One of my wife’s friends in Thailand has been trying for years to have a baby and finally did. Her typing and English are not so good, but her email I thought was quite affecting: My girl, JOOK-KRU,is so young, so I want to spend most time for her. I had a little trouble in first 5 months pregnancy. Now I feel very good, I think big trouble in my life was gone. As you know We see docter for 8 years continuiously and spend a lot of money for the problom. We get her by IVF technique. She is healty , try to climb to upatairs, always make loud noise. I think she can call ‘ mae’ or ‘mama’ or ‘papa’ soon. “Mae” means “Mom” in the Thai language. “Jook-Kru” means “little bird.” Read more →
EppsNet Archive: Parents
Parenting Paradox
How do you love someone so much knowing that you’re going to lose them — that in fact you are losing them a little bit every day? Read more →
Welcome to Irvine!
Education is important in our community . . . Word came home last week that this year’s Stanford 9 testing starts the first week of May. Immediately, my wife got a call from another mom announcing that she’s cancelling all play dates through the end of the testing period so her kid can spend every waking moment on test prep. The gauntlet has been thrown! Meanwhile, in business news, thanks to the tech meltdown, office space vacancy rates in southern Orange County continue to hover around 30 percent. The screaming rent deals this creates were enough to induce the company I work with to pack everything up and move one off-ramp further south on the 405 . . . Read more →
Kidding Around
Parents who joke in a light-hearted fashion during tense or stressful situations may make their children feel more comfortable and accepted, less anxious, and more willing to communicate in a positive manner. This is according to a study done at Arizona State University. My kid’s reaction: “Go, Arizona State! If USC [where I went to school] is so great, why didn’t they figure that out?” Read more →
Are You Proud of Me Now?
Barbra Streisand’s mother died last week at age 93. The two had a strained relationship, as people sometimes do with their mothers. When Mom attended one of her shows in 1994 — she would have been 85 years old at the time — Barbra addressed her from the stage, saying, “Are you proud of me now, Mama?” I’m not a big fan of anything Barbra Streisand has ever done, but for articulating a lifetime of pain in seven words, you can’t do much better than that . . . Read more →
Andrea Yates’ Confession
Transcript of Andrea Yates’ confession This is very, very sad and hard to forget. You may want to just skip it. Read more →
Samuel Butler Meets Rusty and Andrea Yates
“Poor people! They had tried to keep their ignorance of the world from themselves by calling it the pursuit of heavenly things, and then shutting their eyes to anything that might give them trouble.” — Samuel Butler, The Way of All Flesh Related Links Transcript of Andrea Yates’ confession This is very, very sad and hard to forget. You may want to just skip it. Read more →
Hockey is Fun!
Thomas Junta, a 275-pound “hockey dad,” was convicted of manslaughter for beating to death another parent, 156-pound Michael Costin, at a youth scrimmage. The point that Junta was trying to get across to Costin was that Costin’s sons were playing too rough and spoiling a nice, fun game of hockey. Way to go, Dad! Read more →
No Critics
I tried to conduct myself in such a way that I wanted my players to act. I think our youngsters, whether they be basketball players or our children at home, need models more than they need critics. — John Wooden Read more →
Milestones
For some things, you still need a man. Read more →
Having it All! (Except the Kids)
More highlights from the Census Bureau’s Fertility of American Women report released last week: Overall, 43 percent of women of childbearing age (15 to 44 years old) were childless in 2000. Among women who were nearing the completion of their childbearing years (40 to 44 years old), 19 percent were childless, almost twice as many as women in the same age group in 1980 (10 percent). Women nearing the end of their childbearing years had an average of 1.9 children, which is below the level required for the natural replacement of the population (about 2.1 births per woman). This average is one child less than the average for women in this same age group in 1980 (3.0 children). Read more →
Having it All!
Working moms are destroying the nation The labor force participation rates of mothers with infant children fell from a record-high 59 percent in 1998 to 55 percent in 2000, the first significant decline since the Census Bureau developed the indicator in 1976, according to the Fertility of American Women report released last week. Read more →
Dav Pilkey Lives!
Charles Dickens, however, is dead I was reading Bleak House last night, and my 8-year-old son said, “Charles Dickens is dead, right?” And I said, “Yes, he’s dead.” “It seems like all the good writers are dead.” “Well, a lot of them are dead.” “Dav Pilkey is still alive.” So there you have it: Charles Dickens is dead but Dav Pilkey lives. Tra-la-laaaaaa! Read more →
Ansel Adams (and Other Great Americans)
Ansel Adams was born on this date, Feb. 20, in 1902. Adams was a great American photographer, best known for his black-and-white photos of Yosemite and other natural monuments of the American West. Read more →