“And on the seventh day God ended His work which He had done and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done. Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His Work which God had created and made.”
– Genesis 2:2-3

“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates.”
– Exodus 20: 8-10

This article is being written as a reminder to myself and a permission slip to all women that it’s ok to say no, it’s ok to take time for yourself and it’s ok to rest. Continue reading Rest →

Fall is coming, and a hush falls over the neighborhood playground as children trickle back to school. My oldest is old enough for kindergarten. These days I read a lot about education, shoring up my reasons for keeping her out of full-time school this year.

One author worth reading is Carol Black. Black is a writer, filmmaker, parent, and education activist. Her essays are thought-provoking and exhausting — exhausting because they challenge me to make drastic changes to the ways I think and act.

In August, The Washington Post ran one of her articles, “What the modern world has forgotten about children and learning.” In it, she notes,

“[W]e speak of our familiar school experience almost as though it were an integral part of nature itself, a natural and essential part of human childhood, rather than the vast and extremely recent experiment in social engineering that it actually is.”

Continue reading Saving the WEIRD Child →

One of the most commonly heard phrases in our household, due to a propensity towards heated arguments recently, is “do unto others as you would have done to you.” But what does this really mean to us in our daily lives?

First of all, the original quote is a command based on the words of Jesus Christ in the Sermon on the mount, and is a central teaching in Christianity, often referred to as the Golden Rule.

Matthew 7:12 “Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.”

Luke 6:31 “And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise.”

This commandment is stated in similar ways across many ancient religious books: The New Testament, the Talmud, the Koran, as well as the Analects of Confucius and in the writings of Socrates. Continue reading Do Unto Others… →

I am a stay at home mom with a six year old in grade R (kindergarten), three and a half year old twins, who are home with me, and a new baby due some time in the next month or so. Balancing their needs (also the needs of my wonderful husband, who is usually more helpful than needy) with my needs is a daily effort. Finding ways to take care of myself, while having three little people who are very good at making their wants and wishes known, is not usually easy.

In some ways taking care of myself is very easy for me. There are a lot of activities I like that are self focused. It could be easy to spend lots of time focused on things that I find rejuvenating and re-centering, but I don’t actually prioritize it that much, partly just from lack of clarity around how much to put these things at the top of my to-do list. Continue reading Self Care: How Much is Too Much? →