If you have kids, you’re likely taking photos.
If you’re taking photos, like me, they’re likely stuck somewhere in a camera, a computer, or – eek! – your phone. I just checked. There are 400 pictures in my phone. Wow.
With a winter storm coming down on Arizona this weekend – maybe we’ll get RAIN! – I think we’ll be spending time indoors Sunday. A lot of time.
I wish I had a photo to show you – that would make 401 on my phone – of my dining room table. It’s covered …

Do you ever feel this way, moms? That change is ever present? I’ve really felt it recently. Sometimes I wish it would stop!
I first glimpsed it on Sunday – tiny buds of green on the formerly barren trees around our park. Today, they’re full leaves.
A sign of a new season. Change.
There’s been lots of change around our lives in the past few months: many families – and friends – have moved away, two friends soon to welcome babies, one sport dropped and another began. As much as we want things …

Remember my white board when summer started? On it I wrote our daily activities when we had to be at camp or swim lessons or theater activities.
This is what it looks like today.
We’re taking some time off. I have nothing planned.
Maybe we’ll read books, or play with toys. Maybe we’ll paint rocks or bird houses.
I am personally hoping for some time on the porch swing my parents bought us for my birthday (they saw my blog post on my love for my grandparents’ porch swing).
Maybe we’ll take naps or make …

Nearly a month ago I wrote in large letters on our white board, “Harry Potter,” to remind myself to get tickets to this weekend’s opening of the final “Potter” film installment.
I bought four movie tickets, but I’m not taking my children. I’m taking my parents.
As joked about during a staff meeting this week, we’re part of a group of adults who have “grown up” on Harry Potter books and films the last decade and a half.
My family owns all the films. The kids first saw “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s …

OK, brace yourself. Five weeks from today is Thanksgiving. Christmas is nine weeks from Saturday. My son started his Christmas wish list a month ago! (Thankfully since sales have started and grandparents are asking…) I have scheduled our family’s Christmas photo shoot (Thank you Capture Life photography). I’ve started talking to family about Thanksgiving (we have gone out of town the past few years, but I’m working this year). My sister has bought her plane tickets to come visit (YEA!). I found a few websites that send me reminders of …

Today is National Day on Writing. I found this out while researching a story that took me to the U.S. Department of Education website. I’m taking the challenge a teacher posted there to write a six-word autobiography (supposedly inspired by Hemingway). Perhaps you can challenge your own kids (or yourself). Share your post here.
This is mine: Mom of three. Lover of life.

Ah, summer. In our house, I now associate summer with sleep.

The spring sports registration reminder arrived in my e-mail yesterday.
I confess, I did look at the dates and the schedule. Registration is the first part of February. Games would run through May.
I also found myself looking at the gymnastics schedule this week, wondering if my overly eager kids – frustrated with their progress – would benefit from two nights a week at the gym.
But I just signed my son up for his after-school art class. He would be in an after-school program anyway because my husband and I both work …

A friend sent me a post from one mom who wrote about six ways working parents can get more time with their kids. I’ve done a few of these – actually, more than a few. When I had to be in the office one Saturday when a project launched, I brought the kids along. Computer savvy, they had access to Disney and Lego Web sites while I looked over stories and talked to co-workers.
It didn’t last too long, but it was fun.
And as an education reporter, I’m often in schools. …

As my kids and I drove along the I-10 this weekend, my son saw the mountains and asked, “Mom, where’s the snow?”
It was the first of many such “snow” conversations in our house this weekend. I don’t know what got into the three other members of the family, but as I enjoyed the sunshine, they had their minds on a white winter.
First came that comment from my 7-year-old. I went on to explain that while it’s snowing pretty much everywhere else in the country, we won’t be seeing snow here …