This Photo Tells Another Story Entirely

If there's a photo that tells the story of my daughter, it's the one on the wall in my kitchen. Blue eyes wide and shining. Mouth opened wide to show off Chiclet teeth. Nose scrunched up the way her father's does when he laughs.

And skin absolutely coated in dirt.

But it isn't that picture that this column is about.

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I Am the 20% But I Found Help

The latest estimates on parents who hand their cellphones over to their kids should surprise you. Twenty percent of Moms and Dads have used cellphone as pacifier.

WTF? Just 20 percent? I think I smell some burning pants.

Just this week, I was dealing with a sick husband and a 6-year-old who just couldn't take the quiet anymore. She'd played with her LEGOs. She'd read books. She'd colored. She'd thrown a "tea party." And bless her heart, she was about ready to burst from all the being good.

Until I handed over the iPhone.

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'Winnie the Pooh' Movie: Closing the Generation Gap

The release of the new Winnie the Pooh movie on DVD and Blu-Ray today made the blogosphere buzz with giveaways and gushing from all the usual sources. But it was celebrated in a much quieter way in our house. My daughter clutched her two Tigger dolls to her chest as she caught up on sleep on a sick day home from school.

Her blond hair spread across a pillow, a Winnie the Pooh stuffed animal in her arms, it was like peering into my past. Only my hair was never quite that blond, and my favored Milne-inspired stuffie was a Pooh bear, a remnant of my own father's childhood.

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Sleep Is Wasted on the Youth

You've heard it said that "youth" is wasted on the young. That's ridiculous.

It's the ability to crash into bed well past one's bedtime and spring from the depths of a warm comforter at the crack of dawn both bright-eyed and bushy-tailed that is squandered completely on the people too short to peer into a mirror at the bags under their eyes.

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Giveaway: Melissa McCarthy's Children's Place Fave! Ends 10/31

Allow me to geek out here for a moment: I watched Gilmore Girls as much for Melissa McCarthy as I did the witty repartee between an impossibly hip young mom and her impossibly precocious teen daughter. Because way before there was fangbangin' Sookie Stackhouse, there was Sookie St. James, kooky sidekick to the equally quirky Lorelai Gilmore. And Sookie could actually cook.

The world is all suddenly "yay, that funny chick rocks" what with Melissa hosting Saturday Night Live, making Bridesmaids that much funnier, and grabbing Emmy Awards for Mike & Molly. But those of us who have been girl crushing since she made Sookie sound more like a name, less like a nickname for your pacifier (my apologies to any real Sookies out there, but really? You never thought it?) are happy to say "uh huh, told ya so."

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Campaign Signs Aren't Worth Your Vote

Here we go again. Election season. When the yards of the county are littered in signs proudly shouting "Look, I care! I'm involved in the electoral process."

The signs are nice.

I guess.

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Sugar My Kid Up . . . Or Else

There's been a system in place for years, existing within my own head, whereby anyone who sends my kid home from their kid's birthday party, fist clenched around a bag full of kiddie crack, shall find a noisy toy among the rubble of opened presents at the next party.

I have railed against the candy filled party favor bags long and loud. But today, I put down my bullhorn.

Sugar that kid up.

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Your Kids Will Make You a Liar

It's about now that you begin to realize one thing about your kids. They know how to
make a liar out of you.

First it's in the promises you made that they so quickly undo. You won't let your living
room become a second toy room? Sure, go ahead, see how long that lasts.

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The Lion King Broke Down My Defenses & Pawed At My Pockets

When it comes to reasons I believe wholeheartedly in the "opposites attract" concept, the way my husband and I each approach money lands somewhere atop the list. He's a spendthrift. I'm a penny pincher. And last month marked 11 years.

So what does that have to do with the Diamond edition blu-ray version of The Lion King released today by Disney? Nothing. And everything.

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Winner: Dear Bully Book Giveaway!

They're calling it an epidemic. Bullying. Taking kids by storm in 2011.

But consider how few of us would go back to high school, and it's safe to say this is nothing new. It's just finally getting the attention it deserves. And anything I can do to kick it in the teeth is a step toward protecting my kid from the injustices I suffered.

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