new year’s resolutions I resolve not to bother with this year

Help Others. I spend plenty of time Helping Others already. I dry their tears. I pick up the food they throw on the floor. I wipe their bums. That is sufficient. Ladling soup for the homeless or reading clean jokes from Reader’s Digest to the bedridden will have to wait for another stage in my [...]

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negative effects that 400+ years of Protestant work ethic worship has wreaked on modern day parenting

It killed the nap, which is the only real, free, and non-chemical means of surviving sleep deprivation. When people venerate “hard work”, they are usually referring to work that results in financial gains, or a cleaner floor. Consequently, the sticky and financially thankless task that is parenting is (wrongly) not held in high esteem by [...]

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childhood experiences unlikely to befall my child as he comes of age in the next decade

He will never have a “Teen Line”. I had a friend growing up who we assumed was, like, rich, because when you looked her [parents] up in the phone book, you would find, under Walter and Patricia Miller*, a separate “Teen Line”. In retrospect I don’t believe they were rich. I just think they (wisely) [...]

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Aplaydia giveaway: it may be your family’s solution to holiday cabin fever

I may have spent most of my life in Nova Scotia, but a few years on the West Coast made me both soft and predisposed to irritating my East Coast friends with comments like, “We go to the playground all year round, and can have a vegan picnic on the grass in February!” Actually, I’ve [...]

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Happy Holidays!

Yesterday I had a great idea for a post. I started to write “Reasons I Should No Longer Stay Out Past 3 a.m.” but guess what? I was too tired. There are a lot of things that you can carry on doing after you have a baby, but going to live shows that finish past [...]

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small changes in our lives that we’ve noticed lately

Animals are now referred to by the sounds they make. We go to the park to see the quack quaaaacks, and hope that Auntie S brings over her ARF! ARF! and be nice to Nana’s meow meow. There was once a time when we swore that we would never be caught dead doing any such [...]

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reasons why parenting a small child does not in fact require great financial burden

I hear a lot of people say that they are waiting to be more financially stable before they have children. These are wise, sensible individuals, and I could not agree with them more about a roof over your head and food on the table being among the most vital components of a stable home. But [...]

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gifts I would like from Santa this year

I would like to pee in peace. This means door closed, no worrying about what disasters could possibly be transpiring in the 28 seconds that I am occupied, and no watching helplessly as a little person toddles in and makes a move for either the open bottle of nail polish on the counter or the [...]

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baby clothing to avoid

I’ve said before that purchasing clothing in general for your baby under 6 months is a waste of money, mainly because babies under 6 months a) wear pajamas 90% of the time and b) little baby clothes are irresistible shower gifts, so people will buy them for you anyway. But it is the holiday season, [...]

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things to know about travel with a small child

So we survived our cross-country trip, and it’s got me thinking all about the joys of travel with a young ‘un. Believe it or not, seven hours on a plane was not so bad this time. I wrote this following piece after the three of us returned from a Calgary to Victoria road trip this [...]

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