Latest Stories
Most recently published stories in Families.
5 Must-Try Stocking Stuffer Ideas for This Holiday Season
As you approach the holiday season, finding the perfect presents for your loved ones can be quite a challenge. Adding another gift for a stocking stuffer can make this process even harder because you will also want to find the right option to accentuate their perfect present. If you are having a difficult time coming up with an idea, here are a few things that make for the perfect stocking stuffers.
By Paisley Hansen5 years ago in Families
Physical Development - Fine Motor Skills and Gross Motor Skills
This is my observational report on our performance task in the EDUC 231 Child and Adolescent course conducted on a child with a chronological age of 4:2. This performance task aims to observe the physical development of a child about his/her fine motor skills and gross motor skills.
By Domingo Añasco-Gaces Samontina, Jr.5 years ago in Families
Invited or Not to Be Invited
So this week is Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, can't say that I'm excited for it but what I am excited for is spending time with my son and my SO. It's hard to be around people that tell other people and go behind my back and say that I'm not allowed to go over anywhere because they don't like me. So in my eyes, who says they can tell their son not to invite the mother of their grandson. When I told my dad about it, he says that really is childish and that me and my son should stay home and watch Disney movies and have our own little Christmas here at home.
By Manda Marie5 years ago in Families
The Truth About Pregnancy
It was an unusually mild summer. It seemed as though it had taken forever to get warm enough to go outside without a jacket or even a sweatshirt without causing a bout of full body shivering. Perhaps I was just running colder than normal due to a surgery I had just a few months prior.
By Cara Simon5 years ago in Families
The Myspace project: My Father
I originally wrote this as a blog entry on Myspace in 2006. I was a 32 year old self proclaimed immortal with a taste for good cocaine and an eye for what made the world a beautiful place. I was smack dab in the middle of my glory days. Growing old was never a forethought or an option. Even when I look back at this moment in my life, a moment that I think many people would consider life changing or pivotal, in the here and now, it still hasn't really hit me yet. I don't think it ever will either. Ironically enough, the photo this is all about no longer exists, and yet somewhere in my mind it was significant enough to write about 14 years ago, and important enough still to post once again and talk about it. So here goes.....
By Anthony Salinas5 years ago in Families
Step Mom
Step Mom. Its the awful terrible term that women get cursed with as they get blessed with the love of a child that did not come from their own womb. Its the term with such a bad reputation that fairy tales often have an easy time coming up with a villain with its mere existence.
By SirenSavage5 years ago in Families
The Struggle With 2020
Living in 2020 with mental illnesses. Talk about a wild ride. I'm a 30 year old female living with her fiancé and soon to be step daughter (every other weekend and when circumstances deem it necessary.) Many days I feel like I'm the only responsible adult in the whole dynamic. A viscous thought that I frequently feel guilty for. Other days I feel as though I'm failing more than everyone else around me. Mental illness can confuse you like that. Between financial difficulties, work troubles, and co-parenting squabbles I feel as though my brain is trying to work overtime without any fuel for even its normal work. My body doesn't seem to be doing much better than my brain either. My day to day battle just to feel like I'm surviving in the current climate seems more like a lose lose battle inside my own mind.
By SirenSavage5 years ago in Families
Holiday Without You
The tree is up, the fire is lit, the stockings are hung and if it were a picture, it would be the epitome of what a perfect Christmas should be. The holidays are a time of joy, love and laughter. A time where memories are created and traditions are born. Echos of the past that once brought smiles now bring silent tears. On the outside, all seems merry and bright, but when a loved one is missing on the holidays, pain and sorrow are all that's on the inside. How do you celebrate joy when someone you love is unable to celebrate too? And in the most permanent sense, they will never celebrate anything with you ever again. Before you get angry at me, and say “there is joy in heaven” or accuse me of being an atheist, I would like to say that I am a very Christian woman with a strong belief in life after death. God very much comes first in my life, but when grief takes over it is hard to feel anything else. It is hard to even be yourself. In the midst of your sorrow, life keeps charging on. You have no choice but to charge forward too. Putting on a smile when inside you are crying. Everyday you are going through the motions and just trying to get by from one day to the next, and with your best efforts facings all those “firsts” without them. You learn to master the art of looking OK and opening up just enough that no one questions what you are not telling. You learn to navigate with the pain hidden allowing just enough out to not look suspicious so that you can convince the world that you are healing. Heck, if you lie well enough you even began to convince yourself. And then, the holidays come. You feel lost, every decoration has a memory attached, every recipe, every song on the radio and every holiday movie. Suddenly, you are back at square one.
By Michelle Paiva5 years ago in Families
The christmas day horror
The following story is based on true events. Its a memory of a Christmas that I wont soon forget. It was a cold Christmas eve. I was about 9 or 10. My grandmother used to have family get togethers on Christmas eve every year. My mom and dad were divorced for almost my whole life, so I usually spent one or the other with my dad for the holiday. This year was Christmas eve. He was staying at my grandmother's at the time, Granny we all called her, after granny from the Beverly Hillbillies. There was a good crowd this year. Granny, Dad, me, my great grandmother, and some cousins. Granny had a finished basement with a bar and a pool table, so this is the area that the Christmas parties and just about any other function she would have would be held.
By Brad Souza5 years ago in Families
