Julie Pippert: Using My Words

Last week, I had the opportunity to go to a Meet the Teacher. Our school does this every year. It's a great way for the teacher, kids and parents to meet, connect, and be ready for the start of school. The teacher gets our (parent) contact information, puts a face to a name, and is able to set up best contact method for the school year. Kids get to see who is in their class, see the classroom, figure out where it is. Parents get to shake hands, connect, etc. It builds comfort all around, connects people who need to be connected, and is a great thing to do. I'm sorry to hear it's not common everywhere. It makes me more grateful for it, though. I wanted to get to know our teacher, who is brand new to the school, so I crowdsourced my Facebook community for ideas of great questions to ask when I met the teacher, just to get a little sense of who she is. I was stunned by how many people thought I did not have the right to or should not talk to the teacher, ask her ...

One Friday a few weeks ago after a meeting in town, I dragged my kids to the Houston Museum of Natural Science . The real Magna Carta was on display in a special exhibit and I thought we absolutely had to go. How often do you get to see a document that is, at least in part, the foundation of the democracy in which you live. Or be near something that survived so much: strong desire for oppression, wars, and time. Image via www.historyextra.com Sure, it didn't all work out at the time, but the idea took root and finally, about 500 years later, some other men in a not-quite-yet country wrote another document demanding protection of their rights and property against a tyrannical king. This time, a Pope couldn't quash it and neither could a king. It is still the foundation for the United States today. From archives.gov is this crucial point: The Fifth Amendment to the Constitution ("no person shall . . . be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of...

Disclosure statement: SeaWorld did not commission this post nor did they compensate me for it. However, I did receive free admission to the park. If I am honest, I do not actually look that forward to December. Oh I try, but I am usually dragged under by endeavoring to make this the Most Wonderful Time of the Year. People can say simplify and say no, which is good advice, but even with a lot of simplification and no-ing, this is still a month that gets to feeling like a 300 pound ape on your chest by oh say December 16. One thing I have grown to look forward to, though, this time of year, is our family's annual trek to SeaWorld San Antonio . It's cool, the park is decked out to the holiday nines, and there are loads of special events. Before that, though, I get to camp out in the park with some people I really, really like. And this is a story best told in pictures...of all the things we did... We started with a Polar Plunge. I know, everyone says blah blah blah Polar Plu...

When my daughter was in kindergarten, a boy friend kissed her. To my mind, both kids were equally a part of the kiss because it was mutual--they were playing Marriage, and had just pretended a wedding. To me, it was play. Nobody grabbed anyone or coerced anyone and nobody felt threatened or worried or bad. They even had a discussion about it in advance and decided cheek would do even if grownups did lips. But others felt differently. The boy's mom was horrified, or maybe terrified? She imposed a severe consequence on him and had the school do the same. She apologized to me and made the boy apologize to my daughter. One thing I know: this lady is a fantastic mom with wonderful kids. One thing I understand: we do have a rape culture and I deeply appreciate boy moms who work hard to teach boys about respect and consideration of girls. One thing I believe: we have to do something to improve how our boys and girls interact. That means effort with both boys and girls. Preferabl...

The Steubenville Ohio rape case  highlighted a huge ugly disturbing gap in our society about rape. Internet outrage erupted about the "drunk girl" and "getting what was deserved." There was a lot of nasty commentary about all the things women and girls need to do to not get raped (as if rape and rapists are completely fair and only go after the deserving). People commented in typical "blame the victim" ways , shamefully and appallingly. It made me fear for humanity. Maybe, possibly, worst of all, major news network CNN reported the case from a distressingly sympathetic view for...the convicted rapists . Reporters Poppy Harlow and Candy Crowley evinced grief about the convicted rapists' lost bright futures. As the brilliant Gawker piece by Mallory Ortberg said: People who commit acts of sexual violence (rape, for example) and are convicted in a court of law are required to register with the national sex offender public registry, so that future ...

In my kitchen cabinet, over the hyperbolically named coffee counter, is a mug. It's a cartoon, with cartoon font, and it says, "I'm 40, I ought to have more money by now." It was given to my husband by his sister, his younger sister, a number of years ago. It was supposed to be a joke, funny. But the only actually funny thing about 40 and beyond is that saying is sort of an ironic mantra. By now, you're supposed to have a lot more of everything: money, patience, perspective, wisdom, answers. Certainty. I walk through each day feeling very I don't know-ish and everyone really looks to me to be quite certain. I answer calls each day to provide something. I want to turn to everyone and ask what I should do, what I should be, is this where I am supposed to be, is this it? Instead each time I turn to ask, instead someone asks me and I realize I am past the asking, as far as phase is concerned. So as much as I feel very much in the thrall of a second adol...

Last night, my 11 year old daughter and I were running errands and caught this story on NPR, " Online 'Shaming' A New Level Of Cyberbullying For Girls. " We listened silently  My own internal horror and anger grew with each passing second of the story. This part made the bile raise past the back of my throat: "That's not fair that a guy can actually hide his phone, have sex with you and record you, and then show it to his friends," one girl says. When I was talking to the girl this happened to, she said she didn't know she was being recorded. "I kind of had a feeling that something was wrong, but I didn't want to believe it," she says. At school, she was hoping that it wouldn't be too big of a deal, but even the principal knew about the video. He brought her to his office and called her mom. "I couldn't even look at my mother because I felt hurt and I also felt that I disrespected her," she says. "I didn...

Just before the holidays hit in full swing for our family, I spoke openly about our family's slightly disorganized but nevertheless genuine and effective approach to teaching our kids generosity . I also offered one winner a $50 Razoo Gift of Giving card for the charity of choice (generously donated by Razoo). I used Random.org to identify (randomly and fairly) the winner, and it is.... Candace ! Congratulations, Candace. Candace writes for Naturally Educational , and she shared these tips for teaching generosity in the comments: I recently posted a list of 25 ways to give with young children. Pretty much any volunteering or giving I do at this point involves my children...because almost everything I do involves my children *LOL*.  Every year we...sing/play piano at a home for the elderly, donate toys / stuff stockings, help feed people who are homeless on Thanksgiving, make Valentines for Veterans. Recently we have also, had a beach clean-up with our Daisy troop, or...

When I was pregnant with my first, I was all full of how it was Going To Be. We would not be Those Parents, the ones who made it all about the gifts and went overboard. We would not be Those Parents who let Santa bring all the awesome gifts and get all the kudos. Since Christmas came only a few days after my daughter was born, how we'd Do Christmas was at the top of our First Parenting Tasks. And once we had both of our precious bundles of joy...it all went out the window. We just wanted to shower them with things that would make them smile. Eventually though, we realized the love we had for our kids and our desire to bring them joy made it all the more urgent to find a way to ensure other kids who might not get quite the same deluge did get joy for Christmas too. How I loved my kids somehow moved outward and made me want to protect and provide for every child. To know some children needed , hurt. It started when a club I was in adopted a family every Christmas. Thei...

Image shamelessly borrowed from Chobani because they took a better photo than I did and I like that yogurt and they have a fancier recipe. That involves a mixer. I just use a spoon. And I never thought of cream cheese. This time of year I feel stuck in molasses. Every little thing seems a monumental effort. I think it is a drowning pool of too many things. I also get asked to make and bring a lot of dishes to events. Ages ago, when my oldest was barely two, and I had first mom duty to bring a "healthy but tasty for toddlers" treat for a school party...I felt stymied. That's when I discovered Pumpkin Pie Yogurt. I think I made it accidentally. Or it flew to top of mind after I heard about it somewhere. Either way, I had all of the ingredients on hand and I test-mixed a batch. Winner winner with both me and the kid! I took it to school and BINGO...not  bit leftover. Here's the easy peasy pumpkin squeezy recipe: Mix half a can of pumpkin in about 4-6 ...

  “Over the next few months, Congress will be faced with tough decisions. Deep, across-the-board cuts to education and domestic programs loom. ” True story. “Cuts will dramatically cost America’s children: across-the-board cuts could mean nearly $5 billion in education cuts . The cuts have real consequences: Fewer services for more than 9 million public school students and job losses for 80,000 Americans .”   Whoa. Head Start programs are often first on the chopping block, generally cited as an unnecessary indulgence. Oy. What a misunderstanding of Head Start--who and how it helps. Take 19 year old single mom Rosalie and her daughter in Phoenix. Rosalie learned how to supportively parent her daughter, access preventive medical care, graduate high school, and get a job. Her daughter got the best beginning and Rosalie got herself and her daughter into a better position. But now, according to the New York Times , “Tens of thousands of young children from low...

2012 has chosen its theme: The Year of Misplaced Trust. In large part, this is being let down by folks I trusted to care for my kids. Yesterday was another example of this. Persistence has been struggling with hearing issues, and all that stems from that, due to consistently congested ears. Nothing we've done has helped. We started seeing specialists about this early in the year, but we really amped up our efforts this fall. It's been a rough go, involving a lot of tests, poking, prodding, and constantly disrupted lives with doctor visits. She's worn out with it all. And it's a lot of hard and complex stuff for a little kid to process. She's being a champ about it, of course, because if ever a kid had a heart for putting her head down and plowing through, she's that kid. But she's ready for it to be finished. She's ready to have it fixed. And she's ready to launch into catching up on all she's missed and gotten behind on because her hearing...

One thing we like to rail about is the high cost of health care -- and justly so. On the one hand, I don't mind paying doctors for their specialty (who wants to be the guy who says, "hey I want the cheapest doctor! who cares about credentials!") or drug companies for the healing medications they spend years and millions developing. On the other hand, sometimes I think we just aren't smart enough about our health care. Sometimes I think we are too fast to accept health care exactly as dispensed and too slow to consider ways to make it work better for us (our bodies and our wallets). Let me share a short anecdote and a few things I learned this week about being smarter with health care, choices we have that we may not know about and how to get doctors and pharmacists on board. In short, let me tell you about being an empowered patient who takes charge of our own health and wellness. It all started last Wednesday when the pediatrician leaned back from my daughter...