I’ve gone from Child-Free to confused and now I’m grossed out
In the break rooms at work, over lunch, next to coffee pots or in store aisles while shopping for high gloss paint, I have proclaimed with unwavering conviction to at least a hundred people: “I never, absolutely never, want kids.” This stance has come to symbolize a lot more than my choice on children: it represents my autonomy, my position in (or not in) various social spheres, and, to some degree, my rejection of conventionality. And thus, my recent confusion about whether or not I want a kid has felt like a lot of very unpleasant things.
Daddy Skills: the sweet-ass dad-rap video that will make your morning
From Sam Deezy (the dude who brought you Whole Foods Parking Lot) comes this video about the realities of modern fatherhood…
Why a mother with a disability chose to bring a daughter with Down syndrome into the world
Although I’ve had a disability since I was four years old (that we know of anyway), I was mainstreamed at all times. In my family, “disability” was something reserved for people who used wheelchairs. Saying I tried to “pass” and fit in among the non-deaf, non-disabled is like saying the Pope is Catholic. When I found out my daughter would be born with Down syndrome, my world crumbled.
How and when do you tell your kids your dirty little secrets?
Like many of us my husband and I have pasts… and not everything is lily white. While we aren’t proud of these things in our past, we also aren’t ashamed of them — they are part of who we are, and helped define our characters. How do we talk to our kids about our pasts while making sure it’s not OK that they repeat our mistakes?
Take a plastic children’s table and turn it into a fancy spot for kids who dine
Caroline scored a plastic kid’s table at a yard sale a few months ago. She kept it in her kitchen for her son’s snack time, but recently decided she was tired of the faded red, yellow, and teal and wanted to chic the table up a bit.
Reframing destruction: how I kept my cool after my son destroyed the garden
I have planted a garden like I do every year, but this year is different. This year, I will be able to take care of my own garden whenever and however I want. Or I could.. until my four-year-old tore the garden apart.
Heuristic play: here’s what’s in my infant-friendly treasure basket
Take a minute and think about the toys that we provide for our infants, they are mostly plastic and feel/taste the same. Boring! The Treasure basket allows you to create a base basket full of 20-30 multi-textured, multifaceted, objects for your baby to explore daily for about half an hour to an hour. Eventually the basket can contain up to 60-80 objects as you slowly build more items to keep the baby interested.
7 ways motherhood shocked the hell out of me
Full disclosure: I have been a mother for nearly six weeks now. I didn’t think it’d be easy, but when my pregnancy went extremely smoothly I got to thinking that maybe, just maybe, my baby would be easy and being a Mom wouldn’t be too hard. Lo and behold, there are definitely a few things that shocked the hell out of me in both regards.