NJ Mom, Linda Perillo Zazzali, 8 Kids, Daughter of Mario Perillo & A New Blogger,A Serious Balancing Act and Still Having Time to Take Care of Herself!
Linda Perillo Zazzali, “The Real Hip Mom” is a parenting expert and blogger on travel, fashion, makeup, cooking and mastering the toughest job known to man…”Motherhood”! She should know, she’s a mom of 8 kids, ages 4-21, and has travelled with them from Disney to Italy!
Her dad was Mario Perillo, founder and CEO of Perillo Tours, who passed away in 2003. Her mother, Olga, his wife and my dream-girl, raised a great, traditional Italian family in Pearl River, NY and Saddle River, NJ, where she still lives “Italian style”, which in her family means living on the same block and across the street from her brother Steve and sister, Christine. Linda was the youngest of four siblings, with her brother Mark passing away in 2015.
Typically, when people meet her for the first time, they get into a conversation about whatever it is we are conversing about her father or brother’s TV spots, Italy, food, clothes, dance schedule, the parking lot, her parking spot, travel or a sundry of other interesting topics parents talk about, but as soon as someone broaches the topic of familial quantity (how many kids she has), Linda says, “when I say eight, you can literally feel the earth cease its rotation.. Once the movement returns to their appendages and they have been adequately resuscitated, they say the same thing, every time, “YOU have eight kids???”
As time evolved when she had her son, Devin in 1995, way after Carolyn had Laura and siblings, like most graduates just starting out with their first job, experience comes not from a manual, but with the day-to day grind. Linda said, “My mother, passed away when Devin was a few weeks old, and I had to fend for myself. Nobody taught me anything. I read a few books, here and there”. By that time she had her second baby in 1997, her daughter, Brynn.
She says, “There is nothing like a mother’s instinct. “
Twenty years later, she started her blog, “The Real Hip Mom”, because she believes as parents we beat ourselves up, every day, unnecessarily, trying to conform with someone else’s idea of who our child should be. “Not that our experts, like our doctors, our parents our teachers don’t know what they are doing, but keep in mind you are raising a human being, and to take your time with what they should be learning and what they will become.”
Her daughters, Eva and Valentina are singers and dancers, most recently performing at Carnegie Hall, Feinstein’s/54 Below, and Papermill Playhouse. Valentina played the role of “Rosie” in “Bye Bye Birdie”, where Linda was the Assistant Director at Our Lady of Mercy in Park Ridge, NJ.
Linda says, “I want to tackle every day mom issues, and allow moms to ask other moms their thoughts, or vent when they think they made a parental boo-boo, and we all do. I also want moms to make the most of themselves every day, whatever your style is, through clothes, make up, exercise, and cooking. Remember that feeling good about yourself, no matter what you are doing in a 24 hour period, has great results.”
Please join Linda, “The Real Hip Mom” and her 8 children, Devin, Brynn, Valentina, Federica, Eva, Albert Mario, Camilla, and Gianmarco, as they embark on the greatest travel adventure ever … life.
Please follow Linda Zazzali and her blog, www.therealhipmom.com
