And your kids are stuck inside.

When spring showers have children bouncing off the walls, cooped up inside, it’s time to get creative.  Listed below are some fun arts and crafts projects to keep them busy and having fun until the sun shines again.

• Beautiful paper insects and flowers will be the talk of the neighborhood when your kids create a butterfly hanging garden
• Build an edible bridge and make it a contest to see whose bridge will stay up the longest or just have fun tearing it down and eating it
• Have your kids draw crazy body parts on index cards and mix them up for the silly creature creator
• Let the sun reflect in the window with a handmade crayon sun-catcher
• If all else fails, pull the cushions off the couch and have an indoor camp-out under a homemade tent

Have your own fail-proof suggestions for indoor imaginations? Share in the comments!

Interested in getting your kids involved in something that benefits themselves and the community? Volunteering is the perfect way to do both.

Listed below are a couple of creative ideas to for your kids to lend a helping hand.

• Bedtime Snack Sacks: Decorate lunch bags and fill them with snacks and a toy for children living in homeless shelters
• Cleanup Coalition: Have your kids gather their friends monthly to help beautify the community by picking up trash, planting flowers, etc. Contact your local parks and recreation office and they can help find projects.
• Charity Birthday Party: Have guests bring old or new toys to be donated to a charity instead of given to the birthday boy or girl

If you’d like more volunteering options, check out www.volunteermatch.com or www.volunteer.gov.

This weekend, we’re heading to Los Angeles to mingle with the hippest moms at the premiere baby chic event, Baby & Tween Celebration. Held at the Los Angeles Convention Center (get directions here), the show will run Saturday (10 am - 6 pm) through Sunday (11 am – 5 pm).

L.A. parents: You’re invited to come by and check us out! You’ll see the new olli special-edition Paul Frank designs and get a sneak peek of our new full back booster oobr (coming to stores this summer). You’ll also have the chance to enter our olli giveaway and take a backless booster home with you!

For full details on the event, click here or follow the Baby & Tween Celebration on Twitter! Hope to see you there!

It’s never too early to teach your kids the importance of protecting the environment. You probably cover the basics like telling them to turn the water off while brushing their teeth, to pick up trash they see on the ground, and to put juice containers and milk jugs in the recycling bin. 

With Earth Day fast approaching, we wanted to share some neat activities you can do with your kids to start a dialogue about why they should protect the environment and what they can do. Plus, they’re tons of fun!
This Earth Day, turn off the TV and take some time to: 

• Make recycled paper to conserve our trees
• Create a family garden, or visit your local farmers market
• Reuse old cans to make a new pencil holder for the house or a gift for a teacher

Have your own crafty tips to reduce, reuse or recycle? Do share!

This month, we’re taking you to the east coast, where Sheri Gurock and husband Eli, founders of Magic Beans, carry clek products in their three greater Boston retail locations: Brookline, Hingham, and Wellesley, Mass. 

Peddlers of toys, gear and modern nursery furniture, the couple offers a selection of products that reflects both on their own experiences as parents, as well as those of the parents they interact with. The end goal is to help customers understand their best options—and in the process, Sheri has become an expert on child gear, serving as a go-to source for anyone in need of smart safety advice. She also runs the blog, Spilling the Beans. 

During our recent stop in Boston, we sat down with Sheri to get the scoop on all things “cool” in Boston: 

clek: Magic Beans was founded in 2004. What inspired you to launch the stores, Web site and blog?

Sheri: I was inspired to open Magic Beans mostly because I love to shop, and I wanted to create the kind of shopping experience for parents (and kids) that I could not find when I had my first child. That’s why we do things a little differently. Not sure which stroller to buy? Take it out for a walk. Even borrow it for a day or two. Not sure if that booster seat will fit in your car? Let’s take it out to the parking lot and check. Need a place to come and play with your toddler on a rainy day? We’ve got a Playscape in each store that’s all yours - and you can sit there for hours and no one will ever pressure you to buy anything.

clek: Speaking of booster seats, what is it that makes clek olli a standout?

Sheri: There are so many things I love about olli, it is hard to choose just one. But the thing I can say that most encompasses it is the ease of use. Everything about it is easy. It is easy to put into the car and easy to remove. It requires no adjustments, and both my 5 and 7 year olds can buckle themselves in easily, with no parental assistance - especially nice in my minivan, where my clek olli is in the third row. 

clek: Ease of use is definitely an important factor in all clek products. What other child gear trends are you finding grab parent’s attention today?

Sheri: Hot trends right now are customization—adapting your gear to reflect your lifestyle and your personality. clek is right on top of that trend, with lots of colors to choose from. Parents like to have a stroller in their favorite color, but kids LOVE it. It’s especially important to have buy-in from kids with booster seats - it’s the reason why a 7 or 8 year old is still willing to sit in a car seat!