By Beck My grandma – the one who is now, my kids will tell you, in Heaven – was a magically good cook. Even now, I sometimes dream about her food, supernaturally good and the sorts of things that I wanted the most as a child: layer cakes, salads frothy with marshmallows, creamy mashed potatoes,…
Category Archives: 5 Minutes For Parenting
Margin
By Kelly Last night, as I waited for my brain to turn off and the drowsiness to descend, I read through my journal from last year. I was sad and slightly startled to see how much depth my writing had 12 months ago. These days, my writing tends toward the surface and the amusing. Nothing…
Family Reunion
By Veronica “Why is JellyBean so pale?” asked my niece. “She is really pale. Is she sick? She looks sick.” We are visiting family in Buffalo, and the cousins are getting to know each other again. My brother’s family has grown through both adoption and natural birth, and his Korean daughter was expressing shock at the…
A Piece of Cake, Please, with a Side of Gravy
By Megan Well, we did it. Peabody and I have officially made it to the one year mark in our nursing relationship. We’ve had a busy weekend celebrating his birthday, so the realization that we’ve finally reached the goal I set for us long before he was born didn’t really hit me until last night,…
I am potty trained and so are you
By Gretchen “Don’t worry. I won’t pee on you,” my nearly 3-year-old daughter assured me as she climbed onto my lap. “Thanks. I’m glad.” Was she worried she might? Did she need to go? Did I have any clean jeans or even a skirt hanging in the closet? That <em>fit</em>? Uhhhh. Mental note: Buy diet…
Father of 10 Turns Bath Time Into A Career
Guest post by Randy Imwalle I was sitting recently on the side of the bathtub, studying my knees. Were those calluses? Before long, the answer dawned on me: The hardened spots had resulted from kneeling near the tub while bathing my children. Early in our marriage, my wife, Lisa, and I tacitly agreed that I…
A Dose of Humor – Zero Tolerance Policy
5 Minutes for Parenting’s weekly column, A Dose of Humor, is here to remind you to take your humor pill regularly as the best medicine to treat the side effects of parenting! It features a different blogger every week and is hosted by Rachel at Grasping for Objectivity in My Subjective Life. Now you can…
Getting Ready For Winter
By Beck My youngest child was given a chipmunk stuffed animal for Christmas this year, one of Santa’s more inspired stocking stuffers. And he’s a pretty cute toy chipmunk and all, but my kids – as a rule – are fairly indifferent to stuffed animals, despite having enough of them to stock a fairly impressive and…
Multiple Channels
By Kelly There are days when I wonder what it would be like to parent an only child. Oddly enough, the thought isn’t entertained on the days when my three children turn into heathen monkeys. Rather, it lingers on days that are easy, when each child seems to shine brightly as their own, unique creation….
Sometimes Parenting Has Very Little to Do With The Children
By Megan “Grab a fleece and meet me downstairs,” I whispered to Al as I brushed past him outside Bean’s room Saturday evening. We’d finished up the bedtime routine with both kids a little bit early, and I’d already surreptitiously poured us each a glass of wine, lit a few candles, and collected a warm,…