I’ve got an eight year old who has always been on the taller side for his age.

Reliably, I could buy one size up and it would always fit him.  Maybe a tad bit too long, but nothing to cause anyone to point and stare.  Sooner rather than later, he would grow into them, and all would be well with the world.

Except this fall I go to buy him some cold weather pants (he prefers fleece cargo pants) and I blithely order a size 10/12 online, because he’s already got 8’s and they are beginning to look like high-waters.  I inadvertently used the term “high-waters” in front of him, and he looked at me like I was a creature from another planet. Mother, what is this strange language you speak?

Anyhoo, the 10/12’s arrive and they are about three inches too long, and falling off at the waist, even with me trying my darnedest to shrink them.  Shrinking never works when you want it to, does it?

So I start looking for the obvious thing, a size 9.  If a size 8 is too small and size 10/12 is too large, then size 9 it is!

Except nobody really makes a size 9 in boys’ clothing.  Oh a few do here and there, but they are mostly jeans, and my son refuses to wear jeans.

Do clothing manufacturers have some sort of problem with the number nine?  Do they think that boys suddenly stop growing at a size 8 and suddenly shoot up three inches overnight?

He hates the long ones more than the short ones, so he’ll just have to go around looking like Pee Wee Herman for a while.

Insert deep sigh here.

There are few things more draining than parenting a baby who is having difficulty sleeping.

You become so sleep-deprived that even simple solutions are beyond your grasp.  And that is where this book comes in.

As a parent who follows in spirit the ideas of Dr. Sears, The No Cry Sleep Solution dovetails nicely with the thought that the whole experience of “crying it out” is not advantageous to baby or parents.  I’m not saying that it isn’t a successful method for some people, but I recoil at the thought of leaving my infant alone in their crib, crying their eyes out.  I did a one night (desperation) experiment with both of my children using the cry it out method, and suffice it to say, none of us had the stomach for it. 

Author Elizabeth Pantley doles out specific, easy to follow suggestions on how to ease your child into the whole sleeping thing.  You can use whatever ideas work for you, and leave the ones that don’t.  She doesn’t promise that within two days your problems will be solved.  But she does encourage you to stick it out, and over the long run, things will improve.

I liked this book so much that I bought it twice.  We moved and I had no clue as to where the copy I used with the Munchkin was, nor did I have the time and energy to search through the boxes in the garage.  So I took a quick trip to Barnes and Noble, and it was just as helpful with my second child as with my first.  And both of them are completely different temperamentally.

So, it’s a great gift for a parent-to-be, or a parent who is looking for help in sleep department.

*This is not a paid review, nor did I receive any type of compensation.  I would buy this book three times if I had to.

My family likes to drive.

Well, we used to anyway.

Until my daughter made her appearance into the world and took advantage of every time she was strapped into her car seat to let everyone know in very loud and screechy tones exactly how much she hates being in the car.

She might actually enjoy being in the car if she was allowed to roam free, but of course, that’s not an option.

So she fights her harness like a wild cat, trying to wriggle out of it and generally making our lives miserable every second of the drive.

Which is very unfortunate for everyone, as we go in the car quite a bit.

No amount of toy rotating or desperate song-singing or even her brother’s weird faces will deter her for long.

She’s been known to cry so hard that she vomits. Cleaning vomit out of a car seat and off of a crying child is very, very low on my list of preferred activities. It ties somewhere around finding a parking spot at the mall on Christmas Eve.

So until she makes the connection (hello, why has this not happened yet?) that 99 times out of 100 that a car trip means something really fun at the end, we are all held hostage. Since she’s already a year old, we’re not all that hopeful this will occur any time soon.

We’re considering investing in a covered wagon.

I had candy on the brain last week, and so asked for your favorite. It was not too surprising that two chocolate choices tied for first, one being chocolate-only, the other being something chocolate, with nuts, and chewy. That last bunch is hard to please. I know this because I belong to it. Black licorice made a surprisingly strong showing with six percent of the vote, and chocolate and nuts garnered eighteen percent. Sorry, I’m having a hard time focusing with all this talk of chocolate.

Today I want to ask about something that’s been on my mind lately, and that is school bullying. It can be any kind, as I feel verbal abuse is just as bad as physical abuse. My son has been a victim of bullying twice, once in pre-K and once in first grade. The pre-K bullying was from his classmates, and the first grade bully experience was from a third grader. Each time, the supposed “playground monitors” didn’t do jack to help him. Nor did his pre-K teacher, who chalked it up to boys being boys. Uh huh.

Mainly because I love this song.

Can you spot the fake smile? I got 16/20!

I NEVER KNEW THIS. HOW COULD I NOT KNOW THIS?

Ur stressin’ ur kid out with ur stress.

Kids + Kinect = Ouch.

It is time for Dwayne Johnson, aka The Rock, to ascend to the hallowed CDF Hall of Fame.  He had a couple of close calls, but he managed to pound his competition to smithereens.  And you, gentle reader, can now breathe a sigh of relief that all the horrible rock puns will be no longer.

Today I’ve got two new celebrity dads for you to ogle vote upon.

Notice, if you will, that I keep my shirtless streak alive for another week! Well, sort of, anyway.

So without further ado…

VERSUS

Because I have absolutely no qualms about taking my son out of school early next Friday and going to see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part One.

Perhaps because it’s a Friday afternoon before a short holiday week, where I know nothing academically substantive is going to be missed.

Oh, who the hell am I kidding.

I would take him out even if there was something academically substantive happening.

Because he read the entire series over the summer and he is absolutely mad for everything Harry Potter, I want to indulge that a little bit.  He was much too young for all of the extremely awesome book release parties that occurred for almost the entire series, and he should get to experience at least some of the hysteria that comes with an important pop culture moment, don’t you think?  There is only one movie left after this one, and after that, it’s fini.

Well, if you don’t agree, I don’t care.  I’ll be sitting in a movie theater next Friday at noon, sharing a bucket of popcorn and some Skittles with my son.

Because I’m a bad parent like that.

Even though she is beautiful and her daughter is beautiful, I am not in love with this cover.

Am I wrong in thinking that Naleigh is looking almost resentfully at the camera?