What's your favorite candy to pilfer from your kids on Halloween? (Which I have no shame in doing, let me just say. I changed their diapers, now I get to skim off their Halloween bags. It's the mommy tax.) My favorite candy, which I really only ever see or eat on Halloween, is these guys: Dots. I don't know what it is about them. They always get stuck in my teeth but I love them. I'm also a fan of the gummy lifesavers. Now these things, on the other hand: When we go to a house and . . .
What I want you to know about a psychic connecting me with my son
What I Want You to Know is a series of reader submissions. It is an attempt to allow people to tell their personal stories, in the hopes of bringing greater compassion to the unique issues each of us face. If you would like to submit a story to this series, click here. Today’s guest post is by Seth Tearz. Almost one year ago my 4-year-old son, Jax, died in a drowning accident. This is my story about my struggle with faith and an unexpected source that helped me believe . . .
#TBT: Pooping for Disney
On Thursdays I post a favorite from the archives. This is from August, 2009. The backstory: I have been trying to potty train India for five months now. She has done really well getting the #1 part down. She hasn't had an accident in months and does really well at home and at school. The #2 though . . . not so much. I know that she has control over it, though. She doesn't really have accidents, she just waits until naptime every day when I put her in a diaper. (She is very . . .
Austin talks Invisalign (VIDEO)
This post was sponsored by Invisalign® clear aligners. My nephew and mom are receiving complimentary Invisalign treatment as they share their Invisalign journey. It's been almost six months now since I've started documenting my nephew’s journey with Invisalign clear aligners, and he has had some incredible results! For those of you who are not familiar with Invisalign Teen®, it’s a series of nearly invisible, removable aligners that are used to gradually (and discreetly) straighten teeth. My . . .
Wednesday’s Child: Meet Jaime
Every Wednesday I feature a child recently highlighted by a local Wednesday's Child newscast to share the stories of children from around the country who are waiting for a family. My hope is that this can broaden exposure for the children highlighted, but also serve as a reminder that these children represent thousands of children currently in the foster-care system. Perhaps their stories will inspire you to consider opening your home to a child needing a family. For more information and to . . .
What I want you to know about how wonderful it is to have a child with down syndrome
What I Want You to Know is a series of reader submissions. It is an attempt to allow people to tell their personal stories, in the hopes of bringing greater compassion to the unique issues each of us face. If you would like to submit a story to this series, click here. Today’s guest post is by Nora. Yesterday my son Kelly came with a special gift for me. He had carefully picked me a lovely bouquet…of dandelions. I have a bunch of kids, so this was not my first . . .
The inconvenient truth about your Halloween chocolate and forced child labor
The picture below is a photo of a young child gathering pods to harvest cocoa beans. There are hundreds of thousands of children in West Africa who do this work. Young children. Children who should be attending school and having a childhood. And they are working for most of the mainstream chocolate providers in the USA. A report from the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture about cocoa farms in the Ivory Coast estimated there were 284,000 children working on cocoa farms in . . .
Ethical and fair-trade candy ideas for Halloween
Did you know that most commercial chocolate companies are relying on child labor to source their cocoa? The low-down is here . . . but in a nutshell a BBC documentary revealed that child labor and even child trafficking is rampant in chocolate production, and that chocolate from most mainstream candy companies can be traced back to farms employing (and even buying) children to work in dangerous conditions. For our family, the response to learning this has been to limit our chocolate . . .
How to monitor safety issues while managing your own parental anxiety
This post was sponsored by Empowered SAFETY With my first child, I was really concerned about safety issues. Possibly even too concerned. I’ve always been a bit of a hypochondriac about my own health. I am a master catastrophizer, and having a child was just a new place to project some of that anxiety. I have been gifted with an overactive imagination, coupled with a propensity towards gloom and doom. This fatalistic creativity has led me to be a bit, ahem, DELUSIONALLY PARANOID, when it comes . . .
Money management with kids, and the power of matching
This post was sponsored by Scholarshare. For a recent birthday, one of my sons got a twenty-dollar bill from a family member. His eyes lit up when he opened the gift. He was excited about his newfound wealth. He pocketed it. A few days later, one of our neighbors came over after our kids had been playing across the street at their house. She had $20 in her hand. Guess who had just left his new twenty clutched in the sticky hand of the neighbors' four-year-old? My kids are . . .
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