My husband and I have this fantasy of each of us having our own bathroom joined by a big glass shower in the middle. It would be the best of both worlds; I could make a mess in my bathroom and he could have privacy in his; but we could meet in the shower.

But our own master suites? No way! The time we spend in bed together is the best part of the day. It’s the time we catch up on each other’s life and have a glimpse of each other as a person; not just a parent, cook, cleaner, chauffer.

According this article in New York Times, we may be in the minority. One in four couples sleep apart? Sixty percent of new homes will have double master suites. Wow. I thought sleeping in separate rooms was a vestige of a time when women and men lead separate lives and couldn’t fart in front of each other or be seen without their undergarments on.

Stop being a liar! You know that mommy hates liars and you are lying!”

I was a witness to this ugly interaction a few days ago and it really stayed with me. There was no question that the six-year old lied about throwing the ball over the fence. But in my books, what the mother did was a lot worse than what the kid did.

Let’s break it down, the mom labeled the kid a liar and then said that she hates liars. Translation into kidspeak: “I hate you.”

I feel like we’ve been here before. Music is an evil influence, it is turning our kids into zombies! Soon they will be tapping in and tuning out!

It was the social event of the summer last weekend. The kitchen was a disaster and with remnants of flour streaked everywhere, the water balloons were ready, the BBQ cleaned. It was the Alley Party!

Every year our street and the one behind us have an alley party. We pull out the camping chairs, folding tables, tikki lights and get together until the wee hours. The kids wait all year for the alley party, they run like packs of wolves up and down sometimes on bikes, often on foot armed with water balloons. It is a night when the rules are loosened, new alliances are made and the cost of each home and their lawn care gets discussed.

We used to sit with our oldest child while watching TV and ask him: Is this cartoon or real people?

He would routinely get it wrong.

And we would start to freak out because it is so obvious when something is animated and when it is real (well at least it was 5 years ago, not so much now). But he couldn’t tell the difference and since we were first-time parents we obviously thought he had some kind of perception issue. But no, he was just a preschooler with a preschooler’s mind.

I was thinking about this recently when I took my two younger kids down to the CBC building and they met the hosts: Patty and Sid. They were dumbstruck, in awe and had no idea how to handle the situation. Especially when Patty started talking to them.

I love my kid. I hate my life.

The headline on the front of New York Magazine is a real attention grabber isn’t it? The article entitled: All Joy and No Fun: Why Parents Hate Parenting goes on to detail numerous studies that find parenting does not make people happier, in fact quite the opposite.

My daughter looks a helluva lot better in her skinny jeans than I do in mine. But that still doesn’t make me super keen on her running around in something that has the words super skinny embroidered in them I don't really want to say: "Hey kid, throw on your super skinnies"; just as I wouldn’t want to say to a four-year old: “Hey, about your fat pants today?”

I have no problem with skinny jeans for kids but I’m not crazy about calling them skinny jeans – or even worse 'super skinny' jeans. The promotion of this adult style is in full swing, prompting New York Magazine to ask if skinny jeans are appropriate for kids.

Skinny jeans are very cute on kids, and as Katie from Motherbumper found out many of us who have purchased jeans for our preschoolers recently probably have some hiding in the drawer. It is not the issue of how they look, it is the message that goes along with them that makes me pause.

Maybe I am doing a typical mommy over-think. I get told that I am over-sensitive to these issues, that I worry too much about the social pressures on young girls.

It’s easy to be smug about what you feed your kids – especially for me. I cook from scratch, I don’t buy processed foods and there isn’t any pop in our house. I can without a doubt give the evil eye to the woman who filled up her one-year old’s bottle with iced tea straight from the can.

Or can I?

I sat in the audience amongst the other parents, tears streaming down my face hitting my grin as I watched my two kids exuberantly performing in a circus show. And it taught me something.

As I watched my four-year old spin upside down on a hoop and my seven-year old do the flips that he has always longed to do I was in awe of their bravery. They had started circus camp five days earlier and now they were grease-painted clowns part of a topsy-turvy show that celebrated kids’ natural love of performing.

This post is for the ladies only. Keep reading at your own risk.

It’s summer and with the hot weather comes a lot of upkeep. You know what I mean. Starting at the toes, right up the hair on your head. There is a lot of work that has to be done. Most if it painful, expensive and time-consuming.