January 8, 201510 yr This is great conversation. One of areas that popped into my mind was Pierces Park on the pier at Baltimores inner harbor. It's a great play area with out looking like a play set. We stumbled across it last year. I am not sure about the smaller spots discussed up stream, but the lawn at the science center would be perfect for this. My kids had a blast there. Check out the link. I'll try to post pictures once I get on my laptop. http://inhabitat.com/pierces-park-combines-art-play-and-stormwater-management-into-a-stunning-urban-oasis-in-baltimore/
January 8, 201510 yr I love this type of design from Kalahari (Norwalk) for at least one element (of course, this is for an indoor playground so probably won't work.... I believe the playground picture you posted is in Canada. http://www.orcacoastplay.com/project-gallery/joeys-world-bowmanville/
January 8, 201510 yr Or it's just the same design playground. Kalihari has something very similar if that is not it.... Looking at it again, Kalihari's might actually be a bit taller.
March 13, 201510 yr Has anyone on here used an in home daycare?? Either your home or where you dropped the child off at someone elses?? We are in full research mode and cannot find anything. Also, eastsiders what daycares have you used? Recommendations? Now that we have actually bought the house in Shaker we came to the realization that we need to solve all of these other problems. Daycare being a big one.
March 13, 201510 yr Yes. I went through the county and contacted people off their recommended list as I didn't want someone who wasn't authorized. Partly because I wanted to use a dependent care reimbursement account, which you can't use for some fly by night company that's not certified, but moreso because many home daycares that operate under the table are run by moms who want to stay home and take care of their own kids and take on some others so they can have some income. This was a problem for me, first of all because they ALL Seemed to have big dogs and my baby was scared of dogs and I didn't want him around some dog all day, and secondly, if there is a fire or other emergency, whose kid do you think they're going to save first? So yeah, I went through the county. I wish I could give you my person's name but she is west side. She was lovely and served healthy food and I had to search long and hard to find her.
March 13, 201510 yr Several years ago, when our first was born, we went through sittercity.com. We had a great experience with it. I think we paid her $200/week for watching her from 7:30 to 5. She was less then a mile from our house, and very flexible with our work schedule's etc. We would have kept using her, but my wife decided to stay at home as we had a few more kids after that, and childcare would have become too expensive. Goes quick, gosh. 3 of them are already in school now, and my wife is getting excited about returning to work in a year for the first time in 8 years! (I'm secretly excited too!)
March 13, 201510 yr Yes, we used sitter city and care.com as well to find candidates. We didn't find a great match there but they are good resources and worth paying to join for a month or two.
March 13, 201510 yr OUers, I would love to get feedback on your thoughts of installing a playground in downtown Cleveland. My wife and I have the opportunity to pitch a downtown playground to Joe Cimperman on Thursday. We also plan on offering a significant contribution to buy equipment, maintenance etc. I know many (but not all) 18-34 year olds may not see the value for these types of amenities. Please keep an open mind when responding. The highlights of our proposal include the following: *Families/children are a missing demographic within the boundaries of downtown Cleveland. There is a lack of amenities to attract families to put down roots in Downtown Cleveland. *Temporary (visiting) and permanent families support both entertainment and non entertainment retail, with non entertainment retail lacking due to this missing core demographic. *Appealing to all segments of demographics is a much quicker path to a critical mass goal of 20K. *Positive use of underperforming green space. My questions are if it was your proposal, where would you recommend the playground be placed that tie in other features of downtown that attract families and what are your views (agree or disagree) on the highlights of the proposal. How did this meeting go? Anything my wife & I (and new daughter) can do to help advocate and/or move this forward?
April 2, 201510 yr I wanted to give everyone an update on the downtown playground proposal. The first meeting went extremely well. My wife was well prepared for the meeting and comments and suggests from OUers were either directly or indirectly used in the presentation. This lead to a second meeting a few weeks ago with all the necessary City of Cleveland agency heads. Not only were they intrigued but very motivated to start actively perusing feasible locations. The most discussed locations and I would say the top 4 locations were the following: 1. The land in between Progressive Field and The Q. Believe it or not, safety is the number one concern when proposing new playgrounds. This also makes the most financial sense since the two sports organizations would likely contribute and a chance for a corporate sponsorship based on visibility. From a safety perspective, there's zero car or bus traffic. This spot is also my least favorite. 2. Huntington Park (thanks Loretto). The drawback is the traffic flow down Lakeside and West Third. 3. Willard Park based on its close proximity to the Science Center, Browns stadium and the Rock Hall. The drawback being that it's the least of the four that has nearby residential. 4. Mall A. This was part of the discussion but there were concerns that there's enough space to create a suitable playground. I was blown away by the average cost of building a playground. Each urban playground costs roughly $400,000 dollars to build. The prep work that goes into one is 80% of the actual work. There's a third meeting set up in April to trim the locations down to two. Based on the level of discussion, I would say the land between the two sports complexes and Huntington Oark are the front runners. I'm super proud of my wife for initiating, prepping for and ultimately moving this thing in a positive direction. If you knew her schedule, you would know what a sacrifice in time she put into this. David James, my apologies for not seeing your post a few weeks back and for not sending an update sooner. Once again, thanks to all the OUers who responded. Your comments and suggestions definitely helped in moving the discussion forward! :-D
May 9, 201510 yr I cannot believe that my oldest nephew will be a college graduate in a few days. Although he is an adult, he'll always be a "5 year old, with a towel cape, singing the Muppets theme song" skipping around my apartment. I'm really glad that my grandparents are alive to attend his commencement ceremony. My grand father does not have a college education. Only two of his six children have college educations, my father has an associates degree and his sister is the only person to graduate from a 4 year university. However all 16 of my cousins on my fathers side have a college degree - 12 from The Ohio State University. My nephew is the fist person in our family to graduate from an Ivy League university (my cousin has a child at Princeton and UPenn). Although he did break tradition, by not going to OSU, I couldn't be prouder. Disobeying his father and moving to NY two weeks after graduating high school was a huge step for him. He's went from an introverted shy teen into an amazing and cultured young adult. Now he has to confirm a job and pay rent, because I'm not taking care of a grown ass man! >:D After his surprise graduation party....I'm done!
May 12, 201510 yr Well part of our move to the east side was due to my wife being pregnant. That's no longer true. Maura was born 5/11 at 10:27am. 5lbs 9oz. Mom and Baby are currently resting, hopefully. So now the next life adventure begins...
May 12, 201510 yr ^^Enjoy life wrapped around that little finger. Baby girls turn even the strongest men into creampuffs.
May 12, 201510 yr Congratulations Tedders! We have a house full of kids, and pictures like that take me back to when our first was born 9 years ago. Truly one of life's greatest adventures is begining for you! And Hts121 is right, those little girls will turn you soft in a heartbeat!
May 17, 201510 yr Well part of our move to the east side was due to my wife being pregnant. That's no longer true. Maura was born 5/11 at 10:27am. 5lbs 9oz. Mom and Baby are currently resting, hopefully. So now the next life adventure begins... Congrats!!! I don't expect to see you here unless you're up for a late night feeding or diaper change!
January 25, 20169 yr Our newest addition, Lillian Mireya, arrived two days ago. Mommy and baby are both healthy and home now
January 25, 20169 yr 3, which means I am officially a member of the "More Kids Than Hands Club." We thankfully have a nice spread, with our son being 9 and our (now older) daughter turning 4 this past Halloween
January 25, 20169 yr Congratulations! You've officially done your part in keeping the population from stagnation/decline. *gold star* Keep up the good work.
January 26, 20169 yr At least the nine year old can be sent out on short recon missions to retrieve the four year old. Good luck Hts. You've got your hands full.
October 23, 20168 yr I went downtown with my wife and 3-year-old son this Saturday evening before 6pm. My kid loves the lights and big buildings of downtown Cleveland. But I realized today why I haven't spent much of my free time (which usually involves my kid) downtown since I got married in June ... there just isn't much to do especially when the weather turns chilly and windy. You can only go to the Great Lakes Science Center so many times. The aquarium is fine too, although small and expensive. The sloping, grassy roof of the convention center will make a good sledding hill as might one of smaller slopes at Public Square. But why are there no indoor and outdoor playgrounds? (There's an indoor playground at Progressive Field but is open only on game days). And why do all of the stores and restaurants at the 5th Street Arcades close so early (4 pm)? We strolled through at 6pm and there was a surprisingly steady pedestrian traffic even though nothing was open. We headed over to the library but it closes at 6 pm. It was pretty disappointing. So we got in the car and drove back to Lakewood which has lots of playgrounds (yet none are indoor, either). "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
October 23, 20168 yr ^Yes most of the trendy downtowns like Cleveland's are playgrounds for adults, not kids...That said, Punch Bowl and Corner Alley are the exceptions with bowling, pinball, air hockey and video games among other things...
October 23, 20168 yr No, most of the hot downrowns are very kid-friendly, especially for little kids. By dismissing their needs, you're telling the newlyweds starting a family that it's time to leave downtown. Until yesterday evening, downtown never felt so lifeless and irrelevant to me. "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
October 23, 20168 yr No, most of the hot downrowns are very kid-friendly, especially for little kids. By dismissing their needs, you're telling the newlyweds starting a family that it's time to leave downtown. Until yesterday evening, downtown never felt so lifeless and irrelevant to me. KJP[/member] I agree with clvlndr[/member] His age makes it difficult to find a playground or more in Downtown. I tried to think of a true downtown playground, in Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, DC, Atlanta, Miami, NoLa, Dallas, Memphis, Chicago, St. Louis where there is kid friendly playground or activities. Kyle Warren in Dallas is the close to a downtown "park" with playground, but it's really just a sliver of green space built over the highway. Bayside in Miami is a park, but not kid friendly. Chicago has Grant park but most school age activities are north or south of the Loop/Michigan Ave.- River North/Streetville Atlanta's Centenial Park is the only park I can think of with kid friend activities nearby. But outside of that, their downtown is dead.
October 23, 20168 yr In addition to Navy Pier (merry go round, fishing pond, games, etc), we had a great time at the huge play ground at Millennium Park. Let's find solutions instead of excuses... "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
October 23, 20168 yr By the way, this was the foot traffic at the 5th Street Arcades, and not a single store or restaurant was open at 6 pm Saturday. #MissedOpportunities "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
October 23, 20168 yr By the way, this was the foot traffic at the 5th Street Arcades, and not a single store or restaurant was open at 6 pm Saturday. #MissedOpportunities This I can agree with.
October 23, 20168 yr No, most of the hot downrowns are very kid-friendly, especially for little kids. By dismissing their needs, you're telling the newlyweds starting a family that it's time to leave downtown. Until yesterday evening, downtown never felt so lifeless and irrelevant to me. I've said this for years only for my opinion to be dismissed by people who don't have kids. Not only is there very little for families with kids to do, there is nothing cheap, or free for them to do. Nor are there many family friendly restaurants, if any.
October 23, 20168 yr ^Yours Truly should help (not sure if it's it's already open or not). I can't speak to most of the cities on MTS's list, but the centers of Boston and NYC are absolutely crammed with easy and cheap/free ways to entertain little kids, with things like dog parks, play grounds, fountains, ducks/geese to feed, statutes to climb on, ice cream to eat. And I noticed that new(ish?) playground in Millennium Park just a couple weeks ago on google maps- it looks totally amazing. Public Square is a great step for Downtown Cleveland, but there is still a lot of low hanging livability fruit that we should be spending public money on instead of giant chandeliers...
October 24, 20168 yr [i've said this for years only for my opinion to be dismissed by people who don't have kids. Not only is there very little for families with kids to do, there is nothing cheap, or free for them to do. Nor are there many family friendly restaurants, if any. Thanks. Until you have kids, you can't appreciate your children's needs. My kid was part of a package deal with my wife, and it took me a while to get into my child's head to truly understand what it is they want. So for the first few months of marriage, I still didn't see what my child wanted. It took me some time to realize what drives them and interest them. My interests were not their interests. So even for a few months after I got married and cared for a child, I still looked upon downtown Cleveland as a place where you could do a lot of fun things. That was Ken -- the single, childless Ken -- talking. I am a completely different person now, and everything in my life requires me to think of family first, and especially child first. So if downtown is to keep me as a patron, it has to satisfy my child. If it can't, it can't satisfy me. "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
October 24, 20168 yr [i've said this for years only for my opinion to be dismissed by people who don't have kids. Not only is there very little for families with kids to do, there is nothing cheap, or free for them to do. Nor are there many family friendly restaurants, if any. Thanks. Until you have kids, you can't appreciate your children's needs. My kid was part of a package deal with my wife, and it took me a while to get into my child's head to truly understand what it is they want. So for the first few months of marriage, I still didn't see what my child wanted. It took me some time to realize what drives them and interest them. My interests were not their interests. So even for a few months after I got married and cared for a child, I still looked upon downtown Cleveland as a place where you could do a lot of fun things. That was Ken -- the single, childless Ken -- talking. I am a completely different person now, and everything in my life requires me to think of family first, and especially child first. So if downtown is to keep me as a patron, it has to satisfy my child. If it can't, it can't satisfy me. I’ve been saying the same things from a different and intellectual perspective, having basically spent three decades in my 20s I saw a lot of people who either lived or considered moving downtown when single or kidless, but it was pretty automatic that that changed once the kids came around. It was largely because of the schools, but that wasn’t all of it. Now I have my kid and live in an urban setting, more or less. And when she visits there’s some things for her to do but not all that many, especially when winter approaches. If you want families with kids to live in actual downtown, you’re going to have to address that. In a way that makes those parents feel secure as well.
October 24, 20168 yr ^wait until the kids are 12-16 and your neighbors without kids want all the pools and basketball courts removed. I really wonder what people expect tweens and teens to do in their free time. Hanging out and playing is not societally acceptable. But it is true in the suburbs too. Teens just aren't wanted in public. Childhood and teen years should be about more than just school and organized sports.
October 24, 20168 yr The Children's Museum used to be a good destination for my kids, but since they closed the UC location, they've been operating 'virtually', putting together events at libraries. I thought the new location would be up and running soon, but based on this, it looks like they're not expecting to open until late next year. That's surprising because I was at the fundraiser last year and they had a very successful fund raise. The feedback was they had raised in excess of their goal. https://www.clevelandchildrensmuseum.org/2015/08/28/plans-future-home/
October 24, 20168 yr I was having lunch at Noodlecat When a 5-6 year old birthday party rolled in, and the birthday girl proclaimed "This is my favorite restaurant!" to her friends *shrug*
March 9, 20178 yr Ouers, The downtown playground plans are rounding the corner. If anyone can spare a half hour on March 22nd to lend support for the project, please do. I have extremely high hopes that this is going to happen. Location is still being discussed but all the major players on on-board and interested.
August 3, 20177 yr Third visit to Browns' training camp. All girls E Rocc?? I have one (7) and she runs me into the ground. Cute kids.
August 3, 20177 yr Third visit to Browns' training camp. All girls E Rocc?? I have one (7) and she runs me into the ground. Cute kids. Same girl, ages almost three, almost four, and almost seven (last weekend).
September 12, 20177 yr This is pretty cool event to take advantage of Euclid Avenue being closed for the construction of the crane to build the new apartment tower. Play Join us from 11 am – 2 pm every day, Wednesday, September 13th through Friday, September 15th for a unique public experience. Listen to live music while riding a UH Bike around a demonstration midway-style bike lane. Play some lawn games while in town for an Indian’s game. Enjoy your lunch of delicious local food while playing an over-sized version of Jenga. Or simply grab a chair and people watch. Anything goes this week. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++ A press release... See: https://playeuclid.wordpress.com/ Contact Thomas Starinsky Associate Director Historic Gateway Neighborhood Corporation [email protected] 216.325.0937 What is the “Play Euclid”? • “Play Euclid” is a three-day event taking place during lunch hours – from 11 a.m. – 2 p.m. – while Euclid Avenue (between East 4th Street and E Roadway) is closed to vehicular traffic for construction. • The street will be open for pedestrians, offering different activities and live music entertainment. Locals and visitors will also still be able to stop in the businesses in the area while the street is closed. Why is this being done? • As a result of Euclid Avenue being closed for the start of construction on The Beacon (515 Euclid Ave.) during the week of September 11, local organizations wanted to utilize this opportunity to do something fun and interesting in the area. • Groups also wanted to leverage this opportunity to offer more visibility for Downtown Cleveland businesses. • By making this portion of the street accessible for pedestrians, it not only offers entertainment during lunch hours, but it gives people the opportunity to explore the businesses in the district, as well. What kind of activities will locals and visitors find at “Play Euclid”? • There will be a variety of activities offered at “Play Euclid” for locals and visitors. • LAND Studio is providing lawn games and Crackling Art frog sculptures. • Destination Cleveland will offer photo opportunities with its mini #ThisisCLE sign, as well as Giant Connect Four and Giant Jenga, outside of the Cleveland Visitors Center. • UH Bikes will set up a temporary bike station where visitors can obtain a card for a free 30-minute bike rental. • Live music entertainment will also be provided while guests walk around the area. Who is involved with “Play Euclid”? • This collaborative effort was spearheaded by the Historic Gateway Neighborhood Corporation who engaged the following groups organizations that worked hard to put together this event in two weeks’ time: City of Cleveland, Downtown Cleveland Alliance, Destination Cleveland, Bike Cleveland, UH Bikes, LAND Studio, Cleveland Urban Design Collaborative and Trust for Public Land. When and where is “Play Euclid” taking place? • “Play Euclid” is taking place Wednesday, Sept. 13 – Friday Sept. 15, 11 a.m. – 2p.m. It will be held on Euclid Avenue from E 4th Street to E Roadway in Downtown Cleveland’s Historic Gateway District. ### "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
September 17, 20177 yr Enjoy your lunch of delicious local food while playing an over-sized version of Jenga. Sponsored by Stark? :)
January 25, 20196 yr Still the highest publicly accessible point in an Ohio building? I am pretty sure it is.
January 31, 20196 yr Cute pic ? I bet she enjoyed going up in the Terminal Tower! I still fondly remember the first time my dad took me up to the Carew Tower observation deck.
March 15, 20196 yr I guess these days helicopter parenting is for life? Young Adulthood in America: Children Are Grown, but Parenting Doesn’t Stop Dad shows up at your job interview. Mom makes your medical appointments. A recent college bribery scandal is an extreme example of a broader pattern. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/13/upshot/parenting-new-norms-grown-children-extremes.html http://www.mainstreetpainesville.org/
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