Not A Hipster Mom

It was 4:45 on a Friday afternoon, and I was on a mission. My challenge: to find a suitable Halloween costume for my two-year-old daughter. And when I say suitable, I mean pretty much any costume that would fit her, that was still available for purchase in the Bay Area. The next day (yesterday) was the big Halloween parade in our amazing Oakland neighborhood, and I had run out of time to find her a costume. I hadn’t intentionally left it for the last minute--I never do it intentionally --but there I was, feeling more and more like a lousy mom as each store I called told me that they were out of children’s Halloween costumes.  I had promised myself that this year I was going to start early. And I did. A good month before Halloween, I started discussing it with my daughter. She dressed up last year (in a bee costume that I bought at the last second) and went to a party at her daycare, but she was only one, and she didn’t really understand. This year I explained the concept to h

A few days ago, I read something about Michelle Williams and her seven-year-old daughter Matilda, and it really struck a chord. First, let me say that I adore Michelle Williams, not even as an actress so much as a person. She is my single-mom role model. She always seemed like a good mom to me, staying strong after her daughter's father (the late, great, Heath Ledger) overdosed on prescription pills, staying grounded, opting for Brooklyn over Hollywood, always looking pretty and young and edgy but never trashy, balancing her career with being a mother, being very choosy about who she dates, that kind of thing. But you never really understand something until you're going through it yourself, so I could not truly appreciate Michelle's single-mom awesomeness until about a year ago, when I became one.  Anyway, apparently Matilda is so proud of the fact that her mother played the character Glinda the Good Witch in the movie  Oz, the Great and Powerful , that she has a Glinda

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Confession: for the last week or so, I have been using M&M's to help manage my daughter's behavior. I became a single mom a few months after she turned one, and it didn't take me very long to realize what I believe is one of the great truths about single parenting: you have to pick your battles. While this is true for two-parent households, too, at least when there's two of you, you can tag team. When your toddler is having a tantrum, you can team up to calm her down. Or you can take turns. Or, if you're desperate, you can always go with the old, "Just wait until your father gets home!" When it's just you and your two-your-old child, who is more stubborn and strong-willed than any adult you've ever met, failing to pick your battles is the fastest way to go bat shit crazy. And that's not good for anyone. For the record, my daughter is actually pretty well behaved. I'm sure every mother says that about their child, but in this case

I cut my daughter's hair for the first time tonight. She's two, already--two and a quarter, to be exact--but her hair has grown in so slowly, that this was the first time it needed a trim. For a little while now I'd noticed that her hair was in her eyes, and for some reason I held back on cutting it. Upon reflection, I think maybe on some subconscious level, I knew that it was one more right of passage on the road from baby to child, just like transitioning from a crib to a bed (done!), and giving up the pacifier (not done, but that's another post). And maybe I wanted to hold on to her baby self for just a little bit longer. But tonight, as I watched her brush her hair out of her eyes for the millionth time, it was like something clicked in my head, and I knew that it was time. "Little bean," I said, "is your hair in your eyes?" "Yes, Mommy, " she said, nodding solemnly. "Do you want Mommy to cut your hair?" I asked, almos