Category: Export 1-1-23

• Stop Telling Me to Have Fun in Quarantine

  If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a thousand times: I never set out to be a stay-at-home mom. But with the kids’ school closed until at least the end of May, I’m staring down the barrel of another few weeks sheltering in place with my kids. Not every mom is muttering “FML” under…
• Network Marketing Secrets From 3 Moms

  Like many moms, you may have (at one point or another) considered getting involved in network marketing. It’s tempting to jump on the bandwagon after you see your friends share stories of women who have gotten rich this way. But as the old saying goes: if it sounds too good to be true, it probably…
• Alcohol Sales Are Up 55% and Honestly I’m Surprised It’s Not More

  CNN reports that “booze sales are booming as people stockpile alcohol,” but I have questions. For example: why didn’t I think of that? Also: how does one make a Mai Tai?
• An Exquisite Inconvenience

  I knew this quarantine was going to be sketchy. I’m not usually a full-time stay-at-home mom, and I never (and I mean NEVER) set out to be, but here we are. I’m lucky because my husband is working from home – emphasis on the working – so technically he’s here too, but the burden of…
• Love In The Time Of Coronavirus

  I’m writing this from my couch, where the imprint of my rear is really taking shape in one of the cushions. I’ve been perched here for many (too many?) hours over this past weekend listening to Wolf Blitzer and his gaggle of CNN personalities report on the quasi-apocalyptic state of affairs in which we seem…
• This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things

  I hear the loud “thwack” and I know it’s not good. Sure enough, this was the sound of yet another toy colliding with the drywall in my hallway, this time with such force that it left a lovely dent motif. The wall, which was painted long ago by the family who lived here last, is…
• To Tree or Not to Tree: Making New Christmas Traditions

  A quintessential piece of the Christmas season as I was growing up was our family’s annual trip to the tree farm. My dad, having brought along his own saw, would lie on the ground and hack down whatever tree his girls (my mom, my sister, and I) had chosen. Once separated from its stump, he’d…
• Go For Great, Not Good

  A couple mornings ago, my 3 year old convinced me to let him play with the 100-piece Iron Man puzzle he’d gotten as a hand-me-down from friends. It was 6:30 a.m. and I just wanted to drink some hot coffee in relative peace and quiet, so I obliged, knowing full well what a debacle this…
• Minding the Squirrels

  If my brain were an animal, it would definitely be an overly excitable dog on a walk through a neighborhood with an inordinate number of squirrels. I’m thinking some kind of Terrier with wiry, unkempt fur and a high-pitched bark. One minute it’s happily plodding along, enjoying the fresh air and contemplating what’s for dinner…
• Making Time For Friendship

  It was 9:30 pm and we were tired. A few hours earlier, my dear friend and I had carpooled 80 or so miles northeast from the city we both live in to her hometown of Milwaukee. We arrived at her parent’s house and, after a quick dinner and a stop at her favorite childhood ice…