Before sixth grade even started, the rumors swirled. Everyone said Mrs. Lamb was tough, mean, and scary. Even guys from other schools knew her students were prisoners. But there was no bread and water. Instead, she was all about journal…
Are you raising culturally responsive kids and talking to them about antiracism? Read tips for talking to your kids about race and advocating for others.
I have a friend whose parents are very involved in her family’s life. They are helpful and attentive grandparents, and I tell her how lucky she is all the time. Not only are my parents not very active in my…
Over the years, our family has visited every single Virginia State Park (that’s forty parks!) and stayed in a wide variety of cabins, ranging from one-room log cabins built in the 1930s by the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps) to six-bedroom…
When our firstborn was just shy of eleven months, my husband was hit with a sudden and scary viral infection that landed him in intensive care. In an instant, everything about our little family’s life changed and for about a…
I remember when we got it, of course, back in that long-ago December when I decided that it was time for my boy to have a basketball hoop of his own standing tall in the driveway. He had already begun…
Parenting a two-year-old is not for the faint of heart. Two-year-olds are fiercely independent one moment and incredibly needy the next. The highs are higher and the lows are lower. Despite this, I find myself almost looking forward to my…
My 14-year-old son has been wanting to work a real job since he was in elementary school. He could apply for a special work permit and find a job this summer, but I think he should wait until next year.…
In the seventies, my friends and I played near a trickle of a creek in a ravine everyone called “Bloody Bones.” The water was copper-colored from what we always assumed was factory runoff. It might have been toxic, but I’m…
I’ll start running,” my son announced during dinner. “Really… why?” “Three miles, three days a week – for a phone.” A few hours before this declaration, I shared the story of a student who recently ran five miles a day…
