My tips for keeping life with three autistic kids simply scheduled
Having three children with high-functioning autism requires daily structure on my part. I am an organizational freak to a fault, but even I love me some “organized chaos” from time to time. My kids, however, aren’t so fond of not knowing what’s coming up or what’s going on. So I made them this scheduling area by the front door to not only keep them in the loop, but make it easy enough for me to not feel committed to some intricate details that I usually give up on after a week.
A family photo session served with lots of yellow and a hand-drawn lighthouse
Jonas Seaman is a longtime friend of the Empire — he took photos at the reception we had in October 2011 and promptly became everyone’s best friend. I’ve been blogstalking him, patiently waiting for the day that he took the dive into family photography and friends: that day has come. If you live anywhere near Seattle, you’re going to be hauling yourselves up to his door and asking to have your photos taken after seeing these snaps!
How to tell family you’re childfree
Where are my fellow child-free Homies? Your insight is needed! Offbeat Families reader, Haymaker, has a mom-in-law who is desperate for she and her husband to give her MORE grandkids. But they have NO plans on having children. Like, EVER. Head over to Offbeat Families to help a sister out!
Surviving toddlerhood: sleep training, meal negotiating, and discovering How It Really Is
This child is not that child. This child is a warrior. This child narrows her eyes, pulls down her mask affixed to her Medieval spiked helmet and unsheathes her sword. This child licks her lips and spits on the ground, never breaking eye contact. “Hello, Mother,” she quietly growls through her binky. “Welcome to Hell.”
How do we break it to our family members that we’re Child-Free?
My husband and I recently tied to the knot, and here’s the thing: I love my mother-in-law. She is a super sweet woman… but she also wants more grandchildren. She has one, but she wants more. Here’s the catch: we’re not having any children. Ever.
10 life lessons learned from my first apartment
Attention young Offbeat Homies: At some point, you will cease to live with your parents or in a dorm room, and will very likely live in a cheap apartment, quite possibly with roommates. I hit this particular milestone my Junior year of college, and here’s what it taught me…
How to make a baby: sperm donors, IVF, and mad science experiments
Choosing a sperm donor is a little bit like setting up an Xbox avatar. You begin by deciding on the ethnicity, hair color, and eye color of the fellow whose sperm you’d like to combine with your egg to make your baby. Then you enter that criteria into a sperm-bank search engine, which returns a list of matching anonymous males who passed rigorous genetic tests and filled out detailed questionnaires. Finally, you pore through each donor profile, considering things like his height, weight, build, SAT scores, family medical history, sexual orientation, whether or not he has moles, the shape of his nose and mouth, and in some cases, his baby photo or voice sample.
Foster parents: how do you deal when your foster child is adopted by another family?
We’re both gravitating to fostering over adoption for a whole bunch of reasons that basically boil down to it’s what we think would work best for us, save for this one issue. How do you emotionally cope when your foster child moves on to a permanent family?