Moms

My girls get out of school Friday. FRIDAY! How the heck did this school year fly by so quickly? It seems like yesterday that Miss C’s teacher was sending out information about 4th grade graduation. I’ve already asked the girls to each think of three things they really want to do this summer. It could be as simple as going to see a certain movie (Epic looks great and opens this Friday) or Miss A’s favorite outing, the public library. Summer’s going to be short for us, the girls go back to school August 1, so I want to make sure we hit all the highlights before it’s time to sharpen our No. 2 pencils and buy new backpacks. I’ve put together a list of seven must do’s for all you fellow Middle Tennessee families this summer. Check it out! And don’t forget tonight’s Music City Center Grand Opening Celebration, an all out free street party and concert featuring one of my faves, Sheryl Crowe. Yes this is on a school night but it’s the last week of school for most Nashville area kids…why not kick it off right? 12th Annual 5K for Fatherhood at Fontanel This 5K, held on the Saturday of Father’s Day weekend, will feature tons of family friendly fun, such as hot air balloon rides and live music featuring inspiring vocalist Mirka and and accomplished saxophonist and songwriter, Charles Walker. Not only will you get out and get moving with your family ona beautiful summer day, but this 5K event benefits the Family Foundation Fund, a wonderful organization that helps fatherless boys. Register here. Bluegrass Along the Harpeth Admission is free for the Fiddlers Jamboree event and competition July 27. Great way to hear some fantastic live music and watch clogging and buck dancing. Benefits the Williamson County Cultural Arts Commission. Nashville International Puppet Festival One of my friends tells me this is a can’t miss event, especially the programs on Friday featuring the Velo Theatre from France. Zoovie Nights at the Nashville Zoo Enjoy a day at the zoo and settle in to watch a movie under the stars. We’re first time zoo members this summer (tickets are available for everyone) and I definitely want to check this out! Madagascar on June 24 sounds fun although we’ll be singing “I Like to Move It, Move It” all weekend, okay, okay…summer. Leiper’s Fork Lawnchair Movie Theatre Speaking of summer movies, I’ve been wanting to check out the free Friday night family movies in Leiper’s Fork for some time. While you’re in Leiper’s Fork, you must check out Country Boy restaurant, one of our favorite Southern style restaurants. Bruce Munro Light Outdoor Exhibit at Cheekwood This outdoor art installation will be on display on the beautiful grounds of Cheekwood until November 2. and is definitely on my must do list! First Tennessee Fridays will also feature live music, cocktails, and a late closing time of 11 p.m. The Fireflies exhibit in the Japanese bamboo garden sounds amazing. Summer Saturdays at the Tennessee Agricultural Museum I’ve written about Summer Saturdays at the Ag Museum before. They’re filled with family fun, get your kids outdoors, and there’s no fee. The Hold Your Horses program July 6 sounds like a must do! Looking for more summer activity ideas here in Middle Tennessee? Check out my Frugal Family Fun Nashville Style post or this post featuring Ten Fun Frugal Family Summer Outings. What’s on your summer must do list?

I’m not great at buying clothes for Belle. She has what a fashion magazine would call a ‘capsule wardrobe’, and doesn’t really like to dress outside her slightly too small skinny jeans and favourite jumpers, worn over and over. When the people at www.miniwardrobe.com gave Belle the opportunity to try something from their LEGO Wear range then, I was hopeful of expanding her clothing horizons. Now I’m sure you are thinking, ‘LEGO Wear? Clothes made out of LEGO? Clothes for the little LEGO Characters?’ It turns out that LEGO Wear is a new range of kids clothes specially designed to enable them to play safely, at home or out and about. The makers of LEGO Wear have an eye for detail and make sure the clothes aren’t too tight fitting and there is no irritating seams or zips. This is perfect for us as Belle is always fiddling about and complaining about things itching her. The clothes are both sensible and pretty, with LEGO motifs or designs on them. The concept baffled Belle at first. Even though she is a fan of LEGO, she wasn’t sure if she wanted to wear LEGO clothes. Eventually she chose the Tasja Bye Bye Rain girls short sleeve cotton t-shirt in Midnight Blue. As the website says, LEGO Wear really is the same great quality as the LEGO bricks themselves. Belle found it very comfortable, although she said it was a bit long, though I don’t think that’s the t-shirt’s fault, as she is quite small. Some of the LEGO Wear designs aren’t immediately LEGO-like, so if your child isn’t a massive fan of LEGO these are still stylish, practical pieces to buy. Alternatively, some of the clothes feature Ninjago LEGO characters, so you can LEGO up your wardrobe as much as you want. Even though LEGO Wear is quite expensive, children will get a lot of use out of them and they claim to last long enough to be handed down to younger siblings. They provide a free returns bag with every order plus a handy laminated care guide so you know exactly how best to look after your items. Overall Belle seemed to like her LEGO t-shirt and she even wore it long enough that we had a chance to wash her usual outfit of a grubby rabbit onesie.   The post REVIEW – LEGO wear from MiniWardrobe appeared first on Slummy single mummy.

We come in all shapes and sizes, all manner of opinion, tradition, and circumstance. We are not born mothers, regardless of what our children may think, though some of us are clearly better at it than others. Our knowledge does not arrive in a neat little box with a satin bow. We learn by watching others, through sheer will, strength and adversity. We are on the front lines. Some of us hover, some parent from afar. No matter what our style, we are questioned, challenged, revered, reviled. And, fortunately, loved — though never quite as much as we love. We are mothers. We are single, married, divorced, gay, straight. We are perfect; we are imperfect; we are tough; we are soft; we keep therapists in business. We are doctors without licenses perpetually on call to remedy ills and fix broken hearts. We are cheering squads, disciplinarians, realists, dreamers, playmates, chefs, and detectives. We are students of life, professors of whatever the day brings. Whether we work at home or in an office, our job description is long and our days are too short. Whether we have money to burn or none to spare, our salary is the same. It won’t buy what’s in any store, but it can make us feel richer just the same. We are mothers. Most of us do it for love, a few for glory, some just do it. All of us have the power to change lives. We are nearly 90 million strong and sisters at heart. Still, sometimes we are each other’s toughest critics, and forget we have one another to fall back on — we are our own best source of inspiration, courage, advice and kindness. We are mothers. When the earliest memories of our children begin to fade — memories of their first steps, first words, first day of school — we work to keep them alive. We make scrapbooks, take photos, carry images in our hearts. We are mothers. There are those of us who believe that mistakes cannot be guarded against, that the old ways are the best. Others say history is to be learned from but should not be repeated — that the future must be written anew. One day soon, when some of us least expect it, the future will arrive. Our kids will be grown and we’ll move on with our lives separate from theirs. And when it does, and we are in the company of women friends both old and new, we’ll be reminded not of our differences, but of the single most important way we are the same. We are mothers. Author informationMelissa ShultzMelissa T. Shultz writes about life’s journey -- the wistful, the wonderful, and the wry. Her work has appeared in newspapers and magazines including: Newsweek, The Washington Post, The Dallas Morning News, D Magazine, Better Health and Living Magazine, Reader’s Digest, The New York Times, Ladies’ Home Journal, Babble.com, Huffington Post, BetterAfter50.com, The Los Angeles Times, as well as CNN Radio. You can follow her on Twitter @MelissaTShultzThe post The Sisterhood of Mothers appeared first on Scary Mommy: An honest look at motherhood.

You’ve perhaps heard about the annual Blessing of the Animals–this happens in various cities around the country–where pet owners can bring their animal to a local church where the priest leads a ceremony and blesses each animal with Holy Water. In New York, The Cathedral of Saint John the Divine hosts the Blessing of the Animals on St. Francis Day, in October. Hundreds of people gather from around the city to bring their  pets–from fish, to birds, to dogs and all other animals you can imagine–to be blessed, while many others join in to witness the festivities. But for some pet parents, they are seeking out more than a group blessing and hosting their own pet baptism/confirmation ceremonies. Being the animal lovers we are here at eco18.com and knowing what a part they play in the health and conservation of the planet, we were quite intrigued to learn about the extra step pet owners are going to to include their pets in family and religious traditions–down to their own baptism. New York resident Trinette Faint, dog mom to one of our previously featured Pet of the Month, Avery, recently hosted a pet baptism/confirmation. Complete with a confirmation gown and God Parents to particpate, she and a close group of friends gathered at a neighborhood church in uptown Manhattan this past winter to formally confirm Avery. Trinette isn’t the only person who has come up with this idea. A quick Google search will lead to people asking questions on the topic in various forums, YouTube videos pet baptisms and you can even buy a kit to help prepare for the day, complete with a certificate. While most would agree you don’t have to save your pets soul, we can appreciate anyone who goes the extra step to take care of their animals.

I am not a perfume fan. At all. Perfume makes me feel sick, actually, so I do not wear it. Haven't for years. Which is why my obsession for fragrant things, specifically fragrant things to put on my body is strange. But also not strange because smell is perhaps the most underrated sense we have as humans. Smell influences taste in every sense (ha!) and is something we should spend more time discussing. Because sometimes we cannot change the way we look or feel... but smell. Ah, we can smell like whatever we wish... or nothing at all. But also... there are things out there in the world and sometimes these things make us feel happy or sexy or just... you know, good... to smell.God, what am I even saying right now? I do not know. What I do know is that I have stumbled upon many a wonderful smell-good things as of late and I have decided to make it my personal mission these next few months to recommend my faves.Because perfume is so last century. And, when worn improperly, invasive to the personal space of friends and strangers who are now experiencing eau de dizziness and Coco de nausea c/o all those Sephora samples. (ED: I can't even go to Sephora anymore. It gives me legit morning sickness.)First up? This saucy little number which I am recommending to you because it smells amazing/makes your skin feel awesome and might help you want to have sex more. With yourself, if nothing else.I have no idea where it came from or who sent it to me or how old it is but when we moved I discovered it in a box and have been lathering my afre-shower self with it ever since.It smells like a lavender if lavender were to fuse with green apple that time traveled from the 1920s and then exploded mid flight and got a little dusty? And then became oil. (I am terrible at describing the way things smell but intend to work on this and hopefully, improve with time.)Also? It's $20 and will last you an entire year if you use it sparingly. It also might help reduce stretch marks I just realized? Which would explain when/where it came from. Ahem. GGC

Again, back story first. My car collision was more than two months ago, but I am still “enjoying” the pain-numbing effects of a Fentanyl patch, such as lack of energy, emotional instability, forgetfulness that my arm doesn’t work right yet and frequent break-outs as a sweaty mess when I do too much. Fast forward to yesterday when I attempted a fieldtrip because one dog is late on his rabies shot and the other dog is due.  The close and handy Petco (read: not in the ghetto) only has a shot clinic on Friday night and we had a conflict. SO, my two daughters and I along with the two pooches planned a mid-morning trip to another not-so-handy and not-close-at-all Petco (read: in the ghetto).  Little did we realize that everyone who lives in the slums also decided to get their dogs’ rabies shots yesterday morning.  The pain patch + 2 squirrely dogs + Petco full of dogs and “interesting” people = pandemonium to the third degree. We parked in the lot and discussed who would hold the leashes while we crossed traffic and entered the store BEFORE we opened any of the doors.  That was the only moment when things went down as planned.  Being unable to hold a yanking-leash in my right hand, I held onto my little girl’s hand.  My big girl held the wiener dog and had the rat terrier on a leash. So far. So good. As we entered the store, Ringo, the wiener dog decides to announce our arrival with his big-dog voice and won’t shut up, which invited all the other dogs in the store to welcome us as well.  I glanced to my right and saw the clinic table set up and three people in line. We made our way down the center aisle of the store with our heads glued to the right as we were overcome row after row at the length of the line. Finally toward the rear of the establishment, we discovered our place right behind an over-fed and under-socialized huge yellow lab.  At our arrival, the lab went ballistic barking and pulling his owner off balance (a full grown man) to get to our puny doggies. Breathing deeply though my nose to gain composure and accept the fact that we were in for a long wait, I suggested to my eldest that she get a cart to put our doggies in for their own protection. In the blink of an eye, the red leash on the rat terrier was handed to the little nine-year-old hand that didn’t close in time to stop the escape of Trixie.  Without thinking (obviously) I screamed, “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?” which was pretty obvious….. she was not holding the dog leash.  It has been many years since I have moved that fast.  Trixie was running with her ears back and her tail tucked and was bee-lining for the front door. It must have been quite a sight for all the people standing in line seeing the teeny white dog dragging a red leash followed by the flash of a woman at the end of the row. Near the registers I was able to step on the end of the leash and clothesline the AWOL fugitive.  Trixie’s head stayed in place and I’m sure she was trying to figure out why her tail just passed her head. While reaching down to grab the red restraint, my sun glasses tumbled out of my purse and made a sizable raucous to draw more attention to the woman who couldn’t control her tiny mongrel. Victoriously I gathered my glasses and my hound and casually walked back to the rear of the store not making eye contact with anyone who just witnessed the overthrown departure (read: hot sweaty mess, shaky hands, emotionally volatile).  A ten-year-old terrier wasn’t going to get the best of me.  No sirree. As previously planned, my eldest went to retrieve a cart to protect our pets.  Meanwhile, back in the ghetto, Jim Bob’s homemade collar on the fat yellow dog gave way and the mutt pounced on my pup.   His owner sluggishly slurred, “Well, how’d that happen?” as he slowly made moves to re-tethered his pooch.  That dog was going to have to get through ME to have one mini sniff a

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Following a cast of characters through their lives over almost forty years is a formidable task, yet it’s one that Meg Wolitzer has taken on with her new novel The Interestings. This is one of this season’s much-talked about books, and after consuming the 480 page novel in just a few days, I’m in the “loved it!” camp of readers. In the summer of 1974, Julie Jacobson went away to an arts-themed summer camp run by two aging hippies, and at fifteen, the course of her life was set into motion as the result of one nonchalant invitation. After accepting her tent mate Ash’s invitation to hang out with her group of friends, Julie was transformed from a self-perceived “nothing” into Jules, someone who belonged in a group of irony-loving, slightly profane adolescents. The six teenagers who sat together in Boys Teepee 3 could never have fathomed the ways in which their futures were intertwined, with some relationships set to wax and wane over the years, and others to go down unimaginable paths. That first night they all crowded onto the dirty floor of the teepee, their jokes a mix of typical adolescent silliness and a budding sense of the disturbing nature of the politics and social issues of the day, they embraced a name for themselves. “The Interestings” was meant to be ironic, a stab at their perceptions of being inconsequential. For Jules, in her awe at these personalities like none she’d ever met before, the name was more than fitting: The name was ironic, and the improvisational christening was jokily pretentious, but still, Julie Jacobson thought, they were interesting. These teenagers around her, all of them from New York City, were like royalty and French movie stars, with a touch of something papal. Everyone at this camp was supposedly artistic, but here, as far as she could tell, was the hot little nucleus of the place. She had never met anyone like these people; they were interesting compared not only with the residents of Underhill, the New York suburb where she’d lived since birth, but also compared with what was generally out there, which at the moment seemed baggy suited, nefarious, thoroughly repulsive. Jules finds the others the most fascinating, often continuing to feel like an outsider among the group even many years later. Yet Wolitzer has made her the center of the story, with the others’ lives being described around her and her perception of them. None of them are perfect by any means, and through the course of almost four decades, they all make missteps in their own ways, and to certain degrees of significance. Through it all, though, they remain emotionally connected in a way that can often happen when people first meet at such a pivotal time of development. Wolitzer is a masterful storyteller, taking readers from one moment in time to many years later with a seemingly passing statement, subtly foreshadowing events to come or referencing a distant time in the future. The chapters don’t always flow chronologically, but the tone is set in a way that it’s easy for readers to make the jumps in time, altering the images in their heads to account for aging or setting changes. The shifts allow for the stories to unfold gradually, and some character developments change course as stories are unveiled from the past. Personally, I loved this format, coming to expect some twists and turns from the past to be revealed to help inform the characters’ situations in the present time. I was completely drawn in by The Interestings, an incredible character-driven novel that had me openly weeping at times and utterly fascinated from beginning to end. Have I gotten you interested? We have one copy of THE INTERESTINGS to give away today. Enter via the rafflecopter below, US and Canada shipping addresses only, please. a Rafflecopter giveaway

1. Julia and Lucy had a piano recital. They were just as proud of the number of cookies they ate at the post-recital reception as they were of their performances. 2. I pulled the world’s largest splinter out of the heel of Lucy’s foot. Look at that thing! And it was straight up in there. We both screamed when it came out. 3. Bee swallowed a penny. Again.

You know how Pinterest can make you feel like a slacker mother whose cooking and homemaking and craft skills don’t compare with all the other mothers out there? Well, today for a change, it made me feel normal. No way would a sane mother present these sandwiches to her children… Somehow, I think my kids will survive on plain old peanut butter and jelly. Author informationJill Smokler, AKA Scary MommyWhat started as an innocent on-line baby book to chronicle Jill's stay-at-home days with her children, (Lily, Ben, and Evan) quickly transformed into a vibrant community of parents, brought together by a common theme: Parenting doesn’t have to be perfect. Learn more here.TwitterFacebookGoogle+The post Insane Works of Sandwich Art appeared first on Scary Mommy: An honest look at motherhood.