Parenting + Family

During Duluth's winters, all parents are living for the warmer days--the days we can get our over-energized, bouncing-off-the-wall children outside for fresh air, the warmth on their face, and burning all the energy they have been building up during...

I’ve been thinking about Pride Month this week. Although I’m in a same-sex marriage, I’ve never really celebrated the month. My sons are loved in their community; we have always felt welcomed as a family. Pride has been a...

It’s Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month and all month long I’ve been reading beautifully-written and harrowing stories of miscarriage, stillbirth, sudden infant loss, infant loss due to underlying medical conditions, and termination due to fatal chromosomal abnormalities, but...

I pack their lunches with my face half-plastered to my obnoxiously large phone most mornings. More days than not, when they come bounding in the front door with a, “HI MOM,” from school, I’m kissing their dirty little cheeks...

Finding quality education and care for our earliest of learners--our weren’t-they-just-my-tiny-baby toddlers--is a surprisingly challenging and lengthy process, especially here in the Northland. Duluth and its surrounding areas offer several amazing preschool opportunities for three and four year olds,...

We pulled into the permit-only parking lot I used to think was for employees only, and we made our way to the second floor of the hospital. The parking lot, I had since learned, was a special parking lot with...

After living in Duluth for almost 10 years, I had assumed we had done it all at Christmas time - Bentleyville, Christmas City Express, the Christmas City of the North Parade, all of the countless markets - I could go on and on. We’ve driven around to the best-lit neighborhoods and we have all of our traditions mapped out by the time October hits. We know this Christmas city like the back of our hand. But imagine my surprise when we happened upon a new tradition to add to the list: Candlelight Christmas Tour at Glensheen Mansion.

Sorry, not sorry, for all the transformation posts on my Facebook page.  You see, I'm not doing it for attention or all the comments--positive or negative--I am doing it to be a role model to my children, especially my daughter,...

I know. I know. You’re thinking, “Lady, I don’t have a green thumb. In fact, if there were such a thing as a thumbless gardener, that’d be me. I can not grow stuff in gardens!" Here’s my secret. I kill...

Looking for an effortlessly planned meal for your family? Visit the Vanilla Bean-Duluth at their Woodland location on Mondays from 4pm-close as kids will eat for free with a purchase of an entree. I treated my husband and toddler...