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Mother's Day III
Like many adoptive parents, not until I’d adopted a baby did I learn there’s such a thing as “Birthmother’s Day.” That day falls the day before Mother’s Day, the Saturday, and was designated a day to honor birthmothers. I learned...The Carrot Seed
Yesterday afternoon, I got a tummy ache, of the suddenly doubled over with cramps variety. I’d planned to work out (didn’t happen), roll on the floor (didn’t happen), have dinner with the kids (didn’t happen), put them to bed early (also...Start Talking, The Village, Obligatory Motherhood, Perfection
With full acknowledgement of many potential inherent contradictions contained here, I have always bridled at the notion that parenthood—and perhaps, because it’s more often treated this way, motherhood—is a job. Contradictions arise before the...Not Exactly Hindsight
I’m part of a somewhat quirky demographic these days. When four counts as pretty many children, and a twelve year-spread between eldest and youngest counts as a pretty big age span, I’ve started to see how—as is the case for every parent at every...A Nap, A New School, A Toddler, A Tween
Naptime has its inherent rituals. On the three afternoons Saskia’s been out for the morning at her most charming and perfect of preschools in the universe (Sunnyside Child Care Center—and believe me, I am not biased, I’m just telling the truth re:...Imagine the Pigeon at Commencement
Had I not had a third child, I might have missed the pleasure that is Mo WIllems’ Knuffle Bunny. I won’t even divulge the plot, nor the charming exclamations uttered by Trixie; I will say that the description of a young child’s meltdown—Trixie...Lulu
Dictionary: lu-lu (loo loo) any remarkable person or thing For whatever reason—as in, I have no idea—when I was pregnant with our second babe—gender unknown—we needed an in-utero nickname for her or him—him—and so we called the bump...Beautiful Boys
Beautiful Boy was the overly ambitious second book I took on vacation last year (the book itself wasn’t overly ambitious, the notion that I might read two books during one vacation with four kids was). During the post-school, pre-nap bottle with the toddler, I...The Child, The Brain, & The Voices
As I’ve written about before, the idea that really anything about motherhood is definitely universal is, I think, false. Or more nearly, it’s so close to possibly true that one’s inclination is to make it so. Over and over, though, the more you...Summer in Spring
Even though there seems to have been some spring summer confusion this glorious, often steamy May, what either season seems to agree upon is this: local food has arrived. Amidst the floral explosion this spring brought, the early green vegetables unearthed themselves...Disconnection
A bright, summery Memorial Day morning here in New England and I wake to birdsong, a messy kitchen, a sleeping household and a strong sadness at this very day’s disconnects. How can it be so beautiful when we are to remember the bravery of service people lost?...Today: Love, Sadness
At my most unsettled, I don’t sleep well. I know that’s not unusual, and I only mention it because since becoming a parent, the most unsettled times usually have to do with loss, and during those times, part of why I don’t sleep is that the working...A Narrative Self-Evaluation
My kids’ school years are ending and I found myself thinking about how I might improve my performance as a parent to students next year. But this isn’t exactly a report card, it’s more like notes to self: School. I’m pretty much in awe of my...Swirl
For lack of a better way to put this, Thursday afternoon, my household experienced a swirl. At one moment, too many things—some big, some smaller, some happy, some sad, and one totally unexpected—converged and roiled all at once. ** Oh, it was hot, as in a...June Brides
Here’s a question: is there such a thing as out-and-out happiness? Before giving my answer, I am going to describe one of the most lovely of wedding ceremonies I’ve been fortunate enough to attend (and doubly lucky me, participate in). C and C decided to...Second Fridays (We Don't Get Out Much)
I love how my town—many others have, too—has instituted an arts night. For us, it’s the second Friday each month and for me, personally, making it to openings or special events at our local museum (because how lucky am I to walk by the very wonderful...Remy and Nate
There’s a telltale sign we’ve got a launching reader in the house: by the beds and in the bathrooms and on the bookshelves by the couch in the dining room (you read that right, best spot for a couch, just off the kitchen) are slim volumes of Nate the Great...Near, Far, Music, Art, Food, & Cool Stuff
When people talk about what made Northampton kind of “pop” onto the map, one thing often mentioned is the Iron Horse Music Hall. Rightly so: this funky little space—even before it expanded to be a bigger, less funky space—has a certain...Anniversaries. Clear Skies.
I’m not the best holder of dates. So, certain anniversaries might pass me by (at least consciously). Specific dates aside, my psyche and body often seem to exhibit uncanny anniversary sensitivity. There was a period of time—a couple of years, not a short...Complex Narratives: In the Gulf, in DC, in Our Families
I know—certainly at the very least in my bluest of corners in the formerly true blue state of Massachusetts (pre-Scott Brown, that is)—I am not alone in feeling disappointed in Barack Obama’s response (Tuesday night, the past sixty days) to the BP...Put on a Show
I don’t know about where you live, but around here, these warm days become very social, sometimes purposefully and other times in more happenstance ways. Maybe New England’s four distinct seasons have something to do with it, as in we are warm now and can...Childhood BFF: Thing of the Past?
Although BFF has entered the lexicon, an article in last week’s New York Times let it be known that some educators and professionals working with children are questioning the overall merits of childhood best friends. In short, despite the benefits of closeness,...Summer. Here.
Summer is here all right. On the solstice, that big moon shone and the sky held its deepening grey-blue hue that last iota longer enough to have it sink in that the light had stretched itself like a really gorgeously long limb, the muscle giving long, light days its...Shooting Straight in the Dark
One thing I love about certain music: through it, I’m reminded that hope is really the best thing to have. Hope’s not always easy. Hope alone is not enough. But hope—also, love, faith, trust, a voice, and friends—is essential. Lose it and you...Scatterbrain
This is turning out to be a scattered sort of week, with two kids at home with nothing exactly to do (although this morning and tomorrow morning, Lucien is occupied—today spending an hour with a wonderful physical therapist to work on balance and...Other People's Babies
I had one moment, when I was initially passing down the most cherished (some through all four kids) infant clothing (the first last clothes) of experiencing a little pang. It sounded and felt like this: tiny pleading little bit sad voice inside my head asking no more...Open Adoption Roundtable #17
The Open Adoption Roundtable is a series of occasional writing prompts about open adoption. It’s designed to showcase of the diversity of thought and experience in the open adoption community. You don’t need to be part of the Open Adoption Bloggers list to...Remaining Days of Summer: A Wish List
I loved this blog post at bebeloo (found thanks to Design Mom, Gabrielle Blair) about what she’d like to do with her 94 days of summer. I counted (my math skills are very poor, by-the-by) and I think I’ve got about 63 days left so here’s my list of...Heat Recalled
Nashville, Tennessee: heat shimmered upwards from the pebbly driveway at my grandparents’ house. It practically hissed alongside the sound of insects’ wings. Heat had a visual; this is what I learned, a shininess. We were kids. A little hot weather...What Do Feminist Toddlers Wear? The Disney Princess Sandals Installment
This whole pretty thing, it’s really confusing to me. Here I am, mama to a very pretty (oh, of course I think that, but besides what I think, it seems to be echoed constantly by others without the same level of investment) two year-old girl. Despite the fact...Trails
I was in a writers’ group for many years. The group originated with four first year MFA students, four young women, two with curly hair, two with straight hair. We were all in our twenties and single, all differently but similarly struggling through. We wrote...Saskia & Shiloh & Boys & Girls & Clothes
Given her history for being an outspoken kind of celebrity and one who provokes (and sometimes also really inspires), is it any surprise at all that if a celebrity’s child might just stand out as a push against overwhelming trend it’d be one of Angelina...Should These Be Our Daughters' Stories?
These are the kinds of stories we should not even have to discuss: whether women whose backs are truly against the proverbial wall obtain access—just to remember, access means funding—in order to terminate pregnancies that require termination to relieve...Neat Tricks
Years ago (and gosh, when I say years, I mean twenty-four or something crazy like that), I went to Russia (well, then the Soviet Union) with a peace group. We led a series of workshops, many of them nearly clandestine meetings, incorporating Joanna Macy’s...One Morning, Three Kids, Three Ages, One Mama
There are things unique to parenting across a wide age spectrum, and one of them, one that continually surprises me, is how you have to treat your children differently (and by different standards) at the very same time. One morning last week was case in point. Picture...Under the Moon
My dear husband thinks I walk to town more often now that the new frozen yogurt joint is open. He’s probably correct, I do love me that Goberry. And that was my destination yesterday evening when he’d taken the kids to a pickle-making laboratory that was...Five Years
Here I am again, copying someone’s neat blog post idea. This one on Flotsam was written to mark her five-year blog-o-versary wherein she ponders what else she’s been doing for the last five years. I’ve been blogging at Standing in the Shadows for...Hugs
Leaving Sunnyside one day this week, Saskia was in a hugging mood. Unfortunately for her, Allesandra didn’t want a hug, nor did Alli, nor did Vaishali. So it goes in the lives of toddlers. The desire to hug isn’t always mutual and you have to learn to ask...Random Jumble
Subtitle: Me. Recently, I’ve copied a couple of people’s blog post ideas (including a summer wish list of things to do: I mean to go back and mark it up like Damaris at bebeloo has done. Haven’t so far. I’ve managed to complete number...One Degree
There’s so much about local food to savor. Just this past week, I spent time contemplating how very delicate lettuce is in comparison to the hearty arugula that preceded it in my salad bowl just weeks ago. I also bit into my first of the season tart Zestar apple...Half-Birthday, Letter Home, & School News: All in One Day
On Thursday, Saskia turned two-and-a-half*. We didn’t mark it beyond singing “Happy Half-Birthday” at a couple of random moments, which ultimately confused her. She understands birthday. This half stuff, well, she isn’t quite ready to parse out...Cranky Mood (Mine)
You know when you hit those eddies of blah? That’d be me today. Hot. Tired. A big weekend that demanded my being “on” brought me toward this little blah. Partly, I drove a lot. Driving on the highway makes me feel tense and therefore when it’s...Pipe Dreams
Here’s a question I’m asked an awful lot: How do you write so much while raising four children? A: I don’t sleep much. Childcare. Seriously, I don’t sleep much. The rest of the answer includes that I love to write and that I’m trying to...Parenting Lesson #
Let it be said that that number fill-in-the-blank about parenting goes like this: you can anticipate many things, and then you’re bowled over by what should be obvious and you totally missed. A task like sending one’s child to overnight camp for the first...Breather
Every day/I see or hear/something/that more or less/kills me/with delight/that leaves me/like a needle/in the haystack/of light—Mary Oliver, Mindful I turned 47. Here’s what I did for my birthday: I ended up on the Cape (near Orleans) while my seven...Reentry
After 48 hours of solitude (for the first time in at least more than eight years) on the Cape, I returned home—three-hour drive a contributor to this feeling—exhausted. Mostly, the exhaustion stemmed from having let my guard down just the teeniest bit....Table, House, Life
Kids keep growing. Back-to-school forms keep arriving. Work keeps happening (hooray! Freelance writers love deadlines). Kids’ art keeps accumulating. Everyone’s stuff keeps accumulating (and we don’t really spend much time shopping). Laundry requires...Peachy
A week after my incredibly wonderful break from everyone, I’m solo with the two smaller kiddies. Dear husband took the older pair to Portland, Maine (combo visit to sister, visit with grandparents vacationing there and chance to eat at nice restaurants and see a...Fixing What's Broken
I promise that it won’t be long before the school year and writing deadlines and meetings and apple picking (and a lot of applesauce making) will overtake but here at the tip end of summer with a couple of kids plus a husband away, I am trying to chip away at...Perfectionism, Reality (& Self-Esteem)
While surely I am stoppable—I have four stories to write plus blog ahead this week, one school starting, little childcare, a couple of greet-families-for-school events and more—I seem unable to help myself; I must keep plugging away with the end of summer...Soft Launches, Soft Landings
This week, my second guy—first of the four sibs—returns to school. It’s a new school for him, Hilltown Cooperative Charter Public School. At the nearly last gasp, his terrible numbers in two charter school lotteries came up (into August) and a visit...First First Day
Could I say that our bad turn actually began the day before at our most favorite place, Tuesday Market? No, I can’t quite bring myself to lay blame entirely on the mushrooms. That wouldn’t be fair. It wasn’t their fault. Nor could I responsibly lay...Oh, Alexander
To be all bloggy and serial-post-ish, if you read my last piece, you know that mushrooms did not make it better and that we’ve been having a few of those days (but who’s counting?). Throughout this swampy, soupy, clingy, dragged out week, I keep running...Heart in Hand
For JM Sorrell Things in our lives do not always go as planned, so when my friend called with the very sad news her father was in hospice care and she needed to pick up and be with him during this time, I instantly agreed to officiate at the wedding she had agreed to...Last First Day
It’s no surprise that with four kids in four schools, the first day of school was neither a singular event nor did it occur on just one day. Turned out, the first day was broken into three first first days. If this blog’s software let get many photos onto...Growth Patterns in September
When you’ve been watching your kids over many years, you start to notice patterns, like with some kids things get tricky just before the birthday as if developmental leaps are timed to sync up or how when big, growing and stretching events are taking place...Democracy in Action=Putting Your Two Feet In
The part of democracy that’s about participating in the larger community, specifically helping to make the process of community (not a verb, yet an active entity) function, always gives me a thrill. I feel it even when I am in despair about the politics of the...That Whole Three Good Things Idea
I wrote about being reminded of this simple practice, one I often do with my kids: note three good things about the day. Like getting enough sleep, it’s so deceptively simple—and, if you do it, so powerful. ** I’ll admit, this recent patch has been...Reframing, Spinning Out From
I’m not a practicing Jew, as in, I don’t belong to a congregation these days nor do I go to a place of worship for holidays, nor do I even observe holidays in any way you could deem the least bit traditional. That is to say, to the extent we bring Judaism...E-Edition
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