Okay, soapbox time for one moment. My father used to send people home from work if he found out that they weren't registered to vote, and you can imagine that on election day he would make the rounds to see if everyone had voted.

As I told my students this week - people are fighting and dying around the world for the right to vote. And we in this country take it for granted to the extent that so many people are apathetic to the process. Our voter turnout rate is not near pathetic. I'd venture to say that it's far below pathetic. The thing I most... more

Okay, so I'm a huge Law and Order fan, and I found this amusing. Thought I'd share.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=5121VjLwqZM

Anna is in what they call Pre-Nursery at one of the local schools here. This school year is the first time she's gone to school five days a week, and although it hasn't been much of an adjustment for her, it's been a bit of an adjustment for me. Mostly in terms of the schedule. Where she used to go to school, she only went two days a week, but they were very long days - I would drop her off around nine or ten in the morning and pick her up around 5:30 in the afternoon. Now, the school day starts (er, theoretically starts) at about eight in the morning and... more

I posted earlier about the fact that some people don't celebrate Halloween. I don't think there's anything wrong with it, and you can read more about it on that post.

But I wanted to talk about being different. I feel like there are two conflicting messages being sent to our kids in this country. 1) Fit in. 2) Be unique.

So many kids work so hard to fit in, to be like everyone else, and some that stand out for one reason or another do get picked on - I certainly had my share of that as a child. And yet we have another philosophy that we should all be ourselves, be okay with who we are and be proud of... more

I posted an article few days ago on the topic of Trick or Treating on Halloween. Since life (read: six month old baby who is not interested in sleeping) gets in the way, it's taken me a few days to follow up. Angela posted the following comment and I wanted to post a response.

Comment from: Angela Weird... but I never knew that I could be offended by someone writing about Halloween. And I really never knew that I would feel defensive about Halloween. It is a minor holiday that isn't even a legal holiday.

This person has totally... more

I've always - as many parents - feared SIDS, although I never had a newborn in the house or very young infant where the fear would be justified. But anyway, I bring you an excerpt from this article - something we should know about and certainly a way to look at SIDS in a new light.

In a small study with big implications, researchers found some of the strongest evidence yet that sudden infant death syndrome -- a medical and sometimes legal mystery once known as crib death -- may be caused by brain stem abnormalities.

The finding "takes the mystery away from SIDS," said Marian Willinger,... more

As we are once again at Halloween, I wanted to post my favorite article on whether or not Jewish families should let their children go trick or treating. Please note that the article really does apply to everyone - not just Jews - and as a side note, Anna's former foster family - devout Christians - do not allow their kids to go trick or treating as they feel it is not in line with thier beliefs. This article is from Kolel: The Adult Centre for Liberal Jewish Learning and is

Decide for yourselves...

Q: Dear Reb... more

Okay, all you adoptive parents or hopeful adoptive parents out there: Raise your hand if you've had someone tell you that now that you've adopted (or are adopting) you'll get pregnant. How many times have you bit your tongue and stammered some neutral response? How many times did you fly off the handle and take them to task for their insensitivity? And how many times have you had the same conversation with the same people?

We can talk about all the good lines - and maybe some of you will share your good ones - but I think there really are two schools of thought on the matter, and people not touched by adoption have a hard time understanding why I tend to choose one and not the other.

If... more

This came across my desk - it may be helpful to some of you.

Jewswire.com - the global Jewish newswire service goes beta.

21 October 2006 - A new free service to help the Jewish community distribute its information through the internet and also get instant reaction has been beta launched at Jewswire.com (www.Jewswire.com).

Jewswire.com allows anyone sending out a press release of Jewish interest or containing something Jewish to distribute it online for free.

The new global service has been created by SomethingJewish Network owner JMT Ventures and being in beta mode, is also inviting users to offer their thoughts and comments on using the... more

I don't think Anna's two year old stage was so terrible. She wasn't very contrary, generally followed directions and was a pretty happy child all around. The main issue we had with her two year old year was her sleeping - she continued to have night terrors - and totally random screaming and occasional tantrums.

Now, thankfully, her behavior is much improved. We have few tantrums with her - and now if she has one, it's generally "for a cause" not just because she happens to feel like throwing a tantrum. We've practically eliminated the random screaming - which if you imagine the loudest child screaming, I'd bet you a nickel she was louder. And she really doesn't have night terrors... more