Winning form
Mallory won her age division this afternoon at the Coupe Skinouk today. Of course I love my child no matter what and am pleased with any result so long as…
Parenting
My girl learns code
Few things in life give me more joy than walking down the street, hand in hand with my daughter. One of them, which I experienced for the first time today,…
On Childhood Angst
Can children be existentialists? What I’m asking isn’t so much whether or not it’s possible, but should we allow it? If I dare to claim to define some central ideas…
Waterskiing
A happy reminder that my daughter is not me.
On Guilt and Responsibility
I grew up in a family with a strong work ethic. You couldn’t read the comics until you finished the world news first. Sitting to do anything other than read…
On Thigh Gap
My daughter is worried about it. She just turned 11. She’s been sick from the heat a couple times because she wears jeans everywhere. It’s a problem. I told a…
Upset Them at Your Peril
Professor Edward Schlosser wrote an interesting piece in Vox about, in part, the power his students have to call the shots these days. I can attest that it’s at best,…
Handed in our notice at the day care
For the last eight years every working day our daughter Mallory has been in the care and tutelage of the teachers at Glebe Parents Day Care. I still remember those…
First solo walk to school
This actually happened Monday, but things were too squirrelly to note it then. However I cannot let this even go unmarked. Lately she’s been walking to school with her next…
Nine
Almost a decade. I take a lot of photos of Mallory. And each in each one I see a child who is so grown up. It’s always been like that.…
Rite of passage
I got a pound of Bridgehead coffee for Christmas. From Mallory. She slid her debit card into the reader, punched in her PIN and did it, I’m told. I knew…
How does one homeschool, with all the intensity that involves, and be a compassionate, informed person at the same time?
Sometimes it is really hard to keep balance. How does one balance parenting with everything else? I don’t want to undervalue my husband’s contribution to our family life – his…
Peter MacKay’s wife doesn’t help his – or our – cause
The latest flap over sexist comments from Justice Minister Peter Mackay came about when a Mother’s and Father’s Day emails from Peter Mackay to his staff were leaked to the…
Growing by leaps and bounds
I daily marvel at my daughter. I expect I’m like most parents. But I often get caught in the mental rut of baby parenting, despite the fact that Mallory’s eight.…
What’s a Mother to Do?
It’s always harder to have something taken away than to never have it in the first place. But still… A local high school is removing a few dozen students from…
Valentine’s Day
Valentine’s Day is one of those weird non-holiday holidays. There’s issues with the ethics of cut flowers and a need to buy ethical fair-trade organic chocolate. There are those who…
Balance beam
Balance beam. As the family photographer it fell to me to attend Mallory’s last gymnastics class. She had an ear to ear grin on during the entire class. Except when…
For Our Children: Stand Up, Speak Out
It`s TED Talk Tuesday on 350orbust. Marianne Williamson, an internationally acclaimed spiritual teacher and New York Times bestselling author, spoke at TEDx Traverse City earlier this year. I love that…
On the occasion of the website re-launch
So today marked the finale of a two year campaign to re-design, re-engineer and re-everything the flagship website where I work. And after the most excruciating day of bickering about…
Paternity Rights in Rape Cases
It’s an interesting moral dilemma to have a judge decide a child has access to a father when the only contact the mother and father had was a sexual assault…