How to Land Your Kids in Therapy
The behavior of the parents described in this piece from The Atlantic mirror things I’ve both seen and that I’ve done — catching my child right after he falls? Yep. Watching with eagle eyes while a kid acts like he’s about to snatch Jasper’s favorite train from him? Totally guilty.
One big happy family works it out in a high-chroma house
Mica Sue and Stephen live with kids Phoenix, Ocean, Anna, and Garrett and pets Holly and Mr. Kitters in a three bedroom house in east Tennessee. And it’s all a bit… chromatic. And full.
How do we get our housemate to relax about trying to please us?
We like our new roommate, but he seems anxious and way too eager to please. Offbeat Homies, how on earth do you get the excitable bogan housemate to settle into a chilled-out hippy house?
How can I make it easier to be away from my child for a few days?
I will be heading across the country (from Southern California to Nashville! Woo hoo!) for five days in July and it will be my first time away from my ten-month-old son over night. How can I make this easier for both of us?
Broken Phantoms: understanding visually identifiable and invisible disabilities
If there is any one particularly great experiential divide in the vast disability community, it may be that between the visually identifiable and the invisible disabilities. It’s the difference between a world of unwanted pity, and one of unwanted judgment.
We’re turning our kiddos into gardeners — and they love it
Becoming a homeowner and having a patch of my very own earth renewed my enthusiasm for gardening, and my pregnancy a few years later roped my husband into the process. Lumbering, exhausted, and vaguely afraid of toxoplasmosis in the soil, I coerced him into carrying out my vision of the vegetable garden until he’d fully drunk the Kool-Aid.
DIY explosion: my teen and I made a dress out of candy wrappers
I’d been itching to dive in and thoroughly immerse myself in a huge creative project all winter — what could scratch that itch? Then inspiration struck — what could be sweeter than a one of a kind dress created with my fourteen-year-old?
How can I respond politely to unsolicited conception and child-raising advice?
My husband and I are planning to start trying to conceive this summer. I’m so excited about the prospect of starting our family and becoming a mother! We’re doing everything we can to prepare, and I want my friends and family to be excited for us too… but so far that’s not the response I’ve gotten.