Sometimes I wonder if the women who proudly proclaim "I made that" when talking about their exclusively breast-fed children, and the women who relate quotes about how a child is born of the mother's heart's desire and in the life of her mother, and her mother's mother, are the same women who complain about how their husbands never bother to help them out with taking care of the kids.
Shamelessly stealing from other people's blogs but finding another place to quote from, I give you this. You need to scroll down to the entry about "The Continuum Concept", and read these lines "She [Jean Liedloff] states 'I would be ashamed to admit to the Indians that where I come from the women do not feel themselves capable of raising children until they read the instructions written in a book by a strange man.'...I know many people who have devoured this book and have felt affirmed in their decisions to wear their babies and parent with intention."
Hmm. So these women felt affirmed in their parenting decisions because of this book? Could you say they then felt capable of raising children because they read this book, written by a woman they did not know? Could you say that Jean Liedloff is perpetuating the very mindset she's ashamed to admit?
Irony, you taste like coffee. Oh, wait, that's my mid-afternoon beverage.
So according to this article, kids under the age of two aren't supposed to watch any television.
Um.
Well, we did turn off the last half hour of Event Horizon because we were worried about he'd react to it...
Usually I hate when people make smart-ass comments about words. I basically went into it in more detail here, if you want to read about what I am talking.
That said, I do have to say this...
"Mothering" is one letter away from "smothering"!!!
Ha ha ha I kill me.
Here are the books on the Casa De Whitney Parenting Bookshelf:
Dr. Spock's Baby and Child Care. Remember the scene in Raising Arizona when H. I. tells Edwina that he got the instruction manual on Nathan Arizona, Jr., and he pulls out this book? Yeah. The book's like what, 8000 pages long, and I haven't read the whole thing, but it's a nice little reference thing to look at when Otto's screamin' for whatever reason or his eye's gooped shut or whatever.
The Girlfriends' Guide to Surviving the First Year of Motherhood. I didn't read this one as much as I pretty much devoured The Girlfriends' Guide to Pregnancy. Hm.
Sleeping Through The Night. I got this one when Otto was having his little sleeping issues (the instant his shoulders would touch the crib mattress, he'd wake up and start squawking). We ended up not using it (the issues got resolved on their own, more or less), and the author uses the "don't make a big deal of it if the kid vomits" tactic which I think is just goofy (the only people who should have to sleep in their own vomit are drunk college students), but everything else pretty much goes with the way I think helping your child sleep through the night should go.
Some book from the AAP that we got from the pediatrician. I think I used this in conjunction with Dr. Spock once or twice. Then Otto got a hold of it and started chewing the cover off.
There is a magazine out there called Mothering. I freely admit that I've never read it, but from the articles I've seen posted at various parenting sites I frequent it seems to be of the "Why You Shouldn't Necessarily Vaccinate Your Child" and "How to Have a Party for Your Daughter's First Period" ilk.
I have no problem with the magazine (although if I went to a "Red Party" party as a 13 year old I probably would've been mortified), but I am always taken aback by its title. "Mothering." It seems to leave out half of the parenting unit, as if it's only the mother who takes the time to research and scour the web for important articles about Kidlet's safety. I don't know what else they could call it, though, as "Parenting" is taken.