Because natural isn't always possible — or easy.
Posted in Friendship, parenting, School and education on Mar 19th, 2013
Today: “Mommy, the girls were playing at recess and found a cool cut through to a secret area. I went over trying to be nice and to try and get involved. I asked if they had found any clues and [name deleted] told me, ‘Go away, this is none of your business.’ What should I [...]
Posted in parenting, Play, School and education on May 30th, 2012
Little Girl, mind of her own Little Girl, has decreed that she wants a small birthday party. She does not want to invite her entire preschool class, she says, even though it’s something I offered to her and something I always did in the past. No, she wants specific people. Her best bud S. N., [...]
Posted in parenting, School and education on May 8th, 2012
There’s a little girl in my Brownie troop. She’s sort of incredible, actually. She is, as I like to say, my most vocal scout. Loud and boisterous, you always know where she is and what she’s up to. All the girls love her, and despite the fact that it can be a challenge to corral [...]
Posted in Consumer Packaged Goods, Eating Healthy, parenting, Safety, School and education on Apr 9th, 2012
Let me start out by saying I can’t consume caffeine. It gives me heart palpitations and makes me feel jittery. However, I understand that there are scores of people out there who depend on a caffeine fix to get them going in the morning and keep them up late at night. I get it. I [...]
Posted in Education, exercise, parenting, School and education, toddlers on Jan 4th, 2012
Today, three out of four kids ages 3 to 5 are in some form of childcare including daycare and preschool. Increasingly, teachers, parents, and childcare workers are focusing more on reading than on running. However, according to a new study published in Pediatrics, the official journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), running trumps [...]
Posted in Education, School and education on Jun 30th, 2011
In May Little Girl had an incident at school. It’s not something I am talking or writing about, but suffice it to say we needed to find a new school. I did a lot of research (natch!), and visited a lot of places. One of the places I went was a Montessori school a few [...]
Posted in Food, Health, Organic, School and education on Jun 17th, 2011
I was more than impressed this past Tuesday to see that the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) school board voted to eliminate flavored milk from its cafeteria. Now, the more than 1,074,691 students in the district won’t be guzzling extra sugar, food dyes, and high fructose corn syrup with their milk. While the board [...]
Posted in Education, School and education on May 11th, 2011
Today Big Girl should be on a field trip to Queens Farms. Instead, she’s with her Daddy in the city. When the paperwork for the trip came home I was excited to see that all parents, for once, were welcome to come along for what seemed like an all day event. But then I saw [...]
Posted in Friendship, School and education on May 9th, 2011
Big Girl is doing a 50 states lesson in school. The kids are supposed to go out and ask friends and family to send them postcards from whatever states they live in. Cute idea, but could we actually get postcards from every state? I wasn’t sure. I started with my address book. We’ve got family [...]
Posted in Emotional development, parenting, School and education on Apr 22nd, 2011
Last year Big Girl was at a private school. There was a girl. At the time I called her That Girl. She had a lot of problems, or so I was told. All I knew was that she was bossy and mean to my kid. She made her cry. She’d come off the bus, my [...]