HAPPY NEW YEAR!! Well, it’s been a week, are you still writing 2012 on everything? We at NYMetroParents have already been firmly planted in 2013 for a month to get you the January issue, so I’m used to the New Year by now… Speaking of which, I hope you’ve picked up a copy of the January 2013 issue to check out our redesign, which is beautiful, clean, and more integrated with our website. This week, we’re covering New Years celebrations with kids, the newest fad in pregnancy parties, a day home with Dad, why moms shouldn’t judge each other, and raising girls with self-esteem.
How many of you told your kids they could stay up until midnight to ring in the New Year, but they couldn’t last past 10pm? I know my nieces, through Facebook status updates from my sister-in-law, didn’t make it past 10:30pm even with a bevy of festive activities to keep them awake. Nathan, over at DadWagon, wrote about his own kids’ struggle to make it to Jan. 1.
I have no idea why we would be motivated to do this, but we tried to get our kids to make it to midnight. Sure, they aren’t all that different from other partygoers: like any hard-swilling hipster worth his salt, a kid might cry or wet himself during a particularly long party. But stretching a first-grader to midnight is a dubious plan, not least because of this fact: They have very little sense of time.
Nathan goes on to say that a holiday based on the passage of time makes no sense to kids because they don’t quite “understand what 2012 was” or the passage of time. So, NYE becomes a day where they get to stay up late and “party” for no reason. “But they just didn’t trouble themselves with why they were partying, or why we didn’t care if they slept or not, or what 2013 will even be about. I’m not often jealous of my kids, but I was last night. It’s a beautiful thing, to not be able to size up 2012 in any way or to form any anxieties about 2013. We should all be so lucky.” First came baby showers, then came gender reveal parties. Now there’s a new party in town: ultrasound parties! Due to improved ultrasound technology, expecting parents can now hire an ultrasound tech to bring an ultrasound machine into their homes for $100-$350 and share, with friends and family, images of the baby in utero. 
With the exception of two women in lab coats and a buzzing console next to the chaise lounge, the Enderles’ party was like any other family gathering. Drinks, snacks, friendly banter. Once the machine was ready, though, Kimberly asked husband Jonathon to corral the guests around the two monitors and hit the lights.
Suddenly there was a baby on the screen.
The techs pointed out various body parts while family members speculated on the origins of nose and cheek genes. There was cooing, commentary, and from the 3-year-old big brother-to-be, brutal honesty.
“Looks like a monster,” he said. “I like monsters!”
There are still some who don’t approve of the new fad in pregnancy parties. “The FDA has taken an ‘unapproved’ position on keepsake ultrasound videos and images. Technically, ultrasound is approved only under a prescription when medically indicated because the long-term effects of the technology are not known.” Some states, like Connecticut, have limited ultrasounds to “medically necessary procedures.” What’s your stance on this new party fad? Would you let/want people to be in the same room while you’re getting an ultrasound? Here’s a cool time-lapse video of a father playing with and taking care of his son. The video begins after the son’s nap and goes until Mom gets home. Looks like they had a great day! With comments like “There should be a worldwide law, in my opinion, that mothers should breastfeed their babies for six months,” and “a tweet that said something to the effect of ‘circumcision should be banned,'” it’s no wonder why mothers sometimes feel like the world is waiting to judge them. Rebekah, over on Babble,thinks motherhood should be a judgement free zone. Here’s why:
My personal belief is that there are as many ways to raise children as there are children. This belief was strengthened when I had my second child and I realized that everything I thought I knew how to do had to be adjusted to accommodate how different my daughter is from my son. I’m not doing it better or worse the second time around: I’m just doing it differently because it’s a different child coming into a different family.
Monica Bielanko grew up with a mother who “hated her nose. Still does, actually. Even though she got a nose job…to fix what she didn’t like.” Monica ended up getting her mother’s “critical nature,” but now she’s resolved to stop being so critical of herselfand the way she looks so that her daughter grows up with a good sense of self-esteem.
Her critical nature was passed on to me and I have always been extremely unforgiving toward myself in the very same way I saw my mom treat herself.
Until now. Until Violet.
I am very aware of how I speak about myself in front of my daughter. Specifically, I do not discuss my weight by bemoaning the size of my derriere or grabbing handfuls of muffin top in frustration, I just don’t. Even though it’s generally the first thing that occurs to me when I look in the mirror. Because the last thing I want my daughter worrying about is her weight. Yes, I know it’s inevitable. The minute she gets to gabbing with girlfriends they’re going to infect her with their issues. Issues that maybe their mothers unintentionally passed down as they were observed by their daughters bitching about their weight or their hair or their noses. But if I can squeeze in nine or ten years of instilling my daughter with self-esteem, specifically by leading by example, then perhaps the arrows shot at her from friends and magazines and TV and movies won’t penetrate as far.
I don’t know about you all, but that’s one resolution I can get behind! Especially since it not only affects your sense of self-esteem, it affects your child’s, too.
