I wanted to share this wonderfully thought provoking op-ed piece from WaPo with the Mothertalkers, since we were discussing Jamie Lynn Spears.

Learning From Jamie Lynn and Juno

Ruth Marcus offers a measured, rational response to the whole mess.  I really liked her approach, and the way she thought it through.

Ladies, I need your perspectives on a (down)side of pregnancy that I really wasn't aware of two years ago.  I am having a really horrible time with all the physical changes that have happened in my body since having a kid.  This is stuff that I never thought about, and I'm trying to figure out what is normal, and what I need to fix.  Oy.

At the risk of getting banned from this site forever and ever, the one downside of pregnancy that everybody knows about was never a problem.  I sweated the weight away in about two weeks.  Not through exercising, mind you, but through night sweats.  I had been so sick throughout my pregnancy that I only ever gained 20 pounds.  By the time I sweated it all out, I actually ended up 10 pounds lighter than I had been before the pregnancy.

Ok, please, put down the bats.  Really, there's more.  (And I've put the 10 pounds back on anyway through my amazingly bad eating habits.  Yay me.)

First, I want to thank all you wonderful ladies for the helpful comments on the "I hate Daddy" incident.  This board is just such a good place for support.

Since I posted about the bad comment, I wanted to post about the good one.  Tonight as I was putting her to bed (for the SECOND time) I told DD she had to go to bed because we have dance class tomorrow, and I bought her new tap shoes.  Her face lit up, and she got all excited and clapped her hands and said "yay, dance class!" (or actually, "dance cass") Then she settled down, folded her adorable little hands, and looked at me and said "Thank you."  (Or "thangoo") Justed melted my heart, she did.  Ah toddlers, they are so much fun.

Oh, boy.

It has come.

The daughter has uttered the H word.

OK, this isn't exactly mommy related, but for some reason this story gave me such a lift yesterday that I had to share it.  (I hope you can read it without registering.)

Japanese wives boot the bums out.

Basically, a significant change in Japan's divorce laws has empowered Japanese women to take charge of their own lives.

The most critical piece of advice about parenthood that no one bothered to tell me, and that I now make sure to tell every new mother I know, is that Everything Changes.  Again and again and again.

I am constantly surprised, and to own the truth annoyed, by how previously set patterns of parenthood-related behavior can change overnight.  Sleep patterns, food preferences, you name it.  JUST when you think you've got a handle on this whole mommy thing, BAM.

Today was the first day of a really big change in our household.  My husband has started a new job.  He works in IT, and its seems that he changes job every other year.  (SO aggravating.  But I digress.)  Somehow, though, he has almost always managed to have a commute of less than 5 miles.  Can you imagine?  How sweet is that?  In DC traffic terms, its possibly the biggest employment benefit any job could offer.  However, with this new job, he is commuting all the way to Capitol Hill, and gasp, he has to take public transportation.  THis is having a remarkable impact on our family.  We expected some impact, but I wasn't really prepared.

The timeliness of this story takes my breathe away, especially after what happened to me at work today.  

Bloomberg financial services company has just been slapped with a class action lawsuit alleging systematic discrimination against pregnant woman.

EEOC Files Lawsuit Against Bloomberg

I have had a couple of very bad days.

Last Friday, my husband and I blithely set off for our first sonogram.  Since I'm only 7 weeks pregnant (according to the calendar, mind you), it occurred to me that this one was a lot earlier than with my first pregnancy.  But my doctor or her aide (since I had only talked to the aide so far, not the doctor!) hadn't mentioned any concerns about the pregnancy to me, so it never occurred to me to be worried.

I have strange reactions to being pregnant.

I get irrationally angry when people guess that I'm pregnant.  I'm only 6 weeks along, so there is no baby bump to be seen yet.  However, a woman of a certain age is apparently not allowed to get sick.  I was in a training class for my new job, and I called in sick twice over the several week class with, I swear to God, food poisoning.  My stomach clearly does not like the salads in the cafeteria.  On the last day of class, I was told by well-meaning, perfectly lovely classmates (ironically, as I was on the phone checking my messages to see if the doctor had called with my results) that there are bets out on whether or not I'm pregnant.  I was so peeved, I have been trying to figure out ways to hide my pregnancy for as long as frickin' possible so as to delay proving all these people right.  (I have excellent precedent for this--I didn't tell work about my first pregancy until I was 5.5 months along.  And I only did it then because they wanted to send me to India.)  I get very angry at the thought of hearing them say "we knew it!!!"  For god's sake, why can't food poisoning just be food poisoning?

What a fascinating article in today's NYTimes (free registration required):

On the Trail With Daddy

The juggling acts portrayed in this article certainly make mine seem tame in comparison.  Interestingly, I find myself torn about which approach is the "best" approach.  The Edwardses are taking their kids all over the country but they see them every day, whereas the Obamas and the Dodds are leaving their kids behind and keeping them in the safe world of their routine.

So, who else heard about this study?

Preschoolers like McDonalds!

Basically, it boils down to the simple fact that kids as young as THREE YEARS OLD will choose food wrapped up in MickeyD's packaging over the exact same food without the package almost every time.

This is a working mom's lament.

On July 4th, we took our DD down to the National Mall for the Smithsonian Folklife Festival (NOT the fireworks--been there, done that, never again.)  In the Northern Ireland section, they had a woman teaching the audience an Irish reel.  Fairly simple dance:  two steps forward, then back, then switch and then go around the circle.  DD was MESMERIZED.  She walked right up to the dance floor to watch, and then she started doing the dance!  She took a few steps forward, then a few back, and then did it again. When the lesson was over, she grabbed my hand and ran on the dance floor to dance some more.  Cutest thing, ever!

Clearly, my 2 year old needs dance classes.  Right?