Archive for May, 2010
Children’s clothes can be expensive, we all know this. As parents we are supposed to just accept this. A tiny t-shirt for double the price of a regular grown-up’s t-shirt? Geez, where do I sign up? We just sit back and take it, justifying our purchase of expensive child’s clothes by saying that we will reuse them (as long as we have another one of the same sex *fingers crossed*). We all have those friends that spend a lot on their children’s clothes and while they look cute we all secretly mock them and go “Geez, why do they spend so much on clothes that the child is only going to wear a few times”.
Thing is, though, as parents we all have the tendency to break the “cheap” children’s clothes rule. We all have that one thing we bought our kids clothing-wise where, during a moment of clarity, we put our head in our hands and went “what was I thinking?” For me, this purchase happened a few weeks ago at the beginning of baseball season when we decided to buy our kids some adorable Minnesota Twins fake jerseys. That’s right, at $40 a pop, our kids now can dress like they favorite Twin’s stars for like, you know six months. Honestly, I loved the jerseys to a point that I actually talked my husband getting them. And while our kids are now the ultimate Twin’s fans I still have no idea what I was thinking.
But I’m thinking maybe that’s what parenting is all about: well thought out decisions with enough stupid ones stuck in there to keep things interesting. For every five great decisions you make, there is one that is a complete head scratcher. But that’s probably human nature. By the way, I’m thinking of trade marking this “Five good idea- one bad one” phrase because I can believe that I’m not the only parent who feels this way. How many times have you told your kids that they can’t get a soda only to later on get an ice cream cone because you’re totally craving rocky road. And I’m sure we’ve all broken the bed time rule a few times because you’re just too busy to put them to bed.
Being a parent is hard and you’re not going to get everything right. With that said I would like to have that jersey purchase back. My kids are going to look amazing this season, and then we will have three expensive souvenirs to sit in the closet until they have kids.
Author Kimberly Green hopes parents avoid the pitfalls she stepped in when buying children’s clothes.
Like most American’s, I am a proud member of an HMO. As someone who can afford medical insurance, but can’t afford the “best” that an PPO has to offer, I find myself having to constantly roll with the punches and make some rather uninformed decisions during the course of my medical day. While I’m sounding a bit dramatic, I bring this up because I was faced with a rather interesting question the other day in regards to my medical well-being: who do I want to be my primary care doctor?
HMO’s are big fans of having you pick a primary care doctor based upon nothing more than a name and a picture of them smiling in one of those women’s or men’s lab coats. I remember on the first day I got approved they wanted me to pick a primary care doctor sight unseen. They said that you didn’t have to see this person when you went in but everyone had to have a primary doctor. I thought to myself how ridiculous this sounded as it seemed like they just needed you to pick someone for bookkeeping purposes (I was right by the way, it’s mostly for bookkeeping purposes.
I can say, two years after joining the HMO, I have seen my primary care physician twice, both times for physicals. The other times I’ve gone in have been for after hours care thanks to late night coughing attacks or fevers. I remember as a kid having a primary doctor I saw at all times. This doctor knew me like the back of her hand and could remember things without looking at my chart.
At this HMO my medical record seems to be king. The first thing a doctor will do when they see me is log onto the internet in-room and look into my medical record. I don’t mind this terribly because this means that I am getting the right diagnosis and having interchangeable doctors who know what they are doing isn’t the worst thing in the world, but I do miss having someone who you primarily see for your illnesses. This is especially true for my children. They have primary care doctors but I can rarely get last minute appointments with them (trust me, appointments with children are always last moment).
So yeah, I know that this is the way the world works right now. As technology and corporations grow we sacrifice a personal touch for convenience. It’s not the worst thing in the world, but I do certainly miss having trusted doctors whose name I know before hand.
Author Kim Green knows that men’s lab coats can only tell you so much about your doctor.
Though you may not know, lab coat’s have become almost as synonymous with pop culture lately as they have been with medical professional. Besides being the symbol for doctors, nurses and other medical professionals the world over, a lab coat has been a major prop in television, movies, music and literature as long as they have existed.
Don’t believe me: just check your television schedule. Doctor’s have become sex symbols in recent years. Outside of being successful and smart, doctors on television shows have become fit, rarely clean shaven, frisky lotharios that are just as concerned with getting the girl as they are with curing the disease (they typically do both, don’t you worry). The fact that these “doctors” (or at least the actors who play them on television) can look sexy while wearing their lab coats just speaks to how doctors have become the new sexy “it” profession on the small, and big, screen.
At the other end of the spectrum, there can also be nothing scarier than an evil person in a lab coat. What was sexy on McDreamy can become a mysterious cloaking device on a doctor moonlighting as an evil killer or a mass murderer who has taken on the doctor persona. These characters play on the human nature to be ultimately nervous about someone who is this intimate with your health and body. Hollywood, and authors, have always been good at exploiting this fear. This is why doctors, medical professionals, and people just dressed as doctors, have been some of the best serial killers and spooky stalkers in media.
Medical professionals as pop culture symbols have not just been a recent phenomenon. As far as there has been the printed word doctors have played key parts in stories. From Dr. Zhivago to Dr. Moreau to Doctor Frankenstein, people who have dawned lab coats have played key roles in some of our favorite classic stories.
Even on television shows, doctors have always been some of the most intriguing characters we align ourselves with on a daily or weekly basis. Soaps like General Hospital Days of Our Lives revolutionized the way doctors are thought of in daily life (i.e. as sex symbols). During prime time, doctors have always been a favorite of nighttime dramas. Recently, thanks to ER and Chicago Hope in the mid 90’s, doctors on television have hit a renaissance. Now you can rarely spend a night watching television without seeing a doctor drama. From the soap opera-like drama of “Grey’s Anatomy” to the more real life drama of “House” to even comedy shows like “Scrubs”, doctors in pop culture are all around us.
Kimberly Green finds cultural icons, such as the lab coat, to be a fascinating study.
What do you get the girl that has everything? This is the age old question that doesn’t really mean anything but men love to say when describing their mates. It was a phrase that was used to describe rich women in English society who lived in luxury and literally had everything. Nowadays, men use this phrase when they don’t know what to get their women for their birthday or for Valentine’s day. They typically feel like they are stuck trying to find some new piece of women’s personalized jewelry for their mates while ignoring the obvious: there are more things to get a women that just a piece of jewelry. You are allowed to be creative.
Let me explain a second: women like creativity. For some reason men have been forced into the idea that their significant other only likes something that is shiny and attached to ring or necklace. I will admit that women are mostly to blame for this. We love jewelry and we love to show it off. But there is more to us then just shiny objects. As each women is different our ideas in what we like for gifts is also different.
Take me for example. I love sports. I’m a sports nut, always have been. I would much rather go to a baseball or hockey game then be taken to the fanciest restaurant in town. I like jewelry but I wouldn’t be upset if my husband picked taking me to a playoff game over a diamond necklace. My husband knows this too because I, gasp, told him. I feel like too many women out there leave it to their husbands to figure out what they want instead of telling them what they want. I had an ex-friend tell me once that she never tells her husband what she wants because after this long he should know. To me that’s rubbish, and it just seems like too big of a game to play.
As a woman you should be able to tell your husband what you want in a gift. It’s your responsibility because women are typically harder to shop for then men. This is because, throughout history, men have been getting the wrong idea, mostly thanks to women. If you want a gold ring fine, but if you don’t want a gold ring and you don’t tell your husband this you run of the risk of getting one. It’s not his fault, it’s yours. What do you get a woman who has everything? Your husband doesn’t know, so if you want something you might as well tell him.
Author Kim Green wants to make sure her girlfriends get what they want, like women’s personalized jewelry.
What do you get the baby that has everything? I know that is a weird question, but if you really think about it what does a baby really need? Does it need a new frame or wall decoration or one of those personalized baby gifts? What does a baby actually need to be happy?
Let me back up a bit. I bring this up because I realized something the other day while trying to track down a gift for a friend’s one-year-old that was having a birthday party. I made a pact with myself that I would try and buy the child something that he really needs. After about fifteen minutes of staring blankly at the children’s aisle at my local Target I came to the realization that he probably didn’t need any of this stuff. I’ve been to my friend’s house and seen his room: he has plenty of toys, dolls, clothes, bibs, and just about everything else you could think of. I honestly would have been better off buying him some food or diapers, though I know that those aren’t traditional birthday gifts.
As I left the store with my stuffed animal (I gave in and tried to buy him an animal that I haven’t seen in his room), I started to make a mental list of things that a baby might actually like to get for his or her birthday compared to stuff that are more for their parents than anything else. And trust me: babies, even at that age, know what they want. I came up with three things: stuffed animals, playthings that mimic stuff that mommy and daddy use and stuff you can build with.
The first thing is obvious: little boys and girls love stuffed animals. They could be anything from the cutest, cuddliest sea creature to the meanest, nastiest predator: as long as they are filled with fluffy stuff kids will love them. Kids enjoy anything that they can hold onto and squeeze really tight. My youngest kid had a stuffed porcupine. Enough said.
Next, children love to emulate their parents while playing. This is why playsets that involve kitchens, stores and even cars seem to intrigue children so much. After watching mommy and daddy cook food for dinner a child loves to imitate what they see. Better they do it on a plastic playset then an actual kitchen, as I’m sure you all know.
Finally, building and imagination based toys are always good ideas. From giant sized legos to blocks, kids love to build things, especially if they are brightly colored and full of pictures. They might leave them strewn along across the playroom, but show me a child that doesn’t like blocks and I’ll call you a lair.
Kim Green is always on the look out for unique personalized baby gifts for her friends and family.
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