We’ve all heard of chicken pox parties, where parents bring their kids over to a friends house to make sure they catch the notorious illness. On the one hand, I can see the benefit of knowing in advance that your child will be sick. On the other, I can also understand why parents might feel twinges of a guilty conscience for essentially encouraging their children to catch an illness.

Many parents also argue that they actively want their little ones to get sick at day care and in class because they believe it will bolster their immune systems. What do you think? Do you believe that childhood illnesses will benefit your kids in the long run? Would you encourage them to get sick? You tell us!

When I was in high school, my grandma took my prom photo with her to China. There she had someone paint a portrait of me based on that picture. It was a pretty good representation, and I was reminded of it when I read Tiny Talker Lea’s previous post and I saw portraits from Paintyourlife.com. Take a look at some of their portraits, which are artistic takes on everyday photos. They can portray anything from your family to your pets, and the artists can do them in a variety of mediums such as oil, watercolor, pastel and pencil. A great idea would be to take the digital image of your new painting and use them in your child’s photo birthday invitation. The results look like a work of art!