I was reading Atlantic this morning, the June 2014 issue whose cover has no art, just some stark and lovely typography related to Ta-Nehisi Coates's article about reparations for slavery in the US. (You can see it here.) Which is an excellent and depressing and eye-opening and heartbreaking article, and everyone should read it right now. SP was ( Read more... )

So much for Cool Mom. Half an hour ago SP's friend D's dad phoned to invite SP to sleep over with D tonight, and I said no ( Read more... )

(I know, I keep using the same joke.)

In light of this post, I wish to reassure the rest of the world that Toronto has not, in fact, suddenly become so completely free of both serious and petty crime that the police no longer have anything to do but pester children who are going about their business.

This morning I walked SP to the subway station, ( Read more... )

If you’ve never posted (or even lurked) on a mommy message board, there are two things you need to know about these entities. First, the mommy MB is designed to be a welcoming community where moms* can discuss problems and topics of common concern, get helpful advice and input, commiserate with one another, and offer mutual support. Second, in the ( Read more... )

... but boy, if you ever want a guilt trip? Talk to SP's principal. :P

SP is asleep in our bed at present. She emerged from her own room an hour or so ago, clutching her stuffed penguin in his hand-knitted neck warmer, her hedgehog puppet, and Grandpa's special fleece blanket, to complain that she couldn't get to sleep because the baby next door was crying. Our neighbours on that side are "teaching" their one-year-old ( Read more... )

So, the mommy blogosphere has been roiling this week over this somewhat unbelievable Wall Street Journal article, which apparently is excerpted from a book called Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother. You should go read it; I'll wait.

(Shorter Amy Chua: I'm a better mother than you because I'm meaner to my kids.)

There are thoughtful responses I really ( Read more... )

(Okay, I'm just kidding about the "film at eleven" part. Do newscasters even say that anymore?)

SP and I went to Word on the Street on Sunday afternoon. She decided to worm her way through the crowd in front of the TVO Kids stage, where some people were doing some kind of hip-hoppy dancing thing with headset mikes :P, and didn't tell me where she ( Read more... )

Sometimes I can sort of sense people wondering how someone who carried her baby around with her everywhere in one of those weird slings and nursed for ::mumblemumble:: years turned into someone who would let her six-year-old go into a neighbourhood store alone for a couple of minutes to buy bagels, or send her seven-year-old down the block to the ( Read more... )

For my own reference as much as anyone else's, a list of some of my favourite parenting-related websites and blogs (in no particular order):

Discipline & Behavior on AskDrSears.com. I'm not as uncritical a fan of William Sears as I used to be, but he remains one of my favourite "parenting experts" (on the understanding that no expert is right ( Read more... )