I babble about business, babies, and parenthood on this blog, so those of you who come here to read my posts on entrepreneurship but do not have babies, please forward this post to your friends and family who do have babies. For those who have babies and dabble in business, these tips might be right up your alley. If you have babies and have no interest in business, then send it on to the folks you know who are knee-deep in business and encourage them to have a baby! 🙂
Today’s guest baby tip is written by one of my favorite dads, Daddy Clay. Clay is the founder and Chief Creative Officer of DadLabs. DadLabs creates all sorts of cool, informational, not-so-informational, and downright hilarious videos about being a father in this new era of “let’s share parenting responsibilities, shall we?” On Monday’s they have a new video in The Lab, on Tuesday’s they are in The Lounge, on Wednesday’s they have Daditude (Daddy Owen is pretending to be pregnant by wearing a pregnancy belly), and on Thursday’s they are all about Gear Daddy. Check them out!
Welcome any and all baby showers/keggers!
For lots of guys, as soon as the excitement of a positive pregnancy test wears off, the first concern is about money – well maybe the second concern – the first concern we’ll deal with in another post. But money is definitely a big worry. This concern hits an early peak on the first visit to the baby Mega-store – usually a scouting mission. There, a guy silently tallies up the expenses of all the items on the “necessities” list while trying to seem enthusiastic to the expecting mother. How are you gong to afford all the baby gear?
Women long ago figured this whole deal out. Need to outfit the nursery? They gather the gals for a baby shower to play cute little games and open gifts with nifty wrapping. They giggle and gossip. Sound like fun, fellas?
Get over it. Go along if you are invited, and tap into the power of community. Actively encourage your wife to land as many showers as possible.
And here’s a radical idea. Throw a dad shower. But we can’t call it a shower. Not gonna happen. Let’s adapt. How about having a Baby Kegger instead?!
You provide the beer. If you don’t like the idea of setting up a gift registry, host an auction. Ask your funniest buddy to MC and offer various goods and services up for sale to the highest bidder. Any bids on the last round of golf with the expecting dad before his life changes forever? Got to let the motorcycle or the season tickets go? All proceeds go to the stroller fund – – or the 529 plan.
Let your guy friends in on the action of supporting your new life as a parent.
______
If you like this tip, you might be interested in our other recent guest baby tips:
Note to new readers: these tips are based on our experiences, as well as those of our friends and readers. Please always consult with your doctor before implementing any tip that might impact the health of your baby. If you have a tip you’d like to submit please send an email to blogger at babblesoft dot com for possible inclusion. Please check the ‘baby tips’ category to make sure your tip (in some form or fashion) hasn’t already been posted. If it has been, feel free to comment on that post and support the tip. We also welcome respectful challenges to the tips because as is noted in our inaugural baby tip ‘everything is relative!’ We will, of course, give anyone who submits a tip we publish credit and a link back to their site!
I have written about DadLabs before at DadLabs Keeps Us Laughing and I’m writing about them again because they are cool, professional, funny, laid-back, politically correct, and because Daddy Troy just interviewed me/Babble Soft yesterday for a Gear Daddy episode that will air in January 2008!
Daddy Clay also included Babble Soft in a piece in our local Austin American Statesman called Gifts for new or expectant parents that went online today and will be in the print edition tomorrow. Such thoughtfulness!
Our relationship with DadLabs is just one of the reasons I think being in Austin, Texas is so cool. It’s such a friendly, connected town that is so supportive of small companies. Many of us entrepreneurs know that it’s a long road full of challenges, good decisions, bad decisions, no money, some money, nice guys/gals, not-so-nice guys/gals until (or if) we reach our goals of sharing our products and ideas (profitably) with the world and it’s nice to be able to help each other out!
As I was leaving their studio, Daddy Owen was preparing to put on a Pregnancy Sympathy Belly for his Prego Man experience. They have a very verbally forthright video on their blog with their pitch to Daddy Owen as to why he should be the one who plays the pregnant dad at Daditude – Prego Man the Pitch that I thought would be a bit too verbally graphic to embed here. But for those who don’t have kids in earshot or want to see Dads talking about how it is to be pregnant, check it out.
I will, however, embed The Lounge – Mother-in-Law where they interview the moms who wrote Baby Proofing your Marriage, that I’ve mentioned before, sharing their thoughts about experiences with their mother-in-law. Enjoy!
UPDATE: When embedding the video it broke the layout of the following posts on Firefox (thanks Pearl for the heads up) so I had to remove it. You can always check the video out by clicking here.
Our 2 1/2 year old daughter is now officially day-time potty trained! Knock on wood. It’s been a few weeks without any accidents so we are crossing our fingers that we can now move on to the next stage of our parenting lives. My two (and only) posts where I mention potty training are here and here. Correction: I did also mention potty training on my Are We There Yet? When Will We Get There?! post.
Now for a couple of interesting, recent posts on Boing Boing related to toilets and potty training to liven up your day!
Etsy seller Vital makes a variety of toilet-tank decals, from this jellyfish to manatees, SCUBA divers, catfish, and bicycles, drain-plugs, Vespas and skeleton-keys. Link (via Cribcandy)
BB reader Bill Bliss, who shared some cool photos from Ghana with us earlier this year, says…”I was in Greece recently, and in the Agora in Athens there’s a museum. There’s an artifact in there that I just had to take a picture of! It’s a potty training seat made from clay (partially reconstructed, from the looks of it). Who knew?”
I have been meaning to write this post about networking for quite some time now but I’ve been distracted by, held hostage by, paying attention to my network. 🙂
Networking is one of those interesting words that I see primarily referenced in the business world when describing connections with people who can help each other with their respective endeavors (e.g., job search, business building, introductions, etc.). I’m not on Facebook yet, nor do I have a MySpace page but from what I read about those sites people do not seem to think what they are doing is ‘networking’ when they use those sites. According to Facebook’s home page, “Facebook is a social utility that connects you with the people around you.” I never would have thought the term “social utility” would resonate with so many people, but it apparently does.
When people use sites like LinkedIn they do seem to think they are engaging in a form of networking. I am on LinkedIn and you can see my profile here.
My philosophy on who I link to and who I send LinkedIn invitations to is best illustrated in Thom Singer’s post at Some Assembly Required called LinkedIn Rant and Challenge to Bloggers which he later expanded on in his More On My LinkedIn Rant post. In summary, I link to people I know, have worked with, and/or had a meaningful email/phone exchange with. I generally don’t link to people who send me blind invites whose motivations for linking are iffy at best.
So why do I call this post Work/Life Balance of Networking? Well it’s because of Gail Evans, former VP of CNN and author of Play Like A Man, Win Like A Woman and She Wins, You Win. Back on September 20, 2007 she came to give a talk at the Association for Women in Technology – Austin (AWTA). I have been on the board of AWTA for several years and just stepped down this past summer.
Gail said many profound and informative things about being a woman in the corporate world in her speech, but the comments I found most interesting were on work/life balance and networking for women. Here they are:
Why do people (i.e., women) constantly talk about work/life balance? It’s ALL one life! We work in that life, we play with our kids in that life, we play spend time with our spouses in that life, we hang out with our friends/family in that life, and we spend time on ourselves in that life. So if we talk to our kids while we are at the office or we check our Email while at home it’s one life. She said it doesn’t really make sense why people suggest that work and life are warring and opposing elements because LIFE is the clear winner and it includes work!
Women don’t need to be taught how to network. She suggested that women are born networkers because they can find out anything (e.g., best schools, where to get XYZ, best doctors, etc.) from another parent, a teacher, a shop owner, or whomever when they are discussing their kids and family. Somehow, they have brainwashed themselves into thinking they need to hire someone or read a ton of books on how to network to make the same kind of connections in the business world. [I laughed when she said this because it is so true that many women are scared of the ‘networking’ word at work!] She illustrated with a story about how she overheard a conversation between two women who had met on a airport train on their way home. One was pregnant. The other had kids. By the end of the train ride, Gail said she knew practically everything about them and who each of them recommended the other connect with except for where they worked! Gail brought this up because she found it interesting that AWT brought in networking expert Steve Harper, author of The Ripple Effect to coordinate the ice breaker activities before her speech. I’m not sure Steve stayed for the meeting and heard her make that observation. I think Steve had commented that this was the first time he had facilitated an ice breaker for a roomful of women. Way to go Steve!
Check out the books written by the people I mention above by clicking on the Amazon links below (for those reading this in a feed, you’ll have to click on the link post to see the book images below) and partake of their sage advice!
I finally got around to taking our son for his 5 year well-check, and he passed with flying colors! Not that there is a pass or fail to the well-check experience, but I felt good about it (a.k.a. I felt like a good mom). 🙂
Our pediatrician (who I really like) checked him over and then the nurse came in to conduct his vision and hearing tests. When he was 4 years old, the nurse asked him to read the lines of letters on a sign that they placed down a hallway…very much like an adult eye exam. This time the nurse gave him a square laminated card with different shapes on it (i.e., square, heart, house, circle) and asked him to point to the shape on his card that she was pointing to on a sign that was on a door down the hallway. I’m a bad judge of distances so I can’t say exactly how far the sign was but maybe 15 to 20 feet away? She then had me put my hand over each of his eyes and asked him to find the shapes with just one of his eyes. I thought it was a very clever and unique test, because not only was it testing his vision but also his shape recognition and matching abilities.
He then got his chicken pox vaccine booster, which he chose to get in his arm instead of his thigh, where he has gotten all of his in the past. He complained a little bit but then seemed to forget it fairly quickly mostly because our doctor promised to show him a magic trick. Even though it’s been over a year since his last well check, he still remembers that she does magic tricks. The magic trick she did today was to have him tear up a paper towel and put it in her magic bag that has a handle on it. She shakes the bag, the pieces of paper towel disappear, and when she turns the bag over a bunch of stickers fall out!
He was thrilled with his super hero and Sesame Street stickers, and I was thrilled that the doctor said he is doing well and that he was a very bright kid. 🙂
I don’t have time to watch a lot of TV but one of the shows I do watch on a consistent basis is Grey’s Anatomy. I know it’s a night time soap opera of sorts. I know it’s not a real depiction of life in a teaching hospital, and I know that most doctors aren’t that good looking, but I still get caught up in the drama.
In the November 1, 2007 episode, Dr. Cristina Yang said something quite simple yet quite profound to Dr. Meredith Grey. First a little background for those who do not watch Grey’s Anatomy. Dr. Yang is a brilliant surgeon who expresses little to no emotion. It’s clear her entire goal in life is to become the world’s best cardiothoracic surgeon and nothing will get in her way. She is very direct with people and she rarely takes time to listen to other people’s problems. It’s all about her and she has recently been faced with experiences that are making her evaluate her approach to life.
Dr. Grey is also an outstanding surgeon with serious relationship/personal issues. Her dad left her when she was a kid partly because her mother was cheating on him and partly because she was so focused on her career. Her dad never came back to see her. He married another woman and had two kids with her one of whom is Dr. Lexie Grey, who has just found her way to Seattle Grace hospital as an intern. Needless to say Meredith and Lexie have an awkward relationship.
Meredith’s mom, Ellis Grey, was intensely focused on her own medical career and was a highly accomplished surgeon and pretty much resented that she had to take care of Meredith. She often told Meredith that she did not want to have children and consequently was extremely critical of everything Meredith did (or did not do). So now Meredith has tons of personal issues but somehow has won the heart of Dr. McDreamy (Dr. Derek Shepherd), whose character in the show is one of practically a saint among men because he is there for Meredith no matter what she does or says!
Meredith almost drowned in an episode last season. She could have saved herself but instead gave in to her self pity and crossed over to the other side for a short while. Somehow she comes through after being unconscious for several hours and awakens to a different perspective and awareness of who she is and where she fits into the world. This perspective soon fades and she begins to involuntarily inflict her insecurities on those she loves and on those who love her once again. She doesn’t want to, but she does not know how to accept or give love because she was physically and emotionally abandoned by the people most important to her as a child. Despite these childhood traumas, most of the rest of the world would classify her as a functional adult (i.e., she is smart, has a career, has friends, etc.).
In one scene Meredith asks Cristina why she just can’t get past all of this stuff and move on now that she’s aware of her issues. Cristina says “being aware of your crap is not the same as getting over your crap. They are two very different things.” Meredith knows she’s right and stares off into space.
This post is dedicated to a good friend of mine who is dealing with crap of her own right now. I worry about her. I wish the best for her. I can relate a tiny bit with what she might be going through, and I pray that the gap between her being aware of her crap and getting over her crap decreases exponentially day by day!
Check out the new and improved DadLabs site. I’ve been to their lab and met with pretty much all of them. I have to say they are pretty darn cool. They have some downright hilarious videos and I’m embedding some of them below.
Manly breastfeeding – a.k.a. Daditude ‘Milk Man’ – (if you are easily offended you might not want to watch this one. If you are ready for a good laugh, I recommend that you watch this one at least 5 times but make sure you aren’t holding a drink. I was laughing so hard I couldn’t stop the tears!).
The Lab Shoes (all about finding that ever elusive kid’s shoe when you are about to walk out the door)
I can’t wait for them to do a Gear Daddy video on Babble Soft!
Well it’s here. With an assist from our new producing partner For Your Imagination, the DadLabs site is relaunched, and Season 2 has officially begun. Our kickoff episode is appropriately enough, all about shoes. Get it? Kick. Shoes. And check out the special guest appearance by Cooper John!
We could really use your support in this critical time, so please drop by the site and check out a video or three. We will be posting a new episode of each of our shows each week: the Lab on Mondays, the Lounge on Tuesdays, Daditude on Wednesdays and Gear Daddy on Thursdays. You can also check out a classic: all 100 episodes from Season 1 are available on the site. You can even subscribe to us on iTunes now.
Our goal is 150,000 video views in the next two weeks, so if you wouldn’t mind, please watch 150,000 videos. If you can’t manage that, please tell everybody you know to stop by the site and have a look. And let us know what you think by leaving us comments. Help us be the best internet television show on fatherhood. Which shouldn’t be hard because I’m pretty sure we’re the only…internet…television…
Special thanks to the amazing guys at For Your Imagination. When they announced their timetable for getting the relaunch done, I thought they were nuts. Which they clearly are. But they got it done, and it’s amazing.
So stop listening to me ramble on and go to the site! And watch a bunch of videos and leave a bunch of comments.
Check out my guest post at Austin Startup called Parenting a Start-Up and Niños (Kids). I had fun pulling it together! Let me know what you think. Just for grins, here is a copy of the grid I created comparing a High Tech Startup with Kids:
So, being the good little high-tech entrepreneur that I am, I made a grid to outline the differences.
High-Tech Startup
Kids
Time
8 to 16 hours per day; 5 to 7 days per week (unless you are Tim Ferriss, author of the 4 Hour Work Week)
24 hours per day; 7 days per week (unless you have a live in nanny or grandparents)
Resources
Not many, but you have the option of raising funds and hiring people to help you out
Less than “Not many” with no option to raise funds, but you can hire help if you already have money
Rewards
Public recognition
People kissing your _____
Reasonable salary (and maybe even benefits) if funded and/or your product/service is quickly accepted by the market (i.e., paying customers, advertisers)
If things turn out well and your kid is reasonably well adjusted, you have bragging rights and the satisfaction that they have the ability to positively affect the world around them. Oh and they just might take care of you when you are older.
Risks
You fail miserably and your name is in the news as being a ‘loser’ for a few months and you could quite possibly end up broke.
If you do something illegal you can end up in jail but after doing your time you can continue building your Martha Stewart Classic Living empire.
Your kid turns out to be a serial killer and they want to interview you non-stop on CNN and FOX News.
Your kid hates you but still calls you for money.
If you cracked a smile or dared to chuckle, you might also be interested in:
I hope you are all having as much fun as I am with my start-up!
In case you are wondering what my first guest post was about, look no further than Entreprenuership: A Blessing or a Curse? on Wendy Piersall’s eMoms at Home blog. Yes that’s my old curly-haired avatar not my NEW one. 😀
The kids and I just got back from visiting my best friend and her family in a town 2 ½ hours drive Southeast (I think) of Austin.Those who know me probably know that I’m directionally challenged.🙂
For the first time in the history of driving to her house, my 5 year old son did not take even the briefest of naps.He is a non-stop talker.If you’ve ever seen that car commercial where the girl is talking when her dad puts her in his seat and is still talking after he closes the door and opens his door and starts putting on his seatbelt…that’s our son.
However, on this trip he did spend some time observing the landscape and listening to songs on my new iPod nano (via the car stereo) that I got because Erin recently purchased a new Mac and it came with it.Consequently, I only heard the phrases “Are we there yet?”and “When will we get there?” and “Man, that’s a long time!” oh maybe a dozen or so times.My younger daughter slept through most of the trip.I eventually told him if he asked me one more time that I wouldn’t let him do XXX.I can’t even remember what it was that I told him that he couldn’t do.That helped him bite his tongue for the last say 30 minutes of the ride.Overall, however, I enjoyed the relative pleasantness of the drive.
It got me to wondering why we are all so impatient about getting to where it is we are going.As adults we don’t usually freak out about how long it will take to get to a physical destination because we have a better sense of time than a 5 year old does.But often we say things like:
When will my company be profitable?
When will my daughter be potty trained?
When will I close my first big sale?
When will I be able to hire someone to help me with this task?
When will I get an uninterrupted night of sleep? (a.k.a., when will my son sleep through the night without waking up and/or stay in his own bed?)
Are we there (at goal x, y, or z) yet?Why aren’t we there yet?
The big difference I’ve seen between kids and adults is that when kids do get there they are genuinely excited to have gotten there.When we arrived at my friend’s house my kids jumped out of the car and immediately wanted to play, swim, swing, etc. with my friend’s son. Many adults and business people I’ve seen (including myself) get to where they were going, don’t spend enough time excited about getting there, and then start the list of questions over and this time they might be:
When will my company be more profitable than Company X?
When will my daughter quit talking back to me?
When will I close a multi-million dollar sale?
When can I fire this person who really can’t help me with any tasks?
When will I get an uninterrupted night of sleep? (a.k.a., when will my son return from that party so I can quit worrying that he’s lying dead in some ditch somewhere?)
Are we going to make it to retirement?Why aren’t we able to retire yet?Should we retire yet?
Then I think about National Geographic documentaries that show native, aboriginal tribes in certain places around the world.I always feel that those people seem truly content and if I look into their eyes through the TV glass, I’m 100% sure they don’t have similar questions going through their minds.Of course they might wonder where they will find their next meal, but they just don’t look stressed about it.Funny, isn’t it? 💡
p.s. My son was so worn out with all the fun he had that he ended up sleeping about 3/4 of the way on the drive back home!
Perhaps business schools should start teaching parenting classes.
According to new research, parents–at least those committed to family life–actually perform better in the office. Researchers from Clark University and the Center for Creative Leadership in Greensboro, N.C., interviewed 347 managers and executives, mostly from large public companies, about their family lives. Then they talked to the participants’ colleagues, subordinates and bosses about their work performance.
Those who were committed to family life achieved significantly better reviews. The reason: Parents learn to multitask, handle stress and negotiate, says Marian N. Ruderman, research director at the Center for Creative Leadership, and one of the study’s authors.
“In parenting roles you get a chance to do a lot of the same things you do as a manager,” Ruderman says. “You get to hone your interpersonal skills. You learn how to develop other people. It’s another opportunity to learn from experience.” More…
Kimberly recently reached out to me to tell me about her new venture TheGoToMom TV where she publishes a series of videos for parents. She has some great stuff on her site. We chatted on the phone for a while and we discussed each of our business goals. I will be checking out her site from time to time to learn new things about parenting.
I found that the most compelling reason to visit her site came from my phone experience with her. The entire time she was on the phone I barely heard her baby in the background. She told me that she has her baby with her all the time and most people don’t even know it because he is so quiet and keeps himself preoccupied. Wow! I think his great behavior might have something to do with his personality because I know that if I’m on the phone or trying to do something on the computer, my kids find every excuse to come ask me things and whine about something. OK…do I have to admit that I might have something to do with that?!? But just in case she has some advice on how to accomplish that feat, I’ll be sure to watch her videos. She even has a video called Stop the Whining! 🙂
About The Go To Mom:
www.TheGoToMom.TV is a How to show for families with young children (newborn to 6). The ‘Go To Mom’ addresses parenting issues, discipline strategies, development activities and much more. The show also presents cutting edge research about the development of the young child’s brain. Call into the Talk Show and get your parenting questions answered live! Various specialists will be featured periodically. Los Angeles based, former preschool teacher and licensed child development therapist, Kimberley Clayton Blaine, is the Go To Mom. Kimberley is dedicated to teaching parents how to adopt a positive child-rearing stance and to use their authentic self in deciding what type of parent they would like to be. This last decade, Kimberley’s main research efforts have been focused around the Impact of Trauma and Aggressive Child Rearing on Childhood Brain Development. Kimberley currently teaches Early Childhood Brain Development and Positive Discipline Strategies at UCLA Extension Education Department.
Kimberley is well known for her warmth, ingenuity and willingness to reach out to families in need of state of the art child rearing resources. In her own words, “I am here for children, every time I try to branch out I end up back in the preschool classroom – that is were I’m destined to be.”
To help illustrate how different people use Baby Manager (i.e., the baby is managing you!), we have begun creating user stories/case studies.
We appreciate that many new parents are uncomfortable with having their picture online or don’t want to even think about the possibility of being mentioned in print or being on TV the first year or so after they have a baby. But if you are the type of new parent who loves the spotlight, doesn’t care about being in the process of losing those baby pounds, and loves Baby Manager, we welcome your participation with open arms!
If you are interested, please activate a FREE Trial of Baby Manager and get familiar with it. If you find that it works for your family, you want to tell the world about your great experience using it, and you are interested in being a part of our media campaign, please email us at blogger@babblesoft.com for more information and a hook-up. It’s not as big as the Harpo Hook-Up by Oprah, but it just might be what you need. 🙂
We will be posting all future case studies in this blog and on our Testimonial page.
So now for our very first user story about the Hayes family…drum roll please…ta dah (as my 2 year old would say)…
The week before Father’s Day (Sunday, June 17) is finally upon us and I thought it might be interesting to write a short post about the origination of the day as well as provide you with some other neat links. In the US, the first modern Father’s Day was celebrated on July 5, 1908 in Fairmont, WV. It is also suggested that Sonora Smart Dodd drove the effort to establish the Day to honor her father, a single parent of six children. The first June Father’s Day was celebrated on June 19, 1919 in Spokane, WA.
There are many things you can do for your father and/or father of your children and if you aren’t able to do anything really mind boggling this year, then there is always the ‘ole t-shirt option.
With all that said, remember that Dads tend to like gadgets over ties so use the 20% off special going on this month to buy him or any expecting dads a gift subscription to Baby Manager. Remember that you can take advantage of the special to buy gifts for numerous baby showers you are about to attend (subscriptions aren’t activated until the user first logs on)!
Aruni
p.s. Baby Manager’s name is derived from the well known fact that babies “manage us” and the best we can do is try to keep up by using cool, new software. 😉
As I was driving back from dropping my son off at his pre-school today, I heard a radio announcement by washington post.com mentioning a recent article on The Birthrate of Boys Is Declining by Rick Weiss that starts off with “If you are thinking of having children and want to have a boy, you might want to book that romantic weekend getaway soon. Boys are getting harder to make, according to a new analysis.” [You can register for free on their site to see the full article] They have observed this phenomenon is the US and Japan. Some of the reasons cited had to do with fewer males being conceived as well as the current hypothesis of greater exposure to gender-bending pollutants. What does this mean for the fathers of the future?
Interestingly (prior to hearing the article mentioned on the radio), the ‘bug guy’ as we call him came to the house this morning. The kids were with me but we left soon after he was done with the inside and he continued to spray the outside. Coincidentally, I asked him what he knew about pesticides, pregnant women, and babies. Previously I had heard that exposure to certain pesticides while in utero can result in learning disabilities (e.g. autism) later in the baby’s life. He said he has been following it closely. He said he sprays very lightly if there is a pregnant woman in the house and since he typically uses very safe chemicals he doesn’t think there is a big risk. I remember asking him not to spray inside the house when I was pregnant and when the kids were babies. I figured 6 to 12 months of having a few extra bugs in the house was worth managing the potential long term risk; he still sprayed on the outside because here in Texas we have all kinds of ants and other crawly things especially when it rains a lot. We have a boy and a girl, and I believe the bug guy has 4 girls from two different marriages. It gave me pause.
If any of you parents and/or scientists (real or pretend) out there have anything to share about this phenomenon, please leave a comment and let us know your opinions, thoughts, and ideas.
A friend recently introduced me to the sounds of Lisa Lynne Mathis. What a voice! Her music and lyrics are obviously inspired from deep within her. My favorite song on her new CD Hancock Place is called The Anchor. I didn’t realize until I read her reason for writing the song that it was inspired by a friend of hers who survived the tsunami in Sri Lanka. Since I was born in Sri Lanka, I now understand why that song resonates so much with me. Another song on that CD is Comfort Zone, her muscial interpretation of what having children (two daughters) has meant to her…the raw, pure feelings that are a part of being a parent…and how our kids often pull us out of our comfort zone.
So on this Memorial Weekend in between parties, BBQs, and get togethers with friends & family, let’s remember our soldiers in Iraq and all over the world. We wish them a safe return to their families, children, and friends. Whether you agree with the war or not our soldiers are there fighting for what they have been told to fight for…fighting for what they believe is right to fight for. Let’s make sure we do not ignore them “when the cameras are off” and that we are available to serve as their Anchor when and if they return.
As I was driving back from dropping my son off at his pre-school today, I heard a radio announcement by 
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