I have this friend. She’s the sort of person who, when I refer to her as friend it isn’t the way I say it with almost anyone else. I have light in my eyes and a smile is always waiting to burst out. She’s one of those people who I would choose to put in… Continue reading L(egg)s
Lately Daughter has been getting little tastes of independence. She’s been traveling along on her scooter to visit friends in our close little section of neighborhood and then has ventured a little farther. She’s taken the dog on walks and even stayed home while I ran an errand. It has changed her. After just that… Continue reading A taste of independence
I’ve talked before about how I am a fan of the Love and Logic parenting and teaching model. This has given me a lot of tools and phrases to use in difficult situations with kids. The most powerful two are pretty simple, and they are “Bummer!” and “Would you like to hear what some other… Continue reading What would you like to do?
I really don’t like the “everyone gets a ribbon” mentality that has begun to permeate our dealings with children. There’s a whole culture around this idea that showing up is the equivalent of winning and it really drives me nuts. There are kids who win and kids who lose, just as there are adults who… Continue reading My hypocrisy
Let me start off by saying that we don’t have a home phone. Husband and I each have cell phones and Daughter has the ability to text on her touch device. At age nine she does not have her own phone, but it isn’t necessarily because we don’t think she should. You see, nine years… Continue reading Grown up peer pressure
At some point in my life I know that I’d like to leave some pieces of advice, little nuggets of what I have to pass for wisdom, for my daughter. I’d like to think I’ve got lots of time for that. Even so, I’ve started thinking about what I want to tell her. Here’s what… Continue reading Advice for Daughter
Please be aware that this post contains spoilers which may affect the holiday celebrations of your family. I have spent a week now focusing on joy and it has been fabulous. There have been some changes in who I am and the way I look at things. It’s been exciting. But it is not to… Continue reading Magic and fairies
After my last post I’ve been actively perusing joy in the world. I’m making a real effort to see joy in others and find what is causing the happiness that can be found. An extraordinary role model in this “joy search” has been Daughter. She is a bundle of excitement and happiness, so I’m trying… Continue reading Finding joy
It was Monday afternoon and I was happily enjoying a glass of water and secretly watching Daughter play in the yard with three good friends. All of these friends are boys, and I was feeling all smug about how awesome Daughter is, “holding her own” with these boys who play at Minecraft and spies and… Continue reading They don’t have to be anything
A few friends asked me to write about Mother’s Day for the blog today. I wasn’t going to. In fact, I have another post ready and loaded because I was hesitant to write about this day for a few reasons. The first and most obvious is that I fear I am losing my mother… Continue reading Mother’s Day
Elephants in the Room 