Posts

  I HATE SCHOOL AND I AM NOT GOING! I’M QUITTING THE TEAM! I AM NEVER COOKING DINNER FOR YOU PEOPLE AGAIN! I HATE YOU YOU RUIN EVERYTHING! I AM NEVER SPEAKING TO YOU AGAIN! IF YOU COME IM MY ROOM I WILL KILL YOU! OUR CHILDREN ARE THE RUDEST CHILDREN IN THE WORLD! Yeah, yeah, yeah. In this, the first week after school starts here and a fairly early week of the school year for many of us, I […]

  MORNINGS! They’re a madhouse. So much at stake—those kids have to get to school on time! With their gym shoes and their violin and their homework and six manila folders and two cans of green beans and a ball of yarn that they didn’t mention needing until 6:30 am! It’s crazy and it’s painful and it’s chaos—and there really is one secret, one thing you can know, that makes it all better: There’s actually nothing at stake. Nothing. Zero. […]

It’s here. Anybody who wants to can just walk into any store or click any link and get How to Be a Happier Parent right now. I’m happy and proud and freaked out all at the same time—which is, I’m told, exactly the state of mind you want to be in before you walk out onto the set of the Today Show. That’s my big news of the day—if you’re reading this before the 8:00 hour of the Today Show, […]

What’s your ideal family size? There is, of course, no ideal family size. Only children aren’t lonely children. Kids with lots of siblings don’t feel neglected. And if fate deals you a family that’s not the one you expected, you’re very likely to end up perfectly happy about that. Humans are very good at reframing, and when you look at the wonderful family you end up with, well, it’s hard to wish things were different. I have 4 kids. My […]

Reading David Sedaris—and particularly his new book of essays, Calypso —is reading about family, about families of origin and families of choice and how they shape us. And to read Calypso is to understand that that shaping can take a thousand forms—more—and still result in adults. Functional adults who still have relationships with those families of origin, even when they were arguably less than ideal by today’s standards. Outsiders might feel differently, but I think David Sedaris would tell you his […]

Vacations are stressful. I hate that as a sentence, because of course they’re not supposed to be stressful, and lots of vacation advice is to let all the things that go wrong go and just somehow refuse to be stressed. Which is very difficult advice to follow, because it’s hard not to be stressed about some parts of vacation. You’re in a strange place, at the mercy of airlines and train schedules, surrounded by strangers, often accompanied by young children […]

Happy Birthday to me! It really is my birthday. And—my personal celebration—I’m finally actually asking you to pre-order my book, How to Be a Happier Parent. I love it, and I think you will too—it’s a practical, thoroughly researched guide to bringing more joy into our everyday family life, not by doing more (please, no) but by doing things differently. I’m also telling you why pre-ordering the book matters, and what I’ve come up with to make those pre-orders fun […]

For our family vacation this summer, we drove, with another family, from Phoenix to Las Vegas, hitting assorted national parks and forests and monuments along the way. The trip itself was spectacular, and if you haven’t done it, I recommend it. The road trip aspect of our travels was spectacular too, in a whole different way. It’s been a long time since we’ve packed the four kids into the car and driven for hours through spectacular scenery. They’re older (17, […]

It does kids good to do what you want to do—and not just once in a while. Who’s in charge on your family vacation—you, or your kids? Here’s something I learned while researching How to Be a Happier Parent: well over half of parents who travel with kids say they make their children’s happiness the first priority on vacation. And here’s something else: happier parents don’t do that. Instead, they plan trips (among other things) around everyone’s interests, and (within […]

Sometimes it helps to celebrate the very little things. Last night, as I closed the dishwasher, knowing that the last kitchen straightening was done, that I’d taken the final things off the counter and wiped the sink (the one thing the kids never manage to do when they clean up after dinner), I set its fancy timer and shut its door and happily said “Yay!” My daughter happened to be standing there, and she looked at me in shock. “Yay […]

We tend to fill our vacations with plans and projects. What if the plan was not to plan at all? A funny thing about Americans is that we can be a little afraid to do nothing. Our Puritan ancestors (who are absolutely not my direct ancestors and probably not yours either, but they still managed to dump this on us) were all about getting the things done. Milk that cow, tote that bale. Want some rest? Why not sit here […]

It’s not just the lamest flavor of hot sauce. It’s the tone and the mental state you want to reach for when your kids shake on the Extra Hot.

Okay, one of these just kind of sucks. And the other actually helps. Here is perhaps the biggest takeaway from the chores chapter of How to Be a Happier Parent: kids will do chores. Seriously. They’re all capable. The only difference between a kid who doesn’t do chores and the 5-year-old in Peru’s Amazon region hauling “logs bigger than her legs” to help build a fire is (I hate this, I really do): Us. Man, that blows. But there really […]

Some things are just cheesy. I was at a conference recently, and I went to a session where we were first asked to draw our inner monster. (The voice that tells you you suck all the time, and if you don’t have one, then, well. That’s great. I was going to say something snarky but that would be contrary to the spirit of this missive). Next, we went on an inner meditative journey to meet ourselves in 20 years, and […]