If your child struggles in school, cut yourself some slack and stop the self-blaming

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Here we are, many of us in the middle of Spring Break, heading into one, or just getting ready to enjoy a long weekend with our families. Many of us are eagerly awaiting to get our kids back in school and back to the routine. I for one, have a child who needs the steady structure of school, and actually, for the most part, is happy to be there. For others however, school can be a source of dread and anxiety.

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You might struggle every day just to get your child out of bed. You beg and plead, hoping for a day when they happily get on the bus.

You might be dealing with a newly diagnosed learning challenge and an I.E.P. (individualized education plan). Your mind is a tangle of questions, worries, and wondering what this all means.

You might spend so much time with the principal, guidance counselor and other specialist that you feel you know them better than your own family. You might secretly envy other parents whose children are never cited for disciplinary problems, for being a distraction or for being unfit for the classroom. Continue reading →

Five tips for surviving Passover with picky kids

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Passover is almost here, and, for many Jewish families, that means stress. Before the holiday begins, lots of cleaning and cooking must be done to prepare for the eight-day-long festival. Here’s where I’ll admit, I don’t tidy up to the extent of other Jewish families, and I’m fortunate my mother is the one who cooks for and hosts the family seders, or ritual meals which mark the start of the holiday.

Whether you vacuum and scrub every inch of your home, or barely clean at all, if you are a family who observes the holiday, there is one thing which can cause lots of anxiety: figuring out how to get through eight whole days of no bread, no “real” pasta, no pizza and all the other yeasty foods most picky eaters love.

Passover Picky

If you already have healthy, adventurous eaters, Passover is probably not much of a challenge. Kids who love to eat their vegetables and fruit as well as most proteins are going to be fine this holiday as they are at any other. Count your blessings and enjoy.

For those of us whose children are a bit more selective about their food choices, Passover is the most difficult holiday to get through. Though the Passover-friendly food market has grown, and it is amazing how people have managed to produce everything from cereal to cookies, the holiday can still be hard for kids who only eat a limited amount of food.

We parents need to do what we have to to get ourselves and our kids through the holiday, and not like the stress of food ruin anyone’s experience. To help you make the best of the restrictions, here are my tips for surviving Passover with your picky eater. Continue reading →

Son’s incredible progress inspires couple to help other families get much needed speech services

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Pam first noticed something different about her son, Joshua, when he was 18 months old. Though he was a perfectly healthy baby, she knew he was unlike other kids in his age group.

“We were in play groups with other kids around the same age,” she recalls. “When we went to their houses, Joshua would play with their toys but never showed any interest in the other kids. They would play with each other, hopping around from one toy to another. But Joshua would focus on one toy the entire time. The other kids were starting to form words or to have some semblance of communication with their parents, and Joshua just wasn’t.”

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Like many new parents, Pam, and her husband, Joe, chalked these differences up to Joshua’s unique personality and speed of development. They assumed Joshua’s desire to play with one toy for hours at a time or his avoidance of eye contact was just his quirky behavior, and nothing to be too concerned about.

At their son’s two-year checkup, however, the pediatrician suggested Joe and Pam have Joshua evaluated, and after several appointments, interviews and therapy, a specialist at the Cleveland Clinic diagnosed their son with moderate autism.

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Trust me, other parents get it, too

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I often wear sneakers when going anywhere with my children. You never know when you might need to swiftly move in to grab a child out of a dangerous or problematic situation, or, in the case of my youngest, the desire to be at the center of everything.

Neither of my children are wallflowers, so I was far from surprised, when my little one attempted to go on stage during the local elementary school talent show.

Trust Me, Other Parents Get It, Too

My family joined others in the packed cafeteria/performance space to cheer on our little stars in the making. As I learned the evening before, fifty acts would grace the stage, making it a long night, especially for those parents of older kids, who would be performing later in the show.

Smartly, my husband convinced me we should take two cars. I was hopeful both of my kids would make it through the show, but I had to be realistic when it came to our almost four-year-old.

At first, I was delighted by my youngest’s behavior. He calmly sat with the other children, eating a snack, and watching the acts on stage. Occasionally, he would get up to walk around, but caused no more disruptions than any of the other children in attendance.

As the the night wore on, however, the restlessness kicked in. My youngest made several attempts to play the piano, which was located just to the side of the stage. Perhaps he was inspired by his brother, who had just played the piano earlier in the show. Continue reading →

Elevate your cookie game with these Nutella ganache-filled hamantaschen

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Jews around the world are preparing for one of our faith’s most fun holidays. Purim is the celebration of the Jewish people’s triumph over an evil tyrant, hell-bent on our destruction (yes, I realize this sounds like most of our holidays).

Purim is often celebrated with costumes, games and, of course, food.

Elevate your cookie game with these chocolaty hamantaschen

Traditionally,  on Purim Jews will consume a triangle-shaped treat known as hamantaschen. These delicious cookies are commonly filled with apricot, strawberry or other fruit jams. However, if you are chocolate lover like me, ordinary jelly isn’t going to cut it.

This year, I wanted to take my hamantaschen to another level, so I decided to experiment with a Nutella ganache filling. I won’t lie, there was a lot of trial and error, but I think the final result turned out delicious (even if not every cookie turned out picture perfect). Continue reading →

Dynamic mother/daughter team deliver thoughtful insights via new parenting podcast

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Like many relatively new moms, I turn to more experienced mothers for advice and comfort. For me, there is nobody better than my own mom. Our phone calls often morph into intense discussions on parenthood, with my mother sharing her strong opinions on how kids are raised today.

Dynamic Mother_Daughter Team Deliver Thoughtful Insights via New Parenting Podcast

Who better than my mom to join forces with for an exciting new new podcast dedicated to bringing humorous, insightful and heartfelt content to parents everywhere?

“Mom Around The Corner” will examine a variety of parenting issues through the eyes of a baby boomer mom and a millenial mom. Each episode is like eavesdropping on one of the many candid conversations between myself and my mother. Always unfiltered, often heated and always keeping it real, we hope to give our listeners a broad range of perspectives on everything from childbirth to discipline. Continue reading →

Nobody should ever have to choose between tampons and a meal

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You are out and about and the dreaded “time of the month” has arrived unexpectedly; you go to use the restroom, only to discover, as you desperately fumble through your purse, that you don’t have any menstrual products on hand. You scramble around for spare change, and thankfully, the bathrooms vending machine has some tampons available.

Crisis averted.

Nobody Should Ever Have To Choose Between Tampons And A Meal

Plenty of us have been there, and can relate to the awful feeling of not having period supplies on hand when we need them. We can usually rely on having enough cash to purchase what we need from a local drug store, or even ask a friend. Someone we know always has a spare.

But, what if it weren’t so easy? What if having your period meant searching around for spare pieces of cardboard so you wouldn’t have to bleed everywhere? What if it meant choosing between buying food or buying menstrual products? Continue reading →

Five YouTube channels you’ll love watching with your kids

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YouTube; you either love it or hate it, and, from my research and personal experience, I’d say there are much more people in the “haters” club.

I understand the disdain for the video streaming service. The ability for anyone to upload whatever they want to YouTube means a lot of garbage makes its way to an audience. And, often the garbage is inappropriate videos we don’t want our children viewing. YouTube has made some strides in approving how content is delivered, but the bad stuff can still slip through the cracks.

Five YouTube Channels You'll Love Watching With Your Kids

Before you write YouTube off, consider how much quality content it has to offer. The same democratic system which enables the bad stuff to make it on to YouTube is also what brings us some of the most innovative and ingenious programming unseen on any other platform.

Through my own research (i.e. watching channels with my kids) and the help of some of my Facebook fans, I came up with a list of five creative, educational and fun YouTube channels your children will love and you just might love as well. Continue reading →

Dear G-d, thanks for the hormones

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Our human bodies are marvels of creation. We are divinely crafted specimens, whose intricate functionality surpasses even the most advanced of machinery. Every part of us moves in beautiful synchronicity to enable us to live out our lives as best as we are able. And flowing through our impressive vessels are hormones, perhaps one of our greatest gifts from G-d.

Dear G-d, Thanks For The Hormones

Hormones? Are we seriously talking about those things which caused our faces to turn into bumpy messes as teens, and turns us into irrational rage machines about three quarters of every month? What’s so great about hormones?

If you stop and think about some of the greatest moments in your life — the moment you first fell in love with your spouse, your wedding day, the birth of your first child — almost every one of them can be attributed to hormones, those strange chemicals in our bodies which make us who we are and influence so many of our decisions. Continue reading →

Let’s smash the cycle of negative body image

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I am lucky to have had a positive view of my body for most of my life. Sure, I had a few moments, such as wondering whether my breasts would come in by the time I got to high school, or if I put on some extra weight in college,  when I didn’t absolutely love how I looked, but overall, I was happy with what I was given.

I would like to believe this positive body image was built from within, but that is not the case. Those feelings were nurtured by being raised by two parents who never once made me feel ashamed of how I looked, and who modeled healthy attitudes themselves.

Let's smash the cycle of negative body image

In our home, the word, “diet,” was never uttered from anyone’s lips, or written on any product we owned. There was no pinching of fat, or lamenting about weight gain. The only scale I ever saw was at the doctor’s office.

My parents always reminded me of the beauty they saw within me, even if I didn’t always believe them.

Sadly, I know my experience is unique. Many of my peers grew up with moms who were constantly on diets, or subtly, or not-so-subtly, reminding them of their physical flaws. They were raised in homes obsessed with obtaining the “perfect” number on the scale, fueling a lifetime of unhealthy attitudes about weight. Continue reading →