I remember the hysteria over child kidnappings in the early 1980s after Adam Walsh disappeared. I was only a little kid living in suburban Massachusetts but I remember. I knew the little boy named Adam had disappeared at a store and was never found alive again. I knew he was...

I went to my daughter's school, got my yellow visitor's pass and got down to work. I was there to string student "thank you" cards together for the teacher. I tied them carefully with ribbon, brought them to the classroom and waited for the door to open.

8-year-old: "Our room...

We loaded into the back of that flatbed truck. I was told it would be fast. I was told to hold on tight. I was told it would be the ride of my life. Then that starting gun went off and like a bullet we took off through the streets...

It's a challenging, educational, inspirational, stomach-churning, acid-reflux burning, constantly learning, headache-inducing, sleep reducing, pride infusing, emotional, devotional, inspiring, perspiring, rewarding experience to be a parent.

There are so many things I want to tell the kids. There are so many things I've written for them but never shared with...

We got up at our normal time. We got the kids ready for school. We got their lunches ready and we got them out the door. But that is where the similarity to any NORMAL day ends. You see even though it was a work day, even though it was...

I feel extremely lucky. My kids don't yet know the bad words. They know the "s" word is trouble. They know the "d" word is trouble. In our family, those words are "stupid" and "dumb." Yes, I know they don't live in a bubble and hear stuff on the playground....

It was my mother's ultimate revenge. It was her final stand. It was her declaration of independence. Even though my father had died in 1990, it took her years, so many years to finally get to that moment. In the final months of my mother's life, as she made plans...

It happens in an instant. Often, it comes without warning. It can be more dramatic than a flash flood, more dangerous than an F5 tornado, more unpredictable than the most devastating storm. When the mega-tantrum comes, you better watch out. Mega means really big. Tantrum means tantrum. Put the two...

Everything is so neat and tidy nowadays in a society where every texting character counts. When I first started writing a book and blogging about parenthood, I had to be a quick study on terms like SAHP (stay at home parent) or FTWP (full-time working parent). There are the WAHP's...

Now that we've had the girls for a few years, the warranties have all expired, and it's clear we're not returning our purchases, I thought it would be a good time to outline from A-Z just why we're satisfied with the kids. Here goes.

A- anxiety.  I thrive off the...

Dieting has been with me my entire life. I don't need New Years or resolutions or a bombardment of ads on TV and radio to convince me I need to lose weight. I've been down this road before. Maybe you have too. When I was a little kid, I went...

It was a whirlwind vacation week of road trips, amusement parks and holiday parties. And then we woke up all disappointed to the sound of pouring rain putting a stop to things. So we did what any sad and depressed family would do when it rains on their plans. We...

We struggled with this all weekend... Do we talk with our kids about what happened in Connecticut? The 4-year-old is too young. The 7-year-old isn't. She often hears about things on the playground or from friends before we ever tell her and that was the deciding factor that we as...

All I could think about was hugging my kids and hugging them tight.

When I heard the news of the devastating school massacre in Connecticut I jumped into action. That's what news people do. We're supposed to be used to this. But there's never a "getting used to this." While...

My girls have never liked Legos. I loved Legos as a kid and my girls hate them. Legos now come in Star Wars and Sponge Bob and Heroes and Dinosaurs... oh, and sugar and spice and everything nice. Whaat? Yes, the classic building blocks which have tripped up parents and...

My kids and I saw Rise Of The Guardians this weekend. The movie was filled with Santa, the Easter Bunny, The Tooth Fairy and surprise surprise, The Sandman. I've never seen him until now but he's a little, pudgy, golden looking guy who sprinkles magical sand on all the little...

Let me start by saying, "I'm a Toys"R"Us kid," Yep, me. I grew up loving that store. I even worked at my local Toys"R"Us store in high school, carefully tying swing sets and turtle sand boxes onto people's cars for the ride home. Now that I have kids, Geoffrey the...

Stuffing is my thing. I love it. I eat it. I can make it. But it MAY not be exactly the way you're used to making it. I watch a lot of TV Food Network, but never for the recipes, so everything here is slightly ball-parked. That means it is...

It could go down as the day the snack cake died. I'm serious. Twinkie the kid and all his friends aren't riding off into the sunset with his lasso and cowboy hat, they're all being put out to pasture and I don't like it.

Hostess cakes were already an...

I need to get something off my chest. This has to do with breasts. This has to do with breastfeeding. This has to do with with what might be a Dad's worst nightmare for the upcoming holiday season: the breastfeeding baby doll complete with nipple sensors. Yes, the breastfeeding baby...