• Family

    The Pot and the Kettle

    Do as I say, not as I do. I wish this statement were less descriptive of me. I’ve been a mother for only nine years, but I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to apologize to my children…

  • Family

    The Note

    I don’t know about your children, but mine seem to think that going to the bank is all about getting suckers.  One day a few years ago, my son Caleb was going to accompany me on one of these trips…

  • Family

    Scary!

    I was sitting in the living room, working on my laptop, when my daughter Callie excitedly announced that she had just painted her brother and sister’s faces with clown make-up.  Trying to finish a message, I didn’t look up immediately…

  • Family

    The Pressure

    In the last year or two, several of my close friends have entered the world of motherhood for the first time. As I went to the baby showers, visited the proud (and very exhausted) parents and babies in the hospitals,…

  • Family

    Mama Maverick

    It started out like any other Saturday morningโ€ฆ Iโ€™m lying. It was nothing like any other Saturday morning. I woke up with a migraine. The whole back half of my head throbbed and felt like it weighed 67 pounds. While…

  • Family

    Not According to Plan

    It was the first time in my then-nine years of motherhood that all of my children were to have ongoing scheduled activities, of which I was not to be a part. Honestly, this was pretty exciting to me. Now that…

  • Family

    Half as Hard, Twice as Good

    Iโ€™ve had three babies and only once went to the hospital with a โ€œfalse alarm.โ€ Just a couple of weeks before my due date with my son Caleb, I thought I was in labor. So off to the hospital we…

  • Family

    A Decade and a Decision

    My firstborn just turned 10. โ€œI canโ€™t believe itโ€ is my normal reaction to her birthday. As all parents told me it would, the time has truly flown by. Wasnโ€™t it โ€œjust yesterdayโ€ that I was rocking her, spoon-feeding her…

  • Family

    Nose-to-Nose, Heart-to-Heart

    Recently I had to have a difficult โ€œnose-to-noseโ€ conversation with my daughter. She was having a lot of trouble admitting that she was wrong about something, and Kevin and I had been noticing that this issue with her had been…