We’re finally getting some warm weather and the farmers market is stocked with beautiful local produce. It’s salad season is what I’m saying.
I like to make this salad the night before I plan on eating it (when the house is cool) so I don’t overheat the kitchen and so the flavours can really meld. It’s a big, hearty salad that can definitely pass as a meal.
I’ve had many amazing role models in my life, but as far as parenting goals, there’s one person whose experiences have shaped my #motherhoodgoals more than any other. Well before I planned my own family, a co-worker (who became one of my dearest friends) saw her child go into crisis. It had started innocently enough. She told me later that if she’d known the symptoms of a diabetic crisis, she would have worried more. But, as a pre-teen, it was easy to dismiss some of the symptoms as related to a growth spurt.
Mother’s Day sucks. There, I said it! I fully admit it. It shouldn’t. I’m the proud and lucky mom of two great kids, a girl, 10, and a boy, 4. They are my life, my joy, and I couldn’t imagine my world without them. But see, I belong to this club, the one that no one ever wants to be a part of.
I’m a card-carrying member of the “my mother is dead and it sucks club.”
Comic books have always been inextricably connected in my mind with the simple joys of childhood. Leafing through the pages of a comic book, it’s easy to get lost in the fantastical storyline, imagining superheroes swooping in and saving the day when all seems close to lost.
Comic books of yesteryear are places where reality stands still and fantasy can take over. Anything is possible. In adulthood we tend to lose that magic. It’s sad we get hung up on limitations and practicalities. We cease to be incredulous, overwhelmed by the day to day that threatens our ability to imagine.
Nearly everyone who comes to New York City makes a point of visiting Central Park. It is, quite literally, the heart of Manhattan, and any guide to NYC will direct you to explore this green oasis, which is so full of wonders, it can make you feel like a kid again.
But for those of us with actual children in tow, sometimes you just need the relative sanity of a fenced in playpark, where you can sip a coffee while the youngsters burn off some energy. For us, some of the greatest gems sprinkled throughout Central Park are the 21 different playgrounds—all 100% free, open from dawn to dusk, many of which have been renovated by the Central Park Conservancy over the last few years. As a resident of Manhattan since my children were two and three years-old, I’ve done some serious investigation of at least two-thirds of those parks and have whittled down my favourites to these five Central Park playgrounds.
How do you react to stressful situations? I will be the first to admit that my anxiety is clearly linked to my inability to effectively manage my emotions during stress. I am famous for catastrophizing and overreacting. Growing up, I was always known as the one who would freak out all the time. Today, I know that I just needed to develop my emotional intelligence. It doesn’t come naturally and it’s something I will continue to work on throughout my life, but if I can give my children these tools much earlier on in life, I hope that they won’t have to freak out as much as I did.
We look forward to summer break at our house. It is a time when we cut down on activities and well… just, “be.” It never seems to fail though, a week after school lets out, the kids are complaining about being bored. My co-author and her kids came up with a list of ideas to do at their house. This isn’t a list of intricate crafts, projects or extravagant destinations—it’s a simple list. In fact, it’s a list of things that quite often, I forget are an option.
Checking off a couple of her list items, I realized that it’s easy to do fun things with kids, because all they want is our time. If we are there, present, in the moment and playing with them, they’re happy. So I decided to make a second simple list of some of the greatest things that you might consider doing with your kids this summer.
My parents were great—no complaints at all, but as a kid I remember that there were certain house rules that made me repeatedly think: I will never do that to my kids. I will certainly be parenting differently than my parents.
Of course, looking back, my parents weren’t that bad and for the most part, they were pretty logical.
I know I’m not the only one out there who is having trouble dealing with the growing crisis surrounding Syrian refugees, the Paris attacks, this recent massacre in Orlando, and the constant threats that ISIS seems to be dangling in front of the Western world. The tension builds every day, as new hate crimes arise, more misinformed politicians take close-minded stands against what they perceive to be threats to “national security,” and more propaganda from terrorist organizations surfaces. Personally, I waffle back and forth between wanting to stick my head in the sand and pretend that none of this is happening, and wanting to know All The Things, grinding my life to a halt to take in the horror of it all.
Stay-at-home mothers are lucky. We get to be with our babies full-time and witness all of the coveted milestones that make parenthood so special in those early days. We have unlimited time to spend with these tiny creatures who hold our hearts so tightly, and we are free from the guilt and anguish that so many mothers feel for sending their little ones to daycare. We don’t have to put on a suit and drag our tired asses to an office, tearfully kissing our little ones goodbye. And we don’t answer to anyone but our own children, who, in reality, are the worst bosses anyone could ever have. As temping as it is, we must not fall prey to the idea that staying at home with children is a leisurely endeavour—it is work, and yet, somehow, this job that nobody really considers a job, has been placed on the bottom of the totem pole. Yes, we are lucky, but this shit is hard and asking for support shouldn’t be anything to be ashamed of.
But, it is.