At one of the schools I have the pleasure of visiting regularly, this week's craft table featured what the teacher appropriately called the "paper guillotine," along with some glue and paper. At one point, an unsuspecting adult walked over and saw the setup. She inquired, only half-jokingly, "Oh, is this the table where you slice […]

Childhood fears are as real to them, as our adult ones are to us. Case in point, when my daughter was younger and before I better understood highly sensitive children (afflinks), we drove past Seattle's Fremont Troll and it scared the heck out of her. She dubbed it the second scariest thing in the universe, coming in […]

Cleaning with kids isn't easy---sometimes it seems like all they want to do is play! One day, though, everything changed in how I viewed the process. Suddenly, life got a whole lot easier. I was in the kitchen making homemade almond butter (yum!). My five-year-old walked in with her cup of water and announced, "Mommy, […]

If you're anything like me, hints of cooler weather have you savoring the last sparkling lemonades and crunchy salads of the Summer, while also looking forward to savory soups and steamy, hot drinks. As visions of pumpkins dance through my head (and at the grocery stores and coffee shop menus), I can close my eyes […]

Due to my Mom’s work as an international model and actress, I spent most of my formative years surrounded by some of the World’s Most Beautiful People. Some, like my Mom, just happened to be beautiful on the inside, too, but that certainly wasn’t the case for everyone. Couple my surroundings with my passion for […]

Half the people in our city are sick this week. Half. No good, I say! We like feeling healthy and strong, thank you very much. I have no time to be down with a cold or flu. So, to the extent that I can, I'm giving my body every tool imaginable to keep it working […]

I was just waking up and remembered that I needed to move some food from the night before from the refrigerator to the freezer. Upon opening the fridge, I noticed that the lid on the food wasn't secure, so I tried to push it down. In doing so, my Superheroine-Like Muscles (that must be it, […]

I was driving home from the doctor with my five-year-old child. She was on day six of a 102-degree fever and all its accompanying crud. All she wanted was to get back home, as did I. As we were driving along a busy two-lane road at about 35 miles per hour, I saw him. A […]

I've never been a fan of carrot cake. It may be because it goes against one of my core values, which is not to mix vegetables with dessert. I'm no scientist, but I'm pretty sure there's a separate compartment in our bellies for All Things Sweet, and anything healthy in there simply contaminates it. But […]

For the past week, I've attended a multi-age outdoor school led by Teacher Tom, who's hailed by parenting experts as one of the "world’s leading practitioners of 'democratic play-based' education."* If you haven't followed his blog or bought his book, you should, and if you can attend his class, even better. Although I exceed the age limit for […]