Legoland – A How To Guide

As a child, my favorite toys were Legos.  There were many other contenders but none were as dynamic or long-lasting.  I held on to them so that I would one day be able to play with them alongside my children.  About a decade ago I was incredibly excited that Legoland came to be.  A whole amusement park themed with Legos!  My wife and I went to visit the park on the way back from San Diego one afternoon and were a bit disappointed.  Sure, there were Legos everywhere and we had a good time, but the park was a far cry from Disneyland or even Knott’s Berry Farm.  It had potential, but after going on all of the rides that fit adults and after seeing all of the displays, we were done in 3-4 hours.

Legoland has come a long way.  They now have a water park, an aquarium and now even a hotel.  There are so many rides and attractions, it can take a couple of days to get through everything.  The park is no longer a place to stop by on the way back from San Diego, but a destination of its own.  There are so many options available to families at Legoland depending on the experience desired or amount of money to be spent.  Researching in advance of my trip this Summer, I was unable to find a central website to describe the Legoland experience.  No one I knew had been to Legoland since the hotel had been built.  Hopefully this article can serve to address the questions that you may have in advance of a trip you are considering. 

Be ready to get your credit card running.  To take even the simplest of trips to Legoland will set your family back several hundred dollars – more if you plan to stay at the hotel.  Much like Disneyland, your ticket purchase is separate from your hotel purchase.  One would think that they would bundle these into a discounted package.  As of the time this article was written, that’s not the case.  After an exhaustive search of legitimate sites selling discounted tickets, it is the least expensive for those with the Santa Barbara Axxess Card .  For just $69 each we were able to get two-day park-hopper passes.  Costco offers a similar deal at $79.  AAA and other locations offer deals as well, but none came close.  Before purchasing, it’s good to acclimate yourself to the park’s offerings and decide how long you will be spending at the park.  The “park hopper” ticket, like Disneyland, lets you travel between each different park at Legoland.  You may choose to skip the aquarium, as most do, but on a hot day, the water park is pretty nice.  The water park is relatively small for now, but you can see where construction is making it larger from the higher slides.  Currently, the water park does not have a separate entrance from the park – one must already have been through Legoland to get to the water park.  This is not the case for the aquarium, which has a separate entrance.

The beds come with their own personal night light that my kids enjoyed.  There are currently three types of rooms, separated by floor.  The bottom floor has a medieval theme, floor two has an adventure theme (ala Indiana Jones) and the third floor has a pirate theme.  The more expensive rooms have more Lego wall clings as well as additional Lego creations.  If you have always wanted a snail made out of Legos that is the size of your head but you lacked the ability to create one, you may take it home with you.  Your whole room is filled with items like this.  You are warned, however, that you will be billed $100-$1000 for each item missing.  Since you purchased the premium room, you also get additional themed pillows and bed coverings.  Your child will be given a code (or a game to find the code) to a safe that is in the room containing a gift.  The basic rooms receive gold coin candies while the premium rooms receive a mini figure or small Lego set.  The rooms also have a small tub of Legos for the kids to build with while you sit at the provided desk and ponder why it is that someone would steal a $100+ Lego snail fixture.  

In my opinion, if this is your first trip to the hotel and you don’t look like the Mr. Gold minifigure, go for the less-expensive room.  This way, you will appreciate the differences should you get the premium room in the future.  There is so much Lego theme throughout the hotel that you will already be blind to most of it anyway.

   

If you have decided to go all the way and get the hotel room, you are in for a treat.  It will be an expensive treat, but a treat.  Rooms cost between $170 and $370 per night, depending on the type of room and amount of Lego features that you would like in your room.  If you purchase the basic room, you and your family will have a good time and likely not even know that you’re missing anything.  Your room is similar to a suite in that there is a master bed for the parents and bunks for the kids in separate areas.  Your areas are separated by the bathroom and a walking space but there is no door to lock between.  If you’re hoping to have some adult time in your bedroom without your kids walking in on you, you’ll have to wait until they have fallen asleep.  Your kids will enjoy some very safe bunk beds with safety bars to keep them in.  If you have three kids, the hotel has a built-in trundle to pull out beneath the bottom bunk. 

The whole hotel room is set up to be kid safe and friendly.  The bathroom door slides and never fully closes.  It offers privacy to the outside, but a kid can never close their fingers in the door (ruining an otherwise nice vacation).  There is even a kid potty seat built in to the toilet so that families with those potty training (or just really small butts) can pee without bringing the attachment.  The only thing missing is a Lego-themed channel on the TV.  Your kids won’t notice as they’ll be playing with Legos on the floor.  Your kids will notice the complimentary juice pouches and water next to the large Lego head (you know, your ice bucket).

The hotel experience itself is fantastic.  They have gone to great lengths to make things fun and easy on you.  When you pull up to the hotel valet, you will notice a large Lego dragon.  It is rumored to occasionally roar or blow out smoke from its nose, but I never witnessed this.  Valet parking is included in the hotel stay.  

When you enter the lobby, you and your family will notice the giant pool of Legos.  Typically when I have a load of baggage to unload, my wife and I will split up to conquer more ground faster.  One of us will unload the car while the other checks in and gets the keys while the kids are told to remain in their seatbelts.  With the Legoland hotel, this type of strategy is unnecessary and even detrimental to the experience.  Let your kids out first and walk them over to the Lego pool (don’t worry, they won’t drown) while you take a deep breath and unload the baggage, valet the car and get checked in.  If you got to the hotel earlier than your check-in time and the room is not available, your kids will have no problem building in the Lego pool for hours.  Eventually they will get adventurous and wander up the ramp to the giant Lego castle.  This castle is nice but looks cooler than it really is.  Children will naturally want to climb all over it, but it is for show-only.  There are more tubs of Legos and a chalkboard, but otherwise it’s mostly for show.

If you make your way down the hallway, you will come upon the elevator.  Even if you stay on the first floor, take your time and get on that elevator.  While you wait for the elevator, your kids can jump on the whoopee cushion carpet that makes the expected sounds.  Inside the elevator you will hear soothing elevator music like The Girl From Ipanima.  Once the doors close, though, the lights dim and disco lights turn on.  The music switches to various disco or funk hits.

Dining at the hotel there are three options.  The first can be seen from the Lego pit at the hotel entrance.  Near the play castle is a café serving up coffee, juice and snacks.  If you want a quick bagel to go, this is your place.  Down the hall towards the rooms is the Skyline Bar.  This area of the hotel will serve alcoholic beverages but also has a decent menu of foods for the hungry.  You will notice that the food is significantly less expensive than room service (as can be expected) but they are essentially the same items and not a far walk.  The bar also has an impressive alcohol selection.  Your food can be ordered to go and enjoyed at the café while you watch your kids play with Legos or back in your room.  Don’t think about bringing it into the park, though, for you are only supposed to bring in bottled water.  Across from the Skyline Bar is the Bricks Restaurant.  The restaurant serves up buffet breakfast, lunch and dinner.  Similar to Disneyland (in my opinion) the food is just okay.  The restaurant does their best to cater to as many possible people and cultures simultaneously, but as a result ends up with bland and basic options.  Still, it’s incredibly convenient and I am always one to make several trips to the omelet bar.  I recommend getting creative with the staff.  If you are there early enough that it is not too busy, their staff will make creative options for you like chocolate chip pancakes or chop up chorizo for your fourth omelet.

The hotel also offers a decent amount of in-hotel entertainment at no extra charge.  While we attended, there was a Lego building competition.  Around 50 kids competed, including my own.  Each kid got to stand on stage and explain their creation.  It was incredible to see these kids, all proud of what they had made.  At night we had a Lego pool party with a projected movie.  The first half of the pool is only 18 inches deep, so even toddlers can go in, and have independent fun playtime.  The Skyline bar opens up to the pool area, so parents can enjoy a drink while kids are misbehaving in the pool.

If there’s no other reason to stay at the hotel, it’s the early admission.  Similar to Disneyland’s Magic Morning, hotel guests get to enter the park an hour earlier than standard patrons.  As you enter the park, you may be under the impression that your privilege is less than special as the ticket-takers allow for anyone to enter.  Soon after passing the gift shops, though, you realize that the non-hotel guests are trapped while you are allowed to proceed.

I find it necessary to create a strategy for the park itself.  I like to maximize every possible bit of enjoyment possible to my stay and will occasionally go to extremes to do so.  Before visiting the park, I recommend downloading the line app Ride Hopper.  This app for your droid or iPhone will allow you to find out the wait time on any of the various rides in the park.  Also, you can get a map and schedule from the lobby of the hotel in advance.  Sit with your family and decide which rides you believe you will want to visit.  There are carnival-style games that you can do anywhere that distract you and take your money.  Skip past those and get over to the Volvo cars.  There is a course for 3-5 year olds and another for 6+. This course is no autopia – your kid drives independently of you in a safe car around a track with the goal of not crashing.  Attendants are there in case of traffic congestion to help them along.  There are gates on the side for easy pictures.  

Depending on the ages of your kids and their heights, you will want to plan out your day accordingly and hit the rides that will have the longest lines first.  Only a sucker will wander the park aimlessly standing in line for 90 minutes per ride and going on only 5 rides for the price of admission.

If you have some extra cash to throw around, you can purchase VIP passes.  If there was ever a class system, this is it.  For $150 (in addition to your tickets), your kids can go to the front of most lines via a special entrance – just show your VIP “Premium Play” pass.  They are not cheap, but if you have the money but not the time or patience, it could be the way to go.  These passes also give you free food at several of the restaurants.  For those without the spare cash, Legoland offers many build stations along the lines of the rides that take longer.  Your kid will spend their time building a Lego creation instead of noticing that they’re getting dehydrated in line.

Finally, being surrounded by Legos nonstop, you will undoubtedly need to purchase some.  Legos in the gift shops are consistent throughout the park and they are essentially the same as they are anywhere – it is a highly regulated toy.  You can likely, however, get by fairly inexpensively.  If you have three or fewer children, you can go to the build-a-minifigure at one of several gift shops and have them assemble the head, torso, legs and hat custom to their liking.  Three custom minifigures for $10 is not a bad deal and can make for some great pictures and much-needed downtime from the rest of the park.  If you are staying at the hotel and are not checking out for at least 2 hours, you can charge your purchase to the hotel room and have it delivered for when you’re out of the park – no having to tote around very small and expensive toys all day!

This article, while long and detailed, should fill in the holes for parents considering a trip to Legoland.  While my tips may not apply to everyone, hopefully you learned something new and can gain some additional enjoyment from your trip.  I’m very interested in any other tips that you may have – I plan to go again with my kids in the future.

CSA Boxes Explained

Santa Barbara hosts a farmers market six days a week.  With those and our various fruit stands, there are plenty of ways to seek out fresh produce around town.  However, choosing produce isn’t for everyone.  Like selecting a “good” wine in Santa Barbara, there is also a lot of pressure to choose proper produce.  Really, any foods that you buy at any of our farmers markets and fruit stands are selected locally and delicious.  It is hard to go wrong, but self-selecting has drawbacks.  The solution to this problem is the CSA box.

Most of the local farms in town offer some form of CSA box.  These are the same farmers at the farmers markets and several of the boxes are shared between multiple farms.  For $20-30 per week, a giant box of fresh fruits and vegetables are selected for you by the local farm.  These are then delivered to your door or available to be picked up on site.  CSA stands for “community supported agriculture” because you are buying into a temporary share of the land that is being harvested.  Typically you pay in advance several weeks and collect the literal fruits of labor.  For a complete listing of CSA boxes in town, see the CSA box price guide.

A typical box contains an assortment of about 10-12 types of freshly picked fruits and vegetables.  The larger box you buy, the more (and more variety) you receive.  The last box that I received was from Givens Farms and had snap peas, carrots, lettuce, leeks, chard, strawberries, avocados, spinach, cabbage and cilantro.  In my experience, a whole box is a tad overwhelming to my family of four.  I have historically had to share a box with a friend or coworker (and share the cost).  Doing so has made the quantity of the produce less overwhelming and made for less waste.  The food in the box is delicious every time.  Opening the box is like an adventure in food.  Reading over the list, you may already buy some of the items on a regular basis (and sometimes even when they are not in season).  When you see something like chard, however, you may be a little hesitant.  Before the CSA box, I had never tasted or cooked chard.  Part of the charm of the box is that it introduces you to new foods and flavors.  You are also being introduced right at the peak of the food’s freshness (second only to grazing).  This can be a turn-off for non-adventurous and uninventive home cooks.  The rest of us can make use of an internet search and quickly become an expert in a vegetable that they had only previously heard of.

Just because it’s a new vegetable doesn’t mean that you will like it.  Fennel seems to make it into my CSA box when I least expect it.  No matter what I’ve tried with fennel, it always ends up making me think that I’m cooking with black licorice.  The look of the herb is so inviting like dill, but the taste is terrible to me.  Many CSAs have prepared for these types of dislikes with a trade box.  If you pick up your box from the farm, you can trade out an item or two that you don’t like for an item that’s in the box.  Some CSAs will start the trade box with extra vegetables that they have on hand.  Others will rely on early people leaving the items that they just don’t want that week.  Those who get their CSA delivered do so at a price (usually $5) but also at the cost of being without a trade box.  Another benefit to visiting the farm, however, is getting to know the farm itself.  Doing so helps the farmers know what you (the community in CSA) like or don’t like.  While you’re there, they might even hook you up with an extra item of produce.

I like the idea of the CSA box because I like to get creative and work vegetables into my meals.  I like that my daughter learned what kale is before going to kindergarten (and not until after college like her father).  Still, not everything in the box is easily made into dinner.  Neither my wife nor I grew up eating beets and have a hard time with them as adults. This makes it even more difficult to convince the kids that they’re wonderful.  Instead we have found the trick to hiding our vegetables.  The key to this was getting a good blender.  Whenever I get a couple of beets, I clean them and then chop them up (greens and all) and leave them in a bag in the freezer.  A handful goes into a smoothie along with strawberries, pineapple and whatever other fruit or juice I have on hand.  Beets make a beautiful red color and tone down the sweetness of a smoothie.  Doing this, I am able to hide the nutrients locked away in the vegetables that I am not fond of.  If your kids are not a fan of smoothies, consider making popsicles from your leftover smoothies.  Even with beets and spinach, kids love them.

Another criticism of CSA box owners is that too much waste is created.  Even if you are splitting the box with a friend, there are some other tricks.  Chopping and freezing as I did for the beets works well.  Still, sometimes enough is enough.  When this happens, I recommend putting your box on hold until you’re ready to receive again.  Your CSA will be happy to do so for any length of time.  If it’s the large amount of food scraps that you’re concerned with, see my worm article to get ideas on how to constructively deal with your food waste.  To best preserve the vegetables as soon as you get them, I recommend giving them a nice cold water bath.  This keeps them fresh longer.

There is no better time to join a CSA than now.  Santa Barbara’s Spring and Summer seasons bring about delicious produce.  If fruits and vegetables aren’t your thing, take a look at the meat and seafood boxes sold by other farmer’s market vendors.  In Santa Barbara, when it comes to fresh food, you really can’t go wrong.

Fun in the Sun: Rules and Tips

Fun in the Sun: Rules and Tips

Summer is back in Santa Barbara!  While our Summer is nowhere near as hot as it is elsewhere in the state, it’s nice to keep cool and have a good time.  If your kids are ready for some fun in the sun, water play is common.  Graduating from their water lab, my children received their first water guns this year as well as a quick trial with water balloons.  It became clear that we needed rules to avoid some unnecessary tears.

Rule 1) No spraying the face.  This seems obvious, but perhaps only in retrospect.

Rule 2) No spraying someone that is unarmed.  An important corollary to the rule – if one is armed but out of ammunition, they are essentially unarmed.

Rule 3) No spraying someone filling their gun/balloon.  Similar to Rule 2, it is important to clarify for optimum fairness and fun.

Now that you have the rules out of the way, be ready with several buckets about the yard for easy-filling.  If you have made water balloons, take note of some additional tips:

Tip 1) Fill up as many balloons as possible.  Once you get throwing, it really ruins the pace to have to refill every three minutes.

Tip 2) Fill into several buckets.  Place these buckets around the yard for strategic toss and grab.

Tip 3) As you are filling up the balloons, bill your bucket with water as well.  This prevents the balloons from spontaneous explosion while filling and playing.

Tip 4) Use a small-head nozzle at the end of a hose for fill-up.  A number of water balloon-filling devices have come onto the market recently.  While I have had high hopes, they have yet to meet expectations.

Tip 5) Consider filling up a water balloon half-way and fully filling a regular balloon in order to keep everyone on their toes.

Most important of all, stay safe and have fun.  The summer is never long enough, so make every day count.

How to Disappear the Candy

How to Disappear the Candy

Easter has come and gone in Santa Barbara.  There are still lingering signs that it was here, but mostly at grocery stores in the form of half-deflated mylar balloons and discounted peeps.  In my home were two Easter baskets still full with uneaten candy.  Each year, my wife and I find ourselves buying too much candy.  If it doesn’t end up in the baskets, it ends up in a zip bag in our pantry (usually on a high shelf such that it cannot be found easily by small hands).  With a surplus of this sort comes the dilemma of what to do with all of this candy.

Step 1) Take a careful audit – determine how much of each type of candy you have remaining.  If it can be used elsewhere in other projects later in the year, then keep it with your other baked good ingredients.  Jelly beans scream “Easter leftovers” but they also make good cupcake or cake decorations later.

Step 2) Bring what you can to work.  Chances are that your place of employment has some sort of candy dish somewhere.  It’s high time that you made a large deposit after so many small withdrawals.  The perfect type of candies here are individually wrapped like small licorice, Starburst or Nerds.

Step 3) Candy Shake!  If the kids are being difficult at dinner, announce a special dessert if they finish their meal.  Assuming that this has convinced them, get out the blender, some ice cream and milk.  It won’t take long to build the excitement.  Now, have them collect their uneaten chocolate candies.  Let them know that they must contribute to make the candy shake.  Those familiar of the story of stone soup might have thought it only to be a fable.  Have the kids shuck the pastel foils that surround any candies covered by them.  With all of their candy tossed into the blender, it’s time to blend and pour.  In one fail swoop, all of your remaining candy is gone!

My daughter wisely saw right through my ploy this year.  I was disappointed (mostly in myself) but told her that she could opt out of handing over her candy but that she wouldn’t be able to participate in a cup of the candy shake.  She still held out until the pouring of the shakes began.  After a quick surrender of her remaining candy, we all had a great dessert and the candy has disappeared.

If you’re stuck with a stockpile of delicious and tempting sugar that you don’t feel comfortable throwing away outright, consider this post and get out your blender!

Grazing: A New Trend in Healthy Living

Grazing: A New Trend in Healthy Living

Santa Barbara has long held an open mind to residents and tourists with a healthier diet. As vegetarians have given way to vegans, we have seen more fruit and vegetable restaurants and blended-food establishments sprout up all over town. Our residents are so hooked on produce that we have no fewer than seven farmers markets each week. It is no surprise that the most recent trend in healthy eating has risen above the rest: Grazing.

I first heard about the Grazer movement while eating lunch with a friend of mine. While my vegetarian burrito was delicious, I will admit feeling self-conscious sitting across the table from the empty plate of a Grazer-convert. Grazers prefer not only to eat locally-grown organic produce, but to eat it while it is still attached to its original plant. An apple may be delicious, but only if it is still attached to the tree it is growing from. The second that fruits and vegetables detach from their host, they begin to lose their nutrients. The only way to truly lock in their precious vitamins (and flavor) is to eat straight off of the vine. This can be particularly difficult for fruit like tangerines and pineapple.

My friend, Andrew West, Grazing

It wasn’t until I was at the Siam Elephant in Carpinteria a few months ago that I grazed for the first time. I ate outside, where my salad was growing. The cilantro and lettuce were amazing – unlike any I had purchased at Trader Joes or the Farmer’s Market. I also left feeling good knowing that my lunch was sustainable and would grow back for another patron in only a few days. Since eating there, I have learned that it wasn’t true Grazing since I didn’t cultivate and grow the meal myself, but I still had a good time.

The life of a Grazer is not an easy one. For a few weeks before finally closing their doors, Fairview Gardens offered $5 grazing in their field near the Goleta Public Library as part of their honor system. The biggest hang-out for Grazers, though, has been the famous fig tree near the train station. Grazers need not cross the chains to partake in the deliciousness hanging from low-hanging branches.

While it may not be an easy lifestyle, Grazing brings us all a little closer to nature and provides a humbling experience. We are not so different from cows, sheep and goats. Why should our eating habits be? I welcome my readers to post their Grazing experiences and pictures on this site so that others might become more familiar and tolerant.

My friend, Eric Engmyr, Grazing for breakfast in his back yard

My friend, Jana Johnston, Grazing in her garden

TV that is good for the whole family - Part 2

TV that is good for the whole family - Part 2

In Part 1 of “TV that is good for the whole family” I reviewed current shows that might be running and streaming to your TV as you read this. In order to provide my children with a full understanding of pop-culture, I find it important to keep them up to speed on classic cartoons as well. It would be unacceptable to me for my children to know Mickey Mouse only as a computer generated 3D character (though, hats off to They Might Be Giants for their excellent theme songs). Watching the classic cartoons of my youth with my children has become more difficult than I would have anticipated.

Some of my earliest memories include watching classic Disney cartoons beamed to us on the rustic 12-foot satellite that my dad constructed in our back yard. It is only natural that I should want the same for my children now (though, sans giant safety hazard). Donald and Mickey can offer countless hours of entertainment to those who have access to them. I was surprised and confused that so few of these cartoon shorts are available for quick purchase on DVD. As it turns out, Disney has developed their “Disney Vault,” a process by which they release only certain movies or cartoons as they determine will be most profitable. From the standpoint of a dad who wants his cartoons, it is a terrible system. Still, to go about obtaining legal and high-quality Disney cartoons, we have little recourse. The shorts no longer have a show, even late at night, for viewing or recording.

Warner Brothers cartoons are quite a different story. Volume after volume of the classic Bugs, Daffy and other Looney Tunes characters are available for purchase. These cartoons are perhaps even more entertaining to watch as an adult as they are for children. Now that I’m a little older, I can appreciate the classical music with timed animated action. It is an excellent introduction to a child’s musical education. Tom and Jerry has begun to release DVDs as well, though if purchasing, read the label and be wary of anything produced in the last 30 years. These rounded and cleaned up cat and mouse duo have had been cleansed of violence and nearly all of their entertainment value.

Superhero cartoons, on the other hand, have gone from good to great – and all available on DVD and streaming. Superfriends was entertaining for the time created, and to a certain extent continues to be fun. Substitute the kitch and weak writing for deep story lines and deeper characters and you have the Justice League series or the animated Batman and Superman. These have even recently given way to newer cartoons that are rounder and simpler but appeal to a younger audience. I enjoy watching the new Batman Brave and the Bold alongside the animated Avengers and Young Justice.

I may be criticized for the amount of TV that I watch or allow my children to watch. It has also been said that TV programming stifles the imagination and limits children. I couldn’t disagree more. Anyone who has read any of my other articles will know that my family does our best to enjoy all that Santa Barbara has to offer. If anything, the characters that my children identify with allows them to imagine a world different from their own – one where human flight or talking pets might be possible. It’s this sense of wonder and enhanced imagination that I hope for my children and those of the world to bring to solve the problems of the future. It is by watching the TV box that I believe my kids will learn to think outside of the box.

Art and Kids

Art and Kids

Reprinted from Edhat : Mar 06, 2010, 9:00 AM
http://www.edhat.com/site/tidbit.cfm?nid=27840

By Mike Shinn
One of the greatest gifts a parent can receive is artwork from their child. When our daughter creates drawings or art projects, we are very excited, but months later our excitement continues to turn to our daughter's newest project. All parents must eventually make a decision: to keep or not to keep.
There is an appropriate time to part with Thanksgiving hand-turkey drawings and that time is not in May. Admittedly, my wife and I are both packrats. I continue to save my own schoolwork from kindergarten, in our attic. Still, real estate in Santa Barbara is not cheap, despite the recent economic slump. Every square foot counts, and there's only so much room in the attic for extra fire hazards. It's simply unrealistic to try and keep all of your child's original work in perpetuity.
Unfortunately, children are not born with as strong a sense of practicality as they are with emotional attachment. It only takes one art project found in the garbage beneath discarded pudding cups to cause attachment and trust problems that can last a lifetime. I've heard of parents sneaking out to their garbage at night with expired artwork so that their kids will not know. It's only a matter of time before other psychological issues are passed down as a result of this type of behavior.

The ultimate problem is that as parents, we want to save the work of our kids for a number of reasons, but logistically it is far too difficult. The good news is that we live in a digital age. My wife and I have discovered that taking a quick digital picture of the artwork as we receive it preserves it forever. Then, when it is eventually destroyed by a pet or accidentally torn up or thrown away intentionally, we continue to have the gift. It costs nothing, as we already have the camera - no need to print a hard copy. If you set your computer's screensaver to scroll through these images, I would like to believe that you show your kids that you value their work even though it is gone from the physical world.
Quick tip: if the artwork you are photographing is laminated or shiny, avoid lighting problems by taking the picture at a slightly-off angle or turning off your flash and photographing with a lot of natural light. Take several pictures at different angles - extras cost nothing to go back and delete later!