Your Dog Is Not a Baby. But My Baby May Very Well Be a Dog.

When I first had Thalia, various child-free friends and neighbors tried to compare notes between my baby and their pets. I understand that they were just trying to relate. But when you're fat and sleep deprived and freaking the hell out about your new life, the last thing you want to hear is that the baby you just carried for the longest 40 weeks of your life and then expelled forcefully from your person and with a moderate amount of pain is pretty much the same as the rat-like King Charles Spaniel down the hall who growls at shoes and licks his own balls.

Thalia is up all night - sometimes every hour. It's driving me nuts.
Yeah, Buster was up all night too. It's sooooo difffffficult.

Thalia swallowed a penny and I'm freaking out. I might have to take her to the doctor.
Oh I understand. I had to take CC to the vet when she ate a coffee bean.

Thalia is starting solids, we're so excited!
Ziggy just tried a new dog food too!

You only think I'm exaggerating.

Truth be told, I probably would have done the same thing before I had kids. In fact, I think I did. Mea culpa.

But now suddenly I'm feeling more forgiving as I realize that Sage may, in fact be part canine.

The facts:

-Crawls around on all fours with toys with her mouth
-Finds toys under the couch them brings them to us
-Likes to have her belly rubbed
-Eats food off the floor
-Happy to pee on the living room floor
-Eats dog food
-Smelly farts

You be the judge.



On a separate note Sage is now sleeping through the night. (Yippee!) Thank you for all the supportive comments and suggestions and thank you, anonymous anti-CIO internet trolls for sitting this one out. If only Thalia wasn't getting up at midnight every night now and coming into bed with us. Gee, this parenting thing isn't one big happy picnic all the time like they promised in the brochure, is it.

Head, Meet Oven

Here's a new option to add to the list of games to play with your almost one year-old.

Nate: AAHHHHHHHHHH!

Sage: AAHHHHHHHHHH!

Nate: AAHHHHHHHH!

Sage: AAHHHHHHHH!

Nate: AAH! AAH!

Sage: AAH! AAH!

Nate: AAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

Sage: AAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

Nate: AAHHHHHHH!

Sage: AAHHHHHHH!

Nate: AAHHHHHHHHHH!

Sage: AAHHHHHHHHHH!

Repeat infinitely while mommy tries to do taxes.

Good times.

In Praise of C.I.O.: Come and Get Me, Sanctimommy Googlers

I am officially starting a petition to get the phrase "sleeping like a baby" struck from the English language.

My girls are beautiful. Smart. Healthy. (Except for this week, in which the unstoppable, Vesuvian-like flow of thick, nasty mucus from Thalia's nose has us considering just how much it will cost to build an ark.) The one thing my children have not been blessed with is the ability to sleep.

Able to consume astronomical quantities of food: Check
Able to sleep through the night: Not so much

Thalia refused to nap anywhere but a swing, that battery-hungry beast, then forced us into reluctant co-sleeping for 11 months until finally I broke down, emotional and sleep-deprived and let her cry. It lasted an hour. The next night, about 20 minutes. If memory serves, on the third night she slept like...well, some other person's baby.

I can now assure you close to two years later that she shows no signs of psychological damage, no fear of abandonment. Although she did run away, shave her hair into a mohawk and get a tattoo a couple weeks ago. But I attribute that more to allowing her to watch the Family Guy with us.

Sage, on the other hand, was a champion napper until a few weeks ago when she decided she'd far prefer to forage for dust bunnies and small, jagged hair clips under the couch in the afternoons than lie down in her crib. This wouldn't be such a travesty if she weren't also still waking up, on average, 2-4 times a night and yelling for a bottle.

Let me say that one more time for emphasis: After 10.5 months, she still wakes up 2-4 times a night. And cries. Loudly. She goes down, but won't stay down. We shove a bottle in her mouth so that she won't wake her sister right next to her. Which is of course the total wrong thing to do to get her to sleep through the night. We've traded a smart, long-term solution for a quick fix.

Every night for more than 300 nights.

And I am so so so freaking tired. (And, evidently, fat.) I can only imagine that Sage is tired too.

So this week it's deja vu all over again, as we let her cry Monday at 2:45 AM without intervention. It lasted a half hour. We all lived. And then she slept the rest of the night.

Last night: Only one waking. We still gave her that bottle.

But tonight the kitchen closes at 7PM for the night. Wish us luck.

And as for you, the kind, helpful, supportive anonymous reader who commented on a post two years ago: You are a horrible,selfish person.I wont even call you a mother because even animals take better care of their young.Crying it out is child abuse.Most of us want children,not programmed robots.Get yourself sterilised.

I hope you'll be back to offer me more of your thoughtful suggestions. Why, I'd hardly know how to parent without you.

Johnson & Johnson BabyGate: You Knew I Couldn't Stay Quiet For Long

I have been following the J&J Camp "Baby" fallout with great interest. Sort of the way you watch a car wreck with great interest. Or more accurately, reports of a minor fender bender that, by the time it gets to you, is suddenly OH MY GOD 62 PEOPLE AND A WHOLE SLEW OF CIRCUS ANIMALS WERE RUSHED TO THE HOSPITAL. Because it's really not a car wreck. It just seems that way. And I bet that it will be a whole lot of fun and the hair braiding will go swimmingly and the pillow fights will last well past 10 (!!)

(And in case you're wondering: Yes, I was invited, but no, I'm not going, because I'm speaking at BlogHer Business the very same days. But hey - if any of you campers want to sneak away from raiding the fridge and making out with your pillows to road trip it up to NYC Friday afternoon for margaritas, I'm all over that.)

Bloggers like Susan Getgood and today, Heather at BlogHer, have already assessed the issues far better than I from an PR standpoint, and of course I'm saddened reading the accounts of friends whose feelings were hurt and schedules upended after being disinvited (or not invited at all).

But the women like Julie and Kate who were not allowed to bring nursing infants in slings particularly bummed me out. And I've finally put my finger on it, in part after reading Alyssa Royce's comment on Heather's thread in defense of J&J.

I've been interviewing lately, pursuing freelance advertising opportunities around NY. I haven't had to sit across a desk answering rapid-fire questions for a while - most of my jobs have been through people who already know me or at least my work - and I find one thing has changed in the last five years (besides the fact that the economy has wreaked havoc on day rates): I have kids.

I've already had a few (male) eyebrows raise just a bit too high for my liking when I mentioned that I have young children. And so I do my best not to mention it.

Which sucks.

Are there any men who feel they can't go on a job interview, point at a framed Sears portrait on the desk and say "Well hey there, I'm a family man myself!"

Are there any men who are scared that that when they mention their kids, a recruiter will think they aren't the best person to write a beer ad or a car campaign? Are there any men who worry that while the guy across the table is smiling and pumping his hand, that in his head, he's thinking "Hm, he'd probably be happier if he were home with the kids."

But here on my blog it's different. Here I can be both a professional and a mom. Both a person and a mom.

Sometimes even...just a person.

And you get it.

So when a mom blogger is not welcome at an event - hardly a professional one, although the sponsor company may see it that way - she is not "overreacting" when she can't arrive with her nursing infant in a sling. It's not "just business." She doesn't need to be told that with a sleeping infant in tow she will not be able to "focus" properly. And yeah, it's okay to be a little angry about it. Because even with all the progress we've made, all the talk we do about candidates supporting women's issues, fist-in-the-air and amen sister, we're still beholden to the patriarchal model of business. And we continue to feel guilty for having to choose between our family and everything else.

I know. I've been in that situation, with a sleeping newborn in a car seat ten feet from my home office workspace, inviting my boss in, and having him stare at her as if she were a live grenade.

Parents come here, to the world o' blog, in part because here we don't feel marginalized the way we sometimes do in other aspects of our lives (as Kristen has put it). Here we are a community of kindred spirits. We surround ourselves with other parents who get the juggle.

Here, we don't have to deny that mommy side of ourselves. We don't have to hide the pacifier quickly as it falls out of a jacket pocket at work, or pretend that we're not stressed out worrying about a sick kid at home while sitting in a meeting. We can even look at that other picture on the proverbial desk and shout ME TOOOOOO!

Basically, it's okay to behave like a woman here. It's okay to behave like a mom.

So if you're a marketer and you want to come here, into our world to work with parents, I think you need to play by our rules.

Cinderella, The Retelling. Or: Why I Should Never Write Children's Books

"Mommy who is this on my diaper?"

"Well, that's Cinderella. She's a storybook character. A princess. They were out of Dora, sorry. "

"Read it to me."

"Well, I don't have the book."

"Read it to me!"

"Once upon a time there was a beautiful girl named Cinderella who lived with some, um...her step...well some mean people. They made her do all kinds of cleaning up around the house. But wait, cleaning up isn't bad. That's not why they were mean. They were mean because they never helped her clean up. So she had to do all the dishes by herself. And sweep all the floors..."

"I like sweeping!"

"Yes, sweeping is fun. That's right. But she didn't like it. So anyway so she wanted to go to a big party called a ball..."

"A ball! I like balls"

"Right, but not a ball like you throw, a ball which means a big party. At the castle. But Cinderella didn't have anything to wear so a magic fairy godmother came down and gave her a beautiful dress and cleaned up for her and then something about a mouse...and then she turned a pumpkin into a um...well, a carriage - do you know what that is? It's like a cart with horses - so Cinderella could get to the ball. And then the prince fell in love with her. But she lost her shoe on the way home which was made out of glass for some stupid reason and then when the prince came to find her....oh wait, I forgot the part about how she had to leave really quickly before she told him her name. I don't know why. So anyway she tried it on - the shoe, I mean - and it fit so he knew that she was the one he loved and they lived happily ever after in the castle...oh wait, something about midnight. Okay forget that. It's not important. Okay so they lived happily ever after in the castle where they played all the time, and painted and did art together and read lots and lots of books.

Because smart, cool girls always like reading lots of books.

The end.

So, what do you think?"

"Can I watch a show?"

From the Mouths of Babes. Who Will Get Extra-Special Treats Tomorrow.

Thalia steps on the scale.

"Mommy! What number am I?"

"Well, looks like 27.6 Thalia. Very good."

"And what number are you, Mommy?"

"Well, I'm 100 and (mumble mumble)"

"WOW mommy. You're..."

"Yes?"

"You're so...taller!"

Sorry Sheena, Now Thalia is a Punk Rocker

Be warned, unsuspecting parents of America, for it takes very little influence from unsavory sources, until an ordinary, happy-go-lucky, Froot Loops loving toddler to start her downward spiral...


towards a dead-end life of hardcore Punk.


Okay so maybe the unsavory influence were the terrific kids band, The Jimmies, who were shooting a new video for their track, Bedhead. (There's lead singer Ashley in the background above, with...yep, bedhead.)

Remember, it takes three hands and a pint of Manic Panic to get those mohawk spikes to the appropriately threat level - lest you have forgotten the 80s in a haze of pot smoke, inhaled mimeograph chemicals, and minor hearing damage from repetitive playing of the Dead Kennedys tape stuck in your Walkman.


Thalia's so rock star she insisted on only the green Froot Loops in her dressing room.


Yeah, she had like 17 holes in her right ear they closed up. Duct tape did the trick.


She didn't have any spoken lines. But if she did, I would have picked, Let's get sushi and not pay.


Thalia and Ashley prepare to rock the green screen while the fledgling stage mother holds herself back from begging for just one more take "so she can really get it right."


Thalia earns her first ever dollar, hoping to save up for that limited edition Black Flag EP she's had her heart set on. That, or Elmo Sings the Pistols.


The transformation is complete as Thalia tries to convert Mommy to her band of rowdy no-goodnik hooligans.


Wardrobe credits go to Fadiddle for the rockin' tee, Little Ruler for the baby Vans, and above all, Jenn from Babesta, the most rock 'n roll little kids emporium in NYC if not in the whole wide world. She totally hooked us up with some flamin' Baby Legs to use as arm bands, and ripped the red tartan skirt right off her own daughter's body and handed it to us.

Don't worry Jenn, only a couple people at the wrap party partied so hard that they puked on it.

---
The week of shameless Mom-101 family media whoring continues this week with my Montel Show taping airing Tuesday (10AM in NY) that I am somewhat hoping you forget to watch. Plus there's one other very exciting opportunity at the end of the week that you'll just have to wait to hear about.

No, it's not Rock of Love III. I wish.

On Blessings, and Counting Them

I didn't need to turn on the news to catch the breaking story about a 25-story crane collapse in midtown that's now killed two so far and counting. Because my father and my stepmother called me, at 2:25, having just witnessed it. It was so close to them I could hear the ambulances and rescue vehicles start to arrive in the background.

It was so close that my stepmother had passed by the site 30 seconds earlier.

I told my father that I had never heard him so shaken up, not even on 9/11. "That's because," he said, "I didn't see 9/11 myself."

And then he added, "Like you did."

Ran right home and kissed my children.

Dispatches From the Abject Cluelessness Department

Last night I ran into my neighbor, whose grade-school son goes to a so-called top-tier school nearby. She's a nice enough woman and a friendly neighbor, and I like chatting with her. She asked about the preschool process for us.

"We got into school B! We were kind of favoring school A but we got waitlisted so...eh. I'm very happy. It's a wonderful place and I really liked the director."

"OH, school A. That is a WONDERFUL school."

"Yes, yes it is. But we didn't get in."

"You know we weren't going to go to preschool at all when my son was two. But then you know, school A called US. Isn't that amazing?"

"Wait...they just bypassed their waitlist of like 100 kids and called you?"

"I guess so. They BEGGED us to go. BEGGED us. I don't even know who recommended us but I spent ages on the phone with the director until we finally agreed to go. Isn't she the best?"

"I liked her, yes...but we're not going to school A. We're going to school B."

"School A was just the best experience of a lifetime. We can't say enough wonderful things about it. Wow, too bad we didn't know you were applying there. They absolutely LOVED my son. But don't worry, I know school B will be great too."

"Um, thanks."

This morning, slipped under my door...a copy of a two-page thank you note written to director of school A after her son graduated kindergarten, gushing about how instrumental the experience had been in her child's life, how fabulous each and every teacher was, how "the magical light that emanates from school A will forever shine in us."

Oy. New York.

The Baby That Ate Manhattan (Not to Be Confused with The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh)

The most dangerous place in the world just might be between Sage and a saltine cracker.

And this is before the kid has teeth. Gold help us when she does.

While I might normally be a bit more curious as to why my ten-month old is a bit slow going dental, I have a suspicion that the delay is actually a blessing.

Thalia takes after her mama in the not eating too many things department. Pasta? Check. Cereal? Check. I looking forward to summer so we can add fat peas to the list, thereby increasing it by 50%. Sage on the other hand is our little gluttonous foodie monster. Just like daddy. I can't think of one food she's ever flat-out rejected or spit out or flung at the dog.

But ah, if it were only food she's yearning to wrap her sweet lips around. I've had way too many panicked moments reaching into her mouth to fish out coins, hair clips, stickers (ugh, those stickers!), scraps of paper, mealy dog kibble, fuzz from the rug. I expect that if we x-rayed her belly it would be like the cartoon imagery of a whale's innards - some fish bones, an anchor, some old tires, a tin can. Maybe a trio of Russian sailors missing since October.

Each time I am sure that we have thoroughly cleaned the floor and put all choking hazard-sized items out of reach, Sage manages to find that one wayward penny. That one errant morsel of Iams. That one Dora sticker that lost its adhesive powers and slipped quietly slipped out of the sticker book and onto the floor. And never the big Dora either; it's always the backpack or the map, something small and virtually undetectable. Until I hear that scary gagging sound and shove my fingers into the back of Sage's throat to retrieve it.

I'm laughing. But only to mask my absolute terror about it.

I don't want Sage to grow up to fast. She's baby # Last and I'm enjoying her every day just as she is. But let me tell you, I am desperately counting down the days until she just gnaws on furniture and the dog food like normal babies do.

It's Got a Good Beat and You Can Dance To It

Nate: How do you spell "lambadamy"

Me: Lobotomy?

Nate: Lambadamy. Like that thing with your brain.

Me: Lambadamy. The forbidden neurosurgical procedure.

Just One of Those Weeks

You know those crazy nights where suddenly your friend Bethwhoknowseveryone calls, and the next thing you know you find yourself in a trendy Meatpacking District hotel room, drinking wine with eight women and Robin Givens, and trying not to look at the cameras?

You never feel quite so much like a
Cabbage Patch Kid as when you're standing next to a size 0 celebrity
with cheekbones that could slice beef.

And the producers ply you with warm wine and brie and instruct the eight of you to dish about motherhood, and actually, you get to really like all the other women there with you as if this weren't totally staged and bizarre? And then two days later you find yourself heading into the Montel show studios for a live taping to see just what scary things the producers did with your video?

Well, it's no Tyra Banks Show

And then you're in the green room (which is not green) eating some bad turkey sandwiches and run into mom entrepreneur Nina Restieri of MomAgenda who you've always really dug and is coincidentally on the show? And then you're headed towards the audience when suddenly a producer snatches you away from your friends, crams a microphone pack down the back of your leggings and and tells you Montel might throw you a question and you freak that maybe this is all a set up and they're going to hit you with a paternity test or something?

And then you sit back down to watch the taping in the front row center (with almost no makeup on because you weren't expecting this), and then the very edited video of you and your new friends comes on and your one line is about Elmo Sex, in which you plop the kids down in front of Elmo, race into the bedroom for 15 minutes, then get the 2 minute warning when the theme music comes on?

No Elmo, it's we who love YOU.

Nina missed her 15 minutes of trashy TV fame -
but gets 15 minutes of trashy blog fame instead

And then Montel actually does throw you a question and you sound like a total idiot because you're caught off guard and aren't about to divulge your family issues on a talk show anyway? And then the rest of the show downward spirals into boring stories featuring women willing to cry on stage because it's more interesting to keep the trainwreck moms on and cut out the inspiring success stories of Nina and Elena?

And then you're totally exhausted from smiling for three hours straight and go home and fall asleep during the first commercial break of Lost?

Yeah, it's weird when that happens.

You know you've made it when...

(You can catch my disastrous TV appearance mid-March or so if you don't have anything better to do like maybe wash your hair or sort pennies.)

----

Other cool people doing way cooler things, a.k.a. linkie love:

-Bobbie Sue who writes Blooming Yaya needs help with research about parentbloggers of preschool aged kids - help her out and take her survey?
-Blog buddy Devra is the featured expert on PBS Parents this month
-Tony had the line of the night at NYC blogger drinks this week with "Scrappy Doo was the Yoko Ono of Saturday Morning cartoons."
-The Graco Blog gave my Sanctimommy post a nice nod (along with some other good ones) in their monthly fave blog post thingie. Supposedly it comes with a little prize and I'm hoping that it's a free infant car seat and a time machine so I can go back and use it.
-Vanessa Van Petten has a interesting blog about parenting advice from the teen POV (even though she's now herself an old and decrepit 22) and is doing a little best mom blog contest and resource guide: You can even enter your own.

*Last and totally not least: Guy Kawasaki who is like the king of all things online (and was super nice when I met him for about 3 seconds at BlogHer) has come out with a very clean and fabulous mom blog aggregator at Alltop. It even lists the last five posts from each blogger so it's easy to just click around and find fun things to read. Looooove that there is a famous techy sort who actually sees the value in what we do. Bookmarking, stat.

We are worthy! We are worthy!

We are in, baby! Into the preschool with the the less than stellar "playdate"!

Yippee!

Hooray!

Dancing the happy dance in front of the mailman!

Dancing the happy dance in front of our sitter!

Crying tears of joy while I hug my confused daughter!

Calling everyone I know, most of whom don't care!

Celebrating over adult beverages tonight with some of my favorite local blog friends turned real friends!

Dancing the happy dance with the dog!

Whooooooo!

Now I just have to figure out how the hell I pay for it.

The Wai-ai-ting is the Hardest Part

My heart raced as I tore through the mail yesterday. Even the monthly BlogHer ads check (GINORMOUS as it generally is) wasn't what I was looking for.

I was hoping for one of two familiar logos in the top left corner of the envelope, either one containing the word preschool.

As I mentioned back in November, if you don't live in NYC you can't imagine the hysteria of the preschool application process. There's parents who apply to a dozen or more schools, there are parents who bribes their kids to behave on the interview ("If you don't pick your nose, I'll get you some ice cream when we're all done.") there are hysterical moms this very moment posting incessantly on the Urban Baby message boards, Did the acceptance letters go out yet? Has anyone heard? How about now? What about now? How about now?

It's maddening.

Vowing to circumvent some of it, we dawdled, delayed, then finally applied to two schools, both great, both within walking distance. I dropped whatever names I could in the application, used my best penmanship, sent gushy, sincere thank you notes, and then decided the rest is out of my hands. I figure, eh, if Thalia doesn't get in anywhere - 350 applications for 42 spots is tough odds - she'll take some extra music classes and we'll call it a day.

(Although, um, yesterday I totally forgot to take her to music class. And this is why I don't homeschool.)

My laid-back, what-ev-ah attitude lasted about a minute. Or at least the amount of time between the first preschool tour and the first "call us to schedule your kid in for a playdate" letter.
The first session was pure torture. Thalia hadn't slept the night before. The meeting was scheduled for 3:30-4:15, when all exhausted 2 year-olds are at their best. Thalia, generally the picture of energy and advanced social skills exhibited none of the above. She hardly said a word, which is so uncharacteristic, I had to hold myself back from turning into That Mom who hovers around making excuses for her kid.

No I swear, she usually sings the alphabet forwards AND backwards. Sometimes in Greek. And you should see her mix a martini!

I was stressed through the entire playdate - was she playing with one toy too long? Was she supposed to be playing with so many toys? Should she be interacting with the kids more? Why isn't she singing to herself - she always sings to herself. When the director asked her name, why didn't she answer? Ohmigod she's not playing with the dolls, should she be playing with the dolls like the other girls? Should I point her to the dolls? Hey, that parent is playing with the kid - should I be standing back or in there playing with her? What are they looking for anyway? Do they know how late it is for a little girl? GOOD GOD, WHERE IS MY TODDLER EVALUATION CHECKLIST AND SOME FUCKING XANAX?

Seriously, you want to be the preschool that every parent wants their kids to attend? Don't bother touting the teacher-student ratio or progressive curriculum. Just have a ready supply of anti-anxiety medication for the taking.

My heart went out to the one couple whose daughter snatched away every toy that any other child in her vicinity was engaged with. "Please share...please, please share with the other kids... just be good, sweetie.." they pleaded, no doubt as they mentally crossed that school off their list of possibilities. The rest of us just looked at our feet, guiltily pleased that she wasn't our own child.

At the end, as we headed out the door, the girl and Thalia finally clicked. "Oh sure, now she plays nice" the mother said to me without so much as a smile.

The worst part of it all was how crappy I felt on the walk home. I felt just terrible - not that Thalia didn't perform on cue like a trained circus monkey, but that I kind of expected her to in the first place. It was absolutely brutal to think of my child as being judged, as possibly being deemed not worthy. I hated myself that night. Although of course that's not what happens at all. Surely the schools are just looking for preschool readiness and a good mix of personalities and backgrounds to fill out the classroom. But boy, it sure feels like cold-hearted, brutal judgment when it's your own kid under the microscope.

The next playgroup was far less stressful, less rigid. Thalia was her cheery self, and I got to feel self-righteous next to the little girl accompanied only by her nanny. Thank goodness for small favors.

And then March hit. As in, March When the Acceptance Letters Go Out.

So now I wait. And wait. And bite my nails. And check the mail (ugh, why does our postman always come so late in the day?) and wait.

And maybe occasionally I log onto Urban Baby just to see if anyone else is pretending not to be as stressed as I am pretending not to be.

Behold, For She Speaks! (Sort of)

I wasn't entirely nervous when the Doctor With Attitude (who I must say, has lightened up significantly on the attitude since I became a second-time mom without quite so many pesky questions) asked whether Sage was babbling.

"You know - mamamama, dadadada, gagagaga...that sort of thing."

"Um, no. She really isn't. She's not big on consonants." I forced a nervous laugh. "Just a lot of aiyiyiyiyi."

He didn't seem worried. I didn't act worried.

Then I raced home to to the blog (thank goodness for the blog, for I am not so good with the baby book) and found what I was looking for. Thalia's first word: Cat. At 8 months and 11 days.

But Sage, closing in on ten months?

Aiyiyiyiyiiiii

Not a ga. Not a da. Not a bababababa.

But you know, we second-time parents aren't supposed to worry about this kind of thing. So I didn't. I didn't worry. Nope, not a bit. Not for a minute. Not at all. Never once. Nope, never.

(Right.)

My mind races back to the toxo. What if it did affect her? What if all the negative tests were wrong? What if it's the reason she has no words, no teeth, no hair, and can't yet do long division?

And then two weeks ago, suddenly it seemed like Sage was saying "hi" every time she forced her tiny fingers open and closed. And then there was the thhhhhhh sound and the spray of saliva on my face to show for it.

And then, literally overnight: The babbling. The nonstop, god-loving babbling. Glorious Rs. Miraculous Ds. Sloppy but well-intended Ls. And a whole lot of dadas, because damn those Dadas, they always get theirs first.

We even think she's trying to say Thalia.

Sage pondering her next word. Maybe mama. Maybe onomatopoeia.

Just Call Me Mom "Hussein" 101

Because American should object vehemently to the use of racism as a political tool.

Because Bill Cunningham is an asshat.

Because decency is alive on both sides of the aisle.

Because MOMOcrats had this brilliant idea for a meme. Guess it's an unusually meme-y kind of a weekend at Mom101.

I mean, Mom Hussein 101.