If there's a gamer in your house, chances are that a game called Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 is on his Christmas list. Maybe you've even bought it for your young'n already: the game grossed $310 million dollars on its release day, November 10, and earlier this week passed the $550 million mark. But before you wrap it up and put it under the tree, do you know what you're actually buying? [more]

I plugged in the Christmas tree lights, took my Barbie dolls out of an old shoe box, and placed them underneath the tree. I imagined the Christmas lights were those of Times Square on New Year's Eve.

Imagination allowed me to get away from what was real -- another Christmas without presents. [more]

T. and I officially finished all of our holiday baking yesterday. And even though I love holiday baking and cookie-making, I have to say that by the time the last of the dough remnants were scraped off the counter, and the last bowl washed, and the last tray of cookies taken out of the oven, I was more than happy to have reached the end of it all. [more]

Even though I am, by nature, a positive-minded person (at least I like to think I am), I also go through my days keenly aware of both the sweet and salty sides of life--the joyful and the bitter, the two-sidedness of every experience--especially as a parent. [more]

Ever since Scott and I got married, we have traveled back home for the Christmas holiday. We used to travel for Thanksgiving and Christmas, but once we became parents, traveling for two back-to-back holidays became pretty unmanageable. In the old, pre-kid days, and even in the days when L. was very small, we used to travel home at Christmas for a long block of days, and spread ourselves thin over family visits (both our families live in the same area--and for those of you who think this might make things easier, trust me, it does NOT). [more]