crazedparent

And baby makes...a mess...

Even though my writing has been published before, it's always a thrill when I see my articles in print in the newspaper. Especially when it's an essay that is a favorite, like the one that appeared in today's San Francisco Chronicle Home Garden section...

And baby makes -- a mess...
My husband and I are avid baseball fans. We named our first son after the famous pitcher Nolan Ryan. When our Nolan was born, we quickly learned that there was a similarity between being a new parent and playing baseball. Fresh moms and dads start out in the minor leagues, if you will. They're eager to get to "the show"  --  the big leagues  --  and have full confidence in their parenting prowess. There's only one problem. Just when you're ready to play major-league ball, you inevitably commit an error  --  a parenting rookie move. And back to the minors you go...Read the rest!

Home Depot kids workshops...good times and FREE.

Did you know that Home Depot offers free workshops for kids on the first Saturday of the month? Bring your preschooler to 'tween-age kidlings to the store and you can watch them construct anything from bird houses to shelves and other kits. It's a sweet sight. And did I mention it's free?

Thanks to Kikirikee for the details! Check with your local Home Depot for specifics, but here's the big-picture 411...

Home Depot Kids Workshops

Age range: 5 to 12   
Cost: Free

Kids Workshops are free "How-To Clinics" designed for children ages 5-12. The workshops are offered on the first Saturday of each month between 9:00 a.m. and noon at all The Home Depot stores. Children accompanied by an adult construct projects from pre-fabricated kits. The kits are designed to be both educational and practical.

The Home Depot's Kids Workshops offer useful projects including the creation of toolboxes, fire trucks and mail organizers, as well as more educational projects, such as a window birdhouse, bughouse or Declaration of Independence frame kit.

The workshops teach children do-it-yourself skills and tool safety, while at the same time helping to instill a sense of accomplishment. Additionally, this fun time allows for quality one-on-one time between adults and children.

In addition to the newly constructed project kit, each child receives a kid-sized orange apron, similar to The Home Depot associates' aprons, and an achievement pin.

Working Moms: The Pressure to "Have it All"

Can you tell me why working moms self-inflict pressure to "have it all"? Because I don't get it. Even as I do it to myself.

Read my rant at JobMom -- Working Moms: The Pressure to "Have it All."

Scrapgasm...no, really...

I'm spending the weekend in Yountville, Calif. at my first scrapbooking event. A "crop" hosted by ScrapTalk to raise funds for breast cancer research. My best friend from high school, Mrs. Geek, convinced me to go as a belated 35th birthday celebration. And after a month of wiping mocos and feeling like I was locked up in a loony bin of sick kids, a weekend in Napa scrapbooking looked really good.

I'm not a crafty type of gal. When Nol was born I completed his album. And that was the last album ever done from start to finish. And Q? He had no album...until today. I sat in a room at the Napa Valley Grill with 40 other women and created more than 12 kick ass pages, if I do say so myself. This scrapping thing? I'm diggin' it.

Say what you will about scrapbooking and folks who spend oodles of time of a single page. But let me tell you. It's hot. I saw paper that was just gorgeous...hadtohaveit gorgeous. Albums that were too cool to be sitting on a shelf. Cropping tools where women were "ooooohing" in a way that, well, can only be defined in one word: Scrapgasm.

And so, a new blog is born. Scrapbooking? It's sexy. And Mrs. Geek and I are going to show you why with once a day posts about the latest products, layouts, tools and cool shwag we've been playing with. We'll also be hosting some online workshops as soon as Mrs. Geek gets her groove in gear. Trust me, if you are even remotely interested in scrapping, you'll be into her classes.

Scrapgasm.

Bill Gates sets time limits for his kids' on the web...

How much time do the offspring of Bill Gates spend online or playing video games?

Forty-five minutes max during the week, and an hour on weekends, said Papa Gates at a recent business conference in Ottawa. He said his 10-year-old daughter only recently became interested in the Internet and the computer, largely because her school uses laptop computers for "nearly everything."

Do you set time limits for internet/computer use for your kids?

Love Thursday

Nothin' like a nice latte with a little heart in the foam to start your day. The barista made my day with this one...

Happy Love Thursday!

A bunch of random thoughts...

Today's the first day in a week that I've felt like my face isn't about to explode from this raging cold bug and sinus infection. I won't say our family is healthy yet because when that happens, I get a one-to-two day reprieve, then we're smacked with another illness. We are in a better place then we were several days ago. How's that, sick-jinx gods?

A bunch of little items I've been meaning to post here for the longest time but they just sat in my notebook...

• Couture Moms - I always have designs on my t-shirts, but I've never been one to wear shirts that have some sort of "Mom slogan," if you know what I mean. I received this cozy brown long-sleeved  shirt for my birthday - it says "Mom(2)" ... Mom to the 2 (2 kids...get it?) in rhinestones.  And I dig it. For one, the shirt itself is so comfortable I want to wear it all the time. It's just warm and fabric is incredibly soft, wash after wash. It's also just a silly, fun shirt - every time I wear it I always get a least one mom asking where she can buy one. And lately, silly fun is what I need. Check out Couture Moms.

• Unhappy Meals from the NYT: Writer Michael Pollan's penned this excellent story about nutrition. His opening line - "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." - has become our mantra, and his nine tips for eating healthy make you want to break out your cookbooks after a nice, long trip to your local farmer's market. My favorite piece of advice? "Don’t eat anything your great-great-grandmother wouldn't’t recognize as food."  Not rocket science, right? Of course not, but you read it and think, yeah, that trans-fat yogurt butter spread can't be all that good for me.

• I wrote a confession about having a childhood crush on Shaun Cassidy during his Hardy Boys peak. During our sick fest, I hit the library to stock up on DVDs for the boys to watch on my laptop...and I happened to find the first season of the Hardy Boys show on DVD. Coincidence? I don't think so. Friday night, after the boys went to sleep, we watched a few episodes, one of which included Shaun Cassidy singing my favorite song of his, "That's Rock N' Roll." And here's what I said out loud..."what did I see in him?" (To which my husband replied, "Ah, you can add him to your list of "why?") Most singers look good while they belt out a tune. But Shaun? Not so much. Maybe it was his puppy dog eyes or super fly-away hair. However, the questioning of my puppy love -- at the ripe age of 5 -- for Mr. Cassidy has no bearing on my consistent adoration of another rock star. So you'll at least still get to laugh, or roll your eyes -- whichever it is -- at my embarrassing confessions about that topic.

• On writing: Over the past few weeks several folks have asked me about my writing, or like to chat about how cool being a writer is...not "i'm so cool because i write", but how cool that you can make money doing some thing you love and still maintain a flexible schedule." It is cool in many ways, and it happens to my love, but it's also my job. I write every single day, upwards of 2,500 words a day, for various and sundry editorial assignments. Point being, my brain gets tired or words sometimes. My blog is not an accurate representation of my writing. It just isn't. Perhaps it's simply a function of time, which I am always short on. Yet it often makes me question whether or not to even keep it. I will, of course, because it serves many purposes for me personally and professionally. But for those of you who write professionally and manage to keep your blog writing as articulate and entertaining as your published work (print or online), I am in awe.

Random thoughts indeed.

Praising effort versus smartness...

The hubs sent me this thinker article called "The Power (and Peril) of Praising -- The Inverse Power of Praise." It reviews a recent study that looks at the effects of praising kids based on effort versus telling kids they are "smart." The result? The "smart" kids would crumble in the midst of difficult situations. The kids who were praised based on "effort" were more inspired to try more difficult challenges. The "smart" kids were scared of failing. The "effort" kids tried harder to succeed.

It's interesting...I notice this with Nol, how he gets a little shine in his eye when we tell him about how hard he worked on something. He wants to do more. We don't toss out "smartness" often, because really, what does that phrase really mean to a 5-year-old: "You're so smart."

Thoughts?

And we have another one...

Any guesses? Come on - another what?

ILLNESS.

The crazedparent house is now entering Week Four of what I affectionatly dub the Sick Ward. We had all of two days of healthiness before Nol came home with a fever and sore throat. It's the new thing, haven't you heard? Fever, sore throat, awful, wretched cough. And he passed it on to Q., who picked it up Saturday morning. Along with his dad. And then Sunday morning, after feeling so left out of this family sickness thing, I started to feel traces of the scratchy throat, the achey breaky bod. So now, we're all sick. Fun times here.

Every blog I read, every parent I speak with, seems to be in the middle of this battle against germs. Nasty, vile, pro-creatin' viruses that are hitting entire families for days (and weeks). It's beyong the traditional winter virus thing. It's frightening, and I'm left wondering...what gives?

I'm stocking up on my new favorite hand sanitizer, Clean Well, to replace my many bottles of Purell. I picked up Clean Well at a recent event and so far, I highly recommend it. It comes in tiny spray bottle, easy to drop into a purse, and has a nicer scent than the putrid alcohol smell from Purell. Purell was also causing Q'.s skin to peel...Clean Well, so far, hasn't had that effect. One spray goes a long way.

I'm ready for spring in a bad way.

The Mom Ramp...

"When the discussion of working moms is center stage, the phrases "opting in" and  "opting out"  tend to get tossed around alot. As if moms only have two choices: you work or you don't. And if you "opt out," well then, that's just  the end of your career. And it's just so wrong..."

Read the rest of my riff about this event at JobMom!