• Last updated 3/20/13 by mamazee

When I was a young girl, there were a handful of women that I had my own relationship with. My own mother had very good women friends and she encouraged me to have my own one-on-one connection with them. There was Victoria who lived across the walk street; I would cross the sidewalk to her house, we would make strawberry smoothies and play Monopoly on her front porch. There was Candace, a gorgeous thesbian filled with imagination; Candace sewed me a gold velvet Christmas stocking, took me to a grown-up cafe, and took me ice-skating. Victoria and... read more

• Last updated 8/12/10 by Jennifer Margulis

Lava Beds National MonumentA few weeks ago we went camping at Lava Beds National Monument with another family. The kids ran around like puppies and we grown-ups sat in the shade and talked. I told our friends about my daughter’s teacher. Hesperus’s first grade teacher was one year from retirement when she found out the cancer she had battled years before had come back. Lynnette died four months after she was diagnosed. She was 59 years old. When I called her husband to offer my condolences he told me Lynnette had so many plans for her retirement, that she had watched... read more

• Last updated 8/25/10 by Kristen Tea

I shared a bed with my son from the time he was 2 weeks old until he was about 16 months.  For the first 2 weeks I kept him in a little old bassinet by my bed, with me sleeping on the edge, keeping a hand on him at all times.  I didn’t fully trust my sleep deprivation, so that felt like a safer option for me.  I adored sleeping with my new babe; it was so easy to roll over & nurse him instead of having to drag myself out of bed & stumble down a hall to retrieve him from a seperate room, & there is nothing sweeter than waking up to the sounds of your little one breathing... read more

• Last updated 8/10/10 by Jennifer Margulis

Etani shows signs of being a budding photographer as we trek 2,980 miles from Ashland, Oregon to New York City, New YorkWhy do I have to spend four hours on this airplane? And why is that man in the seat behind me holding his temples? And why, I wonder, did they put me and my brother and my mom in the very last row?You may think this is a photograph of Atlas holding up the world with Saint Patrick's Cathedral (the seat of the Catholic church) in the background but it's actually pornography. What other scantily clad man is a naked woman allowed to admire? What do you... read more

• Last updated 8/9/10 by Jennifer Margulis

That long pause was me taking my 6-year-old son and 9-month-old daughter to a work conference in New York City … about blogging. I took Etani because it was his turn to come on a trip with me. We have a lot of family in New York City and he got to spend lots of time with his cousins. “We should stay for three weeks,” he declared, sorry when it was time to go home. Thunderstorms in Denver diverted us to Wichita, Kansas, and we missed our connection back to Oregon. It was almost midnight last night when we checked into an understaffed hotel 25 minutes from the... read more

• Last updated 11/30/10 by Mothering Editorial

By Mary K. EggertIssue 119, July/August 2003 Now with a holy host of others standing 'round me . . . -James Taylor, "Carolina in My Mind," © 1968, EMI Songs, Ltd. Sometimes when I look at my niece, a small crowd gathers. And it is good--so very good--to see them. Some in the crowd are the "regulars" in my life; I find her mother in the angle the four-year-old's eyelashes form at the corner of her eye, and her father in the tuck of her mouth. Others I spend less time with, because of distances geographical or sometimes personal--an absence very present... read more

• Last updated 3/13/11 by Mothering Editorial

By Lindsey Rock Issue 120, September/October 2003 I was living in New York City, where I'd just completed a two-year theater studies program. A Canadian with an expiring student visa, I lived with my boyfriend, Jared, a US citizen who worked at one of Manhattan's countless Starbucks and played guitar in a band. Our plans were nonexistent beyond making it to the end of October, when our lease was up and the future would be ours. But the summer after graduation, when I was home in Edmonton, Alberta, on vacation, the stick turned blue-and I discovered, to my shock and... read more

• Last updated 11/28/10 by Mothering Editorial

By Lisa Agnew Web Exclusive When, at two-and-a-half years old, my daughter Caitlin was tentatively diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome, I had a shuddering, almost cathartic moment. As the pediatrician went through the symptoms of the condition, I was gradually putting two and two together, realizing that this syndrome, this condition, this word, was something that had haunted the female side of my family for three generations. Now my daughter had a label for this predominantly social affliction. Yet would it help her cope any better than her forebearers had coped, I... read more

• Last updated 11/28/10 by Mothering Editorial

By Katharine BealsWeb Exclusive One afternoon last spring Nancy walks into her studio and finds it ransacked. Portraits and still-lifes are smeared with cadmium red. Paint tubes are smashed, as are the Krispy Kreme donuts and homegrown squash that she brings to life on canvas. A lock left unlatched for five minutes; a studio laid bare to the visual and tactile cravings of her severely autistic son. Hours pass before Nancy has the heart to mop up. A few days later she milks this story for all its humor over tea in her kitchen, the setting for many long... read more

• Last updated 3/20/13 by mamazee

Humbled once again. I’m in a clothing store. I’ve “set the stage” (unfortunately, I did not do a recent reminder about this concept…) with my children that we buy what they need, so this means that they may or may not get the same thing as the other. As in, older sister has outgrown her flats and needs new shoes. Younger brother has a plethera of fitting shoes as he gets hand-me-downs from an only child two years his senior. He will not be getting shoes today. Younger brother needs another plaid shirt since he has one and has worn it twelve days in a... read more