I appreciate that parenting is an amazing opportunity for personal growth, but I kind of feel like my psyche is about to explode. I can’t say that it’s my brain, because that would imply a boast about smartifying, which I’m decidedly not. And I can’t say that it’s my heart exactly, because it’s not the…
marriage
Happier at home … by staying at home?
The more I channeled Happier at Home author Gretchen Rubin this morning, straightening up and dealing with clutter, the more I started thinking about ditching the chance to see her speak tonight. Talk about shooting the messenger. She didn’t exactly say the words “don’t do anything that doesn’t make you feel joyful” in what I read…
One person’s happiness is … musings on marriage
Hearing about someone else’s marital problems is a guilty pleasure, but only until it becomes cause for envy. In her new book, Happier at Home, Gretchen Rubin shares the little things that bother her about her husband Jamie (who must be a really good sport to put up with this public laundry-airing). I liked hearing…
City mouse, country mouse, suburban mom
It’s been a lifelong desire of mine to live many different existences at one time. I wanted to be a jet-setting child actress and also live a life of quiet contemptation from my perch in the treehouse. I wanted to be a busy, driven academic and also a party girl. Today, I want to be…
A weekend of many possibilities
For nearly a year, I assumed I’d be out of town tonight. I would either be at the National Women’s Studies Association national conference, hosted this year by my alma mater, the University of Cincinnati. It would have been a reunion of sorts, and I’d have had the chance to talk to people about the…
How to do only one thing at a time: a work in progress
I’m a lucky woman. I get to do a lot of cool things. This morning, I got to take my kids to their great public school, an Expeditionary Learning school, where children start every day Monday through Thursday with a morning meeting and start every Friday with a community meeting. I love that they see…
20 years ago today: How I Met Their Father
I met my future husband at a dorm room party on Friday, April 24, 1992. Twenty years ago today. “You were babies!” people exclaim when I tell them this. Yes and no. I was 19, he almost 21. We did, in some ways, grow up together. We’ve seen the world change together, from days of…
On eating, blogging, and parenting
Being one of some 1500 traditional food enthusiasts here at the Weston A. Price Foundation Wise Traditions conference is humbling and exhilarating. So many people have regained health or healed their children through real food. The stories at the Gut and Psychology Syndrome (GAPS diet) lecture alone were amazing. It’s easy in mainstream circles to…
A weekend of holistic health and blogging
A tale of two conferences I’ve had a split personality this weekend. Much of my time has been spent at the wonderful blogging conference, Blogalicious. Since I first arrived at the conference Friday morning, I’ve met great people, caught up with friends, and learned a ton about social media and media resources in general. A…
Seeing the light, in the dark
It was a day when every hour looked like 5 p.m. Grey. Rain. Then rainier, and windy. So why am I feeling better than I’ve felt since, like, June? One guess is the yoga. I did about 20 minutes alone upstairs in my bedroom this morning, after 5 minutes using the chi machine. Post-juice, pre-breakfast….
Feelin’ the Holistic Moms love
What a surprise I got tonight when my Holistic Moms co-leaders and members presented me with flowers and a (gluten-free, dairy-free, soy-free, refined-sugar-free) cake at our monthly meeting! We decided not to do a huge anniversary party again this year after last year’s blow out, and I wasn’t really missing all the stress! But they…
Tears on my yoga mat
Yesterday I went to a yoga class for the first time since the baby was born five months ago. And I cried. It was a big deal to get out the door. For weeks, nay, months, I had been looking up schedules at all the local studios to see when they might have a class…
Trying to “celebrate calm”
When I first took Rene Hackney’s Positive Discipline class as part of a play and workshop series at Parenting Playgroups, my son wasn’t even two, and he was too cute for words. Just coming off of some intense separation anxiety and just starting to string together sentences, he could do no wrong. It was easy…
Time for mom?
I guess time management experts consider my time writing this to be part of my 30 hours of weekly “leisure time,” so I’ll keep it short. Brigid Schulte has written about this elusive free time concept with regard to moms in the Washington Post Magazine. Definitely interesting stuff. Better stop multitasking and actually listen to…
Small change
Leave it to the French to spoil a quiet moment. No, really it was my toddler, just choosing to blast a track from Putumayo’s French Playground in the middle of a rare couple connection. The three of us had just gone out for a nice dinner together — lovely walk in cool September air down…
Busy mouths
A hickey, a buzz, chocolate and babysitting all in one night. Sounds like high school. But it was really my husband’s 37th birthday. And he wasn’t the one to give me the hickey. Even though it was his special day, I decided to hand the toddler over to my husband so I could go for…