Booty, boobies, and mac’n’cheese
Today’s light reading:
The Bunny Vs the Blue Box (Salon):
Annie’s Homegrown Macaroni & Cheese has pretty much achieved world domination — at least if your world is populated by the chronologically challenged. Refueling Gabriel, Rebekka, Isaac and Yazmin after a grueling toddler networking session? The well-stocked mom breaks out the Annie’s. Three-course dinner with (mucho) wine for the grown-ups? A batch of Annie’s keeps the little dears quiet. Rustling up some grub after a round of African drumming and lacrosse practices? Boil water. Grab Annie’s. But while there’s nothing wrong with food that appeals to kids and is easy to prepare, do we parents really have the right to feel so damn smug every time we open the little purple box?
No, no, no, a thousand times no.
Also of interest:
• Bootylicious (Salon): “My kids’ favorite snack smells funkier than poop, has questionable nutritional value and leaves a trail of bright green powder in its wake. Still, I can’t imagine life without it.”
• A Guy’s Guide to Breastfeeding Etiquette (MSNBC): “If we pause for longer than an instant, we risk being accused of voyeurism, even if the sight of mother-baby bonding is simply making us feel warm and fuzzy inside. But if we make a show of NOT looking, we risk being accused of being disapproving. What’s a guy to do?”
Mommy drinks, but not because you cry
So! Owen and I watched the Today Show yesterday morning, on which Melissa Summers was invited to talk about whether “cocktail playdates” are appropriate. Basically, Meredith Vieira was asking, is it ever OK for a mother to drink in the presence of her children? (story)
Unfortunately for mothers everywhere, the piece was quite biased. And the piece said, NO. From the intro footage of Encino moms drinking (zoom in on the wine!) to Meredith’s loaded questions (“but, how would you feel if it was the baby-sitter?”), the general tone was one of incredulous disapproval.
Melissa did a nice job of speaking out for the rational person, but I fear she was slightly overshadowed by every other aspect of the segment. More’s the pity, because this is the kind of thing that gets blown out of proportion and subsequently used to further pressure moms into some sort of Stepford model of behavior.
Look. Moms are people too. They eat. They drink. Sometimes their drinks have alcohol in them. Nobody’s talking about intoxicated parenting, all right? I think we can all agree that that would be dangerous.
But the simple consumption of an adult beverage in the presence of children, including your own — well, hell. Dads have been drinking beers on the couch for … for as long as beer has been invented, and that’s never been criticized.
I don’t drink often, but I’ve never shied away from having a drink in front of Owen. He knows that some drinks are for grownups (anything that comes in an aluminum can, including National Bohemian). And I know that more than a drink and a half is too much, so I imbibe accordingly.
I don’t see the problem. And I think demonizing moms who demonstrate any sort of human behavior (working, drinking, being exasperated) further dehumanizes them and gives the American public fewer reasons to respect and value what they do. And this in turn is why so many mothers today feel suffocated, anxious, on edge — why perhaps they might need a beer, I would venture to say. Because America has been all up their butt all day long.
patchwork + new fabric = crazy delicious
Permission to skip this boring missive: Granted
Re: The View: Rosie doesn’t bother me at all. You know who bothers me? Elizabeth. The young, conservative one. I really like the one with the N.Y. accent, but I forget her name. And I am LOVING that Tina Fey is guest-hosting. Sweet.
Re: Lunch: I would like to eat one of the following:
- grilled cheese from Easy Street Cafe in Bowling Green, OH, plus fries and a side of ranch
- Belgian waffle with strawberries, whipped cream
- hummus and pita
- toasted bagel with cream cheese
Re: Working at home: Pretty awesome. I’m pretty awesomely loving it, actually. Too bad it’s only for the rest of the week. But, if I haven’t mentioned it, I would like to say that it is Pretty Awesome.
Re: Buttons: I went with heather to the craft store the other day and, on a whim, bought about 5,000 buttons. They came in a mixed set. Some of them are so vividly colored and glossy and beautiful I wonder if they would taste like Runts. As a crazy pregnant woman, I am tempted to find out. As a crazy pregnant woman in elastic-waist pants, I have not seen a button in about five months, so it could just be the novelty talking.
Well! Seeing as Tony Danza is on the View right now, and I’m at home and not chewing on any buttons, and I am six feet from a fully-equipped kitchen, I reckon it’s time to prepare and consume my luncheon. I only wish the cook staff of Easy Street were in there making it instead.
p.s. I am now in love with Lou Dobbs.
Hateration, hibernation
Like other animals, when gestating I feel an urge to withdraw into a dark, private den, pop up some popcorn, and watch prime time television. I find the solitude soothing.
It’s nothing personal, it’s merely biological imperative, eons of mammalian evolution imposing itself on my sodium-saturated person. My DNA is telling me to make my habitat safe, warm, and buttery, and to minimize the threat of intruders, who only want to eat my young.
I just feel sorry for the possums and suchlike, which have to endure their pregnancies sans opposable thumbs with which to pick up the kernels.
Protected: A short tale of midgetry
Nesting, and obsessed with making things
Somebody stop me. Please. I can’t sleep at night.
I may be a big fat liberal hippie snob …
But I’m a CHEAP big fat liberal hippie snob.
Which is why I went to Wal-Mart today, breaking a four-year boycott. My sister-in-law passed the word that Wal-mart was considering closing its fabric department and had super-cheap fabric for sale, so I just had to find out for myself. My stash is growing stale, and Pregnancy Nesting demands that I have some sort of handiwork project going at all times (more like six or seven, if you count yarnwork, needlework, quilting and presents). So I went.
I didn’t seen anything indicating the department was on its last legs, but I’m not a frequent customer. I was, however, blown away by the prices. Everything they say about Wal-Mart is true! It is really fucking cheap. I scooped up an armload of DMC floss for 24 cents apiece and headed to the notions wall, where I kept finding things I needed for my “studio” for under a dollar or two: half-inch elastic, a spare blade for my rotary cutter, a needle threader, floss cards. It was sick. And I scored a crib-size roll of batting for $3 and a pound and a half of polyfil for $3.
All told, I ended up blowing $30 of my Christmas cash in one breath. I’m still not entirely sure how (fabric remnants, maybe), but there it was.
I still think Wal-Mart as a corporation has some, shall we say, issues, but in reading some forum posts across the internet by small-town crafters who feel like they’re about to have the rug pulled from under them — well, solidarity in DIY. I hope Wal-Mart DOES keep its fabric department open. I’ll shop there, sure.
Maybe they don’t carry Free Spirit (who the holy hell in Baltimore does? TELL ME) but a girl can overlook that if she’s got the internet at hand.
(Rolla Daily News: ‘Fabric may be permanently pulled from Wal-Mart’s shelves’. Having a hard time finding any news clippings, but am starting to get a feel for how screwed the small-towners will be.)
I’m growing a person
It’s why come daily life seems so overwhelming to me sometimes. Also, why I need elastic waist pants. And why I’m so tired all the time. And why I’m intensely interested in bagels today. And why network television makes me cry. And why I wish I had a journal in which to write “Nobody UNDERSTANDS me!” and also “But can’t they see I’m PREGNANT?!”. And why I keep telling Owen it’s not OK to kick Mommy in the stomach.
Did I mention that daily life seems so overwhelming to me? It’s all I can do to get out of bed and eat breakfast without panicking about what is expected of me that day. I need a vacation.
P.S. I wish I had started a pool, because then I could be announcing the winners of the Guess Supa’s Baby’s Sex contest. The winner would be anybody who guessed it was a boy. A boy person! I’m good at making those.
Five months in
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