Whatever Happened to Saturday Morning Cartoons?

A couple weeks ago, I was on the phone with my good friend. We were talking about our boys, and what they were into these days. She asked: "What does Noah like to play after school?". I stopped for a moment, kind of in total confusion. My friend had just read off a super neat list of all the things her nearly five-year-old was into: T-ball, soccer, swimming, Legos and superheros. Oh my gosh, I thought, WHAT is Noah into!? I kind of bumbled along...."Um...he likes, well, computers...and uh, he loves Shawn the Sheep, but he isn't too into the competitive sports thing yet, although we'd love him to give it a try..and uh....." Although my friend was ever so gracious and encouraging, I couldn't help feeling at a worried loss at the end of the conversation. Was something wrong with my child!? WHAT does he play? Why can't I explain what he likes to do? Am I doing a bad job as a parent, should I "get him into "something"?
Then this week, another phone call, with a different friend, and tales of her little soccer players, which is AWESOME, and their exciting Halloween costumes, a Star Wars character and a Transformer. Again, I questioned my parenting and our normality.
THEN....this morning I walked into Noah's room to find him contently doing this.
And when I watched the video, it finally dawned on me, Noah DOES do stuff, it's just his own brand of stuff, his own type of playing. Because gosh, paper cups ARE toys, and paper cup math IS playing! My kid's into paper cups! He's carried them around all week, counting and re-counting them in lots of different ways, and constructing teetering, geometric buildings and bridges.
So, this morning I have decided not to worry so much. Perhaps someday he will join the T-ball team after all, and if not, it's ok, he can always be their statistician.





More pictures and videos on my Flickr account HERE!

A Little Randomness Never Hurt Anyone

The school year is into full swing, an exciting hum in every hallway. The trees are well on their way to skinny little shadows of their former selves. We saw a gaggle of awkward teenagers in Target the other night, stampeding their way towards somewhere, looking for something, in some kind of hurry. The boys in reluctant suits, the girls, spaghetti strapped gowns, open toed shoes, no coats, the total Michigan fall inappropriate dress of Homecoming.

So in honor of fall, HB Presents: Top Autumn Picks!

1.) Trader Joe's Maple Leaf Cookies
Just like a double stuffed Oreo, only it's not double stuffed, it's TRIPPLE stuffed, AND it's not an Oreo. Oh no my friends, Trader Joe's Maple Leaf Cookies are way way better than Oreos. No artificial colors or flavors, no preservatives, these babies combine two buttery vanilla, leaf shaped cookies, and one giant dollop of creamy maple filling. Think Oreo middles that taste like fall. The best part, they're so rich and satisfying, you only need one! (This way, I can still fit into my homecoming dress.)

2.) Anthropologie's Daylily Bangel in purple
The above example does not do this bracelet credit. They call it a Daylily, but I call it your own little slice of wrist Om. It looks like a lotus flower to me, especially in pink. (But I like the purple/green combo better.) Bright, fun, and oh so three dimensional, this resin bauble is just what you need to remind yourself during those long winters, that there are indeed flowers underneath all that snow.

3.) The Smiths- There is a Light That Never Goes Out
All of the ooey gooey, melodramatic goodness that you loved in middle school, only more depressing. Because, misery loves company and Michigan winters are long!






4.) The Snail and the Cyclops's post on The Mary Frances Cookbook


If the half-smiling boiler pan and the smirking coffee pot don't put your over the cuteness edge, then the line perfect measuring spoons will. In fact, all of The Snail and the Cyclops is a great Autumn read. Bon Appetite!

5.) White Cheese Chicken Lasagna- only without the chicken, plus a bunch of mushrooms and no spinach. So really, White Cheese and Mushroom Lasagna.
Hi. Want to shine as a superstar at your next potluck? Have of kid who's suspicious of any food that's other than beige? Then step right up. So, SO good. A real crowd pleaser and simple to make.

6.) Ruth Reichl's - Not Becoming My Mother: and Other Things She Taught Me Along the Way

Do you want to understand your mother better? This beautiful memoir of Reichl's mother's life, teaches us about empathy and re-thinking perspective. A super quick read, it'll leave you tearing up and forgiving your Mother for all those years of flank steak all at the same time.

7.) Goldie made me do it: Noah and the Whale- The First Days of Spring

The word on the street is that Goldie- RT: detroitster @HowBourgeois @golds78 goldy is like a young richard-joseph-Gordon Gere-levitt-(Tom)-jones8:35 AM Sep 4th , the Richard Gere, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Noah Wiley, Tom Jones look-alike, and our emerging indie music artist editor GURU. Guys, like...music savant, holy leader level kind of music editor. Suggested to us, Noah and the Whale's newest album "The First Days of Spring". Superb, the breakup and rebirth album of the decade, maybe even the century! It's pretty catchy, and if Goldie says so, then it's true!
WATCH AND LISTEN HERE!

Incredible, awesome. I love it.

Wouldn't it be Cool If.......

......The free traditional Chinese medicine that Beijing is providing to prevent A/H1N1 infection for 3 million students in primary schools, middle schools and universities works!!!? And then the world would be all: "Oooooh, maybe we SHOULD think about Eastern medicine as being valid like Western medicine sometimes." That would be really neat. Hey, you never know!
I think that the two could truly compliment each other.

Noah's Going to Kindergarten, ilya's Going to Grad School. I Feel So Old.

(Be sure to turn the volume up, it'll make you happy.)

Grow Grow Grow

My favorite movie of all time: Annie Hall

You know, it's not easy living the life of a hypochondriac, fatalistic nudge. A girl Alvy singer, with all of the neuroses of Annie Hall . There's always the latest update on the CDC's Swine Flu page to panic about, or some special airing on doomsday 2012, to keep me staring at the ceiling all night. Just the other day I thought I contracted a bad case or Borax, until my doctor told me it's just soap. My analyst said that I have a problem with control, I think he's wrong. I said, look, I don't know why people even bother with life, what kind of fun is it if you don't already know what's on the buffet that day. Setting yourself up for all that disappointment when there's no Jell-O. It's exhausting!

I Really Enjoy Writing, But...........

I have moderate-severe ADHD* (No, really, really, I do. Say lots of expensive tests and "brain mapping".), and every time I hear the slightest noise, I completely lose my train of thought. It is so so frustrating. It makes me cry sometimes, it drives me up a wall. I hate this about myself.

WE LIVE IN 1,100 sq FEET. YOU TRY ESCAPING THE NOISE OF TWO OTHER PEOPLE, AND TWO CATS WHO THINK THAT THEY LIVE IN AN ALTERNATE REALITY CALLED "WWF CAT WRESTLE-MANIA". EVERYDAY.

I dream of a teeny tiny writer's cottage in our backyard.

In college, I had to register with The Handicapper's Office. They gave me the opportunity (which I stupidly never accepted) to take my exams in a small, soundproof room, with no windows and nothing to distract me on the walls. Sad.

I used to take Ritalin. It works. I sobbed the first time I was able to read through an entire chapter of a book, rather than having to stop to jump around and sing after every two pages.
It's hell.

Once I took a dose of Ritalin, but was so quickly distracted, that I had forgotten that I had already taken my dose, and took another. I was panicked. Called my doctor, it was ok in the end, but scary.
Ritalin made me not really me, kind of a shell of me, so I stopped taking it. I wish I had the courage to start again, but stimulants scare me.

In fifth grade I won a little award for my writing. My dream, to become an author. I'd go to school and hone my craft. That was the plan. I never developed the attention span to become a good writer. I hate fiction, I love the brain. My new secret dream? A graduate psych degree, some clinical research, and maybe...just maybe, a book on ADHD and other incredibly annoying odysseys of the brain.


*WARNING: Dressing your daughter in knee socks, banana shirts, and Sally Jesse Raphael glass may induce ADHD in children. That, or years of merciless taunting in regards to being THE BEE GIRL


or WELCOME TO THE DOLL HOUSE.