It's probably safe to say that most people love adorable little mice in all forms other than as real, breathing critters. These days one of our favorite books is Ellen Stoll Walsh’s Mouse Paint ($5.95 at Amazon). This beautifully illustrated board book tracks the adventures of three white mice who, when not hiding from the cat, have a grand time showing you what they’ve learned about color mixing. There’s even a bit of dry humor included for parents.

Parenting is one of the toughest jobs out there; tack on the pressure to conform to the ever present “shoulds” (offered by those who know you well or not at all) or the breezy, effusive parenting reports from celebrities, and it’s no wonder parents often feel that they have to put on airs about how seamlessly things are going at home.

On the flip side, you’ll get nothing but the truth from Meredith O’Brien, a Boston-based writer/blogger whose new book, A Suburban Mom: Notes from the Asylum, includes a collection of essays reflecting the disparity between parenting reality and fiction. O’Brien’s perspective comes from that of a mother of three who discovered that her stay-at-home mom status (even once she started freelance writing again) relegated her – in non-at-home circles – as someone whose “experience and knowledge apparently [were] no longer relevant.”
If you are looking for quantitative documentation that you can still be a good, loving parent while not doing everything letter perfect, O’Brien’s book will make for an entertaining read. And while I have a few parenting quirks (e.g., a penchant for handmade cards and lunatic birthday baking) that likely would render me as decent fodder for some of O’Brien’s commentary, I’ve got plenty of other parenting imperfections that – thanks to a great therapist – I’ve learned to embrace. And Laurel seems to be surviving the ride.

Never was the difference between the handling of boys vs. girls more humorously apparent than during a park visit a while back. I held Laurel’s hand as she crossed a suspended balance beam repeating, “Go slowly Laurel, be careful!” (The suspension cables looked particularly unforgiving.) Minutes later, as we crossed the next obstacle, we saw a father jumping up and down alongside his son (who was of a similar toddler/preschooler size) at the balance beam, saying “Go! Go! Go! Run across as fast as you can!”

No doubt boys and girls are raised differently, and they also have different needs, some of which have trouble getting fulfilled in our current societal structure. This topic has not escaped the pros, and this morning, Jon (my husband) steps in with a guest post, offering his impressions of the PBS documentary Raising Cain: Boys in Focus.
“It’s a strange time to be a boy in America. Male stereotypes of the past generally (and happily) have gone by the wayside, but haven’t found a good replacement. Most boys do not have male role models at daycare or in school. And when they look at the wider world, whom do they see? Kobe Bryant? Bill Gates? George Bush? It’s pretty slim pickings.

In the PBS documentary Raising Cain: Boys in Focus, Boston-area psychologist Michael Thompson (co-author of Raising Cain: Protecting the Emotional Life of Boys) examines many of the challenges facing boys and their parents. He presents a range of stories that span infant development to high school graduation, and that come from poor urban communities as well as wealthy suburbs. The stories are informative, poignant, and sometimes troubling. We get a hopeful glimpse inside an alternative all-boys school in New York where boys are taught that intelligence and creativity are virtues. But we also see a football coach intensely berating a young boy for crying. We see a boy who can’t sit still long enough to make it through a class. And we meet a teenager who is on the brink of going to prison, walking on the edge of a criminal life.

Thompson presents a number of compelling ideas, some of which seem counter-intuitive. He says that we need to not be scared off by boys’ tendencies toward seemingly violent play because, for most boys, play violence is not a precursor of real violence. He points out that our school systems are demanding longer and longer periods of quiet, focused activity, which tend to be more difficult for boys. And most critically, he says that boys need adults in their lives who can help them learn to recognize and express their emotions.”

PBS offers Raising Cain on DVD, with or without a companion text; their raising boys resource page also offers borrows from the Raising Cain video and book.

Fast and furious developmental changes are par for the course with preschoolers, but Laurel really blew my doors off the other day when she started coloring within the lines.

I was fulfilling requests to draw ice cream cones on the Aquadoodle; after I drew a cone with sprinkles, Laurel grabbed the water pen and slowly started filling in all the blank spaces around the sprinkles, staying within the borders, until the entire scoop was colored in. I was both amazed and mildly concerned, given the bad rap that coloring within the lines can get. The psychologist in me couldn't help but wonder whether anyone has probed relations between coloring rigidity and personality traits.
The topic doesn’t appear to be keeping academics up at night, and the age at which kids learn to color within the lines seems to vary greatly. I myself don’t particularly believe that the specific ability to color within the lines is all that important given that fine motor control can be achieved by many types of play. But something that may be of interest to parents who are frustrated by the confines of coloring books is Susan Striker’s collection of creativity books (for ages 6 to 60!). In particular, her anti-coloring book series (click here for the first book in the series) has a long and devoted following.

A mama pal has high praise for the new magazine Wondertime, a periodical focused on helping parents nurture their children’s love of learning. Suitable for moms of infants through 6-year-olds, this magazine offers ideas about playful activities and everyday adventures with your kids, along with developmental insights. My pal likened it to Real Simple: stylish and simple, but with great, practical ideas.

Wondertime offers a subscription rate of $10 for 10 issues over 24 months ($1 per issue).

I’m one of those people who exhausts every possible avenue to find the answers before going to an adult for them.

That is why we found “The Baby Book” (of the Sears parenting series) to be a handy reference (the book covers topics from birth to two years). While the attachment approach isn’t for everyone (and we certainly didn’t follow every single suggestion despite being pro-breastfeeding and into baby wearing, etc...), the basic baby care and developmental information is extremely useful. We were able to do a lot of successful troubleshooting at home with this book as a reference (with the web as backup here and there) and it saved us many unnecessary trips to the doctor's office.

Available at Amazon - regularly $21.95, currently on sale for $14.27.

Too bad there’s no Harrods in Boston. That’s where a London mama pal picked up her daughter’s unbelievably cute Miffy rolling suitcase.

Meanwhile, you’ll just have to content your Miffy fix via print media. Among our very first baby books was "Miffy’s Magnifying Glass" ($5.99 at Amazon). The babe loved looking at the bright illustrations and that cute big bunny head, and I think the punch line is funny and fitting for parents in the trenches (literally) of diaper duty (although I should warn you that some reviewers on Amazon don't agree!).

Parents always look distraught when their babe grabs a toy out of another babe’s hand, or exercises a death grip on an object when it is suggested that they share. But parents ought not to be so hard on themselves and think that their babe is destined to be greedy; self-centeredness is a natural stage of development and it takes time to learn what sharing is all about.

Dr. Cathryn Tobin’s article “Sharing: 14 Ways to Get Your Child to Play Fair” offers helpful guidance. She outlines common mistakes made when attempting to teach kids to share, offering insights into the long-term implications of well meant parental actions such as forcing a child to share or prying a toy out of a child’s hands. She then offers concrete actions to teach kids to share, including ways to model good behavior for your babe while understanding their developmental limits.

Dr. Tobin is the author of the well-rated book The Parent's Problem Solver: Smart Solutions for Everyday Discipline Dilemmas and Behavioral Problems ($13.95 at Amazon).

More indulgent confessions: As you now know, I love celebrity gossip. I subsequently was beside myself when I discovered the Celebrity Baby Blog. Not only do I like the site because it is run by a fellow mama, but this mama does a great job with her team to suss out all the latest on celebrity mamas and babies. Talk about doubling your pleasure!