New York City is full of art, sure, but taking kids to an art museum can either be totally cool or a total nightmare. I wanted to know what's going on this summer in the art scene that my kids will enjoy and not turn into a whine-fest. Who better to ask than Natasha Schlesinger. Natasha is the founder of ArtKids, classes that take children into NYC museums and galleries and makes looking at art fun, exciting and acccessible for kids ages 3 to 12.

Here are five recommendations for cool art outings in New York City this summer from the founder of ArtKids, Natasha Schlesinger.

There's a great new little venue for kids concerts and other children's entertainment in Lower Manhattan. Little Airplane Cafe isn't actually a cafe at all. It's the production studio of the animation company that makes children's television favorites like The Wonder Pets. For the past year Little Airplane Productions has been giving NYC families in the know free tours of their studio so kids can see what goes into making Lenny, Tuck and Ming Ming come to life.

Now Little Airplane has opened a small performance space with some great shows. The space is incredibly intimate. Seeing Laurie Berkner in the space's inaugural performance feels like hanging out with your favorite kids artists in their living room with a back-stage pass for everyone. Everyone sits on the floor and the space was a little bit overfilled, but the kids could not have been more thrilled. After the show there was a radio interview where Laurie answered kids' questions and then she hung out and said hi to everyone who hung around. Kids got their pictures taken and lots of hugs were shared.

It's that time of year again when parents with children of a certain age need to start panicking about getting their kids into preschools. Find out about resources to help you get through it, plus this other news: Parents can't pay for classroom aides, Celebrities are giving City tours, how to know if your child's back pack is too heavy and what can you do about it. And there's some fun contests going on that could win you a free birthday party or some cash. And of course, don't forget to enter our Dinner Party Giveaway. We've given away three dinner parties for 10 and we've got 7 more to go!

We recently visited the newly renovated Sony Wonder Technology Lab and by the end of the visit this great venue had shot up to the top of our list of must visit spots for kids in New York City. The Sony Wonder Technology Lab has always been a great find, with free movie screenings and a fun children's museum with interactive exhibits. But the new renovation and exhibits leap-frog the Sony Wonder Technology Lab to the forefront of NYC children's museums for kids.

New York is full of great children's museums, but the Sony Wonder Technology Lab does one thing really, really well that none of the other children's museums in New York City currently do: it teaches kids about the stuff they want to learn about most, technology.

If you have a Harry Potter fan at home, these are some pretty exciting times. What with the new Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince movie out now and the final book in paper back. But for New York City kids, of course, there are always more ways to get involved in any passion than just viewing it through mass media. If you are a Harry Potter fan in New York, Harry Potter can come to life for you in lots of fun ways.

Here are some upcoming events for Harry Potter fans:

Summer in the city takes a unique type of alchemy to make it go smoothly. Little tricks like putting the juice boxes or water bottles in the freezer the night before and taking a clean, used yogurt container to the playground for collecting and pouring water are the little tricks that seem so obvious once you know them, but help make long, hot summer days go just a little easier. We've gathered up some of the things we think are essential to having the best summer in the city:

If you read our recent post on free outdoor Shakespeare performances and loved the idea, but worried your kid couldn't handle it, we've got another recommendation. The Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival is doing performances of "The Complete Works of Shakespeare (Abridged)" that are so entertaining and funny that we had three kids (ages 5-10) at rapt attention for the entire show, laughing hysterically and (literally) quoting lines from Shakespeare the next day.

One of the geniuses of Shakespeare has always been that it works on so many levels. While we may think of Shakespeare's plays as the high brow and somewhat inaccessible, they are actually filled with lots of very low-brow humor, potty language and puns (the lowest form of humor), couched in flowery talk. Of course, The Complete Works of Shakespeare (Abridged) is a parody of Shakespeare's works, but they're working with some very rich material.