I’ve often wondered if my grandmother didn’t have it easier when my grandfather sailed off for World War II in the Pacific.
Back then, there were newsreels, newspapers and radio, but that was about it. Sure, …

This week’s theme: Bananas and Balboa.
They’re seemingly unrelated, but Dad loves both and I lucked out on both counts.
Trapped with the guys in one of the unrelenting downpours that marked our trip back east, we …

How can the kid who can’t find his shoes in the morning lock his eyes onto a soccer ball as if they were guided by a laser?
Why is it that the boy who routinely turns …

I’m not sure if Big Guy was being cunning or air-headed when he came to the Book Fair room where I was volunteering at school earlier this week and said he’s lost his lunchbox. “I …

Boots came home excited to show me what he’d bought at school, and I was excited, too. I’d wondered all day what he would pick.
“Do they have Thomas books?” he’d asked that morning.
“I didn’t notice, …

When Big Guy was a toddler Elmo always was there for him – on his second birthday cake, on his Halloween costumes, on “Sesame Street” as Mommy fed That Baby Who Ruined His Life.
In recent …

We sent this one while we were on vacation and, as a result, there’s now a chihuahua living in Afghanistan. A stuffed one, left over from the “Yo Quiero Taco Bell” days.
I have no idea …

Boots wanted to grow apples – “nice, fresh apples, but for the people, not the deer,” he explained, eyeing the trail of half-eaten fruit the previous night’s marauders had scattered across his pawpaw’s yard.
Never mind …

So did you learn anything during sparring today, I asked Big Guy after karate class.
“No, not really,” Big Guy replied.
He was lying through his mouth guard.
He’d gone up against The Girl again. The Girl who …

He’s been in kindergarten less than three weeks but Boots already has his college choices narrowed to two:  California State University, Stanislaus or West Virginia University.
The first is a small college that was practically in …

He trundled to the bus stop less than a football field’s length from our back door, waddling slightly from the balk of a backpack a tad to big for him. He clutched a sheath of …

Except for Boots’ Sisyphusian insistence on rebuilding his sand castle in the same spot where the tide had washed it away just seconds earlier, Santa Monica was a great time.
The air was warm, but not …

He hates “Wonder Pets” but will concede to occasionally watching “Max and Ruby.” He admires Max’s sneaky ways and rails that Ruby is a control freak, which is ironic given that he’s one of the …

We’ve been away from the water for more than three weeks now, which is a relief because the incubation period for typhoid fever is 10 to 20 days.
Never mind that there are only about 400 …

I was standing by the pool with my camera Sunday when a voice drew me away from Big Guy’s birthday festivities.
“Excuse me,” she said. “But just who are you taking pictures of?”
“My kids,” I replied.
“Well, …

New crayons are cool, and being promoted to a big-kid notebook was the bomb for Big Guy.
But the big buzz of back-to-school shopping was the new buzz cuts and the new Army gear. Yes, now …

I thought I’d be about three years past buying baby wipes at this point, but not so.
At home, they still go everywhere with us. They work far better than hand santizer for cleaning up on …

If you can’t be at the birthday, the birthday will come to you.
That was Boots’ reasoning behind this week’s care package, though I did talk him out of sending Dad a piece of his birthday …

Dad claims he can’t get to sleep without background noise, though snoring must qualify or else he would have been in a worse-than-normal state of chronic deprivation during basic training.
It’s led to many marital disputes …

Just when I thought three tubs of tank engine track was as bad as it was going to get, along comes the next menace: Hot Wheels.
It’s not that we’ve never had Hot Wheels – the …

Shopping for a bathing suit is bad enough, but it becomes virtually impossible when a kid wearing pale-yellow paints and has an arrow eye-linered onto a freshly shaved scalp pops around the corner.
“Hey, guys, look! …

Coloring books: New and unsullied, accompanied by a fresh pack of crayons. Check.
MP3 players: Charged, with new songs loaded. Check.
Snacks: Enough to cover the midnight munchies plus breakfast the next day because the chances are …

Children’s shows have felled many a strong person. With me, the waltz scene in “Beauty and the Beast” used to do it. I knew that, and used it to my advantage, popping the tape into …

We really should have sent a tooth brush with this one. Or, at the least, labeled it with a warning. Caution: Most of the contents will do severe dental damage.
I picked out the Oreo Cakesters, …

Big Guy’s shorts have been in a wad since late last week, when I came home with a t-shirt featuring a baseball and bats arranged into an American flag. “No fair! I need a Fourth …

Kimberly Sands had a new Tweety Bird swim suit and a good times ahead of her when she woke up that June morning. She was ready to go swimming and eat ice cream at a …

I can’t complain about the 3D, because I saw it at a drive-in.
I won’t critique the CGI, other than to say it’s amazing how much emotion filmmakers can pack into characters that exist only in …

In the past month, Big Guy has proclaimed fish sticks “delicious” and watermelon “yummy.” He’s swooned over apple cobbler and eaten a rainbow-colored salad packed with greens, tomatoes, zucchini and carrots. He wasn’t wild about …

Due largely to the fact that Best Friend was watching and he didn’t want to lose face, Boots agreed to get in the pool the first day of swim class. He wouldn’t consent to go …

Are you the photographer we hired, a woman asked at Big Guy’s school as I checked in during the final week.
No, I just carry enough gear to power a small television station, I said. His …

Given that Big Guy was fearlessly toddling to the top of tall structures by the time he was 14-months-old, I’ve long known that the day would come when he would surpass me athletically.
I didn’t expect …

It never occurred to me that my Father’s Day post was whiny, let alone grating, until a commenter labeled it as such after a friend posted a link to it on Facebook.
In fact, I was …

“When fathers are not present, their children and families cope with an absence government cannot fill.” – President Barack Obama, Father’s Day proclamation.
If there’s one thing the Army does that scrapes fingernails down my mental …

We pulled out hair out for an idea for Father’s Day before we finally wound up in the crafts shop on post. I wish we’d wound up there a week earlier, because it was too …

These kids  just don’t know how easy they have it.
Back in the day when I was walking four miles to the bus stop, up hill both ways, I needed a radio, a tape recorder, cassettes, …

I’ll confess: I bribed Boots this morning, and it worked.
During Day One of swimming class, he did great until the instructor wanted them to bob  in the water.
“No,” he insisted quietly but firmly, with the …

If you ask the guys, they’ll happily complain loudly about it. They’re the last kids at Fort Irwin, maybe even the world, who don’t have Nintendo DSes, and it’s all because their mom is mean, …

Baseball is my native language, but I’m fluent in basketball, football and figure skating.
I can hold a conversation in NASCAR fake my way through several other sports, including hockey and golf. It’s the equivalent of …