My Kid's Back-to-School Lunch is Better Than Your Kid's!

Sing it with me now y'all, back to school, back to school! No more paying sitters and I might just get the Phineas & Ferb theme song out of my head sometime this century.

Maybe.

The better news? I actually have one thing all ready: the lunchbox. All it took was one year, and I'm a pro. Our kids are all off to school together, so let ME school YOU. You just might learn something:

Keep Reading AFTER the Jump

5 Young Mom Myths That Are Old Enough to Be Put To Pasture

I was a young mom. Am a young mom. Not a teen mom. But in a world where -- as the folks at Beloit College so appropriately (and depressingly) pointed out -- today's college students can't remember a time when there was such thing as "too old to get pregnant," it's one of the few places in my life where I'm happily "below average."

I'm happy with when I gave birth. All things going as planned, we'll pay off the mortgage just in time to send her to college. That works for me.

Keep Reading AFTER the Jump

Winner! Snoopy & the Peanuts Gang Prize Pack

Come on y'all, do a Snoopy dance, because the Snoopy & the Peanuts Gang Prize giveaway is officially closed . . . and we've got some winners.  Two to be exact!

So what'd they win?

Keep Reading AFTER the Jump

My 6-Year-Old Needs a Crash Helmet & It's Your Fault

It's been years since I sat in a little corner of the government center in Monticello filling out my questions on the DMV's written test, but I can still remember the question I got wrong. I now know that you steer not into a skid but in the direction that you really want to go.

I may not remember where I put my keys 5 minutes ago (hence the long blue lanyard hanging off them to help me spot them from across the room), but I'm clear on that.

Keep Reading AFTER the Jump

Parents Don't Need a Clean House As Much as They Need This

If I work my brain hard enough, the picture of a clean house comes into focus. The edges are blurred, yellowed even, like a photograph from days gone by.

There were no expired foods in the cupboard, accidentally shoved behind boxes of fruit snacks and Cheerios. There was no risk of the dreaded LEGO foot when you walked through your own living room in the middle of the night to use the bathroom, planting your heel squarely on a plastic brick.

Keep Reading AFTER the Jump

Survival Guide for Moms of Girls Lesson 1: Preventing That Hair ... There

I wish someone had told me that mothering a girl would come with a learning curve. The way I saw it, I am a girl. I already know you wipe front to back. What more would I need?

OK, so that's like saying "I know how to type" makes me a good blogger. I get it now! And remember how silly I was just a few short years ago, I'm willing to share the glory of my new-found knowledge. No thanks necessary.

First up:

Keep Reading AFTER the Jump

Hi Mom, I'm Here To Interview You

There's a game going on on Facebook right now. You "like" someone's status, and they give you a year to reminisce about. But when the year 2003 popped up, I realized just how bad my mom brain is. . . I could barely remember what happened that year. So I decided it was time to revisit my columns from way back when. The Inside Outs that have taken readers of the Sullivan County Democrat on adventures with me ARE my stories of the years gone by. 

Here's one from May 2003!  


Mother’s Day has come and gone, once again. And I have to say, there are some pretty great moms out there.  Now that I’ve hit my 20s, I realize that.

As a typical daughter, I spent most of the prior decade in a constant battle with that lady who spent 28 hours in a birthing room bringing me into this world.  But it took a story I wrote for this newspaper to put a lot of my life, and that of my mother, into perspective.

Keep Reading AFTER the Jump

I Refuse To Give In to Present Face

There's a game going on on Facebook right now. You "like" someone's status, and they give you a year to reminisce about. But when the year 2003 popped up, I realized just how bad my mom brain is. . . I could barely remember what happened that year. So I decided it was time to revisit my columns from way back when. The Inside Outs that have taken readers of the Sullivan County Democrat on adventures with me ARE my stories of the years gone by. 

Here's one from May 2003!  

There’s got to be a strategy set in place by early May in my family.

Jonathan and I have what seems like a ton of gifts to buy – and they have to be perfect (my rule, not his).
So how are we getting ready for the upcoming Mother’s Day holiday with two moms to buy for, his mother’s
birthday, two of my closest friends’ natal days and Father’s Day nipping at their heels (with, again, two dads to buy for) – we’re moving into our new house!

Keep Reading AFTER the Jump

Being a Reporter Could Kill You . . . Or Your Car

There's a game going on on Facebook right now. You "like" someone's status, and they give you a year to reminisce about. But when the year 2003 popped up, I realized just how bad my mom brain is. . . I could barely remember what happened that year. So I decided it was time to revisit my columns from way back when. The Inside Outs that have taken readers of the Sullivan County Democrat on adventures with me ARE my stories of the years gone by. 

Here's one from April 2003!  

You’d think I got into this job knowing what I was in for.

I figured there would be some late nights covering meetings, some early mornings out with the fisherman kicking off the season, maybe even a dash of excitement.  And if you believe that’s all that’s to it, I’ve got a
bridge in Brooklyn to sell you. Let me tell you, in recent weeks, I’ve learned the true “perils of reporting.”
Let’s just say no one, and nothing, is safe around me.

Keep Reading AFTER the Jump

Selena Gomez Can Hear You Kid!

Selena Gomez and the Scene rock out at Bethel Woods

I got one of two responses when I let slip that I was taking my daughter to see Selena Gomez at Bethel Woods. "Who's that?" most asked of the Disney Channel star. My explanation prompted the same response I got from people already acquainted with her body of work. "Oh, you poor thing. You're braver than me."

Brave I may have been. The lawn was a sea of bodies, most of them under 4 foot tall. The lines for shaved ice and kettlecorn were long and winding. And I had my 6-year-old out late for the second night in a row, tempting the "too little sleep" imp to bite me in the rear end. Janet Jackson was for me. Selena Gomez was for her.

Keep Reading AFTER the Jump

Snoopy & the Peanuts Gang Giveaway! Ends 8/17

The first book I can remember surely was not THE first I ever owned. That honor goes to some long-forgotten board book with badly chewed edges (my mom still jokes that my love of reading came first through my preference for the taste of cardboard). But it's the small mustard yellow tome with pithy quotes from the Peanuts that I remember best.

It was a gift from my great-grandfather, who I never met, to my mother. Inside was an inscription to her, and when she handed it over to me, I felt special. Knowing that she was sharing something from a man she adored, a man who she couldn't turn to to ask for a new one, meant that I had achieved a new level as a reader. The sense of value I placed in books had been recognized. It's a value I hold today. Friends joke that when they borrow a book from me they're unsure whether they should take my recommendation to heart; there's so little evidence that it's even been read.

And like that value, the love of everything Peanuts has followed me.

Keep Reading AFTER the Jump

What's Natural About a Purple Cat?

That I was trying to justify how a plastic seahorse came packed with her own life preserver should have been my first clue. 

She's a sea-going creature. Why does she need a life preserver? And what's with the little blue half circle thing? That's an inner tube? Really? For a seahorse? 

You CAN take facts too seriously. 

Keep Reading AFTER the Jump

'Rio' Gives the Girls a Chance

I'm developing what some would call an annoying habit, but what mothers of girls would call necessary. I can't watch a kiddie flick without mining it for lessons of how womanhood rocks the kazbaa.

Case in point: I spent Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 thinking "long live Hermione."

But it's Rio that's been on my mind this week. The movie is coming out on DVD Tuesday, and a screener arrived in my mailbox a few weeks ago. First clue that I should watch it? My 18-year-old babysitter saw it and said, "I'm staying to watch this."

Keep Reading AFTER the Jump