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6 Tools to Make Traveling with Toddlers Easier

Here's 6 Tips to Make Traveling with a Toddler Easier

Traveling with toddlers doesn’t have to be stressful. I’m loving this Britax Travel Cart, which allows me to transport a car seat, with the toddler riding in it, quickly through the airport.

This post contains affiliate links. When you click on a link and purchase a product, I may receive a commission for that product. 

Toddlers have baggage. And if you’ve ever taken a plane or a road trip with these little people, you realize that you’re more likely to forget your own essential items than leave home without something they need.

I just returned from visiting my family in the Midwest, a two-hour flight from the East Coast. As a frequent flier, I’m always on the look out for ways to carry LESS STUFF when I have my toddlers in tow.

During this trip, I kept my carry-ons down to a backpack and a foldable travel cart, used to transport the car seat and the baby through the airport and to the gate. And I’m so glad I bought that cart because it made life so much easier. [Read more…]

Sometimes I Miss the Rat Race….

Interviewing Jesse Jackson

Life as a young news reporter was exciting and downright insane in times. Pictured here interviewing Rev. Jesse Jackson.

I’m pretty sure I do not miss the stress and anxiety of being a young reporter, laying awake at night and wondering if I got a fact wrong that would be discovered in tomorrow’s newspaper.

And I don’t miss the commute to any job, the train delays or the traffic jams.

Five years ago, almost to the day, I went on paid leave from my job at a nonprofit because I got pregnant. It felt like the right time to transition my life into something slower, saner, and to mentally prepare for motherhood. So I jumped off the hamster wheel and out of the rat race (it’s the same thing really, hamsters and rats. I had a hamster once, and it’s really just a domesticated rat without the tail…)

Five years and two kids later, I’m still at home. [Read more…]

BestestMommyBoss Tiara Caldwell, Doula and Lactation Consultant

Tiara Caldwell

Tiara Caldwell is a mom of three and a licensed practical nurse. In 2015, she started Crowned and Cradled, a business offering pre-and-post natal birthing and lactation services.

Tiara Caldwell, 30

Hometown: Upper Marlboro, MD

Business: Crowned and Cradled 

Website: crownedandcradled.com

Tiara Caldwell knows how it feels when a birthing plan goes wrong.

During the delivery of her twins, she was told her son was breeched and she needed an emergency C-Section. “With the twins, I had a traumatic birth experience, the care I received was less than favorable and I feel it was because I was perceived as a young black woman who didn’t know her options,” Tiara said.

[Read more…]

7 Essential Oils for the Working Mom

This post contains affiliate links and links to Young Living’s essential oil products. If you click on the link and purchase an oil, I make a commission based on the retail value of the product. 

Relaxing Lavender

Lavender essential oil is part of my family’s nighttime routine.

Let’s face it, if you’re a MOM, you’re working.

Whether you leave the house to go to work, roll over to a laptop, or spend the day refereeing toddlers, cleaning house, planning meals, and reheating coffee. Mama’s be working!

And frankly, when you’re on the clock around the clock, it’s difficult to find downtime, a moment to ground yourself, relax and regain your balance–before it’s time to tackle the next task. [Read more…]

Breast is Best, Except When It’s Not an Option

Tavia Smith and Baby Ellie

Tavia Smith and a healthy and happy Baby Ellie.

By Tavia Green Smith
Guest Post

Everything was supposed to go perfect.

I was supposed to have an easy induction and progressive labor. Then, I would show my strength as I pushed my baby out, with my husband looking on proudly and cheering me on. I’d hear her beautiful first cry and I’d cry from joy and relief.

Then, I’d cuddle and nestle her in my arms and breastfeed her with that magical milk made just for her. My perfect daughter and I would bond and fall in love as I healed.

None. Of. That. Happened.

[Read more…]

Simple Enrichment Activities for Toddlers

Teaching my children their ABCs, numbers, colors, and shapes is always at the top of my daily to-do list.

Learning Colors.jpg

Help your toddler match the colored blocks with the correct color on the cup.

But life always has other plans. There’s housework, and errands, laundry, and the poopy diapers that leave a trail of poop that I don’t see until an hour later, which requires a bath (sometimes for me and the toddler), disinfecting the trail of poop and any affected areas, snack time, lunch time, and nap time.

And no, we cannot interrupt nap time. [Read more…]

7 Things No One Told Me About Breastfeeding

Sweet sleeping baby

Breastfeeding nourished my baby and provided relaxing, quiet moments.  

It’s been a year since I stopped breastfeeding my two-year-old toddler. 

We nursed for 18 months, and although I look back now with nostalgia, I remember being so relieved when we finished. I had been nursing or pregnant for 3-and-a-half years (42 months) and frankly, I was ready to have control over my body again.

And breastfeeding a baby with food allergies means I was very limited in what I could eat.

Breastfeeding definitely had its challenges and there’s so much that no one ever tells you. [Read more…]

Another Parenting First: When your child hurts, you hurt too

Danielle and her toddler Leo

Danielle and her toddler, Leo.

By: Danielle Robinson Bell

This post is republished from Danielle’s Facebook page with her permission. Click here to read some of the responses to LegoEddie’s demise.

This morning, our almost 3-year-old son, Leo, was very excited to take his two Lego men to school with him. They are both named Eddie. One has a blue hat. The other has an orange hat. Before we left the house we could only find the one with the blue hat (!!!) but Leo was committed to a search: “Eddieeee, where are youuuu?” he kept saying in his wittle voice. After a few minutes of looking around we finally found the other Eddie, the one with the orange hat. He was chillin’ with the rest of the Legos under Leo’s table.

When we got to school, Leo saw one of his teachers as the elevator doors opened. In his excitement, Eddie with the orange hat fell down the elevator shaft. [Read more…]