Imagination, Planning Can Keep Idle Youngsters Busy During Holidays
Writing a business column to be published on Christmas Day is a no-win situation. If you write a bonafide business column, you’re being materialistic on the most “giving” day of the year. If you avoid writing about business, you aren’t doing your job.
There must be a way around this, at least for a starter item. A few North Idaho churches either have moved into or are building new facilities, but they aren’t businesses. It was stretching it a few weeks ago when a business topic was the new Masonic Lodge in Hayden.
Ah, ha! How about outlining some possibilities for family activities, things to do with the kids now that they’re home from school for holiday break. Some of these involve businesses that’ll gather some bucks from the vacationing kids.
A few activities may be - shhh - free, with probably some equipment involved. Most of us already own what’s needed, can borrow it, or should own it anyway. Possibilities include sledding, cross-country skiing, snow-mobiling and ice skating (making certain your favorite area has adequate ice, of course).
Ice skating also can be enjoyed at Go-Kart Family Fun (with rentals, music and nightskating) off Seltice Way, Coeur d’Alene. This place also has laser tag and video and pinball games.
Bowling is a good indoor option or swimming at an athletic club. Consider your child joining a gymnastics club and you an athletic club. Play games, cards, puzzles. Have a taffy pull, make a gingerbread house. See who can take the most creative or entertaining photo. Get busy in the workshop, on the sewing machine. Try a new craft or revive an old one.
Have each family member be in charge of planning and creating a special meal (the cleanup also). Check on church and service group activities. Visit some lonesome folks in a retirement center or nursing home.
Have a neighborhood potluck party. Divide into teams and play charades or word games.
Other options include visiting your local library or the Cheney Cowles Museum in Spokane. Go to a mall or department store or downtown area and have a bookstore be the destination. Check on plays, athletic events, concerts or ethnic restaurants.
One option is The Whitehouse Grill, a new restaurant specializing in Mediterranean food at 620 N. Spokane, Post Falls.
Owners Raci Erdem (originally from Istanbul) and Dalmo Santos (from Brazil) offer many years of ethnic culinary experience. Six years ago Erdem came to Spokane from New York, where he worked in a Greek-Turkish restaurant. Santos came from California where he worked in an Italian restaurant.
Using classic decor (tablecloths, napkins and candle and lantern light), they have transformed the previous Just Dogs cafe space into a Mediteranean experience.
The Whitehouse Grill is open 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. (closed Sundays). Phone 777-9672.
Big boy toys are featured in the four-bay garage that is part of Good Guys Quick Loan & Pawn, a new business at 2411 N. Government Way, Coeur d’Alene. The 2,400-square-foot business is in the old Arrow Ambulance facility across from Shull’s Cyclery.
Big toys currently featured include a ‘55 Chevy, ‘28 Ford, 454-horsepower drag boat, Harley Davidson motorcycle and jet skis. Their inventory includes usual pawnshop fare, jewelry, trick specialty items and wholesale new items (tools, scanners, guitars, radar detectors).
Tom Fisher, who owns the business with Kim Gittel, described the business as “shortterm collateral lending, somewhere between a bank and a pawn shop.” Fisher worked for Hagadone Corp. for 14 years and has had T.W. Fisher’s Brew Pub for 10 years. Gittel is busy with convenience stores and land development.
As a leader of the “Save the Catalpa Tree” movement with the building of the new Boston Market eatery in Coeur d’Alene, I was honored to plug in the tree’s holiday lights at the grand opening last week. I was embarrassingly late as I fell in an icy parking lot (not theirs) and tore my pants. Geez.
, DataTimes The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Nils Rosdahl The Spokesman-Review