Don’t tell your kids you’re going “Antiquing” unless you want to be met with that look you get when you say it’s time for your booster shots.  In fact some parents probably are feeling their teeth start to hurt at simply the prospect of taking their kids to an Antique Shop.  Well, it can be done.  Even if shop owners occasionally grimace!  The first challenge of course is getting the kids to come along willingly, the second is getting through the day without buying a broken vase.

Well here’s my nickle coming from a few years experience in the parenting game. First off we never advertise adult pastimes with adult phrases like “Antiquing”.  No, we go “Exploring”.  Exploring is an open ended journey to somewhere where you don’t exactly know what you’ll be doing.  Well, we know… We also know kids love adventures and framing our days plans that way helps.  We may “stop” at an antique shop or two.. but that’s not “Antiquing”.  It’s simply one part of a day that involves a variety of activities.  I’ve found that keeping kids guessing is a good plan as long as they also have guaranteed “kid times” to look forward to.  My favorite phrase with our son when he asks what we’re doing is, “Who knows what we might do?”  I leave him hanging but at the same time I promise certain positive points such as play or snack times.

When we do end up doing something that may seem atrociously boring to a child we dole it out in small sips.  “A spoon full of sugar” as Mary Poppins sang.  In between the boring adult stuff we fit in “slide breaks” at the local parks, a quick snack in another location, and most definitely lunch at a local cafe. Kids thrive on diversity.  The more diverse our day, the more they tend to tolerate our grown up moments.  This is not catering to children mind you, simply playing fair for the benefit of everyone.  Sometimes this takes a bit of research.  For instance while we’re online looking up the “shops” we are also mapping the parks.

When it comes to browsing antique shops, farm markets and other seemingly not so kid friendly spots we have two goals;  To move at the child’s attention span and keep it interesting.  The better job we do at keeping it interesting the more time we get to browse at our own pace.  In fact, the more engaged we are with our son, the more we ALL enjoy the experience. It can work with practice.  In our experience it does no good to keep children at arm’s length in a place like an antique shop.  It only increases the children’s boredom, causes conflict, and may result in parents cleaning up a china doll from 1847 as they reach for their credit card.

Last week we visited two antique shops in Pardeeville just about a half hour east of our base camp here in Baraboo, the Pardeeville Antique Mall and “The Big Chicken”.  I’ve posted a gallery here. This is the beginning of building a new section on antiquing in our area where we will only include shops we’ve visited ourselves. Antique and resale shops tend to open and close so quickly it seems the only way to make sure we’re giving you good information.  Call this the kick off.  For more on that just go here.

Feel free to take your kids Antiquing, ah, I mean… Exploring!  And Good Luck!

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Comments? - Parents, how do you manage your kids when trying to enjoy a little adult exploring on vacation?

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