Topping the vineyard laden hills of the Piedmont (Piemonte) region in Italy are charming little ancient villages with quaint lodgings, wonderful food and wine specialties. With a romantic getaway in mind, Claudia, hostess extraordinaire, took us on a driving tour down the lovely rural lanes of Monferrato to show us her favorite villas. She insisted […]

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One of our readers sent me an email that really touched me:

“I am not completely an empty nester unfortunately. My 20 year old son was not able to return to college this fall because of the lack of loans and grants available to him. So now he is doing nothing except for playing the computer game WoW (World of Warcraft) most of his waking hours. He did just purchase a small business that will make him a small living, but I pray he goes back to college. He is very bright and it would be such a waste if he didn’t.

Hannah, my heart goes out to you. As a mother of three adult…

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Now that the chicks are out of the nest I’m nurturing a new side effect–fearlessness. Okay, not exactly fearlessness, but I’m finding that I’m more drawn to crazy antics than I used to be. Perhaps this effect is common in empty nesters–or at least with the baby boomer ones. Were we not the VW bus driving, world-changing, stickin’ it to the man, try-anything generation? There must be some latent drive lurking beneath my ex-helicopter mommy exterior–and dammit–it’s getting my attention. So I crammed my not-so-perky butt into a wet suit, strapped 16 pounds of weight around my waist (apparently I’m very buoyant) and jumped in. And immediately FREAKED OUT.

There I was in the ocean, treading water like a madwomen, embarrassed and humbled. What happened? I aced the pre-ocean part of the lesson. In the swimming pool I was amazing–a scuba diving machine if there ever was one. I was practically one of those Discovery Channel shark chasers. My mind frantically tried to grasp where things went terribly awry…

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I’ve read that one of biggest pitfalls to having kids is that couples tend to forget who they were prior to breeding (though I personally think the the loss of perky breasts is high on the list). As a Gypsy Nester, one who is looking forward to life after kids, I thought I’d share a […]

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There may be more than ten ways to chase off your boomerang kid — in fact we’re sure there are!  The GypsyNesters have assembled ten sure-fire, never-miss, bound to run ‘em off suggestions to send your boomerang kid screaming out of your house for good.
10. Greet him at the door naked with a bottle of […]

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I’m an advice column junkie. I can’t help it. I kick off my morning with a frothy soy latte, my “Crack”berry and a heavy dose of the “Dear crew”. When I’m lucky, I can persuade David to play along with a game of “What would Abby do?” If he’s is in a particularly sporting mood, […]

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