March 1, 2013

It’s Okay Not to Share: A Q&A With Author Heather Shumaker

Denise Schipani / 42 Comments / bullying, education, family life, guest posts, kids and friendship, play / Heather Shumaker, It's Okay Not to Share...and Other Renegade Rules for Raising Competent and Compassionate Kids /

I have to say, when I read the title of Heather Shumaker’s new (and terrific!) book It’s Okay Not to Share…and Other Renegade Rules for Raising Competent and Compassionate Kids (Jeremy Tarcher/Penguin), I breathed a sigh of relief. Because to be honest, when my kids were very little, I couldn’t bear the sharing emphasis. Good […]

August 19, 2012

American Girl Doll the “Price” of Admission for a Birthday Party? FAIL!

Denise Schipani / 46 Comments / Ask the Mean Mom, play /

This’ll be short, because it’s a short story that’s left me, on the how-do-I-feel spectrum, adrift between puzzled and spitting mad, and I’m interested in opinions. The other night, at our friends’ house for pizza, my friend, Sally, mentioned that her daughter, Phoebe, who is five, was just invited to one of her pals’ birthday […]

July 21, 2011

Are Our Kids Bored By Playgrounds?

Denise Schipani / 12 Comments / family life, parenting research, play, summer / Ellen Sandseter, John Tierney, monkey bars, New York Times, playgrounds, swings /

Last summer, we met our friends Sally and Mike and their kids in a nearby harbor town to let the kids play on a playground, walk around a bit, and get some dinner. Typical late-weekend-afternoon-in-the-summer stuff here on Long Island’s bucolic North Shore. I’d been to this town many times before, but not with my […]