My family is off for a much-needed, computer-free, cell-phone-less trip to El Salvador, which is where my mother-in-law lives. Even DH has agreed to leave his laptop, which is a first in a LONG time. We plan to take a two-day childfree trip to Guatemala, leaving our son with his grandmother. Of course, this means […] Continue reading →

Babies today are 59 percent more likely to be obese than in 1980, according to a Harvard Medical School study mentioned in HealthDay News. The weight gain is due to the fact that mothers are heavier than ever before, an increase in type 2 diabetes and gestational diabetes among expectant mothers and babies fed formula […] Continue reading →

Thank God the childfree movement hasn’t taken hold in Japan. If anything, there is a big breeding push by the government to mend its population crisis. Right now there aren’t enough young people to take care of the old. I wrote this story for Wired News three years ago about how the Japanese were creating […] Continue reading →

This is funny: Salon’s Cary Tennis — I love him. Moi! — has received at least 150 letters on his latest column. The hot topic? Whether or not a 40-year-old woman should shave her public — now “public” — hair. Said Tennis: So this time I’m just going to own up: I have no idea […] Continue reading →

Editor’s Note: Thanks for the tip, Lorrie! -Elisa Mothers of toddlers are inundating PBS’s Sprout network with letters and petitions opposing the public broadcaster’s firing of Melanie Martinez, host of the “Good Night Show,” according to the New York Times. Apparently, Martinez, an actress and mother in New York, appeared in a video seven years […] Continue reading →

DH and I are about to use his father’s day present: deep tissue massages for two at a spa walking distance from our house. We haven’t been on a date in eons. (A date at night, even longer.) Can’t wait. Have a fun and relaxing weekend, all. Continue reading →

Check out this toddler water-skiing. Apparently, the parents of Cole Marsolek, 22 months, of Wisconsin, are avid water-skiers themselves. Marsolek’s mother, Lissa, started water-skiing at three years of age. “He absolutely loves it,” Lissa said. “He popped right up the first time. He is a little showboat, waving to everyone and blowing kisses at people […] Continue reading →

U.S. men are unemployed in record numbers no thanks to the loss of manufacturing jobs, according to a recent story in the New York Times. But more surprisingly, unlike their fathers in the 1950s and ’60s, they are unwilling to take jobs they consider beneath them. Actually, they would rather spend months, if not years, […] Continue reading →

Along the same lines as the public “scolding” piece, Brain, Child Magazine published a debate on “Should Schools Punish Kids for Off-Grounds Misdeeds?” Writer Miriam Peskowitz, author of The Truth Behind the Mommy Wars: Who Decides What Makes a Good Mother?, said the school should punish students for off-campus naughtiness such as a case a […] Continue reading →

In case you are following this case as closely as this Cuban-American — although I was not dancing in the streets of Miami last night! — Cuban President Fidel Castro, is indeed, alive. But he has decided to keep his health a “state secret.” No doubt many Cubans and Cuban-Americans like myself who grew up […] Continue reading →