I was always adamant when the boys were little that I wasn’t going to be one of those moms who always put the kids’ music on in the car. I mean, we had a couple of cassettes (YES, I SAID CASSETTES: my boys were little in the 90’s.) that were in the genre of Children’s Music–and by “a couple”, I literally mean “two”–but for the most part the soundtrack for our time in the car was made up of Top 40 radio and tunes from the 1980’s and early 1990’s. I figured that the boys would grow to like whatever music we listened to, and I was right. Of course,…
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The Bad Parent, Good Teenager Strategy In Action
The scene: My dining room, earlier this week The players: Seventeen-year-old J, me, and my sister J: “So, Tim* and Megan* want me and (girlfriend) Shannon* to go to this dance club with them on Saturday night.” Me: “Really? A DANCE CLUB? Like, for under twenty-ones?” J: “Yep.” I glanced across the table and raised my eyebrows at my sister. Me: “What is the name of this dance club?” J: “The Zone.**” Me: “And where is this ‘The Zone Dance Club’ that I’ve never heard of after twenty years of living in this Chicago suburb?” J: (shrugging shoulders) “I don’t know. They have a 17+ night on Saturdays. It starts…
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Leafing Another Era Behind…Gladly.
I hope you enjoy this month’s contribution to Hallmark’s “Life Is A Special Occasion” campaign! (Perhaps you should grab a cup of hot cider, and possibly a sedative. This post is about puberty.) I have found that I mentally divvy up the lives of both of my boys into neat little “eras”. It’s easier for me to keep the details of their respective childhood experiences straight if I can associate what I’m trying to remember with the circumstances of a specific period of time. Lucky for my tired brain, they have always been vastly different people and each of them have a unique set of eras, with only two exceptions.…
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Video Evidence Of A Magical Night
You may remember that, back in May, I co-produced a little ‘ole show here in Chicago called LISTEN TO YOUR MOTHER. It was something I had never done before, which was exciting enough, but the evening went off without a hitch and it was a little bit magical. Wait, no: it was VERY magical. You can check out my recap by clicking here. The videos from the evening (as well as videos from the other nine cities!) are finally up on YouTube, and I’d love for you to watch the show. Click here to be whisked away to the Chicago playlist, which will allow you to watch the show in…
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DJ J, Revisited
It’s interesting how life works. While contemplating how my life has taken some pretty cool twists and turns over the past couple of years, I have discovered that often we end up doing things we never set out to do, ever. These new activities, pastimes, or even career changes come in the form of a natural progression, sometimes when you least expect it and often before you realize it. As it turns out, I’m not the only one in our house experiencing this sort of thing. I have written before about how J, my 17-year-old guitar-loving son who has always had a wide range of musical interests thanks to his…
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Back-To-School Fashion: This Time, It’s All About Attitude And Seniority.
I hope you enjoy this month’s contribution to Hallmark’s “Life Is A Special Occasion” campaign! (I bet you’ll love it. It’s got funny pictures, even!) Today is a very special day. It’s not just the first day of school in our district. It’s the first day of J’s SENIOR YEAR. Let THAT absorb for a moment. I know from experience that this year is going to fly by for all of us, what with all of the special activities crammed into a final year of high school education combined with the college search, his girlfriend, his job, his car, and all of the other things he’s got going on. (Related:…
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The Real Martha’s Got Nothing On The Next Martha.
If you follow my friend Jen on Twitter (@TheNextMartha), you already know that she is crafty and creative and crazy (in a good way). She is full of ideas and her mad skills in, well, EVERYTHING related to home projects just blow my mind. She happens to adore Martha Stewart, hence her Twitter handle and the name of her blog, The Martha Project. Did I mention yet that MARTHA STEWART FOLLOWS 57 PEOPLE ON PINTEREST AND JEN IS ONE OF THEM? So there’s that. You can imagine that when Jen found out that the Friday lunch keynote speaker at last week’s BlogHer conference would be none other than the Real…
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#BBSummit12 In A Nutshell
After nearly a year of planning meetings, brainstorming sessions, countless emails, thousands of name badges (okay, 160 of ’em), and excessive sweating, the 2012 Brands and Bloggers Summit (#BBSummit12) came and went this past Saturday. After all the work that I put in alongside my Social RevUp partners MJ Tam and Dwana De LaCerna, I was looking forward to the beginning of the day just as much as I was looking forward to the end of the day (7:00 to be specific, which was the starting time of the after party). My brain is still swimming but I wanted to give you a recap of my favorite parts of #BBSummit12…
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What Teenagers Do Behind Closed Doors
If there’s one thing you parents of young children should know about what happens when they become teenagers, it’s that their bedroom door will often be closed. (Technically there’s more than one thing you should know but let’s just tackle this one for today.) It’s all a part of their asserting independence and wanting real privacy, even though “real privacy”–in my family, anyway–isn’t scheduled to happen for the offspring until they are living on their own. For teens, closing the door can make circumstances more forgivable to play music really loudly, easier to have a quiet phone call after it is technically allowed, conducive to an illicit afternoon nap when…
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Engaged.
My kid is engaged. No, no: it’s not what you think. Let me explain. We’ve had a minor hiccup in J’s college search process recently: he has decided not to pursue music long-term. A couple of years ago he was definitely planning to major in music and then when we started having deeper discussions about what kinds of music careers he would want to pursue, he eventually changed his plan to Music Education and then, most recently, a business major with a music minor. Two weeks ago he announced out of the blue during one of our many college conversations that music was out. It was a shocker to us,…