The MomSpeak

My girls have a half-gallon a day milk habit. If I’m buying organic, that’s $5 a day. If I’m going for the regular old stuff, that’s about $1.75.

Big difference.

Of course we all want to do the best for our kids, but in this economy we sometimes have to make decisions between “the best” and “won’t really kill them, right?” So I started researching which foods make sense to buy organic and which don’t really offer enough improvement to make it worth it. What I found was fascinating.

I checked sites like Consumer Reports, the EPA pages on pesticides in children and the Environmental Working Group and the info was actually really helpful for me.

First off, if you buy anything organic it should be milk, eggs and other dairy products, along with chicken and meat. If animals are eating (excuse me) crap feed, then what you’re going to be eating are crap animals, eggs and milk. Your kids are more vulnerable to the toxins in animals (hello, mad cow?) than we are, so for me, this is the priority. (more…)

I have these fantasies every year about making my daughters’ Halloween costumes myself. But between work and home obligations (and watching Project Runway) it never quite happens. Next thing you know it’s October 30, and I’m picking through the pathetic remnants at the local costume store, trying to decide if it’s worse to make my three year-old a sexy cheerleader to just stick her in a sheet and call her a ghost.

And yes, they really do have sexy costumes for little girls. I’ll spare you a link.

Perhaps you too want to resist the quick ‘n easy appeal of store-bought pvc masks and shoddy quality vinyl capes but also find yourself pressed for time (or, um, skills). If so, it’s easier than ever to find the accessories you’re looking for online. Just a quick poke around some of Cool Mom Picks’ favorite haunts on the web, yielded the following beautiful items. (more…)

We were not one of those lucky couples who had our children’s names picked out on our second date. Or the 175th.

Far from that in fact, I was pregnant-twice-for close to seven months before my partner and I could agree on names for our girls. Part of the issue is that he was pretty insistent on naming them for one of the Washington Redskins, most notably Clinton Portis. On the positive side, she’d be the only Clinton Portis in her class. On the negative side…well, no. Just no.

So I did what any mother would do in the same situation (besides considering temporary separation until I could get something reasonably cute down on that birth certificate); I turned to the vast baby naming resources on the web to help inspire some ideas.

Google “baby names” and you get 13,000,000 results, which is almost the number of possible spellings of the name Jaden these days. So while indeed, there is online help out there for you, navigating it can be overwhelming. I remember clicking from link to link, wasting far too much time on sites with faulty technology or on those so inundated with flashing ads and sponsored text links the content was clearly an afterthought. (more…)

The first time I opened the big fat Baby Book That Shall Not Be Named, I freaked. Just freaked. It was probably a combination of first trimester hormones and the legitimate fears of a first time mom-to-be, but those so-called experts destroyed my confidence in my ability to be a parent.

It seemed to me from the Baby Book That Shall Not Be Named that parenting had nothing to do with love or commitment or even instinct, but one’s ability to memorize the 14 pediatrician-approved breastfeeding holds or dedication to creating a perfect germ-free home.

I was going to be a total and complete failure as a parent.

And so, like tons of parents-maybe even like you–I turned to the web. I couldn’t believe what I found: Message boards, blogs, websites, and online communities filled with people like me who were admitting that they too were freaked out. Plus advice. Oh boy, was there advice. But not from experts who seemed to have no understanding of the constraints and limitations of real-life moms– more like moms themselves who were willing to contribute their own experiences to the community and see if it might benefit anyone. Less the “ask an expert” approach to parenting and more “ask the chick from your new moms group, the one with the bangs and the cool sling.” (more…)

I didn’t have the necklace more than a few days, but I had hardly taken it off. The sweet silver charms were each engraved with my daughter’s names and dangled just below my clavicle.

I stuck a thumb through the ball-bearing chain and lifted it to chin-height for my mother to admire.

“I know it’s not something I’d ordinarily buy,” I told her. “Someone sent it to me. But isn’t it sweet?”

“Well,” she said, as diplomatically as possible, “when you love your children, almost anything that reminds you of them is beautiful.”

Eep.

I can’t even believe it; I had been duped into adorning myself with a goofy, cheap-looking mommy necklace around the streets of Manhattan. (more…)

Frugal is not the first adjective you might use to describe me. I don’t wash out my Ziploc bags or eyeball the roll of toilet paper to determine if anyone in the family is using more than his or her fair share. (Seriously, I once heard about someone who did that. A little scared here.)

I am also the world’s worst coupon clipper. Scratch that, I’m an excellent coupon clipper; I’m a terrible clipped coupon user as the stacks of yellowing, curled coupons from 2003 in my kitchen drawers will tell you. (more…)