Cool Mom Staff, Author at Cool Mom Picks

Should you send your kids back to school? Find guidance from these 14 considerations parents are talking about | Spawned ep 211

This week on the Spawned Parenting podcast we knew there was only one topic we could possibly cover: Sending our kids back to school. It seems to be all any parent is talking about, online, offline, in community groups, and over Zoom cocktails. To cut to the chic:...

Scrambling for summer activities? These fun, affordable online coding camps for kids just got even more affordable.

by Cool Mom Staff | Entertainment + Media, Kids

This is a sponsored message from Coding with Kids With all the gaming kids are doing this summer, it’s pretty cool that there’s a way parents can help turn their love for say, Roblox or Minecraft, into an educational STEM opportunity — all at an...

Kids and birthdays in the age of Covid: The loss is real. | Spawned Ep 210

by Cool Mom Staff | Party Ideas, Podcast

One of our most popular posts of the past few months has been this list of social distancing birthday ideas for kids during COVID-19. And the more it’s been clear that Covid isn’t just a few-weeks-and-it’s-over-kind of thing, we’re now at the...

Should you think about homeschooling this fall due to COVID-19? Spawned Episode 209

by Cool Mom Staff | Podcast

Over the last couple of weeks, many schools have been releasing their plans for fall, and not surprisingly, it’s all the parents in our social media feed are talking about. We recently featured a post about things to consider if you’re thinking about...

Raising smart problem solvers: 4 tips to help parents teach kids | Life Skills Series

by Cool Mom Staff | Tips + Tricks

In the first post of our Life Skills Series, we shared tips to help you raise critical thinkers. And next up, we’re talking about how to teach your kids problem-solving skills. As adults, we know how important they are in our everyday lives, but it’s hard...

Why we need play, levity, and romance, even in a pandemic | Spawned Episode 208

by Cool Mom Staff | Podcast

As we continue to navigate through this unchartered pandemic territory, it’s easy for us to think that this isn’t the time for play, levity, or romance. But as it turns out, those experiences are even more important now than ever, which is something we...

Raising critical thinkers: 6 expert tips for parents | Life Skills Series

by Cool Mom Staff | Tips + Tricks

If one thing has become abundantly clear over the past few years, our kids are growing up seeing all kinds of problems we face in the world, and they’re increasingly asking us what they can do, or how they can be part of the solution. That’s pretty...

How to be the fun mom, with thoughts from fun dad and Magic for Humans host Justin Willman | Spawned Episode 206

by Cool Mom Staff | Podcast

On our special Father’s Day edition of our Spawned podcast, we wanted to figure out how we can get a little more credit for being the fun parent from a dad who is peak fun. We’re talking about magician and dad Justin Willman, who’s also the creator...

8 reasons why every family should have a virtual pet

by Cool Mom Staff | Tech CMP-Style

It’s pretty amazing what you can do virtually these days, which has definitely made these last few months much easier for families. From online classrooms to card games, to lots of other fun things in between, there are no shortage of cool ways for kids to...

What we’re keeping and what we’re ditching, after the pandemic is over | Spawned Ep 203

by Cool Mom Staff | Podcast

This past week, Liz and I were chatting about some of the changes we’ve made since this pandemic started. We’re finding ourselves cooking more, taking more time for ourselves, and spending way less (waaaaay less) on Starbucks. So it got us thinking: what...

Hi! We’re Kristen + Liz!

Kristen Chase + Liz Gumbinner of Cool Mom Picks

We started Cool Mom Picks in 2006 to help make life cooler, more meaningful, and more fun for parents of all kinds.

Trivia: It was called Cool Mom Sh*t for the first two days. (Yeah, we rethought that.)

We had no idea our site would grow to become a major lifestyle network, that we'd end up sharing our finds with the TODAY Show and Martha Stewart, that we'd be able to make a real difference for so many small businesses and women-run companies, or that we'd end up with an incredible community of the coolest readers on the planet. (If we do say so ourselves).

We still love what we do every single day. And we're so glad you're here.