I'm not sure where we moms got the notion that we should put everyone else first, but as soon as I finish packing my kids' lunches, reattaching this button, supporting my husband through his mom's recent illness, and putting together this report for the PTA, I'm going to figure it out. Oh. Wait....

You've done all the planning and spending, and you're finally embarking on a much-needed family vacation. You've even reserved a rental car with a car seat for baby, so that you don't have to lug yours. So smart! Unless it's not, of course. While rental car companies offer infant and toddler car seats as an "added convenience" (and at an additional charge, of course), it turns out that the reality may be worse than you could've possibly imagined.

My very favorite perk of having two parents in the house again is that occasionally I get to take just one kid out to do some bonding. Today's agenda was "girl time," and my daughter skipped along by my side as we headed out to see Kit Kittredge, an American Girl.

It's a beautiful day and Dad has taken the kids out to play on an inflatable slide; they're all laughing and having a great time, and he snaps some pictures of the fun... until he's called a pervert and told to stop. I think that sounds like a plot for a ridiculous, contrived fiction story, but it's what actually happened to the U.K.'s Gary Crutchley when he was on an outing with his two sons and other parents protested his picture-taking:

You've heard the stories about teens tormenting one another on MySpace and Facebook, but did you know that even so-called "controlled" online communities for young children are showing classic signs of bullying activity? It's true. And it's depressing. A recent LA Times article paints a grim picture for those of us who had, perhaps, assumed that our tweens had a few years before we needed to worry about this sort of thing: