Despite my Sunday learning, Towards the bad, I kept turning. ‘Til Mama couldn’t hold me anymore. And I turned twenty-one in prison doing life without parole. No one could steer me right but Mama tried, Mama tried. Mama tried to raise me better, but her pleading, I denied. That leaves only me to blame […]
10 Things I Hope My Kids Will Say About Their Childhood
Someday my kids will grow up. Sometimes a day seems to last a month, and sometimes a month flies by like the snap of my fingers. But someday, someday, they will grow up. They will leave our house and go off to make their own lives. They’ll go to college and choose their paths. They will date […]
Bartending for Moms Everywhere…You’re Welcome
One of my favorite movies from childhood was the 1991 blockbuster hit City Slickers. You’ve probably seen it, so I won’t bore you with the plot summary, but the screenplay’s writers were definitely onto something with the Barry and Ira Shalowitz characters, a pair of adventure-seeking brothers who owned an ice cream empire and one of whom, […]
T-Ball Practice Is Cancelled, and Other Ballpark Drama
Every time a t-ball practice is cancelled, the coach gets his wings. Yesterday afternoon, I received the BEST group text ever. No practice tonight and NO GAME on Saturday morning? This is my kinda team! Can I tell you how happy things like this make me? Just…giddy, if we’re being completely honest about it. I […]
Bring Your Kids to Work Day (Every Day)
I’m lucky enough to have experienced motherhood both as a working mom and one who now stays at home with my children. I was a high school English teacher for 11 years, the last 6 of those years in a Nashville, TN suburb. My husband and I chose that particular suburb because the school system offered on-site daycare for teachers’ children in […]
Growing Up on Social Media…The Hard Way
Facebook.Twitter.Instagram.Pinterest.Flickr.Google+. This morning, another TimeHop update popped into my phone, and I realized that my kids are growing up online. Not because they made that choice, but because I am posting their pictures (both adorable and unruly), their cute sayings, the messes they make, my good-bad-ugly parenting moments, their good-bad-ugly kid moments, and our lives in […]
A Dose of Sweetness, Reality, Humor, and Murder on Mother’s Day
You know the Mother’s Day when you get the sleeping late, the spa pedicure, the cut flowers, the showering of gifts, gift cards, and the afternoon nap? I got some (not all) of it. But I totally loved my Mother’s Day, complete with its dose of sweetness, reality, humor, and murder. Yes, MURDER. Sweetness: Breakfast in bed! […]
The First Drop-Off
This morning, I saw a mom drop off her 2.5yo daughter for the very first time at daycare. She was juggling a large bag of supplies, her beautiful redhead who had begged mama to go to school, and a toddler dragging behind. The mama was fighting tears. “What do I do?” she asked me in […]
Carrie On Parenting: Worrying WAY TOO EARLY About My Kids’ Spouses?!?
In 2010 at a family reunion, we joyously cut into a “gender reveal” blue cake and officially prepared to welcome our second child into the world. A boy! A little brother for our daughter…nothing could have been more perfect. And then my grandmother looked over at me and said , “You know what they say: […]
Car Line Courtesy: Sadly, Not So Common Anymore
As a mom of three children, ages 7, 4, and almost 2, I sit in a lot of car lines waiting for my kids. I wait to drop them off, I wait to pick them up, I wait. And wait. I attempt to appease those unlucky kids who are in the back seat also waiting […]