Category: Uncategorized

Categories
Uncategorized

9 rules for shopping for OTHER PEOPLE’S kids

Oh, the crap I got for other people’s kids before I had kids of my own. “I’m sure he’s going to love this incredibly loud, battery-operated police car!” And then there’s the stuff my own kids have accumulated over the years. I mean, wow, that slime really doesn’t dry out.

Before I go further, however, let me say that any and all gifts we have ever received have always been appreciated. This is not a complaint log. Rather, it’s a live-and-learn list of tips that I like to keep in mind when shopping for others.

If I were to give one piece of gift-giving advice to people shopping for kids, it would be this: “Keep it simple.” Seriously, you could wrap a pack of crayons or a hot wheel car up in brown paper bag with a bow on it and most kids would be over the moon. And if they’re too old to be actually thrilled by that stuff, then they’re old enough to politely fake it.

Of course, I’m not going to give just one piece of advice. That would never go viral. Here’s nine other things to keep in mind when shopping for other people’s kids. (And, yes, there are always going to be exceptions to these rules. If you know a certain family loves doing crafts together, then by all means get them all the glitter glue in the world.)

1. Does this toy come with a million pieces? If the answer is yes, don’t buy it.

9 rules for shopping for OTHER PEOPLE'S kids

Of course, this is not fair because I have bought my own kids all manner of Lego, Rainbow Loom and beading kits. Then again, when I’m stepping on shards of Lego at midnight or spending the better part of my life sorting through itty bitty pieces, do you really want me cursing your name? It’s better to let the parents’ shoulder their own blame.

Continue reading “9 rules for shopping for OTHER PEOPLE’S kids”

Categories
Uncategorized

Rage cleaning: It’s a thing, right?

Rage cleaning: It's a thing, right?

I can’t be the only one who needs to get good and angry, like righteously pissed off, if I ever stand a chance of scrubbing under the sink.

It all started yesterday afternoon when I pulled into my laneway parking spot with Mary. Life was good right then. I had a trunk load of fresh groceries and a reasonable expectation of where my children would be attending school for the foreseeable future. Talk about not appreciating what you have until it’s gone.

I then proceeded to get out of my car and right into a squabble with a neighbour about laneway parking rights. I was no sooner in the door with a whiny three-year-old and a heap of groceries when the school called. Oh no, I thought, who’s cracked their head open this time?

Continue reading “Rage cleaning: It’s a thing, right?”
Categories
Uncategorized

What do you think of those twisted family photos?

Old Habit, 2011 by Susan CopichOld Habits, 2011 by Susan Copich

Some dark and provocative photos that explore the more desperate undercurrents of motherhood have been making the rounds on blogs and social media. Photographer and mother of two, Susan Copich, found herself facing middle age with a waning acting career and a home life set to auto pilot, according to Slate. She also, like so many mothers, realized that she was missing from all the family photos.

So Copich began staging domestic scenes, many of them including her two daughters, and casting her own despair as the star element. The result is a photo series titled “Domestic Bliss” that just finished showing at the Umbrella Arts Gallery in New York City. You can scroll through several of the pictures from the series in this .

I must say, I love them. There’s a bit of dark humour to some of the pictures while others I have to keep returning to look at because they make me feel uncomfortable. In nearly every shot, Copich stares out with perfectly dead eyes, in various stages of undress. She oozes desperation and ennui; sex and violence; drudgery and despair. And then there are her children in the background. I can’t get over just how evocative these images are.

Continue reading “What do you think of those twisted family photos?”
Categories
Integrated custom content Uncategorized

I didn’t know holiday shopping could be this good

RBC Avion Holiday Boutique

Happy to be part of the RBC Avion Holiday Boutique Blogger Campaign with Mom Central Canada. This one’s sponsored.

What if I told you holiday shopping didn’t have to involve sweating half to death in your winter coat while you fight your way through crowds? Imagine if you didn’t have to lug all your purchases around the mall and across a vast frozen expanse of parking lot. And then picture arriving home with all of your gifts already wrapped.

No, I have not completely lost my mind. Nor am I trying to sell you on some sort of crazy expensive, luxury shopping experience enjoyed by Jennifer Lopez and Reese Witherspoon. I am talking about a holiday shopping service that is FREE to all RBC Avion Visa card holders.

I went to Yorkdale Shopping Centre last week for the opening of the RBC Avion Holiday Boutique and I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. An exclusive lounge just for Avioners? Why? Am I too good for the food court? The short answer is yes. NOBODY wants to deal with mad holiday crowds in the food court or anywhere else.

My experience began with me circling around a full parking lot, dreading the unavoidable trek to the mall through bitter winter winds. Except, no! If you have an Avion card, you get valet parking. All you have to do is drive over to the Holt Renfrew side of Yorkdale Shopping Centre and show the valet your Avion card and your parking will be taken care of just like that. I have never, ever, had valet parking before in my life and, let me tell you, a girl could get used to that kind of service.

Continue reading “I didn’t know holiday shopping could be this good”

Categories
Uncategorized

All our kids need to learn about Black history

Civil rights march on police line, Washinton, DC 1963Civil rights march on Washington, DC police line on August 28, 1963.

We shelter our children by censoring Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn, lest they ever encounter offensive language in literature.

But Ferguson still burns.

We tip toe around ideas of race and class, forever tweaking the way we talk about these things as though some sort of semantic twist will be the key to making our problems disappear. It’s as though we believe that if we use language like “person of colour” and “economically disadvantaged” it will somehow make it less true that being a poor, Black man in America means every single odd is stacked against you.

But Ferguson still burns.

If you are a Black man in America, you only have a 54% chance of graduating high school. You have more than a 30% chance of going to jail. And you have the lowest life expectancy in the country.

If you are an unarmed Black man in America, a police officer can shoot you seven times and not even have go to trial.

Continue reading “All our kids need to learn about Black history”
Categories
Uncategorized

10 places to give in Toronto this holiday

10 places to give in Toronto

This is a guest post written by local Toronto mom and wonderful person, Rebecca Lee.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t need anything this holiday season. Sure, I’d appreciate a new duvet cover and I wouldn’t say no to a fancy mixer, but I don’t need these things. My kid has a list of things she would like for Christmas and as the only grandchild to both sets of grandparents, she’s bound to get most of what’s on her list, even as I protest that she’s not in need of anything.

My cupboards and fridge are full. I’m able to pay the rent each month and put gas in the car that gets us to work and school. I’ve never run out of tampons or diapers. I’ve never had to throw out anything I own because it was infested with bugs.

I am so lucky. I am so very lucky.

As someone who worked in the non-profit sector for almost 15 years, I know of people who cannot say the same. Around this time last year I helped a young mother sort through donated clothing to find sleepers that would fit her newborn. It’s not that she didn’t have sleepers for her baby; it’s that she didn’t have the money to wash the sleepers in the laundry basket.

Around this time of year, as we become inundated with commercials, I like to take some time to consider those people who wouldn’t receive a holiday gift if it weren’t for the work of an agency or organization. These agencies and organizations rely on donors, especially at this time a year, to bring joy to those who aren’t as lucky as some of us. Rather than give cash, there are a number of ways to donate that can help you – and your kids – think about the wish lists and needs of others.

1. The Shoebox Project distributes shoeboxes filled with items to women living in, or accessing, shelters and similar agencies. It’s as simple as finding a shoebox in your recycling bin and filling it with appropriately $50 of items. Some suggestions include TTC tokens, toiletries, and nut-free candies. To their list, I would also suggest a gift card to a juice or smoothie cafe (fresh vegetables and fruit are not often on the menu at shelters), and a pair of flip flops that can be used as shower shoes. The Shoebox Project happens across Canada and there is a likely a drop-off location close to you.

Continue reading “10 places to give in Toronto this holiday”
Categories
Uncategorized

5 random facts about me

I was tagged in a “5 Random Facts About Me” meme by the talented Susan Goldberg nearly a month ago. I am bad about participating in things like this, so it was only just now, realizing I have an hour before preschool pick up and wondering what I might write in that small window that I remembered about it. (Susan also tagged Sarah Gilbert, Stacy Morrison, Karin Cope and Deb Rox,by the way.)

mother daughter shot of the year

“Come on, pose for a shot with Mommy.”

Here goes.

1. I’ve lived all my life in Toronto, Ontario (Canada) except for two back-to-back years in Halifax, Nova Scotia and then the Bronx, New York.
Although you’d expect the transition from beautiful, small and picturesque Halifax to the mean city streets of Little Italy of the Bronx to be somewhat traumatic for an insecure 11-year-old girl, the original move from Toronto to Halifax was much harder for me. I did make enduring friendships when I lived in Halifax, though, and my dad continued to work in NYC (commuting back and forth to Toronto) until a few years ago. So there were always frequent visits to the Bronx and I still think of New York as a sort of second home to this day.

Continue reading “5 random facts about me”

Categories
Uncategorized

Listen to me whine about how I don’t know what I want to do #firstworldproblems

#firstworldproblems #shutup

Image adapted from Flickr via the CC license.

“Focus,” I tell Colum. I am forever begging him to focus on what he’s doing, stop getting distracted and stay organized.

Holy cow, am I ever a hypocrite.

My life has been like the Russian nesting dolls of distraction for the past several weeks. I’ve lost focus on every level. Big picture, long-term career and life goals? They’ve become shattered into a dozen sparkly shards, each beckoning me in different directions. The same goes for the mid-range goals I thought I had so clearly laid out for myself. And so on, as you peel back the layers and I find myself sitting down to write a blog post, but unable to remember what it was I so urgently wanted to say.

So I check Facebook and Twitter, reply to a few emails, pour another coffee, start unloading the dishwasher, mindlessly eat a few crackers and then return to my computer. The effect of all these stratospheres of distraction has me reeling. The house alone, my god. Toys, games, books and assorted craft supplies litter every surface. Yes, the floor is a surface. I just can’t keep up with the trail of destruction left by my kids — not when I can whip out my phone to quickly research every passing thought and then fall down another rabbit hole of notifications and messages until I look up 15 minutes later and walk out of the room, leaving the dishes undone once again.

Continue reading “Listen to me whine about how I don’t know what I want to do #firstworldproblems”
Categories
Contests Integrated custom content Uncategorized

One true story and five reasons I’m addicted to the new LGG3 (plus giveaway!)

You can thank LG Canada and Mom Central Canada for this post, the giveaway and all the selfies I’m suddenly posting all over the place.

True story: when my son was born in 2006 I didn’t even have Facebook. Twitter was barely a thing and Instagram was yet a glint in some guy’s eye. I’d never heard of WordPress, I used a flip phone and I had to upload pictures from my digital camera to my computer using an actual cord.

At the same time, this was the golden age of blogging. New moms would cope with bitter isolation and anxiety by logging onto their computers late at night, during naps, while baby wearing or whenever they could. Some started their own blogs as outlets for raw and honest feelings and opinions. Others left comments, creating a new online community for moms. Still others of us, logged on day after to day just to read and to know that we were not alone.

There will always be a place for honest and timely long-form expression of our experiences — especially those of motherhood. But, to a large extent, social media and mobile technology have changed the way we connect. I love to wax nostalgic about the good old days when blogging was honest and real, before it became tainted with corporate greed and littered with sponsored posts. *Cough, cough.* I also talk about the dangers of tech taking over our lives. I worry about the lasting impact it has on my kids and how it affects our real one-on-one connections.
But, honestly? Mobile tech is more good than bad. That’s why we all have a phone fused to our hand, after all. Blogging was wonderful when I had my first two kids, but catching up with Twitter on my phone while nursing my third to sleep was a game changer. Ultimately, phones connect way more than they isolate. They make it possible for me to answer business emails while taking my kids to the park. They help keep track of a busy family’s schedule and they let me share pictures with all the important people in my life at the click of button.
And the better the tech gets, the less invasive it it. Snapping a couple quick pics with your phone is much easier than fumbling around in your bag for a camera. Quickly replying to an email from a park bench is way better than taking out your laptop. And we can put them away just as fast as whip them out. We have our phones out so much, not because we’re addicted to our phones, but because they are our cameras, day planners, computers, TVs, libraries, personal trainers, notepads and so much more.
Okay, fine. I MAY be a little bit addicted to this latest phone. The LG G3 is really blowing my mind. I didn’t even think I wanted a new phone until I tried this baby.
1. It’s so pretty.
LGG3 with case
Looks aren’t everything but good design is both stylish and functional and this phone delivers on both fronts. Love the rear power and volume buttons, the super high-res screen and the removable battery.

Continue reading “One true story and five reasons I’m addicted to the new LGG3 (plus giveaway!)”

Categories
Uncategorized

So I lost my only car key … again

This car is mocking me

Here’s what I remember.

Colum and Irene were eating breakfast in the kitchen and I was letting Mary sleep since her preschool starts later than the kids’ school. I had made their lunches and stacked the containers neatly at one corner of the kitchen island. Colum’s backpack was in the corner of the room, but Irene’s had been left in the car overnight.

I remember taking the car key off it’s hook and slipping on a pair of flats to dash out to the car. I didn’t wear a jacket, but I think I might have had a cardigan on. I unlocked the car doors by turning the key twice in the driver’s side door since we don’t have a remote access key fob for our car. I then opened the rear car door on the driver’s side and saw that the backpack was at the other side of the car. I walked around the back of the car, opened the rear door on the passenger side and took out the backpack.

I remember going upstairs, waking Mary, bringing her to the bathroom and getting her dressed. Her stroller had been left outside and was wet, so I covered the seat with a plastic bag and then a reusable cloth shopping bag. We walked the two older kids to the school bus and then walked back home.

Then I fed Mary breakfast, packed her a school snack, and walked her to preschool. Then I walked back home again, tried to work for a couple hours, walked back to the preschool to get Mary and then, you guessed it, walked home. Yes, this is my life.

Continue reading “So I lost my only car key … again”