If there are any parents reading this who are thinking of taking their under-10 year olds to see the PG rated Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, please read the following from a ScreenIt.com review:Rated PG, the film contains a handful of mild expletives; some non-explicit, but sexually related dialogue; one teen who sexually pursues her [...]

Continue reading " PG Rating Isn’t What It Used To Be "

Without a doubt, the last few weeks of school are amongst the busiest in the calendar year. Graduations, recitals, concerts, sporting competitions and final exams all exert undue influence over the time and energy of students and parents alike. Most days find me traveling across the county shuffling kids to one event or another; May [...]

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Family. We love them, but there’s a reason we leave the nest, right? No one knows how to press your hot buttons and make you feel like an awkward kid again, quite the way family does. For some it’s judgmental in-laws, and for others it’s a well-meaning mom telling you how to raise your kids, [...]

Continue reading " Family Gatherings – How to Deal With Tension and Uncomfortable Situations "

For girls, friends mean connection and validation and when a girl wants to hurt another, the deepest wound she can cause is to cut off that friendship. The technical term is called relational aggression more popularly known as “mean girls.” Often though, the mean girl was a best friend just yesterday! Relational aggression is behavior [...]

Continue reading " Mean Girls – What Parents Can Do When BFF’s Become Enemies "

“If seeds in the black earth can turn into such beautiful roses, what might not the heart of man become in its long journey toward the stars?” G.K. ChestertonI woke up today with achy muscles and hamstrings that felt stretched to the max. Too much time at the gym? Too many miles on my bike?Nope. [...]

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Mothers. Much has been written about, dedicated to, analyzed, scrutinized and attributed to this pillar of our existence. Over the years, the cliché of the patient on the couch being asked “Why do you hate your mother?” has become as familiar as Toll House® cookies and Goodnight Moon.We blame the ‘refrigerator mothers’ of the 50’s, [...]

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“Be not forgetful to entertain strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.“ -Hebrews 13:2My husband is not frequently mortified by my behavior, but within the past year, two separate occasions brought rolling of his eyeballs, scratching of his head, and more than one “I can’t believe you did that” lecture.I befriended a lady-about a [...]

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The northeast corridor got clobbered by heavy snow and ice this week, leaving many parts of the New York City metropolitan area without power for several days. Our tiny town was no exception; most of Ridgefield was without electricity all day Wednesday. Extended empathy for victims of Katrina and last year’s Asian tsunami immediately bubbled [...]

Continue reading " It’s All About Process "

As the weather gets cooler and your lightweight summer maternity clothes are no longer warm enough for chilly mornings and evening, you know it is time to go shopping. If this is your first pregnancy, chances are there is nothing in your closet you can wear as pre-pregnancy clothes stop fitting by the 2nd trimester, [...]

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When entertaining, disposable dishes are hands down the number one creator of trash. Avoid using them, and you’ll cut your resulting landfill-bound waste by almost 100%!  Plastics #3, 6, and 7, of which most disposable dishware is made, are the most toxic plastics ever invented, and sadly, the most pervasive. Most of us, myself included until fairly [...]

Continue reading " Eco-Friendly Entertaining – A Guide to Greener Parties, Part I "