Sparkling Adventures Blog

[Blahblah]

Quick Question: Just tried accessing GOMI to read the Sparkling Adventures thread there, and it says it is Forbidden from my server?? What could this mean? I've only ever read over there once.

I got the same thing. I'venever been there before. Maybe they've gone members only or something?

[Lillybee]

Go to the Gomi website and hit forums, she is listed on the mommy bloggers thread, she is about halfway down the list.

[Blahblah]

GOMI working again now. Maybe some server error yesterday??

[Guest Anonymous]

This is a very disturbing quote:

I thought she'd left the righteousness bullshit behind.

I suspect she was 'maintaining a higher energy level' and 'outlasting' David's mood when she spouted all the sparkly bullshit the day after he drove their van half off the side of a cliff. That didn't end well either. :?

[snarkelle]

I understand it's considered current practice to allow a child to have their emotions. However her comfort is nominal at best. She is NOT helping guide a child through processing their emotions, by valiadating those emotions, given them words when their words fail them, and showing she is strong enough to handle their big emotions. She's just letting the child sit on her lap, while taking a PICTURE of the child's tantrum. She's not parenting.

My four year old gets overwhelmed by his emotionsl and screams and tantrums too. However, I use my words to reflect his emotionsl and help guide him to find his words. I help older children find coping skills, healthy ways to manage strong emotions, and save plalces to express themselves. She's not doing ANY of that.

^^^^^ Well said chaotic life.

(I'm a lurker finally compelled to comment after seeing the blog post about tantrums, because helping my children with their emotions has been THE most difficult part of parenting for me). Psychological research/theory suggests:

Having emotions and not making the child frightened of them, yes.

Validating emotions, yes. Identifying and labelling emotions, yes.

Not taking on the child's emotions and becoming angry/upset/unregulated oneself: yes.

Remaining close to the child: yes.

Also: Soothing the child (helps the child learn to soothe her/himself eventually); talking using simple language; helping them to stop crying (the most potent thing I ever heard from a psychologist was "tantrums are not character-building".) Crying & feeling out of control sucks. Adults don't like it. Why do some people think children like it???

Taking pictures of the child having a tantrum and putting them on the internet: no. Absolutely bloody no.

Children need to learn self-regulation. This will help them with everything they do in their lives - social, intellectual, leisure and other pursuits. They can't self regulate - they learn it from us. It's got nothing to do with being godly or righteous; it's a form of literacy, just like reading and writing.

Thank you for listening!

[Blahblah]

^^this. My kids have had some doozies in their time. I would hold them close, speak quietly to them, tell them I understood they were having some bad feelings, help them learn how to get control back for themselves etc.

What I would not do is grab the camera, jump on to the internet, bleat on about how righteous I was being by allowing them to scream themselves out and tell everyone how my hands-off parenting is all sparkling.

[CheeseDeprived]

Taking pictures of the child having a tantrum and putting them on the internet: no. Absolutely bloody no.

This. It beggars belief. Every time I think she has reached maximum levels of selfishness and craziness, she goes and tops it with something even more disturbing.

[Freyacat]

This. It beggars belief. Every time I think she has reached maximum levels of selfishness and craziness, she goes and tops it with something even more disturbing.

Lauren is one of many mommy bloggers that have made me start thinking that children need to have some kind of legal right to privacy. I mean, it's a hard thing for me to know where the line is, because I guess it's ok for people to put up privacy-restricted photos for friends on facebook (although personally, I don't do that). But it's unfair to children to be plastered all over a wide open, publically viewable blog, especially photos of embarrassing or private moments. I can't count the number of mom blogs that have included nude photos or photos involving bathroom functions, and that just doesn't seem appropriate - someday 20 years from now a prospective employer or date or whatever might be searching for info about all these mom bloggers' kids, and they will find a lot of really personal info that's beyond the child's control. At the very least they ought to use pseudonyms for the kids.

[CrankyCatLady]

There's been a lot of discussion about that subject over on GOMI. Cecily Kellog particularly got raked over the coals for posting pictures of her seriously ill mother online. It's definitely something that's made me re-think what kind of photos I post on my blog. FB is different because I have it locked down pretty well, but I still wouldn't post a photo of my kid having a tantrum.

[Porcelina]

Laurens hand looks very... Umm... Reptilian in that picture. I know it's an odd thing to snark on but either she has ridiculously elongated hands/fingers or Delaney is very small for her age. I just checked my hand against my 14mo's upper arm (50th percentile) and all but one inch of my hand and fingers covered her arm.

I was also a bit weirded out by her return to using the words righteousness and godly, def doesnt match with the impression of her being an earth mother like she wants us to believe.

[MMS]

^^this. My kids have had some doozies in their time. I would hold them close, speak quietly to them, tell them I understood they were having some bad feelings, help them learn how to get control back for themselves etc.

What I would not do is grab the camera, jump on to the internet, bleat on about how righteous I was being by allowing them to scream themselves out and tell everyone how my hands-off parenting is all sparkling.

Exactly. This is the same reason, as adults, many of us will turn to a trusted friend or family member when we are angry or hurting. It helps to talk about it, and have someone outside of the situation speak into the situation and help us gain some perspective. If I asked my best friend to come over to talk, and instead she came into my home, took a picture of me, put in on the internet, and told the world I was having a tantrum, but she was going to outlast it and let me work it out, I wouldn't call on that person again. Children need that same support.

[Vex]

I understand it's considered current practice to allow a child to have their emotions. However her comfort is nominal at best. She is NOT helping guide a child through processing their emotions, by valiadating those emotions, given them words when their words fail them, and showing she is strong enough to handle their big emotions. She's just letting the child sit on her lap, while taking a PICTURE of the child's tantrum. She's not parenting.

My four year old gets overwhelmed by his emotions and screams and tantrums too. However, I use my words to reflect his emotions and help guide him to find his words. I help older children find coping skills, healthy ways to manage strong emotions, and save plalces to express themselves. She's not doing ANY of that.

That is because you are a wonderful parent. I've always thought so from what I've read of your posts here. You're the antithesis of Lauren and her hands-off fake hippie bullshit.

Her hippie schtick is just an excuse to be a negligent parent. A homeschooling mother might be expected to take away the goddamn scissors when their toddler plays with them, but since Lauren is an unschooling hippie unmother it's totally cool with her sycophantic followers. She just drives me nuts the way she constantly lets them be in harm's way. I'm not a believer in helicopter parenting by any means, but this is neglect rather than relaxed parenting.

[OnceModestTwiceShy]

Lauren is one of many mommy bloggers that have made me start thinking that children need to have some kind of legal right to privacy. I mean, it's a hard thing for me to know where the line is, because I guess it's ok for people to put up privacy-restricted photos for friends on facebook (although personally, I don't do that). But it's unfair to children to be plastered all over a wide open, publically viewable blog, especially photos of embarrassing or private moments. I can't count the number of mom blogs that have included nude photos or photos involving bathroom functions, and that just doesn't seem appropriate - someday 20 years from now a prospective employer or date or whatever might be searching for info about all these mom bloggers' kids, and they will find a lot of really personal info that's beyond the child's control. At the very least they ought to use pseudonyms for the kids.

I hear you. I recently made a friend at grad school that I like a lot. She's extremely intelligent and has great, positive energy (the latter being a rare thing in grad school, sadly :lol: ) and has these two wonderfully talented children. We recently added each other on FB, and I saw that she posts a lot of pictures of her kids playing around naked - in their rooms, in the tub, etc. Now, I don't think anything untoward or creepy AT ALL is going on in that family (obviously you never know), but it boggles my mind that she puts that out there, even on a private FB page. I never put anything on FB that I wouldn't want the whole world to see if there were some glitch. Naked pictures of one's 3 and 8 year old just worry me.

[Blahblah]

She isn't just unschooling and unchurching. She's unparenting.

[Vex]

The GOMI thread is very interesting. I was expecting more snark initially, but a surprising number of people either didn't want to snark because of poor Elijah or didn't think she was snarkworthy. I don't know how anyone could read that blog and look past the filthy clothes, scraggly hair and the way every post is about Lauren and see something well-written and charming.

Also, did you know we have a time out for naughty posters and secret forums for the cool kids to bitch about us mortals (that totally isn't a mistaken reference to the FJ FB group)? I'm learning so many things about FJ!

[CrankyCatLady]

I did know there was a timeout step and a chatter section. I wasn't aware it was a bitch section since I don't have access to that yet.

[Vex]

Not the chatter section! It's a super sekrit forum within a forum for only the most popular kids to hang out. Like behind the gym at high school.

I've finished the GOMI thread and now I must check out Kayla and Checkers, since Lauren is being oft-compared to them. Off the top of my head I have the feeling they're homeless, which is only the slightest step down from Sparkles, but I might be confusing them with someone else.

Actually, homelessness might be a good thing for Lauren's girls. If they were homeless, surely the government would be able to take them to a real home?

[CrankyCatLady]

The Kayla and Checkers thread is a real rabbit hole.

[happy atheist]

Not the chatter section! It's a super sekrit forum within a forum for only the most popular kids to hang out. Like behind the gym at high school.

Yeah. I go there. It's called Helpmeet Hangout. We do really cool shit like let Curious know when we are available for mod or admin duties. You all should be totally jealous.

[Dysfundamental]

Not the chatter section! It's a super sekrit forum within a forum for only the most popular kids to hang out. Like behind the gym at high school.

I've finished the GOMI thread and now I must check out Kayla and Checkers, since Lauren is being oft-compared to them. Off the top of my head I have the feeling they're homeless, which is only the slightest step down from Sparkles, but I might be confusing them with someone else.

Actually, homelessness might be a good thing for Lauren's girls. If they were homeless, surely the government would be able to take them to a real home?

Kayla and Checkers were homeless, but they now rent a small house and appear to be doing better at caring for their children (children seem fed, not visibly dirty) but have a looooooong way to go with improvement in parenting IMO.

Like Lauren, they are very involved with Rainbow Family gatherings.

[pastaswife]

Kayla and Checkers were homeless, but they now rent a small house and appear to be doing better at caring for their children (children seem fed, not visibly dirty) but have a looooooong way to go with improvement in parenting IMO.

Like Lauren, they are very involved with Rainbow Family gatherings.

Don't you mean UNlike Lauren, as Kayla and Checkers have been to more than a single rainbow gathering

[August]

That'll learn me not to read the GOMI thread before I go to sleep. I had a dream that I met Lauren. We were at the Wright Bros museum in Kitty Hawk and she'd cut off her dreads and had lovely thick shiny hair about chin length. It was super awkward because apparently I knew her IRL and was trying to pretend I didn't read her blog, so I gave her my condolences and she started crying, and then I remembered I'd posted a condolence note on her blog so I shouldn't have said it in person and was terribly embarrassed. So odd. I think my subconscious is stressed about my hair and reading Lauren's blog so I can bitch about her here.

[sassyNoz47]

Why are they boarding a plane to Brisbane? Did I miss something?

[Blahblah]

Why are they boarding a plane to Brisbane? Did I miss something?

First she's mentioned it. Weird. Especially because she says "this March we're exploring Victoria". Wonder where the bus is? She must be due for a blog because we haven't seen anything about Dancing Ground yet. Maybe she'll have some sparkly explanation for us. Is David due in court?

[pixydust]

Yeah. I go there. It's called Helpmeet Hangout. We do really cool shit like let Curious know when we are available for mod or admin duties. You all should be totally jealous.

Shhh! Don't let anyone know where we practice our magical helpmeet powers! Besides, I AM cool :geek: oh, maybe not.