Are parents getting more and more competitive- or is it just me? I keep meeting parents who are red-shirting their children. What do I mean by that? Making their child repeat kindergarten whether the child really needs it or not.  Ostensibly these parents want their children to have the best advantage-- whether it is a fair advantage or not.

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I just wanted to take this opportunity to offer my sincere Happy

Father’s day wishes to all you guys out there. 



I think that one element of father’s day that sometimes goes unnoticed is that it isn’t just dads that should be celebrated. There should be a pause for thought for all the mums out there who play both roles for their children. Without these mums there would be some under privileged little boys and girls, this could also be said for dads playing both roles before…

Sigh . . . It is prom season, wedding season, celebration season, and although all of these occasions are among life’s happiest, they also serve to remind us (or maybe just me) of the frequent “over the top” state of our culture.  I’m not against celebrations, mind you, but seemingly they are growing and expanding so as to become bigger than life.  And when the events are bigger than life, then life suddenly becomes not big enough.  A little disappointing even.  And so everything else has to…

I have been on a sort of a blogging hiatus. Only because I taught myself to crochet and have since made both of my girls decent size blankets. I'm now working on one for my niece and one for my mother in law. There are several things I really want to blog about that we have done lately that would be a much happier topic than what I'm going to talk about tonight. I think this may be therapeutic in some sort of way. There is a paper I wrote for English 101 in college about this topic that I…

In our first year of marriage, my wife Kendra and I tested our relationship with a six-week trip to Europe. Fortunately it was a great tip and the first of many more. Not even with the birth of our daughter Addison in 2010 has slowed down. Our 2-year-old has been to more than 30 U.S. states, England and France.

Adding a little one to the mix has definitely changed how we travel. We now plan our adventures around naptimes and Addie’s ever-changing routine. Being lesbian moms requires…

Lock Med -The Safety Product No Home Should Be Without!

Todd Millar, past volunteer President of Hockey Calgary, has written a book entitled, “Moron:  the Behind the Scenes Story of Minor Hockey”.  As a past Hockey Mom, I’ve witnessed some of the behaviors that he describes.  One incident occurred when our boys’ were scheduled to play and we were watching the Div One game that was finishing.  Some of the parents of the other teams were banging on the plexiglass and swearing at the officials.  Slyly, we parents all looked at each other and were…

Does your car need some tender loving care?  Have your kids helped trashed your car?  If you have kids, you probably are already aware of how much stuff tends to accumulate in the car and if you are a new parent, here is what you can look forward to in the future.  I know that if I went out to the car right…

Although the 2013 Academy Awards are history, one gem - Amour - will continue to shine. This heartbreaking and unflinching movie was painful to watch but it stimulated conversations with more questions than answers.

As the people we love decline, how do we deal with the inevitable suffering?

Austrian filmmaker Michael Haneke tackled this subject and won the 2013 Academy Award for best foreign language film. The leads, veteran French actors Jean-Louis…

Every now and then it feels so good to say I was right.  I am the first to admit that I don’t know a lot about a lot of things, but when it comes to kids and family, I am usually spot on.  I remember one time making the observation that kids used to be afraid of their parents, but today’s parents are afraid of their kids.  Not two weeks later, John Rosemond himself, made the exact same statement in one of…

Last week I had the good fortune to catch up with one of my favorite twenty-somethings. Remaining involved with her college and her sorority, this twenty-something frequently finds herself on campus with friends, advisors and professors. In the course of her visit with me, she mentioned a conversation she had recently with the Director of Greek Life.  Her opening line: Oh you are going to love this. Her words, her stories.

Evidently the subject of college freshmen came up and…

Parent Coaching is a fairly new paradigm and I am frequently asked what a parent coach does.  In an effort to explain my role, I share an example like the one below.  The scenario and players are fictional, but I think the story will ring familiar, as I have heard similar parental challenges described to me in the past.

Mom:  OK you guys, finish your breakfast, we need to be out the door in 15 minutes.

No response from children.

Mom: (5 minutes later) Alright,…

This weekend Andy Stanley used two words to describe a king, autonomous and unaccountable.  As he said, kings can do what they want to do and they are required to answer to no one.  Their thinking goes something like this: I am the King and I can do whatever I want because . . . well . . . I am the King. And as he uttered the words, I silently thought that his description would be a fairly accurate depiction of the attitudes of far too many of today’s children and young…

We observed one of the rituals of spring this past weekend.  We moved from Standard Time to Daylight Savings Time.  That wonderful time of year when the days begin to get longer, the evening light lingers later, and the promise of no coats and hats and mittens and boots is in the air.  We do have to lose a precious hour of sleep, but no matter.  We will get it back in the fall!  And as I changed my clocks on Saturday evening, all I could think about was my dad.  Sweet memories.

When I…

I could understand a mother's instinct to protect their child from any danger but I can't understand why a mother would intentionally hurt their own child.  Is this because of a mental illness or are some people just not born with the instinct to mother?  I seem to believe it must be a mental illness because even if you didn't have the motherly bond with your child it still doesn't mean you would harm your own offspring.  So the question I pose is why is it acceptable for any mother to just…

http://perfectlyimperfectmomma.com/2013/03/03/the-day-i-met-you/

http://perfectlyimperfectmomma.com/2013/02/27/trust-no-one-and-suspect-everyone/