Welcome to Musings of a Mom Scientist!

A blog aimed at answering difficult parenting questions using fact-based science

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Fun Stuff
Kristen Navara

15 Things You Probably Didn’t Know About Love and Attraction

Valentine’s day is approaching fast! Whether you’re looking for some good conversation starters, or wishing for some tips on how to make that date turn into something even more fun, science has got you covered! Here are things that you probably don’t know about falling in love and attracting the person of your dreams: 1. Want to know if a person is right for you? Follow your nose!  The scent of a potential partner can

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Parent Life
Kristen Navara

14 Things Nobody Ever Tells you About Parenting Young Kids

When you’re getting ready to be a parent, there is certainly no shortage of advice. Yet, there are so many things that nobody ever tells you about parenting young kids. When I was expecting my first, I thought that I could do a whole bunch of research beforehand and make sure I was prepared. I read about baby development, sleep, breastfeeding…you get the picture. I thought that, as a scientist, I should be able to

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Health
Kristen Navara

11 ways to treat cold symptoms without cold medicine

Note: As an Amazon associate, I may stand to profit from purchases made from links within this post. That first time your child comes down with a cold and you find out that kids younger than 4 can’t have any cold medicine, it’s impossible not to feel helpless. Your child is suffering with those terrible cold symptoms – snotty congested nose, headache and awful sounding cough. Yet every form of relief that you would normally

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Parent Life
Kristen Navara

11 Unique Science-Backed Ways to Reduce Stress

Whether you’re dealing with the challenges of parenting, a day-to-day rat race at work, the spread of a pandemic, or a looming deadline and/or big event in your life, the associated stress of daily life is something that most of us unfortunately encounter on a routine basis. By now, most of us have heard of the classic ways to reduce stress, but there are many other ways that you may not have heard of.  I’ll

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Babies
Kristen Navara

Probiotics: Here’s Everything You Need to Know

We’ve all seen those TV commercials touting the many health benefits of foods and supplements that contain probiotics. They now even have probiotic supplements for kids! In fact, a few years ago, when my youngest was 1 year old, her pediatrician recommended giving her a probiotic powder in her bottle to help with a particularly bad case of diarrhea. It did stop right away. Whether that was because of the probiotic or because it had

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Parent Life
Kristen Navara

Work-Life Balance? Surviving Life as a Working Mom

As more and more women take on both working and parenting, work-life balance has become the new buzz word. We look at other moms and wonder how they have it so much more together than we do. We aspire to the mythical goal of that perfect balance.  I’m a single working mom, and a question I routinely get from other moms is “How do you DO it?? How do you achieve that work-life balance?”. I

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Health
Kristen Navara

10 Food Myths you might be falling for at the Grocery Store

Every time we hit the grocery store, we are surrounded and enticed by food myths. The food industry knows what we, as parents, want. We want the safest and healthiest food for our kids. Unfortunately, many times, companies are not above using our concerns and fears to improve profits. It is often confusing to determine which of the claims on food labels are meaningful, or even accurate, and which are not. I work in a

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Trying to Conceive
Kristen Navara

Trying to conceive a boy or girl? Here’s the science.

As a sex ratio biologist, I get asked a lot of questions about how to conceive children of a particular sex. I understand the desire. I’ll admit that when I was pregnant with my kids, I was hoping for girls. And then some moms have had many of one sex and are trying to round their families out with the other. A simple Google search on this topic brings up many methods that people say

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Fun Stuff
Kristen Navara

Why a butterfly kit is the science activity your kids need right now

We’re stuck at home, our kids are missing their friends, and we’re all craving the social interaction that we can’t have right now. It’s not surprising that people are turning to animal companionship to fill that void and give their kids a mood boost. In fact, many shelters are empty for the first time! But what if you can’t afford and/or take on a new pet? A butterfly kit is a great alternative and an

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Hi Everyone! I’m Dr. Kristen Navara, a scientist at the University of Georgia and a mom of two girls. Parenthood is amazing and wonderful and insane and challenging all at the same time. Like most parents, I am faced almost every single day with hard parenting questions. As a scientist, I am extensively trained in how to find factual scientific information to answer those questions. I am excited to share with all of you the challenging, quirky situations I encounter as a parent and the bare-bones science that can help to answer those challenging questions that arise. Please join me!

*The views and posts presented here do not represent the official views of the University of Georgia

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