't even remember what a schedule is.

But the thing I love most about summer - after the swimming and sunning - is the sleeping late. And if I want to do it, the kid's gotta do it, too. So we tend to stay up later during the summer months and getting back into the swing of things in the fall is a challenge. But with a little forethought and planning, it shouldn't be too painful.

As with just about everything else in life, talking things out can help ease a transition. Explain to your child that in order to be healthy and ready to learn, a good night's sleep is necessary. And if you have to get up earlier, then you have to go to bed earlier, too. This transition takes a little time, so don't wait until the night before the first day of school to implement the change. A week or so of 'early to bed, early to rise' before the big day should help things go smoother.

For some of us, it is still light out when it is bedtime. This is when blackout shades or curtains are worth every penny you pay for them. But don't leave them closed. After your child has fallen asleep, sneak back in and open them up. When the sun comes up, the light should help rouse them.

Once you've got everyone back on track, try not to slip off schedule on the weekends. This just makes Monday morning even harder for everyone. Lastly - and this is the hardest part for me - try getting yourself to bed earlier, too. Cranky parents make for cranky kids and nobody wants to start the day off that way.

My kid takes showers. He is sixteen months old. I took showers as a kid, but spent most of my time in the bath, surrounded by various toys and lots of suds. When our children are first born we barely bathe them, then move them into the little plastic tubs, then eventually into the tub for big kids. I don't even know when the technical transition from bath to shower begins.

I got the idea to put my child in the shower from a friend who always took her three girls into the shower with her (not all at once). The concept was that mom was in the shower and wet already anyway. Showers also use a lot less water than baths, and they're faster. Baths are tough in our apartment as the bathroom is small and the bathtub is awkwardly placed.

So, my husband and I tried taking our son, who was able to stand very comfortably on his own, into the shower a few times with decent results. Over time he became less intimidated by the water and now enjoys splashing around in it. He still plays with his toys and we all get clean relatively quickly. Still, I wonder if there's any reason to go back to baths, or to only do baths. There will come a point when our son is too old to be in the shower with us, for obvious reasons. There will also need to be a time when he lathers himself up instead of having a parent do it. I'm not wild about leaving him alone in the bath or the shower, and I wonder if either is really "safer."

Do you do showers or baths for your kids? At what age did you settle on a routine?

Pic by Don Nunn.

Fart-lighting has probably been around since early man discovered fire. After all, what could be more entertaining than combining something smelly and gross with something flaming and hot? Whether that first fart ignition was deliberate or unintentional, fart-lighting for fun has stood the test of time and for some kids, become a competitive sport.

But it is a dangerous game and should not be played, as a 12-year-old boy in the UK found out. He may have won the fart-lighting competition with his cousin, but he paid a heavy price for victory. He not only managed to light his toot, but a nearby can of gas as well. The gas ignited in a flash and the boy was burned on the backs of his legs and thumb.

By the time firefighters arrived, the fire had burned itself out, but the kid was hospitalized with burns over 18 percent of his body. Fire commander Paul Harpin says this is the first time he's been on a call for a fart-lighting incident and warns others against trying it themselves. "I think he must have won the competition but he will have some nasty burns now. It is a warning not to mess around with fire," he added.

The town of Yuma, Arizona sits very near the border of Mexico in the southwest part of the state. It sits so close, in fact, that a wrong turn may lead you right out of the country. As will boarding the wrong school bus, which is exactly what a 6-year-old boy did last week.

The boy was supposed to be on his way home from school, but accidentally got on the wrong bus. He got off the bus at an unfamiliar stop and wandered into San Luis Rio Colorado, Mexico. His mother said he was disoriented and thought he might walk to his grandfather's house, which is in Mexico. The boy was rescued by a passerby, who returned him safely to his home.

Officials at Gadsden Elementary School District are looking into the situation and promise to correct any failures they find the school transportation system. I think a small boy being allowed on the wrong bus and ending up in another country where he is picked up by a total stranger pretty much qualifies as a failure of the system.