Reston Mom

Birthday wishes for my husband

This Labor Day, was also coincidentally, my husband's birthday. We had a great time celebrating with family and eating LOTS of really good food! (Sweetwater, baby!)
If you want to get to know my family, then you would have to know that Matt plays more than just a periphery role as husband and father...but rather, his role as husband and father are a powerful and vital force in shaping our family into who we want to be.  I am so grateful everyday for his wisdom, love, guidance, and support and for his obvious care and concern for us.  He is always intentional and invested in what is going on with the kids and with me, in taking care of business, and in being a respected role model.  He is a wonderful leader and friend to our children.  I have felt so privileged to be his wife and have really grown personally from his partnership.  This past year was wonderful and I am looking forward to celebrating his life again after another great year to come.  I hope that this year will be full of good surprises, overwhelming blessing, laughter, and love for him.    Love you darlin'!

Family Night #4

Last night was "dinosaur night" or loosely something along those lines.  We had "stegosaurus" ribs for dinner in honor of the carnivores and "triassic trees" (broccoli) in honor of the herbivores. 

Tell me it doesn't look like my smiley Rex just scarfed down a stegosaurus!

After dinner we let the girls dig for "fossils" (small dinosaur figures, shells, rocks, one real fossil from my own collection as well as a piece of petrified wood).  I bought a bag of moist play sand from Home Depot and poured it into a storage container with the items, added some slotted spoons, cups, and sieve.  The girls who have never had a real sand-box experience loved it and ended up making sand-castles too.  Afterwards, I just put the lid on the storage container to keep animals out and to save the fun for later.

We made "fossil" cookies by pressing some plastic insect figurines and shells into sugar cookie dough.  The imprints actually turned out really well. And finished the evening by reading a library book about fossils while eating ours. 

weekend highlights

finally painted the playhouse

sunflowers now blooming

Nana!

my new nephew

Maddie LaForge (outlet shopping :)

Family Night #4

This week was "Treasure Island" night.  I had lots of creative ideas for this one, but kept it simple since I was trying not to spend any money.  First, the girls decorated the dinner table with various sea shells.  For dinner we had brown rice islands with carrot/snow pea palm trees and "cannon balls" (meatballs), there were also tropical smoothies and of course Pirate's Booty!  After dinner we taught the girls how to make newspaper sailor's hats and then surprised them with a little treasure map which led them around the block and eventually to the "x" where they found a small treasure box filled with chocolate gold coins.  We finished the night by watching Muppet's Treasure Island. The movie was okay...I had really wanted to get Daffy Duck's Fantastic Island (a childhood favorite of mine) but you can't Netflix it and it's nearly impossible to find on DVD, though you can pay a bit for a collector's VHS - ha!  All in all, a really fun night.

Me and Maddie

You can just see Maddie's hot pink nail polish - I wish you could see it better - it's soooo cute on her chubby little digits. (and Hope is off doing her own thing behind us :) 

Family Night #3

We recently had "pretzel night."  For dinner, the girls helped to make homemade soft pretzels which we ate with cheddar cheese dip, olive tapenade, and spinach dip and fresh cut veggies.  We actually took a break from the plans after dinner to just go for a walk outside because the weather was amazing! Sunny and in the 70's.  When we returned home, Matt and I taught the girls how to dance "the pretzel," a favorite swing move and then we all engaged in some Twister.  And for dessert, we shared some yogurt-covered pretzels.

What to do when it rains

Hurry to have fun of course! (unless there is thunder and lightening) 

return from vacation

So we're back...and like any vacation there were definitely unplanned challenges and great need for flexibility - but it was definitely worth it all!  We had a great time, tons of family bonding, and are returning refreshed and full of fun memories.  Some highlights:

• a walk by the ocean - love that ocean air! but my children would rather search for seashells in the tourist shops than on the beach, what's with that?
• 3 days of Busch Gardens "The World's Most Beautiful Theme Park" - my fave!
• My 4 yr. old rode The Big Bad Wolf roller coaster with no coaxing and loved it! (she rode everything she could and the only time she cried was when she wasn't tall enough - so brave!)
• 10 laps around Hubba Hubba Highway (lazy river) at Water Country USA
• lots of yummy eats!
• seeing my new little nephew (born on the 14th) for the first time...ahhh newbies!
• hanging out with good friends we don't see often and their little girl who is two weeks older than Maddie
• absolutely perfect temperatures - gorgeous days!
• tons of time together and the kids couldn't have behaved any better! amazing!

Happy Father's Day!!!

Happy Father's Day to all the dads out there, and especially to my bro-in-law Heath whose first son, Christopher West, was born yesterday - congratulations, man! Now we can pay you back for all of your crazy influence on our own kids! (jk :)
We are off to start a week-long vacation - a much needed gift for my husband (who, by the way, is an AWESOME dad!)  I'm going to time some posts to pop up during the week...but I'll be living it up at the amusement parks and beach with my family.  This is what my husband told the kids in the car today (and may I remind you again that he is, in fact, an AWESOME dad before this changes your mind about that)
" Vacation is about treats*.  You will get to eat sugar and lots of food that isn't really good for you.  You will get to miss naps and stay up late and ride rides and all kinds of things, because that is what family vacation is all about!"  Yeah, so we'll probably reap the consequences of all this upon returning...but we'll have some great first-family-vacation memories and I'm totally looking forward to letting down the rules and just living in the moment together a bit.  So live it up kids, while you can! Eat ice cream twice in one day because it's hot and it just tastes so good! Be tired and refuse to take a nap because you can still manage to drag your feet to one more ride! Be spontaneous and very loud! Go for it - you're daddy and I will be right there with ya!
(* we did actually clarify that family vacation is really all about spending time together...um, and then we talked about all the break-the-rules treats we were going to have again :)

Family Night #2

Our second family night was "movie night."  I generally don't consider watching a movie together as a family activity, since you don't really do it together as much as next to one another.  But, after a long week, we needed some R&R too.  I made movie tickets and a concession stand.  We gave each of the girls real coins and had a lesson about their names and their value, and then they were allowed to spend them on the concessions.  We watched old home videos while we ate our hot dogs - it was so fun for all of us to watch the girls as infants again.  Then we popped in The Muppet's Movie (which I hadn't seen before, though I have seen Muppets Take Manhattan) and snuggled together on the couch.  It was a fun way to spend the evening together.

Can't wait for vacation!

I'm soooooo excited!  This summer will mark the first time our family has been able to take a true vacation together! My hubby has taken a full week off from work and bought us week-long passes to Busch Gardens Va. and Water Country USA.  The girls have never been to any amusement parks before, and Busch is my fave!  We'll be staying at a house in Va Beach all by ourselves - which may seem an odd location for visiting parks in Williamsburg, but it puts us close to the beach and Matt's sister who is due this week with her first baby!  It also puts us close to both Matt's parents and my own, which means we might get some free babysitting too.  But honestly, I'm most excited about just spending the week with my husband and girls all together.  June 15 begins our get-away, we've never done this before so I'll let you know how it goes. I'm sure there will be plenty of chaos when schedules go awry and we vacay with two young kids. Any tips for us?

Family Night #1

I was inspired by another mom to start being intentional about planning a regular family night - a night set aside just for us to enjoy eachother.  We started it off with "fairy-tale" night.  We started by slaying a dragon - well, a meatloaf dragon. (I shaped a turkey/beef loaf and then covered it with "green" brown rice) and the girls had previously helped me to make white-chocolate dipped pretzel "royal scepters/wands" for dessert.  They also helped to turn some cardboard boxes into castles and made crowns for us all to wear. After dinner we pulled out the dress-up clothes and all got in on acting out fairy-tales such as Rapunzel and the Three Little Pigs.  We even video-taped one of our productions.  Then we closed the night by reading some new fairy-tales for bedtime stories.  The girls loved it so much they awoke wanting to do it all over again today.  It was a special night. We're looking forward to many more and a scrapbook full of fun family memories!    

Exposing myself

When my sister started her blog in 2007, she included a few posts called "mama exposed."  The idea was to expose some of her imperfections - the fish that were swimming in murky tanks, the messy closets she couldn't get to, etc....   I think that we all have things that we'd rather not advertise because we want to appear to be good moms who have it all together.  But the reality of being a mom is that there is always something difficult, something we can't get to, somewhere that things are falling apart a little bit (or a lot), something we feel that we don't want to admit because we'd seem like terrible moms.  Little by little, I'm going to unveil some of those things in my life for you to take a peek at. Why? Just keepin' it real. As my husband is fond of pointing out; life is messy. (not just in the organizational sense)  Maybe you can relate and we can laugh a little.  Keep an eye out for "mama exposed."

            Here is a recent family photo: I love the looks on the girls faces - Hope is modeling the "life is perfect" fake mom-face, and Maddie is modeling the "mama exposed" face (not planned...just thought it was cute!)

little sleep, lots of fun....

Busy, but good.  That's how I might describe my week.  Mom came into town on Wednesday with my little sister (who will be staying with us for a week) and also Matt's mom arrived the same day.  My husband was MIA for the day as he was busy having meetings and running production for a large conference the next day.  They couldn't get into the venue to set up until late, so he didn't come in until 2 am, and I hadn't gone to sleep until midnight.  He got up again before 5 am to return to finish before the conference started that morning.  I spent yesterday in the company of around 800 people (including some blog friends :) listening to some amazing speakers and some amazing musicians (my husband was one of them - you guys rocked darlin'!) Matt officially crashed at 6 pm last night and I got up at 5 am to take my mom to the airport.  8:30 began my day of caring for four children and I'm already pooped and I miss my hubby. Still, it's been fun!  

I didn't have time to download any great pictures, but 10 pts. if you can spot the back of my head in this crowd :)

little singers and dancers

Spent a couple of hours today at the playgrounds over at Bready Park in Herndon (good uncrowded playgrounds, if you've never visited.)  The girls were enthralled with watching people play tennis on the nearby courts and clapping for them.  But, they spent at least 30 minutes straight simply dancing and singing on the sidewalk.  No kidding.  30 minutes dancing and singing, happy and free.  I couldn't help but be slightly envious and totally entertained.  I also found myself wondering - do all little girls do this?  'Cause mine are always singing and dancing - all around the house, in the car, outside, everywhere! 

when preschoolers paint....

I love to let the girls paint, but their creativity and interest seem to stretch beyond the boundaries of the paper.  Somehow it always ends up like this.  No, I take that back - because this isn't where it ended.  I failed to get pictures of them using each other as full-body canvases shortly after this. I see their motive now in suggesting that they just paint in their underwear instead of donning their designated "painting" clothes.  No staying in the lines here......

4 yr old funnies

.....when Hope found that her spoon had been completely licked clean of brownie batter, she turned to her rather messy little sister.....

Great day for Great Falls

Spent a great day at Great Falls National Park listening to the rush of the water, breathing deeply, and being awed by pink, white, blue, and purple flowers blanketing the fields and springing out from every nook, cranny, and crevice of the rocky terrain.  The girls enjoyed the hiking over rocks, following the trail searching for the next best rock or view, watching the falls, and scoping out nature through their magnifying glasses.  I enjoyed just being in a natural space for a change.  I grew up playing in reeds, beaches, and woods...I don't have any memories of playgrounds at all really.  It was good to get my girls off the pavement and planned play areas and into nature. 

marshmallow roast

Perhaps not the safest item for children, I still really love our patio fire pit and think they are a great family item.   It's perfect in the fall for sitting around with chums or keeping warm while eating outside...and it's great in the spring too.  Since today was so cool and spitty, we decided to make use of the pit once more before the heat and humidity fully descend upon us.  So, after dinner we headed out with the girls and a bag of marshmallows for a family roast. It was so much fun!  We are taking the girls and my little sister camping in the Shenandoah this summer and it was fun to imagine our first camping trip while staring at my two-year-old giddy with marshmallow beard and gooey strings between her fingers.  It also reminds me that a great s'mores pie is never more than one pre-made graham cracker crust, brownie mix, and bag of marshmallows away! (bake the mix in the pie crust until not quite done, place the marshmallows cut in halves to cover all the top and stick under broiler until golden).

time and space and the big rat-race

I've been doing some reading lately, and pondering.  I quote:
"Life in Modern-day America is essentially void of time and space.  Not the Star Trek kind.  The sanity kind.  The time and space that once existed in the lives of people, who regularly lingered after dinner, helped the kids with homework, visited with the neighbors, sat on the lawn swing, went for long walks, dug in the garden, and always had a full night's sleep.  People are exhausted.  People are stressed.  people are breaking the speed limit of life.  People are overloaded.  We need more time.  We need more space.  We need more reserves.  We need more buffer.  We need time to rest, and space to heal. "
(Richard Swenson, The Overload Syndrome)
This totally struck a chord, particularly living in Northern Virginia in conjunction with being a parent. I refuse to live this way.  I don't care what my refusal means - less money, smaller home, less light friendships, less "well-roundedness" for my children.  I won't allow the sacrifice of peace in my home or peace in my heart.  And I ponder, is it really possible to become a "still axis within the revolving wheel of relationships, obligations, and activities." - (The Gift of the Sea by Anne Morrow Lindbergh - an incredible book, I might add).  Can a mom of two young 'uns be ruled by something other than chaos, lack-of-time, and exhaustion? 

The answer to that question is yes, by the way. 

Horton Hears A Who

Today was dreary and chilly and so we decided to take advantage of the yet unused movie tickets that had been given as a Christmas gift to all of us.  We took the girls on our first full-family visit to see a movie and watched Horton Hears A Who.  It turned out to be a rather relaxing way to spend the afternoon.  Popcorn is always a hit with our girls who sat on our laps, and despite already having had a morning nap, Maddie fell asleep during the movie.  Hope enjoyed the movie and I'll agree that it was pretty good. I'm always a little skeptical to allow my girls to watch something I haven't already seen, but this turned out well and was a really nice way for the family to just chill out and enjoy a drizzly afternoon together.  If you aren't familiar with the Dr. Seuss book, it's a good one - one I've enjoyed reading to my young girls as the theme-line is "a person's a person no matter how small." 

last chance to WIN this book!

There is still time to enter to win a free copy of Rock Solid Families.  Just click here to learn more and leave any comment to enter.  I'll announce the winner on this Tuesday, April 1 - and that's no joke!

enlarging the fun

Hope had been bugging me for a magnifying glass for a while, so I included them in the Easter baskets this year.  They've been a big hit!  The girls are having tons of fun exploring their world a little more closely.

Easter pictures

After a short Easter-induced blogging hiatus, I'm finally back into the swing of things once again.  Here are a few pictures from our family's celebration.

WIN this book!

For five years I lived next door to a woman who was not just a friend but someone who profoundly affected my faith and the mother I am today.  I am sure she has not known this - but simply observing her and her family was so meaningful and helpful to me that I still think of them often.  Recently, realizing that her eldest daughter must now be graduating from college, I was curious to touch bases with them again.  I was excited but not surprised to find that Janell has published this book. I am so thrilled to be able to GIVE AWAY a FREE copy (you know you want it :) and to highly recommend it as a must read.  Just leave me a comment on this post between now and April 1 and I will randomly draw a winner and send a free book. 

Easter Bunny? yeah right.

While Hope is fully willing to believe in Santa Claus, she's apparently a little too astute for a bunny who delivers colorful eggs and candy.  Here is the simple straightforward conversation we had recently - out of the blue, Hope asks:
"mom, is there really no Easter Bunny, right?"
me: "well, yes, not really"
Hope: "then who puts the stuff in my Easter basket?"
me: "well, who knows what kind of stuff you like?"
Hope: "you and daddy."
me: "yes."
Hope: contently "okay then."
So much for childhood fables, my girl is a realist.

Daddy Gymnastics

Oh the fun things daddy's are good for!

Sleigh ride together

While Minnesota may not be the place to go in order to recover from the flu, it definitely is the place to go for a completely charming sleigh ride.  Matt and I are on a short visit to extended family for the sad occasion of a funeral - but gathering family together inevitably means good times too.  So, we took the opportunity to visit Matt's aunt's gorgeous shire horse and take a truly authentic sleigh ride through the snow.  Finally, I can feel like I've had a quintessential winter experience this year - though I'm sad that my girls weren't here to share it too, as they are finishing flu recovery in the care of grandma.  But now I can go home ready to welcome spring!....and with some really fun memories of surfing on toboggans rope-tied to the back of the sleigh (yeah, man, I did it in leather boots with 3 inch heels and didn't fall! Go mama go!)

Sick day

Maddie has been sick for the past two days - fever, aches, shakes, a couple trips to the bathroom, no food and little sleep.  Thankfully, the rest of us have managed to remain okay.  But, it's the first time we've ever had a kid become truly ill.  It's the most pitiful thing to see your tiny, sweet child groaning and flushed with fever - it's hard on a parent's heart.  Maddie's little 2 yr. old voice saying "ow, it hurts" and "I need to spit-up in the potty" (amazingly she's helped us get her there in time every time) is about the saddest and cutest thing ever.  What is not cute is the way I look and feel after two nights of little sleep.  I think we're on the upswing now and Maddie is feeling much better today.  But having your kid get sick - man, it really sucks.

Oh what a lovely day!

We were so grateful for the gorgeous weather today (perfect timing for my husband's day off) and celebrated it by packing up a picnic lunch and spending the afternoon at Clemyjontri Park (which if you are in the area and you haven't been there - you must go!).  It revived us so much and totally revved up our spring fever so that we decided to cap off this lovely day with a cook-out featuring hamburgers on the grill, fresh green beans, caprice salad, and strawberries.  These are the best kinds of days.

Planning with kids

I am an organized person - I feel better when everything is in a designated place, typed, arranged, filed, planned, alphabetized, categorized....you get the picture.  Then came motherhood - and let me say that I've had to let go of a lot of my expectations for remaining organized and neat at all times.  Now, some hybrid form of organized chaos now fills our days.  Nevertheless, I do find that a little bit of effort in planning ahead can go a long way toward maintaining a mother's sanity...and helping her to feel like she is making and employing good decisions for her family instead of simply being pulled along by the massive weight at the other end of the leash.  I'm still trying to figure out how you find the time to plan for things that you already are having trouble finding time to do.....but nonetheless, I do manage to plan some things - like my dinner menu for each week, though planning other things that I'd like to like a regular routine for my housework, I cannot seem to pull off.  Anyway, I found this site - Planning with Kids, and I think it's great.  So whether you are a Type A personality who is just constantly looking for more ideas and better ways to plan or whether you are looking for some help to just survive another day of this adventure with kids - or if you are just looking for ways to make family life more simple and fun..it might be worth checking it out. 

Second-hand education

I'm always amazed at what sponges little kids are...they have such an immense ability to retain stuff that they hear.  It is always fun to hear Hope suddenly include some crazy word in her vocabulary when I have no idea where she got it from...and spend the next few days like a sleuth trying to figure it out until we run across the word again in a library book or she remembers who she heard it from.  And it always tickles me when Maddie starts spewing out stuff that she clearly has overheard but that I had no idea she was paying any attention to.  For example, Hope and I have been having some fun with shapes recently.  The other day while eating at Chipotle, Maddie picked up a triangle-shaped tortilla chip, bit off the top point, held it up to me and said, "look mommy, a trapezoid!" The cuteness of a tiny two-year-old voice using such a technical word totally bowled me over!

parked and peaceful

We spent the entire morning at an open house for a homeschooling program that we are looking at for the girls....it was a great time, but Hope and Maddie were pretty tapped out by the end of it and fell asleep on the drive home.  I decided to just park the car in the sun and read for a while to let them have some of the rest they needed. It was a nice moment to gather some of the rest I needed as well.  The bonus of the natural light minus the distractions that await within my house combined with the sweet sounds of peaceful breathing from the backseat and otherwise silence....was really refreshing.   It probably only lasted twenty minutes before Hope awakened and we headed inside to carry Maddie off to bed and get on with other things. But, it was definitely a wonderful treat of slowing down in the midst of my day. 

a little R&R at a nearby B&B

I apologize for the short lag in posts, but it was for good reason.  My amazing husband whisked me away overnight to a location listed among the luxury hotels of the world.  Goodstone Inn and Estate, located nearby in Middleburg, was utterly beautiful! My husband and I have gradually become big fans of Bed & Breakfast inns, and of all that we have visited this is definitely at the top of my list.  Though it was just an overnight excursion, I can't tell you how relaxing it is to be surrounded by huge sprawling rolling pastures, spotted with little rock outcrops and historic stone walls, not to mention the room amenities. The estate features a farmstead and several adorable houses plus much more (gorgeous main carriage house, pool, horseback riding, etc...) with 18th century feel and tons of luxury! We were totally spoiled by our stay and then followed it up with a leisurely afternoon strolling through quaint Middleburg exploring the antiques and other cute shops.  I definitely recommend this B&B as an amazing destination for anyone who needs a little getaway (and chances are, you do!)
(here's some fun pictures - my english muffins topped with tender spinach, tomato, perfectly poached eggs and hollandaise sauce, yum! and my husband playing on the hill that led to our little house.  But, you'll have to visit the website to see just how gorgeous this place is!)

cousins and writing plays

Recently our girls got to visit with a few of their cousins that they don't see very often.  Emily is two years older than Hope, but the two of them make easy pals. Hope adores her cousin and relished the opportunity to play with her.  The two of them ate early and spent dinnertime creating "plays" for the adults to watch.  Ahhh...the memories.  I can't believe my little girl has graduated to the age where she is totally occupied with play at family gatherings - excited to see her cousins, off doing her thing...engaging in that age-old girlhood pastime of making plays. 

gushing over my family

There are no words to express the love a mother has for her first child.....and there are no words that cover her astonishment to understand the reality of loving a second child with as much gut-wrenching depth as the first.  There aren't words to tell my husband, the man who gave these beautiful children to me, all that he means to me....
my family leaves me speechless - and living in a home that is filled with love.
Valentine's day may be forever marred by a big fat pink and red heart-shaped Hallmark branding...but I am blessed by a lot of love in this life and I'll relish the reminder anytime.   

Aaaahhhh......

It has been a bit of a whirlwind week for us...and the weekend like a tornado!  We hopped down to Va Beach just for one day while my husband's brother is in town - but surprise! Matt treated me to an early Valentine's gift by sending me out to an hour long full-body massage (my first massage) and it was wonderful! I've always seemed to store stress as tension in my upper back/neck and my masseuse did a fabulous job at working it out...then, of course recommended monthly visits - wouldn't that be a dream? So tell me, which is worse - physical stress carried in my neck or emotional stress from trying to squeeze out extra cash for regular massages? :)

The workings of a 4 yr. old mind

Hope is masterful at bombarding me with questions while we drive, I sometimes find myself at a loss at how to answer them.  Here are just a few quotes from our ride today:

• Why do some people call Santa Claus St. Nick?
• Why do mosquitoes need to live near water?
• Is the Easter Bunny not really real and who puts the candy in the basket?
• How do we get babies? How do babies get in our tummies?
• Why is there water in the clouds?
• Why do we build more roads?

budding entreprenuer?

My 4 year old and I at the sink last night while brushing her hair before bed:
Hope: (holding her toothbrush with the Dora picture on it) Mommy, I think I know how they make these
Me: really, how?
Hope: they take the Dora band-aids and stick them on the handle of the toothbrush
Me: like a sticker?
Hope: yeah
Me: that's good reasoning, Hope, it does look a bit like a sticker on the handle, doesn't it?.....
Hope: Can we make one?
Me: a toothbrush?
Hope: yeah, get a toothbrush and put the band-aids on it, make it ourselves
Me: sure we can do that, but we might want to choose stickers instead
Hope: no, it's band-aids and I want Barbie ones.  Then we can put the Barbie band-aids on the toothbrushes
to make our own and then we can take them to the store for other people
Me: That's a good idea, but it doesn't work exactly like that, I don't think the store will buy them from 
us.  Although, maybe as you get a bit older you will come up with some special creation that you can 
actually sell in a store, how would that be?
Hope: yeah, but can we just make a Barbie band-aid toothbrush? please?

peace

I've gotten into the habit of reading long chapter books to my girls at times during the day when they are sitting on the carpet playing or coloring or whatever. Usually after about 15 minutes, Hope will climb into my lap because she wants to see the words as I run my finger underneath.  So, today as I was reading the 13th chapter of The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe with as much dramatic interpretation as I could muster, Hope climbed up on the couch.  Soon after, Maddie joined her sister.  Within ten minutes, they were both draped over me sound asleep. My husband was also soundly sleeping on the other end of the sofa.  So, with my entire family wrapped in peaceful slumber, I sat warmed by my own sweet children and watched The History Channel (I love it and the Discovery channel and have fond memories of lazily watching them with my dad on evenings or weekend afternoons as a child) for about two hours. It's the most peaceful chunk of time I have had in a while, and it felt gooooooooood. (of course, I couldn't reach the camera to get you a good picture of my sleeping clan.)

Candice on Toys and Race

But I Wanted Miko

When it comes to toys and dolls, I have never understood why kids should have dolls that look like them. When I was a kid I wanted Miko, the Asian Pacific Barbie doll. I loved her long black hair and tropical outfits. I don’t know why I never got her. Maybe I never asked for her because I thought I shouldn’t or my mom was uncomfortable about getting me an ethnic Barbie doll.

Whatever the reason, my opinion is even stronger now that I have a bi-racial child. I feel like no one in my family looks alike, so if she wants a blonde doll to be her sister, so be it.

But, I do find it very thoughtful of my friends and family who have gone above and beyond to find dolls, including

• My mom buying the   entire Fisher Price little people collection of families so that my   daughter could have a white mom and black dad. We have the little people   United Nations in our house.
• A shower gift from   my husband’s cousin of bi-racial Real Kidz dolls.
• A shower gift of   lots of little clips and pony tail holders to use in African American   hair.

Even though I don’t think Lili should only have bi-racial dolls to play with, I do think companies who make things celebrating multi-racial families are great and I do want Lili to have some toys that do resemble her and will help her with her self-image. So here are a few sites I like:

www.swirlsyndicate.com Comical tees for multi-racial kids.

www.dollslikeme.com Their collection is impressive. I never knew there were so many items like this out there.

www.simpleasthat.com This is more than a shopping site. A great resource for all  kinds of articles on multi-racial families.

Even if you are not in an interracial relationship, these sites are interesting to check out to help teach kids about diversity.

Candice writes on Identity Crisis

Recently, I told my husband that I was a little annoyed about the fact that everyone identifies Barrack Obama as black when he is bi-racial. My husband’s response was he looks black so he is going to be black. This raised a lot of questions in my mind about my daughter. Would she identify herself as one race? How would I feel if she only identified herself as black? What type of situation would she be in where she was forced to identify as one race and how could I prevent it from causing her any kind of distress?

During the last U.S. Census, people were allowed to select more than one race for the first time. This raised a lot of issues abut how such a decision might effect everything from public funding for programs for minorities to compromising health data.

While the practical me understands the complications such multiple identifiers create, the emotional mommy side of me doesn’t understand why my daughter can’t be both. 

But this issue is like most parenting issues. You cannot control what the outside world does, but you can control your reaction to it. I can only instill the confidence and self awareness in my daughter that she will need to be comfortable with who she is no matter how the world may identify her.  

There will always be people in this world who will want to put others into simple categorizations. I want to make sure that my daughter believes in her heart in who she is and won’t worry about what others think. Will someone let me know when they find the magic formula for that?

Candice writes on Celebrating Change

If it wasn’t for people like Martin Luther King Jr., I would not have the family I have today.

I’m white and my husband is black. And while our interracial marriage and bi-racial child rarely get a second glance now, it wasn’t too long ago that our lives would have been a very different story.

I read stories in a book called Interracial Intimacies about bi-racial children torn from their white mothers because they looked too dark to stay with them. Or children who were put in strangers’ homes, taken away from loving parents, so that they could be raised all black or all white and not be confused about their racial identity.

It frightens me to think that there would have been a time that I would not have had the chance to raise my daughter because she did not have my skin tone. To think that her identity, even her very existence, would have been shameful breaks my heart.

That is why I feel that this day, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, is important to celebrate. I am humbled by the struggles so many went through so that my daughter, husband, and I can live in a world proud of who we are.  And one day, when my daughter is old enough to understand, I want to teach her about the struggles and dedication of those before her that made her life possible. That is a change worth celebrating.

Hooray for a snow day!

I found a definition for "refreshing" during a peaceful moment this morning as I ate my perfect grapefruit while taking in the gorgeous snow-covered view.  One of my favorite things about snow is how much light it bri