Living with Littles: Tales from a Local Mom of Two

Time for a Change

When I started writing this column I had a baby in my arms and a two-year-old toddling around the house. I was firmly in Starter Mom territory, juggling bottles, diapers and sleepless nights. I’ve spent three years as the Starter Mom with you, through the years my kids have grown as I’m sure yours have, and I’ve covered everything from potty training nightmares to late night illness, my travel headaches and even my mommy guilt.

However, times have changed and after six years with kids I don’t know if I can still consider myself a Starter Mom. I’m in a transitional phase where I feel more comfortable in my role as parent; I feel sure of my decisions and trust myself to know what’s best for my kids. My life is also changing. I no longer leave the house with a diaper bag or sippie cup. I don’t have to check to see if there is a Koala changer in the bathroom or make sure the restaurant has booster seats. I don’t have to hope the store has a double cart, I can just go shopping.

Parenting young children is a different experience from raising older children and that is another column all on its own. With all of these changes it was decided it’s time for me to graduate from Starter Mom to something more apropos, from here on out this column will be Living with Littles.

I will be focusing on writing articles that you want to read. Not that I haven’t always done this but the head honchos at Happenings made it even easier by running an analysis of the most popular columns from the past three years. We are using that data to make sure we are writing content that you love. We are looking at the most read articles and getting ready to explore those areas even more. For example, the number one most read article in the history of The Starter Mom was about Fighting the Flu with the doctors from Two Peds in a Pod. One of the biggest revelations in that article was that they told us that thing we all call the flu, might not necessarily be the flu. It’s just a catchall term we use. Knowing how well that article was received I hope to team up with those doctors again for an article about how to get through the night in the era of Web MD and late night browsing when you have sick kids, (especially since if you search WebMD long enough everything leads to cancer).

Other surprise favorites were the back to school article, which was liberally sprinkled with humor, and the mother’s day throwback edition where I shared stories of my mom and stories from my friends’ mothers. Nostalgia seems to strike a chord as do holiday articles. I was surprised that my Christmas Poem, a silly ode to how over Christmas I was that season, made the top 10 and garnered a good number of personal responses from people who felt the same. Top tips articles such as How to Travel with Toddlers were also a hit.

With each new phase of parenting I’m finding new tips. Just this year my daughter went to real school for the first time and the mom’s at school told me what sort of backpack I needed, they told me how to handle parent teacher conferences and clued me in to early registration. Just when I thought I had this parenting thing down everything changed again. Just a few years ago bounce house parties were all the rage, but now my six year old says she’s over bouncy places. It seems that everything is constantly changing so there is still plenty of new things to cover. I’m looking forward to sharing them with you as I explore Living with Littles.

This article is presented by The Dance Academy. Since 1987, The Dance Academy in Holland, PA has been offering professional dance training with a personal touch, instilling the love of dance to students and families throughout Bucks County. Under the direction of Miss Donnajean Kline (BFA in Dance, Temple University) and staffed by a group of highly-trained instructors, The Dance Academy has acquired countless awards and accolades each year at local, national, and international competitions. Through recitals, competitions, advertising publications, professional companies, and tours; Dance Academy students are spreading their passion for dance both here in the States as well as on international stages.