Tag: single parent life

  • Best Piece of Advice I Ever Received. Period.

    This is the 4th part in my series on the best advice I’ve received. Friends, we have arrived at #1 in the countdown. Drumroll please… The best piece of advice I’ve ever received is: Build a life from which you don’t need a vacation. (I’ll add that I strongly support taking vacations anyway…😉) But how…

  • Best Advice I’ve Ever Received, Part 1

    This is the first part of a series on the best advice I’ve ever received. Over the next four weeks, I’ll write about statements that have altered my life and inspired me for years. Although it’s impossible to rank their importance, I will attempt to count them down, Casey Kasem style. “And coming in at…

  • All the Memberships

    I’m the kind of mom who buys all the memberships.  Science center, botanical garden, zoo: you name it, I buy a membership to it.  I know a family who buys only one membership per year. They go to that place once a month for 12 months and then buy a different membership for the next year. That…

  • A Pride Month Story

    “Could you hand me those Barbie dolls?” my son asked. “Sure,” I replied, trying to hide my surprise. Not surprise that he would play with Barbies—even my brother had one that he would carry everywhere while he trailed after me. But until now, my son had completely neglected these dolls. Suddenly he was asking for…

  • Excuse Me: I Have an Announcement to Make

    How old does your child have to be before you remember not to declare loudly, “I’m going to go pee in the potty!” when you are with a group of adults? #askingforafriend

  • Dating for Moms

    Browsing on dating sites, I see so many guys who write that they are looking for spontaneity. These guys clearly do not have kids. The only spontaneity that happens after parenthood takes the form of either a temper tantrum or a stomach virus. Sometimes both. Just the word “spontaneous” is enough to strike fear into…

  • Visual Calendars Rock

    In my recent post “Where the Wild Kids Are,” I discussed my how I equip myself for life with a super-active child. A visual calendar is another essential in our household. I bought this set of SchKIDules magnets with pictures of all of our common daily activities: I then bought several portable, magnetic dry-erase boards…

  • What’s in your boots?

    This morning as my son was putting his rain boots on, he stopped abruptly. “There’s something in my boot.” I picked up the boot and turned it over, expecting to find a rock. Instead, four cherry tomatoes rolled onto the floor. I picked one off of the ground and saw that it was moldy. “Did…

  • How to become your child’s hero

    What have I done to become a hero to my son? It’s nothing I ever imagined. I thought he hear me in a concert and think how cool it was to have a musician-mom. Or he would see me running a marathon and say, “That’s my mom!” But be has watched those things for his…

  • Riding the Meal Train

    I love this new trend to start a “meal trains” where you drop food off for friends with newborns. And I know that the friends who receive them are very appreciative. But still I never sign up to bring anything. It’s meant to be simple enough for anyone to do. You are just supposed to…