Of Children, Paint, and Unplanned Sabbats

Originally posted to Pagan Families, 9/22/14. When Beltane came, we’d planned to dance a May Pole at my older daughter’s preschool.  Not exactly pagan, but I don’t know many pagan families locally, and the school May Pole was as close to traditional as we were going to get.  Well, my daughter lost all interest in …

Parents Are Different

We don’t use time-outs or other kinds of punishments; most people do. Whenever I get into a conversation about toddler discipline, the conclusion seems to be that kids are different, and different kids respond better to different parenting approaches. It’s true that kids are different! And aside from being true, it’s a way of giving …

Epistemologies

Before anyone gets excited, let me note that this pregnancy ended in a miscarriage a couple months ago. I’m not currently pregnant. “Maybe,” then “probably,” and at that point I joined the April 2012 birth board on BabyCenter. I’d fantasized about the moment I found out I was pregnant again. My face got hot when …

Scuba Fiasco

I have a friend whose baby is nine months older than Rebecca, and recently she and her husband decided to do a romantic getaway before their next baby comes. That sounds nice, I said, whenever she mentioned it. Was I really oblivious that she was nervous about leaving her daughter? I really was. Despite having been a stay-at-home parent for over a year now and having read a lot about other mothers’ experiences, I apparently still haven’t gotten it through my head that leaving your baby can be hard to do, even when your baby is more like a toddler and even when you’ve got someone you trust and who isn’t unduly put out to look after her. Lots of people leave their babies every day, so how bad can it be?