Rage Against The Minivan

This is a safe space, so I’m going to tell you something I don’t dare speak aloud at home in my living room: If I have to provide voices for the creatures of My Little Pony for one more minute, it will likely be a string of expletives that would melt Pinkie Pie’s little plastic ears. I’m glad I got that off my chest. There are four kids in the Howerton family. Three of them are extroverts, and I’m a classic introvert. I used to think making small talk with loud strangers at large social . . .

Last week, the news broke that the police officers involved in shooting an unarmed black child for holding a toy gun would not be indicted for any measure of crime. I missed this news breaking. I was busy celebrating my own son's 11th birthday party. His party of choice was not entirely unrelated to Tamir Rice’s death over a year ago. Since then, I’ve not allowed him to play with pretend guns. So for his birthday, he wanted to go to a laser tag facility and play in an environment that . . .

This post is sponsored by Flare Play. I have been hesitant to engage my kids in gaming. I have always been concerned with both the content of video games, and the propensity for gaming to taking up too much time. So when Flare Play reached out to me about reviewing their new console, I was curious but also a little skeptical. How would this work in a family where the parents are reluctant and the kids are dying to play video games all day long? Flare Play is a really unique interface. It is . . .

This past week, a video went viral of two young white girls being gifted with black dolls and subsequently expressing their disapproval. It has the provocative title "Parents get white girls black dolls and what happens next is shocking." Except that it isn't that shocking, sadly. I'm not going to link to it, because these are very young children who are clearly products of their parents at this point and don't deserve to have their faces on blast all over the internet. But chances are, you've . . .