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gender schmender
When he was three years old, my son Oliver used to dress up as a fairy. On a regular basis. Some of his closest friends were girls and there was always an encouraged exchange of costumes between them,...
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my mommy’s mommy
How old is a child when he realizes that his Grandma – or Bubbe or Nana or Gaga – is actually his own mother’s mother? I have forgotten this. I don’t mean how old is he when he can correctly identify...
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memory keeper
a box of memories When my first child was born, the impression of each day felt so strongly imprinted on my mind, on my whole being really, that I couldn’t imagine forgetting a thing. Some of the...
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welcome to middle childhood
Every year has felt different, but seven feels different in a whole new way. According to child psychologists, it is the beginning of the phase of development known as ‘middle childhood’. This has...
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a view from the sidelines
Three kids ago, it probably would have boiled my blood. But last week when I read Frank Bruni’s article about the foibles of modern parenting I laughed, I shook my head knowingly, I winced in a few...
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nighttime
Nighttime used to be mine. Then it was the struggle to turn over, your feet under my ribs. Then it was a contraction and another and another and I think this is it. Now it is being pulled, pulled from...
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tea-and-crumpets parenting
There are not many contexts in which I can make the claim, but when it comes to parenting I am pretty sure I want to be French. Everything I read about this classy, balanced mode of motherhood makes me...
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mommy csi
Dear Mom of the Kid My Kid Hit at Playgroup, It wasn’t that hard, it really wasn’t. Sure, she was screaming like a banshee, but with a 14-month-old volume can be a red herring, can’t it? There are...
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peas in a pod
Last week, I did a segment on HuffPost Live about multiples. It was a conversation among six women, each of whom had been touched by twins in some way. Of the six, two were a set of twins themselves,...
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a parliamentarian, an old jewish man, a friend and a wasp
In 1642, Oliver Cromwell led a contingent of parliamentarians against King Charles I, defeating him in what became known as the English Civil War and giving rise to the only occasion in modern British...
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this is how i do it
The nanny is on holiday, my husband is out of town. It’s not necessarily a typical day – in our house, the schedule is different every day of the week – but the pieces of it all are. Inspired by the...
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my wiggly party is over
The Wiggles have a new line-up. They have a new album, which came out last month, an accompanying DVD due to be released next week, and are currently ‘Taking Off’ on their first tour as a...
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what’s in the middle
First names make a statement, middle names tell a story. Often they preserve a memory. In the Jewish tradition, there is a disinclination to name after the living. Ours is not a culture of ‘Junior’s or...
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boys will be boys…or not
I have three boys, each distinct in his own way. When they are at school, I imagine their differences are taken into consideration, to the degree it is possible in the context of a heterogenous...
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food, glorious food
We had a French family over for brunch one Sunday morning not too long ago. The father was a colleague of my husband’s, visiting Scotland from Paris on an academic stint. The children, a girl and a...
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i’d say he’s average
I could see the penalty shoot out, but only just. Five balls in the back of the net and you win a prize! My two sons were standing in line, waiting, kicking up the dirt together in anticipation. It was...
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learning to ride
My first post is up as a contributing blogger at Brain, Child Magazine (if you haven’t checked out this wonderful publication for ‘thinking’ parents, you should)! The essay is about how my oldest child...
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i should have given my kids my last name
My daughter’s last name is the same as her father’s, but only because she came third. Had she been born first, she would have taken mine. That was the deal we struck in the interest of fairness. A boy:...
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my biggest parenting critic right now? my eight year old
This week at Brain, Child I am wondering whether Oliver thinks I am too hard on Phoebe and Jasper because I was too easy on him. The essay is about how much my conception of discipline has changed in...
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