Tag: family
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Crossing Invisible Finish Lines
Recently, I found our old copy of Sandra Boynton’s Snuggle Puppy. Though Noah was not keen on sitting still and letting anyone actually make it all the way through a book without seizing it and possibly throwing it, I thought that book had a chance. It’s mostly a song, so I thought that would capture…
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I’m Not Cut Out for This
I’m not cut out for this. I turn around in my seat, having just finished hollering something ineffective and useless like, “I mean it!” And the children don’t care, and they aren’t listening, and I am filled with rage. I’m not cut out for this parenting thing. We are on our way back from Lake…
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So, You Would Like to Have Three Children…
I regularly speak with people who have zero children, or one child, or two children. And they tell me they might consider or would like to have three children. My first impulse, I will own, is to bark, “No, you don’t want three kids.” But that is not helpful, I know this. So here’s what…
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Death Geese
I will admit, I have made some slanderous statements about geese in this blog (see All in the Family). However, I maintain that I was justified in calling them a$$holes. And if you do not already feel this way, I would like to tell you a story. My sister has always been afraid of geese.…
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Go Home, Lassie, You Are Drunk
Valiant, rescuing dog stories are kind of a cliché. Even if you never actually watched Lassie getting Timmy rescued from the well, you have probably encountered all the stories about brave and noble canines out there. Meg, my childhood dog, was very good at being a Labrador retriever. She was well trained. She could have…
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That Was a Sick Road Trip
Some of you have said that you are hoping for a blog post out of my trip to Mendocino with the three kids. Well, I’m not saying that won’t happen (we’ve only been here two hours). The drive sucked in the ways that all family drives suck. Nothing outlandish happened, however. But the fact that…
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Stuff That Happens When I Am Not Looking
Once you are a parent–or really, once you have even just conceived–the advice starts rolling in. “Don’t leave the baby on the changing table unattended.” “Use ‘natural consequences’ to discipline your children.” “Don’t tell your child that he will go blind if he touches himself.” Well, I could probably write a blog post about any…
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Party Foul
When I was in graduate school studying publishing, we discussed a certain author and her series in my book marketing class. A well-known author, she was held up as having her act together on the marketing front. So when I met someone who said she was his grandmother, I was in awe. My new friend…
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Penis Envy
Our first child was a girl. Partly because of this, I think of her as kind of a “starter child.” I know it must be because I’m a woman, but having a child with a penis just felt entirely outside of my skill set. When we potty trained Selah, it seemed straightforward. The differences between…
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Signs of Subpar Parenting
I’m not saying that all this stuff happened. This is just a random list of red flags, I swear, just signs that would indicate subpar parenting. Telling his father that we should have named Asher Ashhole instead Going to Mother’s Day tea and hearing the sentence “My Mommy spends all her time______” finished with the word…