Health & Safety
Lavender Oil, Revisited
Amalah explains the evolution of her change in personal opinion regarding her once safety-focused concern on lavender oil in children’s personal care products.
Pregnancy
Is It Safe? Hot Yoga During Pregnancy
A reader asks whether it is safe to continue practicing hot yoga now that she’s pregnant.
Big Kid
How To Handle The “Bad” Girlfriend
A reader is worried her young teen son’s girlfriend is a bad influence; there’s lots to unpack, here, but I give it my best shot.
Health & Safety
Tell Me How To Feel About: THE LEASH
Kids on leashes. Probably one of the top parenting choices all but guaranteed to earn you some judge-y side-eye or comments from strangers, even more so than say, breast- or bottle-feeding in public.
Health & Safety
Babyproofing Your Home
Our new-to-us house is one big adventure zone for my 2 year old. Babyproofing is at the top of my current to-do list. Here are my five top tips.
Big Kid
A Driving Contract For Teens
We’ve been talking a lot about teaching your teen to drive ’round here, lately, and so we thought it might be a useful thing to come up with a sample template of parent-teen driving agreement.
Health & Safety
Keep Calm and Carry On (with Empowered SAFETY)
in 2013, there were 113 children’s products recalled. Whoa. I couldn’t name one of them. However, Empowered SAFETY does all the legwork for you.
Health & Safety
When There’s a Ferocious Fido in the Family
A mom needs encouragement to confront her family about its aggressive dog being around her young children.
Health & Safety
Gun Videos, Gun Toys, Gun Safety
My young son is disturbed by the gun videos the older boys on the school bus are showing him. What should I do? Am I overreacting by wanting to contact the school?
Young Child
Goodbye Baby Gate, Hello (Terrible, Frightening) Freedom
My preschooler is very good at unlatching our strong baby gate. At what age can I let him have some independence in house during the early morning, before we are up?
Pregnancy
When You’re Tangled in Your Safety Net
I’m 17 and pregnant. My family is wonderfully helpful…to the point that I’m afraid I won’t be allowed to raise my own baby! How can I ask them to back off without alienating my support system?
Baby
Bathroom Faucet Safety Gear: The Yay to The Nay
Looking to make your bathroom more child-friendly? We test out some bath spout safety guards and a faucet extender for you.
Young Child
Be The Helpers
I believe that most of our children’s character is not something that is taught but that they learn how to react and interact in the world by watching us.
Toddler
When Your Toddler Won’t Stop Running Away From You
My 2.5 year old loves to RUN. Away. From us. At every possible and dangerous occasion. What can we do, besides putting him on a leash?
Baby
Warning: Smoke Alarms May Not Wake Your Children!
Many children can and often do sleep right through the piercing sound of a smoke alarm. So what should parents do?
Baby
Avoiding Toxic Ingredients in Children’s Personal Care Products Can be Easy
Find out if you know your Sodium Lauryl Sulfate from your Polyethylene…. It can be overwhelming, but it doesn’t have to be. We created a cheat sheet so that you can keep it all clear.
Young Child
What You Need To Know About Children’s Cough and Cold Medicine
Are OTC cough and cold medicines effective? Are cough and cold medicine safe for children? Do natural cures even work? It’s hard to know which advice is best. That’s why we’ve put together the following cheat sheet of cough and cold medicine information for parents wondering just how to treat their sick child. Hopefully it’s advice that will not only help your kids feel better, but will help you feel better, too.
Big Kid
Keeping Track of Your Kids, One GPS Coordinate At A Time
Once you accept that your kids will be monitored around school by a tracking device, what’s next? Should we have a problem with schools tracking our children with chips embedded in their school ids?
Big Kid
When Is It Okay To Leave Your Kids Home Alone?
All that said, the decision to leave your kids alone is obviously a very personal one and depends on factors such as their maturity, their environment and your basic comfort level. As well as other issues like whether you should put the oldest kid in charge and your kids’ ability to follow safety rules to the letter.
Baby
Update: When Daddy’s Been Drinking
An update from one of our most memorable Advice Smackdown columns: The pregnant mom faced with a husband in rehab on her due date.