Planet Mom: It’s where I live, probably eating leftovers. Visit me there at http://www.melindawentzel.com and http://www.facebook.com/NotesfromPlanetMom. Caricature by Simon Ellinas.
We have an old refrigerator in our garage — one that migrated there when we remodeled our kitchen some time ago and it was no longer deemed efficient, never mind fashionable. Granted, it’s an oversized beast whose shelves are a tad unstable and whose exterior was all the rage in 1989, but because the universe
READ MOREI hate to parallel park, so I avoid it at all costs. Sometimes that means I attempt to maneuver my car into what appears to be a ridiculously small space and shortly thereafter, drive away, defeated. Other times I opt for a traditional parking lot and convince myself that that’s not cheating — even when
READ MOREIt’s possible I made a horrible mistake when I decided to make my kids responsible for their own laundry. In theory, it was a wonderful idea as it relieved me of the dreaded chore and saved me from spending countless hours in what may be the smallest and most depressing room on earth. What’s more,
READ MOREMy husband and I have a badminton net in our backyard currently, which is terrific, except that it required two master’s degrees, a fair amount of duct tape and an afternoon of misery to set it up. Confession: We probably could have used a marriage counselor or two, but none were available at the time.
READ MOREThe kids are away at camp this week, which might explain the glorious silence in our home. The week BEFORE camp, however, qualified as pandemonium. There were monumental outbursts over the issue of procrastination, and epic battles over the sovereignty of the laundry room. We argued about what to pack and when we should leave,
READ MOREGod apparently has a terrific sense of humor. I know this to be true because my husband and I are currently embroiled in one of the most intense parenting rites of passage known to man — teaching not one, but TWO teenagers to drive AT THE SAME TIME. Granted, Thing One and Thing Two didn’t
READ MOREI heard the trucks rumbling in the street this morning, groaning to a halt as I peeked through the blinds to see. The movers were here, preparing to load the wares of two families in my neighborhood who are off to faraway places — one to the Delaware shoreline and the other to the mountains
READ MOREWe have a half-dead tree in our yard. Make that FIVE half-dead trees. A pine, an ash, and three fruit-bearing ones, although they haven’t produced much of anything in a very long while. Hence, the time has come to take them down, which by almost anyone’s standards makes perfect sense. It’ll be safer since the
READ MOREI have a confession to make. I stalk my children. I stalk my husband, too. I don’t know why I do it, actually. It’s a sickness, I guess — an unhealthy obsession with knowing exactly where my loved ones are at practically every moment of every day. Thanks to the fine people at Apple and
READ MOREWhen I first became a mother, it felt as though time stood still, my days and nights never-ending, woven together into an unfamiliar tapestry that defined my upended world. I remember thinking the infant stage would endure forever and that I would surely be driven mad in the process. Sleep was a commodity I craved
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