Category: Parenting

Growing up, one of my best friends lived down the street from me with her terribly abusive stepfather and mother. Susie (the mother) was outside, dragging one of her daughters by the arm down the street, throwing punches and screaming curses. My mother and I were on the porch swing

Jeez, when did back-to-school season become Pint-Sized Prom? All the supplies, accessories, new clothes and haircuts to procure. Frantically arranging one’s children in perfect formations for the perfect first-day-of-school photos. It’s stressful, amirite? And mine aren’t even in school yet! I get residual anxiety just seeing those cute pictures with

Pointing is an important developmental milestone for young children. It helps them learn language, gives them a better understanding of their environment, and provides the ability to socialize with others in a meaningful way. Teaching pointing to your autistic child may be challenging, but it’s not impossible! We’ve been working

In my last article I wrote about the best parenting tip I’ve ever received. Catch up real quick and read it here. Nah? In a nutshell, the tip revolves around using non-reactive parenting techniques as tools for discipline and enforcing calm. Slightly controversial and unpopular opinion alert: this parenting advice

The best parenting advice I’ve ever received was delivered by one of my besties, Amanda. We’re both psychology nerds and love to talk about totally fun and not boring stuff like internalized vs. externalized anxiety and the role of perception. Somehow the subject turned to Big A (who was probably

Happy birthday, little A! While Pinterest makes me yearn for a cupcake bar, with two toddlers we ain’t got the time or the budget for that. Read on to learn how we threw a cute first birthday party, serving good food to a large crowd, for less than $100. This

“How did you know your child has autism?” is the number one question asked of me since sharing Big A’s autism diagnosis. In person, but especially in messages, from acquaintances and strangers alike. Hey, I get it. It’s not a question I wanted to ask aloud either. But paying attention

I have a confession: I side-eye the parents yelling at their kids in Wal-Mart. You know the ones. The real screamers. I’ve always advocated and strived for non-engagement with my kids’ (we both know I mean Big A) negative behavior. With concentrated effort, I usually succeed. Until earlier this week

I am a woefully bad at art. I’ve never been good at painting or drawing. I can’t even use scissors well (I blame being left-handed). I love doing Dollar Tree crafts, but that’s just hot gluing cheap pieces of plastic to other cheap pieces of plastic. As I scroll Pinterest,

Last Wednesday we had our toddler tested for autism. At barely two years old, he received a definitively diagnosed with autism. It is like everything has changed, yet nothing has changed. Our day-to-day is no different. There are triumphs: Big A said “choo-choo” and signed “train” Sunday. There’s still a