The brown needles were needling me. They were also stabbing anyone who walked in stocking feet on any floor in our house. Needles have a ten...

On weekend mornings I have a hard time getting off the couch. Even for coffee. The kids play around me in a low growl that is a mix of fight...

"Mommy? Will you play wit me? Mommy, come here! Mommy, where’s the DEE? Want to watch race cars on Dee. Mommy, where’s superboy cape? M...

Experience — often lack of it — really is the hobgoblin of all life pursuits, isn’t it? There are times when a person’s complete familiarity...

I stepped on the "Balance Board" and a mechanical voice protested: "Oh!" The games hadn’t even begun and I had the disti...

Lap, lap, lap … "The cat is drinking out of the tree water again," shouts Ittybit in mock exasperation. "CAT! Dinking! War! G...

The phone rang at 6 a.m. I bolted upright in bed and immediately thought of Olympia Dukakis. "Who’s Dead?" I growled in my best Br...

I don’t care what implements of torture you use — squeaky mice, feather ticklers, New Bark Times — no one is going to get me to buy Christm...

I vaguely remember the last time I slept through the night. It was the last Saturday in November. It was a fluke made possible by a stomach ...

I couldn’t look at her. Just the sight of Ittybit wiggling her loose tooth made my stomach flip on end. With the crooked tooth dangling mid-...

Whenever something new challenges conventional wisdom or standard practice, sparks will fly. That’s what happened this week after a federal ...

In the dark, I sat next to my daughter, hissing a threat: “If you DON’T calm down, I WILL take you out of this theater and we WILL go home.”...

My father phoned the other day to report on a report about my son that he’d gotten from his town’s librarian. Every Wednesday, you see, our ...

Barbie qualified for her AARP card this year and so many people wish she'd just retire already. Feminists I know have told me that Barbi...

Slam. Slam. Slam. Slam. I peek into the playroom. I can see Ittybit’s legs pressing down on the bed of the metal dump truck … and then lifti...

A few years ago a moms’ group I belonged to on the internet hosted an autumnal meet-up. In preparing for the fall event some mothers travele...

Lately it seems as if I'm talking to myself. “Please get some socks.” “It's time for school, please put your shoes on.” “The bus is ...

All she wanted to know was if there would be kids at Amah's and Papa's block party. I wasn't sure. I thought of all the people I...

I love the idea of yard sales. I adore that on specific days of the year folks can browse the front yards of their neighbors and purchase th...

To be honest, watching the media implode with anger and stunned disbelief that a stranger would strike a crying child in a Georgia Walmart s...