June 2011 – The Best of Uncool Mom

Hard To Say Good Bye, But Worth the Pain

Posted on June 28, 2011October 5, 2020 by uncoolmomdotcom

Our exchange student begins her journey home today after living with us for the past 10 months. It’s hard to believe that
this day, that once seemed so far away, is here. It’s been a bittersweet last few days as we’ve all seen it looming larger and larger on the horizon…I cried in the car on
Saturday, Emmie cried last week, Cleo cried yesterday…we all cried today. Cleo doesn’t want to leave and we don’t want her to leave, but she must, and so we have to learn
how to deal with this new kind of loss, new for all of us. We’re saying good-bye to a daughter, a sister, and a friend. Not gone forever, but gone from
our everyday life, gone from our family dynamic, and so very far away.

Earlier …

Uncool and Biblical

Posted on June 23, 2011October 5, 2020 by uncoolmomdotcom

On our recent family trip to Iowa we took a tour of an Amish community– rode in a van with a tour guide through rolling farmland and saw
homestead after homestead of Old Order Amish families, working in gardens, driving wagons down the highway, running through the fields barefoot… there are 2,000 Amish living near Kalona, Iowa
(almost 200,000 in the U.S.) and according to our guide, the community is growing, thanks to their large average family size. It was fascinating, like something straight out of the
movie, Witness, but Emmie thought it was just plain stupid that anyone would want to live like that. No electricity (the Amish stores we visited used only skylights for lighting),
no in-home phones, schooling only through the 8th grade, long pants and dresses all the time, even in the hot summertime… They subscribe to this type …

Blog Nuts 'n Bolts, Humor

The Unexpected Cheerleader: When Your Kids Support Your Blog

Posted on June 18, 2011November 16, 2020 by uncoolmomdotcom

It’s tough trying to blog while on vacation. But bloggers need to post regularly or they risk losing visitors as
their blog goes “stale” (in my first year, I learned the hard way after being sick and waiting more than a week to post—the numbers drop was dramatic and took months to regain) and so it’s good to
write some posts in advance that are “waiting in the wings” as finished drafts, so if you are “out of pocket”, all you have to do is hit “publish” when you need content and go on with your
vacation (or illness, or whatever). Only for me, it was hard to stock up during busy May (remember, next to December, May is the busiest month of the year for parents of school-age kids with
all the “end of year” activities happening all at once). So I found myself at Grandma’s house last week with no stockpile of posts, trying to write …

Being a Better Parent

Random Acts of Art: Why Yarn Bombing, Flash Mobs, and Other Unconventional Creations are Good for Kids…and Communities

Posted on June 10, 2011November 16, 2020 by uncoolmomdotcom

An article in the newspaper recently caught my eye, about the “Surfing Madonna”, a mosaic that has been causing a commotion in
California after it was installed clandestinely this spring on Good Friday/Earth Day, in the beach town of Encinitas. The 10 ft. x 10 ft.rock and glass piece, depicting the Virgin of
Guadalupe hanging ten and the words “Save Our Ocean” along one side, was created elsewhere and then brought to the site by people disguised as construction workers, and installed
with powerful epoxy glue. Though much of the public loves it, city administrators got in a huff and hired an art conservation agency to study how the mosaic could be safely
removed and displayed elsewhere, since “grafitti” is against the law. After receiving thousands of dollars from the city, the agency told them the best plan for the artwork
is to leave it where it was, protected from the wind …