My local newspaper, “The Orlando Sentinel,” published an article about how “time-stressed moms get new options for quick lunches.” The article seemed to blame busy moms for supplying their children with unhealthy meal options. The article was on the front page of the Sunday paper and got me worked up that morning. Why blame the moms?

I took the time to write a letter to the Editor, but it has yet to be published. I must assume, that at nearly two weeks old, it will not run. I realize they have limited space to print letters, but I had hoped they would have recognized their oversight with this article and would have run my letter. Since they have not, I am posting it below.

Interestingly, there are several headlines that seem to be associated with this article:

• In print: “Will healthy box lunches tempt kids?”
• Online: “Prepackaged kids’ lunches get healthier”
• In the title bar of the Internet browser: “Time-stressed moms get new options for quick lunches”

Read the full article here.
Dear Editor:

Sunday’s front page story,” Will healthy box lunches tempt kids,” seemed like a positive read for families who want to feed their children healthy meals. What was most likely well intentioned, quickly became biased toward women by blaming “busy working moms.” The positioning of this article was incredibly disappointing.

The author, Sandra Pedicini, writes, “now, time-stressed moms … are getting other options.” What about time-stressed parents? By ignoring spouses in this story, it leaves the impression that mothers are supposed to do it all — including taking the blame for their families’ meal choices.

This negative focus on mothers keeps working women from getting, or even feeling like they can ask for, additional help. Their career successes are mitigated by this constant reminder of a consequence of working motherhood and somehow lets fathers off the hook. It just perpetuates the stereotype that the mother is responsible for everything.

In section G of the same paper, Gregory Karp wrote an article about couponing and menu planning. He could have geared the article toward mothers, but he used different words: families, Americans, people. This made the difference.

Even the President get this concept. Earlier this year, during the White House Forum on Workplace Flexibility summit, President Barack Obama said, “Workplace flexibility isn’t just a women’s issue. It’s an issue that affects the well-being of our families …” He recognizes that people tend to assume that workplace flexibility is needed for mothers, but says it’s needed by “families.” In that same spirit, we need to focus articles like the one in Sunday’s paper toward families, not just the busy working mom.

- Alicia Lewis Murray, Orlando

What do you think?

(Disclosure: Several years ago, I worked at The Orlando Sentinel.)

A couple of months ago I realized that I hadn’t been away (overnight) from my daughter yet. It had been a year of all of us being together. And it’s been great. But there comes a time when the parents need to get away. We were worn. The baby has been sick a lot her first year of life. Everything from acid reflux as a newborn to constant, non-stop ear infections and a couple of yeast infections. This lead to lots of sleepless nights for everyone.

I thought about how my husband and I could get away and when we could do it. Finally, I thought about leaving the kids at my parents for a night. They don’t live in our town so I had to plan it when we had a long weekend, and when they would be able to watch them for an entire 24-hour period. Fourth of July weekend was an option, I thought, but was months away at the time. I felt I needed something sooner, but no options presented themselves so I booked the Grand Grandparent Getaway. Now, I just need to wait about 3 months for this one day of bliss.

Well, it was worth the wait. I’m so glad that I went ahead and booked everything. Had I given up, the three months would have come and gone and no getaway would have been had. Instead, this is what I saw upon entering the hotel room:

Can you say Heaven?

Our room was right on the beach. Open those big sliding doors and the surf crashed right outside our window.

Our room had a little breakfast area that was almost too cute to use.

And, this little guy. He’s in the room waiting for us. At 9:00 p.m. everyone is to close their windows so the light doesn’t distract the baby turtles from crawling to the ocean. The La Playa hotel has a partnership with the Conservancy of Southwest Florida to help protect the turtles.

And, so it was. I just loved this place. It was perfect. Even though we were only gone 25 hours, it felt like longer. We were able to hold a conversation without any interruption. We stayed up late, knowing we could sleep in the next day. We had a great, adult dinner in a fancy restaurant. We walked the beach. It was just great to rejuvenate and spend time together remembering why we got together in the first place.

I didn’t want to leave, as evidenced by the photo below. The bed was calling my name again. I laid down, grabbing the down pillow and crisp white sheets and huddled up one more time as my husband snapped this photo.

He summed up our stay best on his outgoing Facebook post, “Good bye La Playa, we’ll miss you.”

I’ve been seeing a lot of hot parenting topics on the news lately on which I would love to write full blog posts, but life intersects and they don’t get written. Tonight I thought I would highlight some of them here so that I don’t completely miss the boat and can share what I think are some important messages coming from a variety of places.

• Mom Plans Meals For Entire Year — there’s a woman in Texas who has mapped out her family meal schedule for the entire YEAR. She says it saves her time and money. Check out her 2009 meal plan.
• Defining the line of communication between teachers and students. Is it OK for teachers to use social media to connect with students? It’s unrealistic to think that a high school coach won’t send a text message to the baseball team notifying everyone the game has been delayed. Schools across America are dealing with boundary issues for social media. Does a district have to say “no Facebook, no texting, no Twitter following,” with any students. Period. What makes the most sense? Read about teachers texting students here.
• It was nearly impossible to have the TV on without hearing how a trainer was killed by the Killer Whale at SeaWorld. This is a place where families go to learn about and see animals up close. I have to admit that we avoided watching the TV, but I’m not sure that was the right thing to do. Admittedly, it was easier. We plan to go to SeaWorld later this year and I don’t want my son to be afraid the workers (or worse, he or a member of the family) will be hurt or killed. How did you handle the news with your kids?
• A  house with two working parents is a tired house. It’s a house where jugging children’s schedules along with the parents work schedule is exhausting, frustrating and sometimes impossible depending on your job. Morra Aarons Mele writes a great account of how hard this is. She mentions other’s who have written on the topic and how hourly employees are sometimes “one sick child away from being fired.” It’s a tough situation to be in, but one that many parents have to deal with on a daily basis.

Photo credit: adjustafresh.

I’m not a good cook. Partially because Food TV didn’t exist when I was growing up, but mainly because I didn’t want to learn how to cook. I tried desperately to not confirm to the mold that the woman had to cook. I figured if I didn’t do it well, I would have to do it. I never had an Easy Bake Oven, nor did I want one. To me, it represented the typical stereotype of the traditional woman’s role at home.

My mother forwarded me an interesting article from the “Pittsburgh Post-Gazette” newspaper about kids and cooking. It has stuck with me and makes me quite irritated. Is cooking and baking just for girls? Yes, say major manufacturers of children’s baking toys, according to the article.

The article, entitled, “Boys at home in the kitchen: Yet makers of cooking-related toys still market almost exclusively to girls” discusses the growing number of boys who are interested in cooking and baking, yet how everything is marketed to girls. They cite the popularity of cooking for boys is because of shows on television that feature men like Duff Goldman from “The Ace of Cakes.” He’s a tattoo-d, goatee-wearing, manly man, who bakes cakes for a living.

Mr. Goldman had Easy-Bake Ovens when he was a kid. So did Rick Bayless, recent winner of “Top Chef: Masters” and chef and co-owner of Chicago restaurants Frontera Grill and Topolobampo.”

Back when Goldman wanted a toy oven, I’m sure it was unusual for a boy to have a typical girl toy. Fast forward 20+ years and nothing has changed — a boy today who might want an Easy Bake Oven must get one that has a girl featured on the front of the box, thus telling that child that it is, essentially, a toy for girls. What’s worse is that the marketing on the Easy Bake Oven Web site states that it is, indeed, for girls.

The large promos says:

The classic light bulb oven still delights with a girl’s first real baking experience!”

There is so much wrong with this picture and I get infuriated when people make these assumptions about what a boy should want to do and what a girl should want to do. Why not have a photo with two kids (a boy and a girl) on the front of the box?

Today I spend more time in the kitchen and enjoy it. I’m trying to learn more skills so that I can offer better meals at home. I also love spending time in the kitchen with my son — he won’t let me bake anything without his help. As my daughter gets older I’ll spend time in the kitchen with her too. We’ll all learn to cook together — without any stereotypes.

Boys and girls need to be able to grow up being whatever they want to be.

What do you think?

Related:

• Read the full Post-Gazette story here.
  
• Easy Bake Oven Web site
• Take your kid to a children’s cooking school: Young Chefs Academy Cooking School
• Get in the kitchen with your kids and start cooking. Here’s a Web sites that offers quick and easy recipes to prepare with children: Children’s Recipes
  
• Top 10 Children’s Cookbooks

On “The Oprah Winfrey Show” today, Taylor Swift said she doesn’t need a boyfriend. She was interviewed by the sweet, 11-year-old Jordan (a big Taylor Swift fan), Oprah’s “co-host” for the show. Jordan asked Taylor if she has a big crush right now and Taylor responded by saying that she doesn’t have a boyfriend and doesn’t feel the *need* to have one. She explained that she’d rather be single than in a relationship just to be in one.

How refreshing.

As a parent, and now to a girl, it’s great to hear. It’s especially important coming from a young woman that so many tween and teen girls admire. Taylor is beautiful, talented and rich. Any man would want to date her, yet she’s choosing to fill her life with other things, saying she’d make room for a relationship if the right man came along.

It’s great for 11-year-old girls to hear. Too often I see women, not just girls, dive into relationships that are wrong. They are always in a relationship, moving from one boyfriend to the next without taking a break just to “be.”

Last year I wrote a post inspired by the people at Dove who continue to promote the importance of teaching a sense of self esteem in girls. They said, “only three in every 10 girls feels worthy.” Wow. It’s important to teach girls, from a young age, how important they are. They don’t need a boy or a man to feel worthy. That while being in a relationship can be a great thing, it shouldn’t be the only thing in your life.

Maybe Taylor will inspire young girls to have confidence in themselves and to be comfortable with who they are — boyfriend or not. If it’s cool for a pop star like her to be single, maybe other girls will not put so much emphasis on whether or not they have a boyfriend. We need to shift the focus on needing a boyfriend, to wanting one if it allows them to continue to be who they are. And, that if they don’t have a boyfriend, they are OK.