Festivals with Teenagers
Your Teenager’s first festival?
A parent wrote to us asking about teenager festivals:
Our 16 year old is off to their first festival this year with some friends. They are all pretty sensible but I can’t help worrying.
Any advice?
Letting our kids spread their wings and explore the world is something all parents will wrestle with at some stage.
Teenage years are tricky – everyone tells you so. We want to give them space to grow and freedom to develop, but most importantly we want to keep them safe. Read more…
Keeping Children Safe at Festivals
Being lost can be absolutely terrifying for young children (and parents) so getting reunited as swiftly as possible is really important. And although you know they will be OK in the end, the experience can still be pretty traumatic even if it’s only a few moments.
Rest assured that at any decent family-friendly festival, staff and stewards should be fully trained to deal with a missing child situation – in fact often it’s all over so quickly the children are unaware they had even been lost. The parent will be a gibbering wreck though!
Please read our fantastic guest blog Diary of a Lost Kids Officer from festival welfare expert and Angel Gardens founder, Angel Sam. With tips, and a full explanation of what goes on behind the scenes when children are separated from their parents at festivals, it’s well worth a read.
Teenage Kicks
For the last 13 years or so I have been going to festivals with my family. When the boys were babies it was relatively easy to get around, see what I fancied, and have some fun.
When they were busy and approaching school age it got harder. I started to offer to help organise kid’s fields. Mainly so there was something for them to do that I knew would keep their attention for the 3 & 1/2 minutes that I wasn’t holding onto them.
The last 10 years I have persevered and stuck at it, now they are approaching teenage-hood and are well experienced travellers and festival goers! Read more…
Rain Rain Rain
Well I was full of good intentions at the end of last year’s festival season. I would write lovely reviews, fix the tent, buy some amazing retro equipment to go with my shiny new camper van and I would have a easy to read calendar on the fridge of all our away days as a family (colour coded of course). But, alas, here I am, sitting indoors with only weeks to go before the end of term, listening to the rain and wondering what to do next. Without a camper van in sight!
Read more…
How to choose the right festival for your family
and is a festival the right place for you?
There’s no denying that taking children to a music festival can be very hard work, and it’s not everyone’s cup of tea – but for those uber cool, let’s have it, this is how we roll type of parent (that’s you) you might take the plunge and hopefully find the rewards are well worth the effort. Accept that you won’t see everything you would see if you didn’t have children with you, get in the festival spirit of what will be will be, and let the adventures begin…
Your Teenager’s first festival?
A parent wrote to us asking about teenager festivals:
Our 16 year old is off to their first festival this year with some friends. They are all pretty sensible but I can’t help worrying.
Any advice?
Letting our kids spread their wings and explore the world is something all parents will wrestle with at some stage.
Teenage years are tricky – everyone tells you so. We want to give them space to grow and freedom to develop, but most importantly we want to keep them safe. Read more…
Teenage Kicks
For the last 13 years or so I have been going to festivals with my family. When the boys were babies it was relatively easy to get around, see what I fancied, and have some fun.
When they were busy and approaching school age it got harder. I started to offer to help organise kid’s fields. Mainly so there was something for them to do that I knew would keep their attention for the 3 & 1/2 minutes that I wasn’t holding onto them.
The last 10 years I have persevered and stuck at it, now they are approaching teenage-hood and are well experienced travellers and festival goers! Read more…
How to choose the right festival for your family
and is a festival the right place for you?
There’s no denying that taking children to a music festival can be very hard work, and it’s not everyone’s cup of tea – but for those uber cool, let’s have it, this is how we roll type of parent (that’s you) you might take the plunge and hopefully find the rewards are well worth the effort. Accept that you won’t see everything you would see if you didn’t have children with you, get in the festival spirit of what will be will be, and let the adventures begin…
Keeping Children Safe at Festivals
Being lost can be absolutely terrifying for young children (and parents) so getting reunited as swiftly as possible is really important. And although you know they will be OK in the end, the experience can still be pretty traumatic even if it’s only a few moments.
Rest assured that at any decent family-friendly festival, staff and stewards should be fully trained to deal with a missing child situation – in fact often it’s all over so quickly the children are unaware they had even been lost. The parent will be a gibbering wreck though!
Please read our fantastic guest blog Diary of a Lost Kids Officer from festival welfare expert and Angel Gardens founder, Angel Sam. With tips, and a full explanation of what goes on behind the scenes when children are separated from their parents at festivals, it’s well worth a read.
Rain Rain Rain
Well I was full of good intentions at the end of last year’s festival season. I would write lovely reviews, fix the tent, buy some amazing retro equipment to go with my shiny new camper van and I would have a easy to read calendar on the fridge of all our away days as a family (colour coded of course). But, alas, here I am, sitting indoors with only weeks to go before the end of term, listening to the rain and wondering what to do next. Without a camper van in sight!
Read more…