LA Moms Blog

Lessons Learned

I took piano lessons for years when I was young but don't ask me to sit down at the piano at your dinner party and play "Ode To Joy" or request my keyboard accompaniment when you sing, "Always and Forever" at your sister's wedding. (Don't laugh -- you know you've never been to a wedding where they didn't play that song.)

And the reason is, I don't remember how to a play a single thing after all those lessons and that drain on my parents' bank account. In fact, one of the only things I remember has nothing to do with perfecting my scales or learning the difference between a major and a minor chord. It's this: I remember my piano teacher's false eyelash coming off during a lesson and fluttering down to her cheek, where it sat for the next thirty minutes, totally unbeknownst to her.

The Hot Zone

The other day I was thinking about all of the parenting advice I’ve read over the years. From the proper way to change a diaper, to mastering the fourth-grade playdate, to the most effective way to deal with your tween's first zit — I think it’s all been covered.

But hey, where’s the part about what to do the first time you hear your 13-year-old daughter refer to a boy as being ‘hot’?

I’m sure it would be followed by instructions to lock the doors, invest in some sturdy Amish dresses and take a big swig of hard whiskey.

Grateful

I was picking up my kids from school the other day, and when they got in the car my 11-year-old launched into a story about a classmate who said that his parents would be really upset that he got a 'B' on his report card. Without thinking I responded, “Well, aren’t you grateful we aren’t like that?” Naturally, I followed this up with a lecture about having to walk fifty miles through a hurricane to get to work and then a short summation of my time as an overworked child in a rug factory in India.

You’ve heard this before -- parents using other people’s misfortune to instill gratitude in their kids. The ones that say, “Hey, eat your peas — there are kids starving in other zip codes,” or “Sure you don’t like those generic jeans, but how’d you like it if all you had to wear was polyester?”

Bye, Bye, Baby(sitter)

Something happened recently that I like to brag about to my friends with young children. I like to tell them the story, and then watch as their eyes glaze over and they start drooling and then some of them start crying with envy. Some of them get angry but then I point out how jealously doesn't become them and then they put down the knife.

The story I tell them is this: My husband and I left our girls, ages 11 and 13, at home and then we went to dinner. And a movie. Without having to find a babysitter or beg our friends to watch them. That's right -- we've reached the fabled light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel, the sweet life, Oprah's aha moment -- whatever you want to call it, we've reached the time when our kids are actually able to watch themselves. You may not be jealous this second but wait until you see the commemorative plaque I'm getting engraved.

Women's Conference '09: Somaly Mam, Human Rights Activist

I have to admit that getting to the Women's Conference in Long Beach by 8am was no small feat, especially since everyone knows how much I love mornings (said with the greatest amount of sarcasm.) But I'm glad I did since I was priveleged to experience what for me were the most powerful moments of the conference by far. In this morning’s opening session I, and no doubt everyone else in the arena, was moved by the words of Somaly Mam, a former sex slave who was sold to a brothel in her native Cambodia as a child.

I’ve seen her story before, but reading about it didn’t approach the power of hearing her tell the story herself in front of a hushed arena.   Mam admitted that she didn’t even know her real name, or her exact age. She talked about telling her story to a stranger who in turn helped her escape her imprisonment and how it strengthened her resolve to help other innocents like herself.  

Mam has made it her life’s mission to help children entrapped in the world of sex trafficking and sex slavery.  Fighting back tears, she spoke proudly of one of her ‘children’ who we would be starting college here in America. But her most important message was her plea to the audience to be willing to help those in need, those like the over 5,000 children she’s helped since embarking on her mission as a human rights activist. Her parting words “Your love can heal a victim.”  Powerful words worth getting up early for.

Written by Marsha Takeda-Morrison, aka Sweatpantsmom

This post is sponsored by Lean Cuisine.

Our Dark Little Secret

We went on a vacation recently, and two of the best days were ones where my husband and I took our daughters, 11 and 13, biking along the Truckee river in Lake Tahoe. This was the culmination of a dream of ours – not the river ride itself, but the very act of biking. Yes, you heard me right – my kids have been on this planet over a decade and just recently learned how to ride bikes. But I've decided to come clean and now I’m all about disclosure – next I’ll be telling you about my third nipple.

It really was our dark little secret. While we watched other kids riding around on their fancy two-wheelers, we could only stand by helplessly and say to ourselves, "Why not us?" It wasn’t for a lack of trying – we’d attempted to get our girls to ride numerous times but they rejected the Schwinns in favor of Razors or rollerblades. And our plan to convince the neighbors that training wheels were the new, retro, 'in' thing like bell bottoms or turntables? Totally not working.

I Used to Hate Kate, Now I Hate Jon, But Mostly I Just Hate Myself

So I was having dinner with friends recently and we were discussing the usual things like parenting, and politics and face creams when the conversation inexplicably turned to Jon and Kate Gosselin, stars of the reality show Jon & Kate Plus 8. Suddenly all eyes turned to me and I gave an impressive two-minute discourse on why their marriage inevitably failed, what a shrew Kate was and how Jon's publicist should be fired for letting him wear those awful Ed Hardy pants. Then I crawled under the table and died.

R.I.P. Michael Jackson

Michael Jackson died on Wednesday at the age of 50. While tributes poured in, there were also slams on Jackson and his controversial life - the child molestation charges, the financial troubles, the extensive plastic surgery that left him almost unrecognizable. I hear all of it, but today I just want to remember Michael Jackson the child star, the gifted performer, the songwriting genius.

Is Kidz Bop An Evil Plot to Poison Our Kids' Minds? Nah.

And here I thought those super-sized fries were the only dangerous thing at McDonalds. 

According to some parents in Alabama, the Kidz Bop CD included in the chain's Happy Meals contains a bad ingredient as well; an obscenity in one of the songs. At least one McDonalds has pulled the CD from their Happy Meals because parents say they can hear the f-bomb being dropped in the cover version of Gavin DeGraw's "I Don't Want To Be."  (This contradicts earlier reports that the CDs were pulled because they were irritating and caused parents to attempt to pull the CD players out of their cars with their bare hands.)

I wouldn't know a celebrity if they moved in next door to me

Almost thirteen years ago, right after I had my first baby we were living in the Hollywood Hills. Like most new mothers, I spent a freakish amount of time pushing my newborn daughter in her stroller around the neighborhood, partly to let her get some fresh air but mostly to pull myself away from endless hours spent on the couch crying and watching Roseanne reruns. 

A couple of times on those walks I ran into a neighbor, David, who had recently moved into a house around the corner from us.  He mentioned that he was an actor but I didn’t give it much thought until one day when my nieces, who were tweens then, were at my house watching Buffy The Vampire Slayer and while changing a diaper I happened to glance up at the TV and saw my neighbor on the screen.  “Hey, that guy lives two houses away,” I pointed out, gesturing towards the TV with a poop-smeared wipe in my hand.  Obviously I had never watched the show and had no idea who this Angel character was, but judging by the ear-piercing, alien-sounding squeals coming from my nieces this David Boreanaz guy was a big deal.

That wasn’t the first, or the last time I didn’t recognize a celebrity.  You see, I’m celebrity-blind.  While most people imagine they see George Clooney in every gas station and Thai restaurant in town, I wouldn’t recognize a celebrity if he was living next door to me.