She did it. This is what my husband says. 

People say, “Oh my gosh, you have such amazing kids”, and he smiles, points his finger at me and says “She did it. It’s because of her” 

He’s right. I did the bulk of the childrearing, adopting...

I just finished listening to Brene Brown's book, Daring Greatly, and promptly burst into tears.

I nearly made it too. But the last four minutes did me in.

You know when, back in the day, you went to a movie theatre and it was a tear jerker but you kept it together, so as not to blubber cry...

During the infancy of this blog I’m turning the vulnerability spotlight on myself so that you can really get to know me at the deepest level that a blog connection can create. To that end, I’ve been attic diving into old papers, photos, and VHS tapes (yes, you read that right) and...

All I’ve ever wanted to do was be a parent. If you follow me anywhere on line, you already know that. If not, I mean… well the pics say it all. (Yes, my Cabbage Patch Kid had a first and middle name.)

Blood may be thicker than water, but that’s science and this is spirit. ...

Me, circa 1986, doing what I love best.

A conversation with me as a child:

Any Grownup: “Cara, what do you want to do when you grow up?” 

Me, holding at least one baby doll and instinctually rocking back and forth: “Be a mommy”.

“Aww”, the grown ups said,...

Welcome back, mamas. Today we're wrapping up a six part series. We started this five episodes ago, talking about the skills that your COVID babies, infants, toddlers, and preschoolers need to practice every day in order to have a breadth of skill sets to go be ready learners and ready people to...

Welcome back, mamas. We are nearly through our top five executive functioning skills series that will help your child grow into a kindergarten and world ready kid. Today's skill doesn't actually sound like one.  Today's executive functioning skill is sense of self. Let's sit with that for a...

Welcome back, mamas. I am thrilled that we are still in the middle of our five part series of executive functioning skills. We can practice with our kids every day that will set them up for success in the real world.  Today, we are talking about flexible thinking, skill number three out of...

Hey mamas, welcome back. I'm so excited that we are in the depths of our six part series.  Highlighting the five essential skills that you need to practice with your child every day to raise them into great human beings who add value to the world.  Today we are on skill number two out...

Welcome mamas! Welcome back! If you caught last week's episode, you know that this one is special. We are kicking off our deep dive into the five skills that we need to observe and create opportunities to practice with our kids so that they have a holistic, well rounded toolkit of skills to go...

I am so excited because we're kicking off something really special this week. It's a six week series and we're covering in detail what I have been sharing with you in all these introductory episodes. The five self skills to practice with your COVID babies and toddlers every day that will set them...

Today we're talking about a concept that is near and dear to my heart, and it's deep inside the methodology here at Core 4 Parenting.  It's a concept that I created called the Parenting GPS.  Let me tell you a little story before we get started with how this applies to parenting. ...