Filed under: High school, Teenager, Weird but True

17-year-old Matt Wong is an accomplished student, pianist and...sandwich maker. He likes to whip up gourmet sandwiches in the kitchen of his La Jolla, California home but often buys more than he needs just for his family. He's also a budding entrepreneur and decided he could use his leftover ingredients to make his classmates happy while earning a few bucks for himself.

He made up menus and handed them out at school. For just $5 each, the kids at his school could pass on the lunchroom mystery meat and instead enjoy a tomato, salami, olive baguette, a turkey pesto with zucchini or a roast beef with dill sandwich. He had fourteen orders by second period.

The next day, he set up shop on the quad and went about making his sandwiches. But once the principal got a whiff of what was going on, he told Wong to shut down his little sandwich shop because of health concerns and permit issues. "He was quite serious about making sure nobody got a sandwich, but I managed to
get them all out," says Wong.

Wong may have filled all his sandwich orders that day, but he also earned himself a two-day suspension. So,what did Wong do with his time at home? He invited his classmates over for sandwiches, of course.

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Filed under: Stores and shopping, Momwear, Tees, Baby clothes, Kidwear, Brands

To celebrate the re-appearance of February 29th today, British clothing company Boden is giving away 29 online orders.

Load up your cart with cute kids clothes for spring and summer like the adorable hopscotch jersey vest or non-scary skull hoodie or treat yourself to something yummy like the contrast trim coat and you might be one of the lucky ones who gets it all for free! If not, you'll still LOOK good!

The leap year checkout lottery is only good for today and lasts until 11:59 PM EST.

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Filed under: Health and Safety, Stores and shopping, Outings, Current Studies and Research

When my husband returned from his New York business trip last week, he was all aghast at the lack of hand washing he observed. I wouldn't call him a germaphobe (yet), but my husband is a stickler for keeping his hands clean. He was surprised and a little disgusted to see many, many people coming in off the streets to eat lunch or dinner without washing their hands first.

Sometimes germs just can't be avoided, but knowing where they lurk can at least offer you a fighting chance. With the assistance of University of Arizona microbiologist Charles Gerba, Dr. Andrew Weil tested everyday items and compared them to others to see which was germier. The results are gross and sometimes surprising. For example, if you think that the toilet would win a germ contest with the kitchen sponge, you would be wrong. The sink is full of nasties and it is a good idea to change your sponge often. In between sponge changes, you can sterilize it in the dishwasher or get it wet and microwave it for one minute.

Icky hotel bedspreads actually have fewer germs than the remote control but ATM machines and first floor elevator buttons tied for germs. The one place that always icks me out is the grocery store. Some stores offer hand sanitizer wipes right near the shopping cart corral, but mine doesn't. I always try to avoid touching the handle, but it is damned near impossible to steer a wobbly cart with your elbows. But you might want to give it a try because according to Dr. Weil, there is all kinds of yuck on those handles. 55% of the cart handles tested were contaminated with bodily fluids (urine and saliva!) and 21 percent had traces of blood.

The moral of this story is wash, wash, wash. Oh, and you might want to rethink that lemon wedge in your tea.

Illustration by: Paul Sahre and Loren Flaherty

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Filed under: 2 years, Toddler

I've never been sentimental about Riley's hair or reluctant to cut it (in fact just between you and me I sort of get itchy when I see little boys with longish hair -- when everyone else on earth is cooing over Baby's Curly Golden Locks, I can't help thinking how much cuter the kid would be if Mama would just whip out the scissors already), I think we gave Riley his first buzz cut when he was maybe a year old and we've been buzzing him ever since.

There are downsides to the buzz cut in that your kid sort of looks like a plucked chicken for a few days afterwards, but really, you can't beat the maintenance. The only thing I dread about cutting Riley's hair is the event itself, which he invariably reacts to with the sort of hysterics that would lead an outside observer to assume he's being eaten alive by hungry snapping turtles.

Oh, the tears, the screaming, the howls of "NO HAIRCUT WIGHT NOW!". It reduced ME to tears the first couple times, before I grew steely and determined and cruel. He pitches such a fit about his haircuts -- and we've tried just using scissors, too, wondering if it was the buzzing sound of the clippers that made it so bad (NO) -- I've never even considered taking him to one of those kid-friendly hair joints where they sit your child in an airplane and play videos and all that. No one should be forced to listen to the noises he makes during the Great Hair Trauma unless they're related by blood, is my thinking.

We tried having him watch while I gave his daddy a haircut, making a huge deal about how fun it was and how it didn't hurt and all that, but our last buzz session was its usual disaster: flailing, sobbing, and physical restraints. Until, that is, the moment when we finished, and my son -- tears still running down his face -- leaped to his feet and announced with great joy and pride that "MY HAVE A HAIRCUT, DADDY!". And that's what he talked about for the rest of the night, how he had a HAIRCUT and how it FEELS GOOD (running his hand over his clippered head-fuzz) and MY HAPPY, MOMMY! MY HAVE A HAIRCUT!

Man. Toddlers.

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Filed under: Image of the Day

We thought it might be fun for you to pick the ParentDish Image of the Month from this month forward. So, let's get to it!



1. Through Rose Colored Glasses, submitted by beembag.

2. Yellow, submitted by Torrie.

3. Beauty On The Green, submitted by Megandavid.

4. It's All In The Heart, submitted by jenn jenn.

Please click on the above links if you would like to see the full-sized photo.

View Poll

Voting ends March 2, 2008.

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Filed under: Pregnant celebrities, Celebrity babies, Obstetricians, Hospitals, Celebrity parents

It's been over 25 years since I gave birth, so I have no recollection of just how much it cost me to have that baby. But I think it would be a pretty safe bet to assume the number was in the thousands, nowhere near the $1.4 million Jennifer Lopez is said to have spent birthing her twins.

According to several sources online, the cost of giving birth in the U.S. averages just under $9,000. So, how do you stretch that number to $1.4 million? JLo did it by shelling out $700,000 for a luxury birthing suite, spending $300,000 on private doctors and nurses, adding on another $300,000 for security and topping it all off with $100,000 in salaries for personal assistants during her pregnancy.

Deduct that from the reported $6 million Lopez is being paid for exclusive pictures of her babies and she still ends up making a nice profit.

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Filed under: Adventures in Parenting, Emotions, Whining

Between the lingering flu fatigue, a couple of birthdays (my own and my first baby sneakily turning 15), whippersnappers addressing me as ma'am, and the bag boy at the grocery store asking me if I need any help getting this out to my car, I'm feeling OLD.

The rumor that Prince, the short-on-height-but-huge-on-hotness singer who made many a junior high girl have impure thoughts back in the 80's, needs a hip replacement isn't doing much to keep the raspberry beret of my youth from flying out the back of a little red corvette, either.

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Filed under: Pregnancy and Birth, Third trimester, Baby furniture, Nursery decor, Adventures in Parenting, Baby clothes

Here it is, more than two months before number three is due and already, Rachel is starting to get things ready. She wants me to pull the boxes full of baby clothes out of the garage so she can go through them and get them ready. We got our old bassinet back from her cousin and are going to get our crib back from her brother's father-in-law this weekend.

Is it too early to start getting ready? Rachel has always been the sort of person who prepares well in advance -- unlike me who tends to be more of the last-minute type. If it were up to me, I would wait until we got home from the hospital to see what we got (you know, boy, girl, lizard, etc.) before digging out the boxes, but there's no way Rachel could possibly wait that long.

Of course, Rachel's way is probably better -- she tends to screw things up a lot less than I do. Still, how far in advance should we be preparing for the new kid's arrival? Do I need to head for the garage this weekend? Or can it wait a bit longer?

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Filed under: Newborn, High-risk pregnancy, Weird but True, In the News

Both times after giving birth, it amazed me to look at my baby, then look at my belly, and think, "THAT used to fit in THERE."

I can only imagine that Stacey Herald, 33-year-old mother of two, thought much the same thing. The difference is that Stacey is only 28 1/2 inches tall herself. Her second daughter, Makaia, was born five weeks ago and measured 18 inches at birth, more than half her mother's height. Herald believes she might be the smallest woman to ever give birth.

Ms. Herald's short stature is caused by complications of osteogenesis imperfecta, a genetic condition marked by fragile bones. She said doctors had cautioned her that a pregnancy would be risky, and that both she and the baby could be endangered because of the limited space in her abdomen to carry to term. Two babies later, she's proof that the pregnant body can stretch in amazing ways.

"If I laid down, I looked like a snail," she reports, laughing. "That's how big my belly was. I looked like an Idaho potato with arms and legs."

Officials from the Guinness Book of World Records are investigating Herald's claim.

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Filed under: Health and Safety, Doctor's office, Drugs, Current Studies and Research

A significant jump in the number of measles cases in England and Wales is raising concerns among health care professionals and epidemiologists, as parents choose not to have their kids vaccinated. According to the Health Protection Agency, there were nearly a thousand cases of Measles last year, a big jump from the 740 reported in 2006. This is the largest number of cases since records began being kept in 1995.

As has been discussed extensively, here and elsewhere, one of the main concerns with vaccinations has to do with the possibility of a link between vaccinations and autism. Of course, the experts have shown that those concerns are unwarranted and that the vaccine is safe. Still, parents are choosing to forgo the vaccine, figuring that measles, mumps, and rubella are less of a concern than autism.

"Although MMR coverage is starting to improve, we know that large numbers of children are still not fully protected. Therefore we expect to see more large outbreaks of measles in the future," says Doctor Mary Ramsay, a HPA consultant epidemiologist. "The only way to reduce the impact of such outbreaks is to ensure the uptake of the MMR vaccine increases, and that older children who have missed out come forward for vaccination."

I know my kids have gotten -- and will continue to get -- all the recommended vaccines. Having had a (now) preventable disease -- chicken pox -- as a young adult, I know how miserable such diseases can be. Luckily, I escaped with nothing more than a hole in my nose, but I worry that others may not get off so easily.

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