Guest blogger Tiffani lives with her three right-brained kids and one left-brained hubby in Erie. When not blogging the minute yet incredibly exciting details of her life at Child’s Play or dreaming up ways to look productive and organized without actually having to be productive and organized, she runs her own natural bath and body company, Serendipity Bath Co. If she had to sum up her life in three captions, they would be: “Proudly wiping other people’s butts since 1996!,” “Unschooling: not just for weirdos!,” and “Have minivan; will travel!”

I’m beginning to understand why ideas and education are the first things to be controlled in oppressive regimes. Education leads to…thoughts. Ideas. Connections. Expression. Discussion. And yes, Revolution.

I, being the Head Mama around here, am in a position of Exalted and Sovereignly Great Dictator. Especially when the playroom and bedrooms look like they’ve been ransacked by a bunch of gremlins with a penchant for making cardboard box civilizations and scattering the contents of every toy container to the four corners.

Today is particularly oppressive for the kids, as I am leaving to take care of some business for a few days, and Head Daddy is large and in charge when I’m gone. He needs a clean and tidy house like I need Dove Chocolate and Cherry Coke. I have them on a strict schedule of 15 minutes cleaning with a 10 minute break. Must. Clean. Up!

After lunch, I sent them upstairs to clean some more. They both did their best to argue why they shouldn’t have to/needed less time cleaning/needed a longer break. I announced in my best Exalted and Sovereignly Great Dictator voice, that I was boss and what I said GOES.

However, Read on …

Guest blogger Kagey is a mom of three living in southeast Centennial with her husband, Mr. Adventure and her dog. Her house is never quite clean, her clothes are always a little out of date, and she is always looking for more time to write, but at least she can laugh about it all.

It’s 4:30 a.m., and I scan the house for any missed essentials before heading to the garage, where my husband, a.k.a. Mr. Adventure, has the car warmed up, full of our sleeping children, son age 4, daughter age 2, and son age 6 months. If we’re lucky, we’ll hit the Kansas border before they wake up.

Why are we doing this crazy-long road trip, through three states, staying in three different places, with a preschooler, a potty-training pre-preschooler and an infant? Well, when you are blessed enough to have a grandmother turning 90, you don’t miss the party! We have known, barring a sad turn of events, that we would be heading to the big birthday party and family reunion this May for over a year. We had two options: the ridiculous cost of gasoline for the 953-mile drive, or the insanely ridiculous cost of airplane tickets, plus rental car and its gas.

How bad could it be? Read on …

Guest blogger Heather lives outside of Denver with her husband and two young sons. When not blogging at A Mama’s Blog, Heather is an almost full-time stay-at-home mama, who also works part-time a few days a week. When she is not trying to keep up with her two active boys, Heather enjoys blogging about daily life with her sons, pregnancy and birth, and more natural living. On the rare occasions when she has spare time, she enjoys hanging out with her family, gardening, exercising and reading.

My son Ryan is participating in a language development study. He was a participant about two years ago, before he was talking. The research team recently contacted me and said they wanted to have some of the original children participate in their latest round of research, and asked if we would consider having Ryan participate again.

The research involves having Ryan wear a vest, with a slot for a special recording device. It is about the size of an iPod. It records for 16 hours a day and will pick up everything within a 6-foot radius of the child, to “hear” what the child hears, and then determines what the child says.

It is a little odd on recording days, because I am very mindful that anything and everything I say will be recorded. Same goes for Joe. The researchers assured us that they have heard it all- even awful, drug-out fights between parents. Fortunately Joe and I haven’t had one of those yet on recording day, but it does keep you on your toes.

Today was a recording day, and I felt well enough to go to work. The boys went to daycare. I stayed a few extra hours at work to catch up, and honestly I was kind of glad I didn’t have the “pressure” of dealing with the recorder.

All went well, until the last half hour before Ryan went to bed. Read on …

Guest writer Shannon lives in colorful Colorado Springs with her news anchor husband and two sons. When not fixin’ up their fixer-upper home, hiking, gardening, cooking, changing diapers or chasing children, this Colorado Native is sure to be found blogging at The Cole Mine.

I have taken it upon myself to change my perspectives lately. I am a stay-at-home mom. My husband works evenings. For so long, this weighed heavily upon my soul. I was disappointed we didn’t have a “typical” family that could sit down to a family dinner every evening. I grew up with conversation galore and both parents sitting down to dinner with me every night. I mourned the loss of this usual and socially acceptable structure in my life. It is how I always thought life would be and we had it for a short while when my son Josh was tiny and my husband was on a different career path for a brief 10 months.

Now, he is back to his much-loved career and I felt resentful toward him and his profession and blamed them both for the aloneness I felt every night. To me, it seemed most moms got a break in the evening with Daddy giving baths and orchestrating bedtime. Where was my break? Why do I have to do everything?

I’m not sure if it was Josh’s recent stint in the hospital or just a simple and pure realization that I do not HAVE to take care of these children. Instead of “have to,” I now say “get to.” A while back, I read many a blog post about re-framing thoughts toward a “get to” perspective rather than a “have to” perspective. Read on …

Guest writer Melissa can be found blogging at A Mom in the Burbs. While she claims it to be a work of fiction, the blog bears an eerie resemblance to her actual family of three delightful daughters (ages 9,6 and 21 (painful) months) and one incredible(ly) tired husband. She recently launched Under the Reading Tree, a Web site that has parent reviews of children’s books.

For the purposes of this post, I am going to consider myself an expert at travelling with a toddler. I am, at least, an expert at the pain and suffering associated with travelling with my toddler. In an effort to warn inform other parents, I have compiled a list of ways to possibly delay the hell small children impose on travel enjoy your trip with your little one!

1) Don’t go. Seriously. We just attempted lunch out with Toddler only to be vividly reminded as to why they invented take-out. Just borrow some nice travel DVD’s from the library. Easier on everyone. Checkout my 10 Steps to a Fun Family Outing to see why….

2) Okay, fine. If you’ve made it past #1, you are actually planning on going, blatantly ignoring my sage advice. Fine.

2) (For reals) Scale down your expectations. Read on …

Amy (aka Crunchy Domestic Goddess) is a guest blogger, wife and mother of two who lives outside of Denver. Passionate about attachment parenting, informed birth choices, green living and photography, Amy is trying to change the world, one blog post at a time. Her blog is Crunchy Domestic Goddess.

Spring is in the air here in Colorado and now is an excellent time to reevaluate your child’s sun protection for the summer months ahead.

The Centers for Disease Control recently came out with some bad news for nearly all Americans who use sunscreen. A recent study shows one of the commonly used ingredients in most sunscreens (for adults, children as well as babies), a chemical called oxybenzone, has been linked to allergies, hormone disruption, and cell damage. In fact according to the study, 97% of Americans are contaminated with this chemical. Another study has showed oxybenzone is linked to low birth weight in baby girls whose mothers are exposed during pregnancy. Also worth noting is “oxybenzone is also a penetration enhancer, a chemical that helps other chemicals penetrate the skin.”

No FDA regulations
The last time the Food and Drug Administration reviewed the safety of oxybenzone was in the 1970s. It republished its evaluation in 1978, and announced plans to develop comprehensive standards for sunscreen safety and effectiveness. However, it’s been 30 years now and the Agency has yet to issue final regulations. “Instead, it encourages manufacturers Read on …

Join us in welcoming our guest blogger, Melissa. This photographer extraordinaire for hire claims to be a semi-normal person who is surrounded by crazy people (namely her two daughters). This also means she will fit right in at MHM! She can be found blogging at The Howell Herald.

When you were young, did your parents ever say to you, “I hope when you get married you have a child who acts JUST LIKE YOU!” My parents never said this to me because it’s something you say to your naughty children, not your perfect children. (My younger brother used to call me “Perfect Child” because I never got in trouble or did bad things).

However, I have discovered that even if your parents never officially put this curse upon you, it naturally follows nevertheless. Read on …