One of the challenges of a new school year is figuring out how to negotiate class treats and parties with a kid with food sensitivies. In the past, it’s created a lot of stress for me, because staying on top of every possible treat served, and having an acceptible alternate food at-the-ready, is not always […]
Category: Me Time
On the night of November 20, 2001, a conversation held over Instant Messenger changed our lives forever. Our twelve year old son messaged me in my office from the computer in his bedroom. Ryan says: can i tell u somethingMom says: Yes I am listeningRyan says: well i don’t know how to say this really but, well……, i […]
Black Is The New Black: White Privilege And White Fragility | SpokaneFAVSJust as sexual violence is a male problem, so too is racism a white problem. White Americans are complicit in — and the primary beneficiaries of — a system that dehumanizes and erases black lives. If Howard Zinn is correct that “our problem is […]
September was a full month. It started with my trip to Ethiopia with Help One Now, which was a great success. Our team really clicked and I felt great about the organization and their local leadership. But best of all, we met our goal! 300 new sponsors for kids at risk of becoming poverty orphans. […]
I took a kid to the mall. It has been years since I braved the mall with a child in tow. This Sunday, though, I had to go the mall to replace some makeup. (I left my makeup bag in a hotel in Ethiopia which was a rather expensive mistake.) So I was on my […]
What I want you to know about dressing to please a guy 2014-09-29T15:00:00-07:00 Kristen Howerton what I want you to know|
Reconciliation requires more than a rainbow of skin-tones at the 11:00 o’clock service. Diversity without justice is assimilation. And assimilation makes clear whose culture is the favored one, the good one, the right one, the holy one. If your culture is the standard for rightness, you have found the Imago Dei in others to be […]
For When You Don’t Understand Why. | Life Rearranged It is hard. I know. It is so. damn. hard. Have hope, sweet friend. Dream and wish and pray for outcomes. But know that your baby is your baby and IS WORTHY OF ALL THE LOVE IN THE UNIVERSE no matter what. Even if the prayers […]
I’m in Ethiopia this week with Help One Now, hearing stories of how their work is preventing the tragedy of poverty orphans. I thought that for this week’s picks, I would share some of the writing of the other women on this trip. I hope you will take the time to click through and read […]
I know many warrior moms . . . women who have had to overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles as they seek the best for their kids. I know moms who fight for services for their special needs children or advocate for research for childhood illnesses. I know moms who work multiple jobs to make ends meet, […]
My Father’s Search For The Fisher King | How To Be a DadBoth men, Robin and my father Stephen, had their ashes spread over an ocean, each on an opposite side of the country. Both fought demons most of their natural existence. And both killed themselves. One used a belt. The other did it slowly […]
Four years ago, Birkenesh was at the end of her rope. She had five young children and her husband had just died of AIDS. She was HIV positive and her health was declining. She had no means of supporting herself, and her HIV status meant that the community saw her as an outcast. Meals were […]