LA Moms Blog

The Big Picture

Ok, it’s only a few hours into the New Year, sheesh, new decade and already I’m feeling nostalgic.  Is it me or does it seem like it was just last night that we were all stressing about Y2K and the potential havoc it would wreak on our computers? Looking back at how quickly time has flown by helps me put into perspective exactly how quickly these next 10 years will fly.  Scary. 

In a few hours, I’ll be putting my daughter on a plane by herself to fly across the country.  She’s seven and I know my nose will be pressed up against the glass watching her plane long after it has left the runway.  My heart will be in my throat until it lands and I know she’s in the arms of welcoming family members.

In Fighting Our Children's Battles, Are We Losing the War?

The other day, I received a newsletter from my daughter’s elementary school.  One section caught my eye, “If your child has had a problem with another student on campus; whether before school, during school, or after school, you are asked to discuss the issue with the classroom teacher or the school administrator.  Please refrain from confronting the other children about the issue.  Allow the school to appropriately investigate concerns and situations.”

Whoa!  I couldn’t help but wonder what went down on the schoolyard?  How many parents are skipping the middleman (principal) and going directly to the source? I know it’s a Mama Bear instinct to want to protect our own but it can be a slippery slope to navigate and difficult to know when we’ve crossed the line of doing too much or not enough.  What propels many parents to intervene may be the numerous stories about kids getting hurt or worse, killed, because the school moved too slowly in addressing the complaints of bullying. I know it’s always in the back of my mind. But I also think, while extreme, we may see more cases like the MySpace suicide.

Confessions of a Shameless Campaign Momager

 Ok, I’ll be honest with you.  I’ve never been the type of mom who hovered.  I don’t over schedule my kid. And even though she’s been modeling and acting since before she had teeth, that’s like the riddle of the sphinx as to why and when she books a job.   Totally out of my hands. When she decided to run for safety commissioner on the student council…my how things changed!

Already I was envisioning elaborate posters and sandwich boards.  We could create snazzy full color post cards to hand out and do custom buttons.  My dreams were dashed when the principal handed out two poster boards to each candidate and that was the extent of the promotions they were allowed to do.  Can you imagine if politics worked like that in real life?  Sorry Ms. Whitman, you can’t use your Ebay money when running for California governor, every candidate is only allowed to use Twitter and Facebook Fan Pages – no ads. 

When she brought home a lollipop bearing a taped-hand drawn sticker from another candidate, it was so on.  I badgered her about who was handing out what and am ashamed to admit it but I asked, “do you want to win or not?”  I felt like Joe Jackson as I said it but...had I known we could pass out candy, we would have flooded the student population with a steady supply of sugar and slogans days ago. Umm, yes, I’ve watched way too many episodes of The Apprentice.