August 2009 – The Best of Uncool Mom

Flipping Upside Down for Kids’ Activities

Posted on August 28, 2009September 6, 2020 by uncoolmomdotcom

Should parents encourage kids to do whatever extracurricular activity “floats their boat”, or encourage them in skills they can enjoy as hobbies later in life? For example, volleyball or running? Cheerleading or swimming? Skating or dancing? Football or golf? And once the choice has been made, do we think about what that will eventually mean to our families, time-wise and dollar-wise, if they progress?

My husband and I have been thinking a lot about this topic lately as our youngest daughter recently was accepted onto the city gymnastics team. She’s always been agile, climbing and hanging on everything, always been tiny for her age, so I …

Yahoos and Boo-hoos

Posted on August 25, 2009September 6, 2020 by uncoolmomdotcom

I cried yesterday on the first day of school. I didn’t think I would. I mean, I’ve been looking forward to this day. As a work-at-home mom with two kids, back-to-school means I can get more work done. Peacefully. Back-to-school means I can go back to my exercise class. I can play my own choice of music at my desk without it clashing with the theme song to The Suite Life With Zack and Cody– and sing along if I choose! And I can clean …

Domestic Engineering, Kids and Cleaning

The Big “But”

Posted on August 21, 2009September 6, 2020 by uncoolmomdotcom

I’m throwing in the towel about…well, about throwing the towel. And the clothes. And the shoes, magazines, old shopping bags, old Kleenexes, and everything else that my teen manages to throw on her floor. See, I’ve decided, with the high school years dawning bright and early on Monday, that I’m giving up the battle of the teen bedroom. I’ve decided that my daughter is truly not a morning person and I’m tired of deducting allowance every time her bed isn’t made or her clothes aren’t picked up by noon. Like I said in a previous post, she always …

Random Thoughts

It’s A Different World…

Posted on August 13, 2009September 6, 2020 by uncoolmomdotcom

This has been a week of eye-opening experiences that has made me think a lot about the state that I now call “home”.

On Friday night, Allison and her friends introduced me to a TV show called “Toddlers and Tiaras”, a documentary-type show that shows the behind-the-scenes workings of beauty pageants for young children (even babies). I watched in horror as a tiny three-year-old who looked exactly like a pint-sized version of Anna Nicole Smith was forced to endure a photo session while she was sick with fever. …

Raising Girls, Random Thoughts

When Mom Dresses Like A Teen

Posted on August 10, 2009September 6, 2020 by uncoolmomdotcom

I once bought jeans a few years ago from Limited, Too– for myself! No, I’m not a size zero. Just a busy mom who never has time to shop for herself, yet gets dragged to the mall on numerous occasions by her oldest daughter so that she can shop. So there I was one day, bored, waiting while my then pre-teen daughter was trying on clothes (and I kept waiting….. and waiting…..) and sick of listening to the pounding pop beats played nonstop in that store, and I started thinking “outside the box”. Hmmm, I …

Domestic Engineering, Giving Kids Some Freedoms

Just A Spoonful of Sugar…

Posted on August 4, 2009September 22, 2020 by uncoolmomdotcom

Heard while walking out of the grocery store yesterday, spoken to me by my 10-year-old, Emmie: “You are so lucky, you get to do this all the time!”
She was talking about grocery shopping.

It wasn’t that she’d never been to a supermarket before. I have my share of kids-whining-at-grocery-store stories, or kids-reading-embarassing-magazine-covers-in-the-checkout-line stories, or kids-shopping-together-and-running-their-cart-into-people stories. Yesterday was different, because for the first time, I let her take a copy of my shopping list and one of those small plastic “carry baskets” and head out into the grocery store, alone, while I pushed my cart around and got the …