How to keep kids entertained at wedding receptions

The thought of having to sit still through an elegant wedding reception makes most children recoil in horror, especially when the only music is smooth jazz and the most appealing thing on the menu is a bowl of bouillabaisse.Here are ways to keep the tykes busy.

Serve kid-friendly foods. Set up a bar with foods you know most kids fancy: macaroni and cheese, chicken fingers, french fries, pizza. You could even set the bar low so they can fill their plates without interrupting parents for seconds.

Make eating fun. For dessert, have a cookie-decorating table with an assortment of cookies, frostings and sprinkles. Your banana-walnut wedding cake is probably not their ideal treat, and cookie-decorating will keep them entertained.

Set up activity stations. Put out three or more tables with an activity assigned to each one -- a coloring table, a Play-Doh or Lego table, a puzzle or game-board table.

Have outside play. If your reception is outside, get a few buckets of sidewalk chalk so kids can draw and play hopscotch. If you're ambitious, you could buy a sandbox and beach toys.

Hire an entertainer. If the budget allows, hire a professional magician or clown.

Send them away. Put down blankets and pillows in a separate room and pop in a DVD.

Study: Moms do more work around the houseA two-year study of 500 middle-class, dual-earner families shows that even as modern dads help out more, the burdens of household and children continue to fall disproportionately on moms. Mothers spend almost 10 more hours per week multitasking on chores than do their husbands -- and they're stressed out because of it.

Published in the American Sociological Review, the study says frazzled mothers not only devote more hours to chores but also do more multiple activities than fathers. In defining the transition time from work to home, dads got an "elevated, positive effect," but moms called that second shift "the arsenic hours."