The rollercoaster ride of divorce and hope
By Karen Kaye I was blindsided. I did not see this coming. Sure, we had our issues, but I was not prepared for the volcano that would erupt and continue to overflow for a solid decade. I was a stay-at-home mom.
Decode Your Child’s Cold
By Sandra Gordon As miserable as a cough or stuffy nose can make your child feel, it’s helpful to know that cold symptoms can often seem worse they actually are. “Congestion is a normal, healthy response to a virus or an irritant.
Last call
I wrote my first article for this column in August of 2013, which means that I’ve been writing it weekly now for six years and three months. If you were wondering, that works out to something like 300 articles, give
Making good manners cool again
By Sandi Schwartz Have you noticed that kids these days do not have the best manners? When I volunteer at my daughter’s school at lunchtime, I rarely hear the children saying please and thank you, although they are certainly not shy
The Right Situation
Helping your kids be successful is in many instances about putting them into the kinds of situations that emphasize their strengths and compensate for their weaknesses. This is true in big ways, like when choosing high school classes. Why force your
Teach me
My youngest kid was up very early this morning, coming downstairs while I was still meditating. “Dad,” he said, poking his head through the doorway, “can you make me some scrambled eggs?” I told him that he was perfectly capable
Dropping the “n” word
My middle kid had the N-word dropped on him again yesterday (he’s had to put up with this at least once a year since he was school aged). This time he was playing basketball with a kid he’d never really
Best baby skin care
By Sandra Gordon Skin care for babies is big business. On Amazon alone, there are more than 60,000 products in the baby skincare category. Before stocking up on bottom balm and lavender baby wash or skincare “essentials” for your baby registry, read
Turning the corner
By Tiffany Doerr Guerzon My daughter and I have turned a corner in our relationship. Mia has come to the point in her life where her friends and social circle outrank her family — including me. The clues that she is
Something Real
By Luke Hill Our family often hosts homestay students from other countries. The most recent has been participating in a local high school program called Beyond Borders that specializes in teaching ethical business leadership by combining traditional classroom work with hands-on
Teach kids to become money masters
By Sandra Gordon Lee’s passion for teaching her boys about money through a system of reminders, routines and rewards grew from her own experience with poverty. Growing up in Suncheon, a scenic agricultural and industrial city in South Korea, Lee saw
Confident thinking
I’m not exactly an advocate of what people call “positive thinking” philosophies. I think they mostly encourage people to adopt wishful or imaginary thinking that prevents them from dealing practically with the very real problems of their lives. I am, however,
This is our day to do our way
By Jane Muller Even on days when we’re not feeling it, there is love. And even though our loved ones know they are loved, it’s reassuring to them when we express those feelings. We’re not an “I love you” out loud kind
The Right Time Question
There’s a kind of question that comes up constantly when you’re talking about parenting. I call it the “right time” question, and it starts way before there are even kids around to worry about. You know the kind of question
The Principles of the Thing
Setting clear but reasonable boundaries for children is an essential part of parenting. We’ve all seen situations where kids have been given either too little or too much structure and end up unable to regulate themselves. Kids need boundaries. It’s easy
Solid points for when to introduce solids
By Teresa Pitman By the early to mid-1940s, doctors were recommending that formula-feeding parents should be adding solid foods earlier and earlier. (In time, they began to recommend this to breastfeeding parents as well, though there was no evidence to support
Making a nest
This week has been a great week, because we finally (knock on wood) discovered a solution to our bedtime woes. My youngest son has real difficulties going to sleep at night. It isn’t for lack of trying, but some combination of
Parenting Induced Exhaustion
You may have heard this from a parent before, but sometimes looking after children makes me tired. I’m not talking about the physical tiredness that comes from children waking up in the middle of the night (which, thankfully, I no longer
A Chance to do Something Real
I’ve written before about how our family often hosts homestay students from other countries – Japan, Spain, Mexico, Saudi Arabia, and now Germany. These students are usually in late high school or early university, and they stay for a semester
Growing up
You know how you see a picture of your kid from 10 years ago, and you know it’s your kid, and you even know it was you who took the picture, but you can’t for your life figure out how
