Bunch Family

What the cool parents are reading today:

1. Want your kid to step in line? Try public shaming! Wait, maybe not. No, definitely do not change your kid’s cover photo on Facebook to some PSA about how she misbehaved and wasn’t allowed on Facebook for a while.

2. Or maybe presumptive, judgmental, racist people are the worst. A woman writes Dear Prudence that she was trying to befriend a mom at her daughter’s dance class, but the woman stormed off saying she was anti-adoption… and her daughter’s not adopted, but she is mixed-race.

3. A vegan book for kids. Do you think the author was banking on controversy selling their book?

4. Peaches Geldof has named her son Astala, and Bob Geldof wants his daughter to change his grandson’s ridiculous name immediately. Yes, the man whose kids are Peaches, Pixie and Fifi Trixibelle is annoyed that his daughter chose an old and obscure name from a baby name book.  Read more...

What we’re reading today:

1. The kid as parenting guru. It makes sense if you think about taking cues from your kid as to what they need.

2. That Hilary Rosen-Ann Romney thing: It’s a war on stay-at-home-moms and according to Jezebel, has ignited a rich lady shit storm.

3. Back to Bringing Up Bébé. One way that French parents seem to be superior to North Americans: they make their kids learn to love a lot of different foods and don’t ask if they’re full.

4. We’ve been hearing that declining marriage rates are bad for kids, but are they really that big a deal?

5. Amazemom Maya Rudolph impersonates various celebrities singing “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.” Her Gwen Stefani is spot on; why did we never see this on SNL?

Yesterday: What toddler remember, how to eat when you’re pregnant and the miracle baby found in the morgue.  Read more...

Megan Pettit shares stories from a new mom

Each marriage is a tiny society with its own rules, laws and regulations. Something that’s enjoyed by one couple might be punishable by death (or castration) in another relationship. There are minor offenses and crimes that can tear societies apart. Adding children means more rules and regulations have to be created so the society can run smoothly, or as smooth as it can with the addition of lawless savages.

George and I weren’t married for long before I was pregnant, but we had lived together for a while. Our living, breathing society had its basement membrane all laid out. We both enjoy telling the other everything, and I mean everything. The time someone in a stall beside me said “pssst” and I said “yes” even though it turned out to be the person’s fart I was talking to? My husband was the first to hear about it. I say the same stuff to my friends that I do to George and that works for us. Some societies need a little more mystery and less fart stories.  Read more...

What we’re reading today:

1. Kids don’t really need Gatorade, unless it’s really hot and they’re running around a lot.

2. One San Francisco mom was a little scared away by “mommy makeovers” being promoted in her otherwise helpful new mom newsletters, what with the multiple plastic surgery procedures you get all in one go, so she started making her own clothes.

3. One author says that parenthood is swallowing marriage.

4. How to raise a socialist.

5. Social Family news: Soldier dad can’t be there for the birth of his son, so he watches the whole thing on Skype:

Photo by r3v | cls via Flickr

If you think that all the high-profile celebrity divorces of the past few years is a bleak sign of our times, think again. The divorce rate among pop culture and political icons may be driving to an all-time high, but us plebs are enjoying the lowest divorce rate in 30 years.

Ironically enough, it may be our cultural obsession with divorce that’s keeping couples together. Bruce Feiler’s recent New York Times article credits a new phenomenon, “divorce porn,” with satisfying the divorce fantasies of married people.

“Divorce porn” is any and all ways we indulge in the divorce/separation stories of others, whether they’re stories of our friends or fictional characters. According to Feiler, while married people may not actually want to get divorced, they do often dream of escaping their marriage. It’s like thinking about how awesome it would be to be a member of the opposite sex, but not actually wanting to make the switch.  Read more...