Category Archive

Families

Our sister site Offbeat Mama launched in 2009, became Offbeat Families in 2012, and was merged into Offbeat Home & Life in 2015. This archive contains all the posts ever published on those sites! We believe that while children change your life forever, being around kids doesn’t necessitate abandoning your identity. We believe in supporting and inspiring parents and caregivers who are moving beyond mainstream visions of parenting. We welcome anyone who’s interested in families, whether you’re pre-parental, in the process of becoming a parent, or choosing to live childfree.

8051194050 d553899061 c

Hack your clock to help your kids tell time

Remember Tina’s punk rock dining room moment? She’s back with a clock hack idea that will help your kids learn to tell time…

photo

Dykes and Tikes on bikes: celebrating Pride with my family

We celebrated Pride weekend in August this year, and it was a hot one. Saturday was the Dyke March, which we tapped into later in the day. I had zero intention of braving a crowd of 650,000 people with a fiercely teething and mobile infant and his fearless three-year-old sister and decided to lay low. Back in my twenties, Pride was about volume. Do more, see more, flirt more, be more queer.

6987720324 c0a7ce8fed

The parent stays in the photo: part two

Yesterday we ran part one of photos featuring you guys and your parents. Since there were so many in the Flickr Pool we figured it made sense to split the posts into two. Without further ado, here’s part two!

4337432867 abe89b4fa2

A life-altering diagnosis: I just found out my unborn child has Down Syndrome

I knew I was pregnant the moment I conceived. Call it a woman’s intuition or a case of mother-knows-best, but I knew. As the weeks went on and I could finally take a pregnancy test and receive reliable results, my partner Brian and I stared at the giant plus sign and I said, “I told you so.” As things progressed, I also knew I was having another boy. So when I got additional news about our son, I was shocked that I didn’t already know…

5828972879 e8f4f9da49 b

Finding out the sex of your baby: pros and cons

Finding out the sex is one of those favourite sources of conversation for pregnant women and all who know them long into early parenthood: “Will you find out/have you found out/did you find out the sex?” It’s the earliest indication of the significance society places upon the gender distinction.

MANA presidents

Yay for midwife mamas!

I’m not sure how many Offbeat Mama readers know about my mom. She wrote a few guestposts back in Offbeat Mama’s early days, but for those who weren’t around back in early 2010 here’s the backstory: my mom Therese is a retired midwife who was first the founding president of the Midwives Alliance of North America (MANA), and then the Academic Director of Seattle Midwifery School. In high school, I grew up grading midwifery tests.

Anyway, MANA just celebrated their 30th anniversary, and my mom went to a big gathering they had in California. I was tickled pink when she shared this picture of some of the past presidents, and thought some of you midwifery fans might be as well.

490656316 0114bc7aa7

Everything you need to know about life can be learned in Little League

It was the 6th inning and our team was down by one. Carter, a third grade boy who had yet to make contact with the ball the entire season, stepped up to plate and gave that ball the greatest wallop seen the entire game, landing his first RBI and tying it up, 1-1. And then everything stood still, including the tall maples that edged the stretching field.

6749689975 2393a32ba0

“How can I talk to my kid about _______?”

We love our questions posts, and we’ve noticed that a lot of them tend to be about talking about a particularly challenging topic with your kids. We’ve also noticed that even though the topic changes, the advice is usually similar — so it seems that it would be helpful to collect some of our favorite, most relevant bits of advice in one place.