We talked 2012 parenting trends on Parenting U a few weeks ago, but in this video I talk to Laurie Gelman from BabyCenter about their predictions. I’m not sure I agree with all of them, but it’s always fun to talk to the experts.

Trending Topics we discussed:

• The Year of the Dad: We decided to employ nanny cams to see if stay home dads are really doing the housework, or just watching Mob Wives marathons.
• Fertility as you age: How many times can Laurie repeat my age? (Note to self: Don’t say your age on live footage that will not be edited)
• Too much technology? She likes XBox Kinnect. I like texting my kids from the kitchen.
• Is everyone looking for their 30 minutes of reality fame? Please pray that my kids don’t figure out how to post to YouTube.

About Laurie Gelman

Trend and Lifestyle Expert Laurie Gelman has 20 years of national broadcast experience including stints at “Fox After Breakfast,” and co-hosting a national parenting show in Canada called, “The Mom Show.”  Laurie was also a contributing editor for Cookie magazine, and she has written for The Observer Playground.  Laurie is the mother of two little girls and currently the house mom to her 4th grader’s class. She is married to executive producer of “Live! With Regis and Kelly,” Michael Gelman. Laurie is also a regular contributor to BabyCenter’s Momformation blog.

What trends are you seeing, or predicting, for 2012?

(I’m hoping duct tape attire makes a comeback.)

I’ve been talking about Listen To Your Mother everywhere, except here. So I thought I should. I am thrilled to bring this show to Northwest Arkansas for so many reasons, but come on– New York City, Chicago Washington DC, San Francisco and Northwest Arkansas? Taking it up a notch my friends in the 479. This show gives people a chance to read heir personal writing about motherhood in front of a live audience. You don’t have to be a writer or have any experience in front of an audience. We want anyone and everyone who has something to say to submit an audition piece! To find out all the details on LYTM, check out our fancy new page on the national site.

Audition For Listen To Your Mother

Stephanie McCratic, and I have already heard from an amazing group of women. Yes, they are sending in audition pieces, and you should too. We are creating an amazing depiction of what motherhood really is– the good, bad, ugly, scary, and sometimes funny. So send in your writing about motherhood now! We are going through the submissions  and will be contacting those we would like to see for live audition.

Save the Date!

If you don’t want to be IN the show, be sure and mark your calendar for April 29th at 2pm. Walton Arts Center in the Starr Theater.

And Now, a Word From Our Sponsors…

If you would like to sponsor this event, please let me know! This is a wonderful opportunity to interact with some very influential women in Northwest Arkansas and beyond. Sponsors have opportunities to get in front of the performers at the auditions and at the rehearsals, as well as exposure in posters and print advertising. If you’re looking for Mother’s Day business, we’ve got a spot for you! Listen To Your Mother is a perfect opportunity to align your business with an amazing event celebrating motherhood.

Net proceeds from Listen To Your Mother Northwest Arkansas will be donated to various charities, including Arkansas Visitation and Exchange Center. 

I love doing the ParentingU segment on 5News. I love learning about the cameras and the mics and the when I’m supposed to shut up and when I’m supposed to talk. I even love getting up super early once in a while for the boost it gives the rest of my Monday.

And I LOVE those guys at KFSM. Mitch and Shane and… that other guy. The only thing I wish is that they’d offer up fashion advice when I need it. Like when my holiday cheese intake has been at odds with sweater, so that when I attached the mic (I do that myself, now, because I’m all like, knowledgeable, and stuff), I wish the boys would let me know that my sweater was all bunchy.

Oh, well. It’s not like I was there on a fashion assignment. We were talking parenting trends.

Slow-vaxing, home-birthing, yeah, yeah, whatever. My favorite part of this segment? Mitch’s joke about helicopter parenting. You’ll just have to watch.

The first time I heard about Listen to Your Mother, I wanted in.

What is Listen to Your Mother?

Listen to Your Mother features live readings by local writers on the beauty, the beast, and the barely-rested of motherhood, in celebration of Mother’s Day. Born of the creative work of mothers who publish online, each production in this national series is directed, produced, and performed by local communities, for local communities. The mission of each LISTEN TO YOUR MOTHER production is to take the audience on a well-crafted journey that celebrates and validates mothering through giving voice to motherhood–in all of its complexity, diversity, and humor. And it’s coming to Northwest Arkansas in 2012!

Why Northwest Arkansas?

Because we rock. It started when I saw that Wendi Aarons was producing Ann Imig‘s Listen to Your Mother (LTYM) in Austin. I wrote to Ann, letting her know how much I loved the idea of the show, and how I’d love to help her bring it to Northwest Arkansas. For the next year I Facebooked and Tweeted her, sent her a copy of Blacklisted from the PTAto review, and took the mic at the LTYM Salon at BlogHer11–all the time reminding Ann how very well LTYM would be received in Northwest Arkansas. Keep in touch, she said.

Then I got the call to action. Ann was adding cities to the 2012 schedule. All I had to do was apply. All I had to do was convince Ann that Northwest Arkansas was the perfect community, I was the perfect one to lead the effort, and that I would have lots and lots of help to make the event a success. No pressure.

And we got it, Northwest Arkansas! We got it!

I’m so excited to work with mother/writers in our community to celebrate the diversity of motherhood. Listen to Your Mother, Northwest Arkansas is going to be amazing. Because you’re all going to be a part of it. Can’t wait. Can. Not. Wait! Stay tuned for specifics, including timing, sponsorship opportunities, volunteer staffing, and auditions.

We’re in Good Company

The 10 cities hosting LISTEN TO YOUR MOTHER shows in celebration of Mother’s Day 2012:

AUSTIN: Co-Director/Producers Wendi Aarons and Jennifer Sutton

CHICAGO: Co-Director/Producers Tracey Becker and Melisa Wells

D.C.: Director Stephanie Dulli, Producer Kate Coveny Hood

MADISON: National Director, Ann Imig

NYC: Director Amy Wilson, Producer Varda Steinhardt, Assoc. Producers Holly Fink and Julie Nemitz

NORTHWEST ARKANSAS: Director/Producer Lela Davidson

NW INDIANA: Director/Producer Stephanie Precourt

PHILADELPHIA: Co-Director/Producers Cecily Kellogg and Dresden Shumaker

SAN FRANCISCO: Co-Director/Producers Kim Thompson-Steel and Kirsten Patel

SPOKANE: Director Stacey Conner, Producer Elise Raimi

Special thanks to BlogHer for national media sponsorship!

Image: Auntie K, Flickr

The official day this year is Friday, November 25th. That is the day my family is allowed to start singing Christmas songs. I have nothing against Christmas music. I rather enjoy it. But only during the season. There is nothing worse than a cheerful child’s voices singing about dashing through the snow when it’s 85 degrees outside. It’s crap like that can ruin a holiday. If you ask me. And you didn’t, nor did my family. The difference between you and them is that they must abide by my rules. Or find loopholes. Hence:

We wish you a happy Halloween,

we wish you a happy Halloween,

we wish you a happy Halloween

and get lots of candy!

Good candy to you, to you and your kids

We wish you a happy Halloween and get lots of candy!

“What? That is NOT a Christmas song.”

Little shits.

Image: D’Arcy Norman, Flickr

Dear Mouthy Housewives,

I just became Room Mom of my daughter’s Pre-K class. I didn’t really want to do it, but nobody else volunteered. The first event I did—a Welcome Breakfast–was a simple affair because the kids are still young and I didn’t have a lot of time to organize. I thought it was fine, but now I hear that a lot of the moms were making fun of the event and calling it a “Cheap Breakfast.” Should I say something to them? Make sure the next thing I do is nicer? Hit them with my car? This is all new to me and I’m panicking!

Signed,

Dubious Room Mom

Read my answer on The Mouthy Housewives

Try These, Too. Pretty Please:

• Confessions of a Dirty Housewife
• 7 Surefire Ways to Get Blacklisted from the PTA
• Applying MBA Savvy to My Life

Image: spaceoddisey, Flickr

Dear Family,

I might have been kidnapped.

Unlike Michaele Salahi, if this real housewife goes missing, it’s probably true. With the house and the kids and the job, and tripping over your combined 76 pairs of shoes, I just don’t have the time to orchestrate a fake abduction.

Besides, who would I count on to contact the right media? You’re all too busy with school, work, and imaginary sports. And you know what they say: No publicity is no publicity.

Read the rest of this post on Modern Mom.

Image Credit: Andrea Rinaldi, Flickr

Grocery shopping is not a crime. Except when it is.

I often pick up more than I can carry at the grocery store. With a toddler in tow, I might stick a bottle of Heinz in my pocket, hoping I remember to produce the concealed condiment for the cashier. (That’s a risk I take when I fool myself into thinking I can get in and out with just a hand-held basket.)

However, here in the suburbs of Rogers, Ark., most food shopping involves a cart the size of my first car, which makes accidental theft less likely. Countless times I’ve almost walked out of the Super Center with a case of Diet Coke and a pallet of Charmin, but those are easy to spot on the lower rack of the cart.

Click here to read the rest of this post on the Today Show Moms blog.

You Might Like These Too:

• Ask the Bubbly: Babies Laughing at Paper
• A Case for Arts in Education
• The Legend of My Ten-Pound Baby

Image: Ed Yourdon, Flickr

Pity.

Or is it?

Dear Lela,

What’s up with all the laughing baby videos lately? And why didn’t any of those parenting books tell me that I could get my kid to laugh just by ripping up paper? This could have saved me a lot of sleepless nights when my kids were babies. I sure wish I had known about this miracle baby-enchantment strategy then. I feel cheated.

Frustrated Father

Dear Frustrated,

Take heart, and enjoy the videos while you can. The baby-laughing-at-ripped paper phenomenon will be short-lived. The reason you never read of this supposed miracle baby charming technique is because it is not a time-tested method. Unlike tickling a baby’s belly or dancing him around to vintage Britney Spears, these seemingly innocent giggling baby antics are nothing but precursors to what is referred to in the trade as meltdown. (Not to be confused with blowout, which is a marked discrepancy between human elimination and diaper capacity.)

Videos of babies laughing at ripped paper last approximately one minute. You do not see the moments preceding or those following. Note that the baby paper film genre is dominated by male directors. At some point during the day of filming, this man receives a rejection letter of some sort, a past due utility notice, or mortgage statement with an unfavorable escrow account adjustment. Just prior to making the video, his gainfully employed partner says something to the effect of,

“Get your lazy ass off the couch and do something around here.”

At this point, the man chooses from among the many household chores what he believed to be the easiest task: childcare. And because he is Daddy, aka the Fun Parent, he passes the time with Junior by making him laugh. Specifically, he rips the offending rejection or bill. (My sources have no idea why this works or how it has caught on so quickly, but I suspect it has something to do with the influence otherwise unemployed daddy bloggers.)

Daddy rips; baby laughs. It works.

For about one minute.

Then Daddy bores of this tiresome routine, because let’s face it, watching babies laugh isn’t that satisfying, not like picking March Madness brackets or eating an entire piece of leftover pizza in two bites. So the funny man stops the show and the baby starts to cry. Translation of baby’s wails: “What do you think you’re doing? Get back here and rip me some paper, Fool!”

Here’s where Mom steps in. No one has actually seen one of these videos. No one wants to.

Enjoy the foolishness of others, but consider yourself lucky, not cheated. At least during your sleepless nights there was a chance, no matter how slim of sex. Not so for the paper rippers.

Got questions? I’ve got answers:

• Girl Scout Dilemma

Ask your own questions in the comments or drop me a line.

Image Credit: Creativesam, Flickr