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Family
Home Repair v. Sending My Children to College
Posted on Jul 30, 2008 11:50:28 AM  |  By KristinVanOgtrop

A few years ago I had the great misfortune of buying a house that came with an in-ground pool. This was immediately followed by the misfortune of discovering that I was married to a man and had two children who all thought that having a pool was really, really great — so you can imagine my suggestion that we fill it in went over like a lead balloon. I have three issues with the pool: first, my belief that somehow, someday, someone is going to drown in it. Second, that telling people we have a pool is a bit embarrassing,...

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Observations
A Few T-Shirt Slogans I'd Really Like to See
Posted on Jul 23, 2008 5:07:16 PM  |  By KristinVanOgtrop

I was walking through Rockefeller Center today and saw a woman wearing a t-shirt that was a genius takeoff of that now-classic “Got milk?” campaign. This particular t-shirt said, “Got wine?” Ha. Well put, sister. I laughed to myself, and then thought of all of the other “Got...” t-shirts I’d like to wear on any given day. Here, in no particular order: Got a self-cleaning husband? Got 15 minutes to fold my laundry? Got a non-shedding yellow lab? Got a self-renovating house? Got a sabbatical? Got a trip to Mexico? Got perfect skin? Got kids who will throw food wrappers...

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Family
From: The Mother of a 13-Year-Old Boy
Posted on Jul 21, 2008 2:32:58 PM  |  By KristinVanOgtrop

To: Anyone who has been an adolescent or successfully raised one Re: Embarrassing parents It has come to my attention that I now embarrass my son about once a day. About half of what I do embarrasses him, whether it’s asking another adult about his well-being (“Did my son seem to like camp?”) or being concerned about his safety (insisting he wear a bike helmet) or revealing anything whatsoever about him to just about anybody who doesn’t live in our house. Maybe I’ve blocked it out, but I don’t recall ever finding my parents embarrassing, and since this is my...

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Observations
Cultural Forces I Will Never Understand Because I Only Have Sons
Posted on Jul 14, 2008 8:14:03 PM  |  By KristinVanOgtrop

Polly Pocket Miley Cyrus Purple (And, for that matter: pink, aqua, and sometimes even yellow) High School Musical Bratz Dora the Explorer The whole American Girl thing Colored cell phones Hair detangler Most Lindsay Lohan movies Most emoticons The Jonas Brothers

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Observations
Stockings in the Summer — Remember That Torture?
Posted on Jul 10, 2008 7:03:23 PM  |  By KristinVanOgtrop

One of the various perks, if you can call them that, of my job is that I have a t.v. in my office. Despite the fact that I can count on two hands the number of times I’ve actually turned it on in five years, it does come in handy. For example, how else would I have been able to watch Michelle Obama on The View in the middle of a staff meeting a few weeks back? Because the other editors in the room and I were actually pretending to get some work done, we mostly watched Michelle O with...

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Family
Do You Send Your Kids Away for the Summer?
Posted on Jul 7, 2008 3:40:21 PM  |  By KristinVanOgtrop

I know there are kids who go to camp for six or eight weeks in the summer; in fact, I know some of them, and I know their parents. They all seem like perfectly reasonable people, and some of them are even our close friends. And yet...I can’t imagine mustering up the whatever-it-takes (fortitude? organization? money?) to send my kids off to camp for six weeks. Forget sentimental issues — I can’t imagine all the packing. Just sending Middle and Eldest off to camp for two weeks, which we did yesterday, seemed like a Herculean parental feat. Things you learn...

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Family
A Few Great Things About Having a Baby in Your 40s
Posted on Jul 2, 2008 10:44:19 AM  |  By KristinVanOgtrop

toned arms without a lot of trips to the gym many people assume you’re 35 you probably have older children to help, and they might even be old enough to babysit! you meet a whole new set of parents baby gets great presents because your friends have more money than they did 10 years ago you know all the awful stuff (teething, tantrums) is probably just a phase you know all the good stuff (fat fingers, fat thighs, toothless smiles) is also a phase, so you work harder to appreciate it even the childless women your age don’t have flat...

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Miscellaneous
Things That Have Happened to the 10 or So Hamsters We Have Had Over the Last 7 Years
Posted on Jul 1, 2008 2:03:45 PM  |  By KristinVanOgtrop

escaped, discovered but not eaten by cat, returned to cage squeezed head through bars of cage, eyes kind of popped out, but returned to normal once we rescued him using pliers to separate the bars nearly scalped by another hamster before we knew not to keep two in one cage escaped, found wandering around bedroom a few days later, returned to cage escaped, never seen again died of natural causes had 6 babies, even though we were sure she was a male had 6 babies that survived and were returned to Petco once they were weaned

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