*This DIY Halloween costume story is sponsored by Amazon and Mom It Forward. All opinions expressed below are honest and unbiased, as always.
It’s a cliche for a reason: cats and babies alike would be perfectly happy with just a box.
We’re seasoned vets at this parenting game and yet we heap upon...
October 23rd, 2017 | Parenting Blog | Read More
The band was still finding its footing, having just placed their drinks down and positioned themselves at or picked up their instruments moments earlier, but you had gone from zero to 60 with the first note. You bounced along to “I Am A Runner” with more spring than I have ever possessed.
I...
October 20th, 2017 | Most Popular Stories, Parenting Blog | Read More
We’ve managed to avoid major childhood injuries and medical procedures, and the accompanying debt-inducing healthcare bills, for the first 13.5 years of family life but the streak has ended with a momentous clattering.
Both of our daughters need braces. Oof.
And the right-handed teenager took...
October 19th, 2017 | Parenting Blog | Read More
My definition of a friend was as rigid as glass when I was young.
It all started with a song lyric from the album that changed my life when I was an impressionable 17 year old kid:
“Your ideas, your image, your definition of a friend”
Before this song, before that lyric, I had never considered defining...
October 16th, 2017 | Parenting Blog | Read More
I finish pissing and step up onto the digital scale for the 3rd time today, with more eagerness than the occasion warrants.
There are water stains on the reflective black surface from the kids swinging their wet hands over to reach the hand towel after washing up. Every once in a while I’ll bend...
October 5th, 2017 | Parenting Blog | Read More
It’s over.
The fat lady has sung.
The dust has most definitely settled.
The summer is over.
Summertime is a memory now, fading slowly in the dying sunlight.
School is on again and the associated paperwork is already taking over every flat surface of my home.
The furniture in the backyard is spared...
September 23rd, 2017 | Parenting Blog | Read More
Her mother and sister had already left for their weekend away. They are heading up north. We aren’t pushing back until morning, going south to Virginia for soccer, history and hiking.
I showered first and then she got in with a shower cap to continue preserving the dyed color that clings to her hair.
Neither...
September 22nd, 2017 | Parenting Blog | Read More
It would be too easy to blame the walls, to blame the regressive nature of what I swear was a dignified brown paint fifteen years ago, for our lack of entertaining.
Over time, that evocative brown became emotionless beige and while we adventure together outside of the house, from Gaudi’s fractured...
September 22nd, 2017 | Parenting Blog | Read More
