"Stai attenta!" (Be careful!) More than any other word or phrase, I heard this throughout my childhood -- literally, from my nonna, who has always spoken to me exclusively in Italian, and proverbially, from my mom, who most would call extraordinarily overprotective. When I was younger, I always...

Abject fear may not so much be cute, but I couldn't help but revel in Kai's first-ever clinginess on Halloween, and the months before that led up to it. It started at Sam's Club, during our bi-monthly wallet-busting blowout there. The incorporation of Halloween decor began innocently enough...

Since Gage has understandably had enough of my ever-burgeoning fear that there is something wrong with my son's health, and my mother is certainly of no help (in fact, I recognize that her quasi-constant side commentary about Kai's state has a bit to do with my being so undone in the first place...

Preface In spite of the depressive waves that wash over my very soul as we voyeuristically wander past one exhibit after the other of sad, living creatures, imprisoned with a life sentence that is solely for our pleasure and delight, I continue to subject myself and Gage to relatively regular trips to...

I know, I know. Squeezing the liver of a fish until it produces oil and then being expected to drink it by the tablespoon-full sounds utterly disgusting. Good thing there are companies out there dedicated to fish-liver squeezing, because if I were to witness such an act, I surely would never have had...

So the light of day has officially transformed into that diffuse, hazy hue of autumn -- even B.K., this changeover would always remind me of how much I still needed to soak in those last, few rays of sunshine before begrudgingly bunkering down for the winter. Back then, I abhorred this time of the year...

I've exerted significant restraint in these past few weeks in terms of divulging the most recent tale from the bungalow. Gage was offered a full-time, at-home ad sales position for a publication called LakeHomes (I also write for it), and he took it! That's right. All three of us. At home. Together...

Motherhood offers up such a plethora of unprecedented circumstances that one would be remiss to not make the connection that (not just in this place called parenthood, but also on the grandest of human levels) often, people do what they do out of necessity, and not out of desire or laze. Case in Point...

Prepare. Some of you may not agree with my seemingly sacreligious ways in the following: To be sure, it is also against my own official religious stance (Catholicism, with a twist of liberation theology, for fun), but the real reason I've been stuck on the safari concept for Kai's birthday party...

Kai Patrick is officially 1, and I am officially done . Please, stick a fork in me. Us. Gage, too. He was immense . Just look at us, would you? We are looking farrrrr more burned out than we ever have after any all-out all-nighter we've ever pulled, what with Gage's fireman hat and my blindfold...