Parenting

Mary’s New Year’s Resolutions: 2024

| Mary Stoffel, MOT, OTR/L

It’s 2024, which means that Child(ish) Advice is four years old (old enough to be in preschool).

The lull between Christmas and New Year’s always has me contemplating what goals I’d like to set for the upcoming year. This time around, I found myself writing the same goals that haven’t been achieved for years (or piggybacking on goals that have recently been met). The resolutions started feeling like a never-ending hamster wheel. I don’t want 2024 to be mundane.

During our monthly meeting, Patti had mentioned creating resolutions about how you want to feel rather than what you want to accomplish. That perspective shifted my mindset on how I want to live in 2024. So, with that said, here are my New Year’s resolutions.

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Patti’s Favorite Posts: 2023

| Patti Webb

My favorite 2023 post was our Treetop Quest playdate review. 

I was so excited to find this activity and overjoyed at the mental and physical determination our kids displayed. Mary and I could only help or talk to our kids from a distance. We also couldn’t exactly show or model how to do the courses ourselves. They had to assess the situation, work their equipment, motor plan, and overcome a bit of reluctance. Our kids showed true teamwork, were cheerleaders for each other, and it was impressive. Such a proud mom moment. 

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Mary’s favorite posts: 2023

| Mary Stoffel, MOT, OTR/L

Sifting through a year’s worth of posts to find a favorite one is hard. We covered a ton of topics this year, all of which I am rather proud of, as they’ve had a positive effect on me and how I parent as well. But for 2023, my favorite post is Coffee Chat: Dogs are like kids, right?

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Child(ish) Reads: MORE + Being Seen

| Patti Webb

“What we are teaches the child far more than what we say, so we must be what we want our children to become.”- Child development author Joseph Chilton Pearce, Teaching Children to Love

This post is actually part Child(ish) Read review and part Coffee Chat. I finally finished More: Life on the Edge of Adventure and Motherhood by Majka Burhardt. Burhardt is a Princeton graduate, a professional rock and ice climber, and a twin mom. The book spans her pregnancy through her kids’ fourth birthday, compiled from audio and journal entries over five years. The book started out as letters to her twins and morphed into book-form when she could see the overall message not only to her children, but to all moms.

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Holiday Mom Magic

| Mary Stoffel, MOT, OTR/L
Photo credit: A Bad Moms Christmas (2017)

Moms don’t en-joy, they give joy. That’s how being a mom works. – A Bad Moms Christmas

Thanksgiving starts a mad rush all the way through December. While we can’t speak for other religions and their traditions, Christmas has a chokehold on an entire month; bringing festivities, expectations, and Mariah Carey.

This onslaught includes: hours making and checking shopping lists, wrapping the gifts, sending out cards, decking the halls, baking the cookies, making the travel plans, and keeping the spirit of Christmas alive. And year after year, the person behind all of this isn’t Santa. It’s mom.

Why do we do this? Is it a rite of passage to level up as a mom? Is the expectation the same for dads? With a few weeks left before December 25th, let’s get to the bottom of this quandary and how we can alleviate this self-inflicted stress.

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