Wine Time to Woo Woo

It’s been a year with no alcohol for me as of this month. I never thought I would be a person who didn’t enjoy a glass of wine (or two) a few times a week, but here I am. I thought it might be helpful to share the things I have learned about myself here and please note I am only speaking about my personal experience.

During the beginning of the pandemic I noticed that I was having wine more evenings than usual. I mean–nowhere to go, nowhere to be, right? Plus my social media feed was filled with #thisiswhymomdrinks and the like messaging so we were all just trying to survive, right? Studies now show this was a thing–overall alcohol consumption increased among all Americans during Covid, and especially among mothers to small children.

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Bethann Cinelli
IT’S NOT YOU, IT’S ME.

The move is complete. The kids are still bored at times, but much less so now that the internet abounds and we are easing into a summer rhythm.

Though now the boredom has been replaced with its friend, BIG FEELINGS. 

These big feelings are likely due to the changes happening–moving, new house and neighborhood, out of routine–and I find my kids just EMOTING more… especially my tween. As an aside, one of my favorite podcasts, The Girl Next Door, had an episode on Parenting Tweens that I cannot recommend enough. In it they talked about how with their tweens the highs are real high, and the lows are real low, with not a lot in between. I FEEL THIS DEEPLY.

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Bethann Cinelli
Embracing the Boredom

Ahhh just barely a week into summer break and here we are already “bored.” Sometimes I would answer my kids by listing a bunch of activities they could do–which they of course would ultimately refuse. Sometimes I would offer to do something with them if I was able. But this summer, nope. No, THIS SUMMER is the summer of “figure it out, I am sure you will come up with something.” (I must note here my kids are 10 and 6 years old which makes this possible.)

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Bethann Cinelli
PARALLEL LIVES, BRAH

Friendship has been a topic I’ve seen coming up a lot in my phone life—podcast episodes (aside from ours) and Instagram posts. One person I follow, Laura Tremaine, just published a book about the importance of social support and how it’s good to have different kinds of friends for different parts of your life.

As I have consumed this social support content, I couldn’t help but think of the monthly peer parent meetings I attend. Yes, it is a CTC program, but I attend not as a CTC staff member but as an elementary parent looking to talk to other parents that may have similar experiences (like your 4th grader calling you “Brah” at every turn).

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Bethann Cinelli
Walk, Don’t Run

Racing, racing, racing. It seems all I am doing this spring is racing from one thing to another.

If someone asks me how I am doing, I answer honestly: “Busy. Overwhelmed. We have a lot going on.” Do you feel this way too?

It’s a combination of normal life stuff—kids’ doctor appointments (including more endless sickness–truly when will it end?!), school events, soccer and ballet, and a busy time at work. But I also kind of feel like, how did this happen? How did I set up my time to be so tight? So nonstop that all the efforts I’ve previously written about—being present, finding time and space—have gone out the window?

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Bethann Cinelli
7 Minutes in (Prevention) Heaven

I was driving my fourth grader to school the other day and I said to him, “I have to get home and get set up for a podcast episode as soon as I drop you off.”

He asked what it was about and here is how the conversation went:

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Bethann Cinelli
Mission: Get Kid Intel

Three quarters of my family are now all in therapy. As you know I am one of those quarters and am still really benefiting. Therapy for all! Maybe I will get us matching t-shirts…

One of my kids had a decent amount of paperwork to complete in preparation for their first appointment. It’s all done in a portal so I said to them, “Hey we need to answer these questions. How about I’ll ask and then you tell me your answers and I’ll enter them for you.”

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Bethann Cinelli
“Are We There Yet?”

“Are we there yet?”  A.k.a. “How many more minutes?”, “I have to pee!” or “I’m gonna be sick.”  Four phrases that can test the strength of even the strongest parent. From tinies and toddlers to tweens and teens, the infamous road trip can be one of a parent’s greatest challenges but can also inspire some of a family’s greatest memories.

Greetings! My name is Cheryl Wendt, Parent to Parent Program Coordinator at CTC, and I am the guest blogger this month. I have 3 sons, ages 17, 14, and 12. My family is on a quest to visit each of the 50 States. Traveling as a family unit, we have succeeded in visiting 45 states! I can’t even begin to calculate how many hours or miles we’ve traveled. Over the years, I’ve learned a few parenting travel tips that I’d like to share. 

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Bethann Cinelli
The Lessons of Parenting Past…

During the past year, I have been the other half of the Chrissie and Bethann Parent to Parent podcast series. I looked back over the topics we have covered in our 20+ podcasts including parenting, communication, cannabis, dealing with feelings, setting boundaries, and mental health. My role in the podcast is to present the parenting perspective from someone who has successfully (or not) navigated the challenges of raising children into healthy young adults. My children Aubrey (25) and Joshua (28) would be the best to determine my “parent score” but, I am willing to share with you my short list of “things” I would tell my younger parent-self now that I am in a different parenting space.

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Bethann Cinelli
Sports and Betting and My First Grader, Oh My!

In my house, we are BIG Philadelphia sports fans. On Sundays during the Fall, we have football on all day in our house (Go Birds!). As my 7 year old has gotten older, he has started to take more of an interest in sports and pays more attention to the games we watch. Last week, we were watching our favorite pregame show and he noticed that they were all talking about sports betting. I explained to him that many people do this and it is legal in the state of Pennsylvania. After that short conversation, he started to take notice of all the online sports betting commercials - and for good reason, as these commercials, highlighting various sports betting sites, seemed to flood our tv.

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Bethann Cinelli
The September Struggle (and Excitement) is Real

September is here. Kids are in school again and structure has returned. Many of us (maybe most of us?) welcome this time of year as “summer together time” has peaked and is petering out. My kids and I feel ready for a change of routine and season come the end of August (even though it is a strange in between time as I wrote about last month).

But forget January, September is truly the “new year”, as my friend and co-host Bethann told me, “September is the real new year where we all get an opportunity to start fresh.” I tend to agree! In my house, we are excited to get new school supplies and backpacks. We are filled with anticipation to see who is in whose class, and what each new teacher is like. But we are also filled with lots of big feelings that we aren’t quite sure how to deal with…the “we” here being my kids, but also me at times.

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Bethann Cinelli
August aka Month of Mixed Messages

Time in August feels strange. Summer isn’t over yet but fall is looming and you can’t escape it. It’s 90 degrees outside and I’m ordering school supplies and learning teacher names. I’m taking my kids to go swimming in the morning, and stopping at the outlets in the afternoon to get a winter coat for a deal at an early Labor Day sale.

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Bethann Cinelli
Update: Camp Big Brother

Back in April I wrote a post about my plan for finding time to work this summer using my older child as a helper with my younger one, I called it “Camp Big Brother”–you can read the post HERE–and I wanted to provide an update.

As with anything, I could for sure make a meme about “how it started vs how it's going” for this adventure. Back before school was over I met with my son to outline the expectations of Camp Big Brother (CBB)--the rules, the pay, how much time he would have to do this each week. He asked if he could use the money he earned for anything he wanted to get. I told him, ‘Yep, it's your money so you can save up to buy what you want as long as it is age appropriate.

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Bethann Cinelli