Mean Moms Rule: The Blog
Observations on parenting in the tween and teen years.
This blog was born in 2009 as Confessions of a Mean Mommy, and gave rise to the book you see over on the right. Since I began blogging, my sons morphed from 5- and 7-year olds who looked to me for just about everything, to 11- and 13-year olds who have perfected their eye rolls and have one foot out the door. This parenting thing just got real.
Twenty-Five Years Later: My Thoughts on College, Then and Now
Just last weekend, I attended my 25th college reunion. It was fun. It was hard, even painful, to contemplate going again, but it was fun. Why hard? Well … college wasn’t my best time in life. I wonder if it really is for anyone, but the way folks talk about their college years — the […]
Can You Hear Me Now? A Guest Post by Caren Chesler of “The Dancing Egg”
Today, Day 12 of the WordCount Blogathon, is a guest-post exchange day, so I’m swapping posts with writer and mom Caren Chesler, who blogs at The Dancing Egg, which is about having conceived her only son, Eddie, in her forties — through IVF and with a donor egg. Here, she writes about her struggle to […]
Tossing the Precious: Why I Don’t Save Art Projects
Here’s a picture of a box of artwork I unearthed from under my son’s bed, in an ongoing effort to conquer the paper tiger around here, save what’s worth saving, and toss what’s not: This particular box escaped a big purge/organization I did last year (and am still recovering from; sorting through piles of papers, […]
Monday Funny: End-of-the-School-Year-Slack-Off
If you have been hiding from the Interwebs lately, maybe you are one of the few who have not read this post on Jen Hatmaker’s blog. She calls herself the “worst end-of-school-mom” ever, and I laughed through the whole dang thing. It starts like this: You know the Beginning of School Enthusiasm? When the pencils […]
Graduation Post Redux: We Love Ya, Kid — But You’re Not That Special
Hey, everyone! I’m out of town this weekend at my 25th college reunion, so I’ve reached back in the past (specifically, exactly a year ago!) for a post that I thought fit this Pomp and Circumstance kind of time of year. Hope you enjoy it! It’s graduation time! It’s also time for the myriad […]
Useless Baby Products! What Would You Avoid Next Time?
I just saw, in a quick link to the Parenting.com website a story about useless parenting products, and I could barely click past this, the Thudgard baby helmet: I did do a bit of clicking, though, and as expected the rest of the slideshow was full of things that feel marginally clever but are really […]
Photo Friday: Siblings!
I promised Photo Fridays to ease up on how much you have to read while I blog daily this month, so here’s my ode to siblings. From left, there’s my big sister Marie (mother of a 25-year-old married daughter, a 21-year-old son, and an 18-year-old daughter; my little brother Frank, who’s got the family’s younger […]
News Flash: Shredded Wheat Won’t Make You Smart
I’ll keep this one short; it’s been a long posting week, and there’s still a whole bunch of June left to go in this WordCount 2013 Blogathon I’m involved in! So there’s this: Apparently, Kellogg, makers of Shredded Wheat, have had to apologize — and answer to a lawsuit — after ads that ran in […]
This Ad Seeking a Skinny Person to Scare Picky Eaters Can’t be Real… Can It?
Oh, dear God in heaven someone tell me that the ad, below, which someone found on a Phoenix craigslist board, is some kind of “I dare you” hoax. Because if this is even a teeny bit true, I think I’m going to throw up in my mouth a little. And you’ll see as you read […]
Just Name the Baby, Already!
I want to say something here like, “naming a baby has always been fraught,” but really, has it? These days, you can bet that superfluous “y” in some kids’ names it is. Just take a look at this recent piece in the New York Times. Now, bear in mind, this is one of those style/fashion/trend […]
My name is Denise, and I’m a Mean Mom.
That’s the very first line of my book, Mean Moms Rule. Let me explain the “mean” for you, in case you were under the impression that I never hug my boys (I possibly do this too much, as evidenced by the fact that they routinely try to wiggle away from my embraces and especially my sloppy kisses, the urchins), or that I advocate for children to work in coal mines (it’s illegal! Plus, no coal mines in my area!). I say “mean” because my approach often bucks the prevailing parenting trend, which you could call helicopter-y or indulgent (I prefer my own technical term, “squishy”). It’s mean because it’s not easy. Because it’s focused on the end game, not the here-and-now (and anyone who has kids’ll tell you, they are all about the here and now).
Grab a copy from your favorite bookseller:
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