In the past week, a couple things have happened in my world. First, we learned that our 5 1/2-year-old needs a nap after school. Luckily, it only took us two days to realize what was going on. Unluckily, we haven’t figured out how to make it really work yet, so sometimes it happens, and sometimes…it…
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Fragility and Indestructibility
This is a post about this boy… …who yesterday, while I was running siblings to various lessons, punched (yes, I did say punched) the light switch in the kitchen, with this result: But at three this morning, the cries started up in his room. I hauled myself out of bed and across the hallway to…
Read MoreA Message for Young Moms From Someone with A Little More Experience
The day school let out for Christmas, I walked seven kids, ages 5 to 11, about a mile from school to the mall, across nine lanes of traffic on one of the busiest roads in town, so we could ring the Salvation Army bell at JCPenney. And I wasn’t nervous about it. I knew it…
Read MoreThe Problem(s) With Mother’s Day
The problems with Mothers Day are legion. 1. It’s not fair to the dads. Mother’s day is way, way, way bigger a deal than Father’s Day, and that’s just not okay. 2. Everybody wants to give mom gifts for one day, make these adorable crafts that you’re expected to keep for all time, and it…
Read MoreThis Stage of Motherhood, In Four Pictures
1. Alex’s search for the meaning of life is carried out using the simplest of tools…like the wax tablet he made in his gifted program, where he has spent the last several weeks learning to utter such profundities as “May the Force Be With You” and “Stay out of my room”…in Latin. 2. Alex was assigned to…
Read MoreMore Post-Nap Cuteness
3:05 p.m. and I hear hands rattling the spokes on the stairs. “Hey, Munchkin, you up?” I call. “Yes.” Michael pads into my bedroom, where I’m channeling my childhood by writing while stretched out across my bed. “Mommy, why do you call me Munchkin?” “Because I like to call you loving, silly names. Like boo…
Read MoreMoments
And then, in the course of time, old rituals pass into new. My baby, no longer a baby, dresses himself now, refusing help until he’s worked his chubby arms into such a snarl within his fleece sweater that he can’t move. He runs for the van yelling “I, buckuh, mysef!” And he does it, too.…
Read MoreThen And Now
We stretched out across the front pew when we arrived at church Sunday morning, the boys (as usual) waging a silent war to sit by Mommy, who did not at all appreciate being consequently shoved so far to the end of the pew that there wasn’t room on the kneeler. When the fallout cleared, Nicholas…
Read MoreFading Into Memory
Bedtime on a Tuesday evening is a zoo. Christian is in the basement teaching piano. Julianna is listening to a Christmas sing-along CD (yes, still). Nicholas is endeavoring to stay in the tub until he develops hypothermia. In the other bathroom, Alex sounds like he’s making a movie in the shower, complete with sound effects,…
Read MoreMama Rabbit And Me
There’s a rabbit under the red maple in front of my house. It’s standing in a funny position, back legs on the grass, front legs up on the mulch. I’m about to turn away when suddenly there’s a flash of gray under its belly. A wiggle. Another flash. You know that cliché about hearts stopping?…
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Kathleen M. Basi 