If you’ve commented recently and it never showed up, please go back and take a look again. I set my comments to “moderate” because I was getting so much spam, but apparently it hasn’t been letting me know when there are comments to be moderated, because I just fished a bunch out and published them!

Ten years ago, when my oldest son was a newborn, I remember some extremely frustrating shopping trips. When it came to stylish and well-made baby products, it seemed that the pickings were pretty slim.

From strollers to baby carriers, most everything was powder pink, baby blue, or an unfortunate combination of teal, purple and fuchsia. Prints were juvenile (like teddy bears), ugly (geometric shapes) or both (teddy bears wearing sweaters decorated with geometric shapes). It was as though baby-products manufacturers felt the need to loudly announce that the baby inside the stroller had sucked out her mother’s sense of style.

But things have changed a lot in 10 years. Featuring trendy prints, a variety of fabric and color choices, and an ever-growing price tag, diaper bags began to rival designer purses. Instead of uncomfortable, bulky, and just plain ugly baby carriers, you can now buy slings to coordinate with your wardrobe and match your lifestyle: satin for dressy occasions, fleece for cold, mesh for wearing in the shower or pool.

Strollers have become much more than just a way to push Baby from point A to point B. With model names that sound like they belong at an upscale car dealership, these strollers are stylish, sleek and sexy.

And even though our sturdy, not too ugly, and reasonably-priced old Graco held up remarkably well through four babies’ worth of walks and my youngest is almost old enough not to need it for much longer, last fall I found myself staring enviously at other mothers’ strollers. I saw them everywhere: at the park, at the coffee shop, at the zoo: modern, hip little-person transporters with funky minimalist design and cool features like clip-on umbrellas and all-terrain wheels.

After a while I had to face the facts: I had major stroller envy.

It wouldn’t be a total waste to buy a new stroller, I reasoned with myself: after all, it might encourage me to go for more walks, which would be healthy for me and stimulating for Owen. And I’d been making do with this old ride for almost ten years. Didn’t Owen deserve a three-position seat? Didn’t I need a swiveling cup holder?

But I was in for a rude awakening when I jumped onto the Internet to do a little comparison shopping. The stroller I’d been eyeballing cost $900, and that was WITHOUT the cup holder or clip-on umbrella.

Of course, as it turns out, my hankering for a $1,000 baby buggy is small potatoes. Recently gossip blogs and columns publicized Jennifer Lopez’s baby registry, which includes a $3500 baby carriage. At first, I rolled my eyes at her extravagance. Then I realized that, considering J-Lo is worth over $100 million, her buying a $3500 stroller is roughly equivalent to me picking one up at the dollar store.

When you have kids, it’s easy to start thinking of yourself as frumpy and unfashionable. It starts to feel pointless, styling your hair and wearing great shoes just to chase your kids around all day, and it’s easy to begin that morph into a person who wears “fancy sweats” to work and never gives up the 90s’ Rachel-from-Friends hairdo. Maybe pushing a high-end stroller is one easy way to look like you’re still “with it” even when you’re with a kid - or four - all day.

But splurge on a spendy stroller and where do you stop? Pretty soon you’re hankering after cashmere spit-up rags and suede diapers. Unfortunately, no amount of expensive fabric on her backside is going to change the fact that a baby is, overall, a pretty unglamorous little creature. And a high-end stroller may provide a smoother ride, but it’s not going to make the road of parenthood any less bumpy. While I’m all about buying quality stuff, it just feels wasteful to spend so much money on something that’ll be peed, pooped, and puked on, and used for a relatively short time.

As for myself, while I still have the occasional bout of stroller envy, I decided to save myself $800 and splurged on a pair of warm, comfy, and supportive boots instead. I guess I could feel guilty that I invested in shock absorption for my feet rather than Owen’s stroller ride, but the fact is, I need it more: after all, I’ll be running after him and his brothers long after he’s outgrown it.

Chris is embarking on a neat project–a year without buying anything she doesn’t need.

I thought about doing something similar over a year ago, when we were still living in a tiny town in Michigan. I was going to commit myself to only buying products from local artisans, farmers, craftspeople, etc; and then if I couldn’t get the item actually MADE locally, I would only buy it from a locally-owned business.

That seemed like a real challenge when I lived in a rural town of 3,000 people. Now that I’m here in Chicago, it seems like it would be more akin to shooting fish in a barrel. But Chris has gotten me inspired and once again thinking about ways to cut down consumption while still supporting local businesses.

So if you have a pulse, a TV, or an internet connection (I’m guessing you have three) you probably know about the latest Britney Spears drama, at least peripherally. Many of you will have clicked a link or visited a celebrity gossip site and read the account of her standoff with the police, or perhaps even seen pictures of her being loaded into an ambulance.

I know I did. Though I’ve never been into People magazine or OK! or In Touch or any of the other celeb gossip rags, a few months ago I started visiting a celebrity gossip site with some regularity. It was snarky, mean, and often downright hilarious, and I got in the habit of checking in every morning while having my cup of tea to laugh at the antics of Paris and Lindsay and Britney.

Somewhere along the line, though, the Britney story went from “oh-no-she-didn’t!” hilarious to just plain sad. The fact is, something is wrong there. Whether it’s substance addition, a postpartum mood disorder, mental illness or she’s just self-destructing before our very eyes, we are witnessing somebody’s very public demise. And those of us who are clicking the links, reading the blogs and looking at the pictures? We’re participating by creating a demand and a market, turning that downward spiral into mass entertainment.

I’m not willing to be a part of it anymore. It won’t be easy…reading the latest Brit story has become as habitual as my daily caffeine fix. But think what you will of Britney, there are children involved here. If we don’t stop looking, we are just as guilty as the paparazzi. After all, in a roundabout way we’re the ones who pay their fees. And once the Britney story reaches its conclusion, who’s next?

So? I’m out. No more celeb blogs. No more pictures. They’re off my favorites list as of today.

Anybody with me?

–Cross-posted at Chicago Moms Blog

I’ve chosen a winner for the Mom Pick-Up Line contest, but with so many great (and clever) suggestions, it was not an easy task.

But though I’d love to reward everyone who entered, let’s get real here: we moms all know how dreadful a trip to the post office with all of our children can be. Now picture that same trip with not one, but FOURTEEN packages to mail out. I just broke out in a cold sweat.

Anyway, the winner is…

(drumroll please…)

Sandy from Momisodes! Her entry, ““Dad isn’t home during the day. I have snacks and DVDs. Wanna come over?” is reminiscient of a coy teenage make-out session suggestion, so any mom with a sense of humor would get the joke.

Sandy’s prize is a signed copy of either Table for Eight or the Everything Postpartum book, plus some other goodies I got from BlogHer including:

A Carseat Couture cup/water bottle cover in an adorable reversible pink leopard/pink toile print. Due to raging testosterone levels in my house, pink anything just isn’t well-received around here, particularly when I try to wrap it around my eight-year-old son’s water bottle on his way to baseball practice. Who knew?

My Baby Can Talk sign language for babies DVD. (I kept meaning to get around to teach my babies sign language, but then they just kept GROWING UP…)

Thanks again to everyone who entered–make sure to go read their comments, click through to visit their blogs, and most importantly, use their pick-up lines! A mom can never have too many friends.

It’s come to my attention that some of my comments are getting lost in cyberspace. I have it set up so that if you haven’t commented before, your first comment will be moderated because I get a lot of spam on here. However, that doesn’t seem to be working, because some comments seem to be getting eaten by the moderating process!

So I’m going to remove comment moderation and just see how it goes. In the meanwhile, I’m going to re-open my “Mom Pick-Up Lines” comment contest through this Sunday, December 16, just in case anybody’s responses were lost. If you have any trouble commenting, drop me a line and let me know!

When my oldest child was a toddler and I wasn’t sure how to structure my time as a new at-home mom, I took to a life in front of the TV: “Teletubbies,” then a talk show or two, followed by back-to-back episodes of “Designing Women” and “The Golden Girls” on Lifetime.

Fun for a few days. Pretty depressing after a few months.

So I went to a few morning playgroups to let Jacob toddle around while I had some adult conversation. The groups were generally held at a park, church nursery or other kid-oriented location, the other moms and I would all sit on benches or chairs facing the kids (not each other), make small talk and comment on their behavior, development or disposition. Because we were so focused on what the kids were doing, it was difficult to strike up meaningful conversations. Or, frankly, have much fun.

So I was intrigued when I read an article in the New York Times earlier this year about “cocktail playgroups”: informal hang-outs where moms enjoy a glass of wine or a beer while they watch the kids play. Reactions around the Internet were mixed, with some moms simply aghast: Drinking around children? Isn’t that, like, dangerous? And aren’t play groups supposed to be fun for KIDS, not moms?

A while later I heard about a new event called Baby Loves Disco. (events here in Chicago, ya’ll!) It’s a mid-afternoon music party where parents and kids can get their groove on, complete with lights and loud-ish music in a real, but childproofed, nightclub (note: adults can only come if they bring kids with them). Cool idea, huh? Not according to some critics, who accuse the founders of trying to “replicate the adult clubbing experience” for children, and who accuse parents of being too permissive, trying to be a friend instead of a parent and just in general setting a bad example.

Personally? I don’t think this is really about alcohol, loud music or permissiveness. I think that many people have gotten the idea that when you have kids, your life is supposed to revolve around them at all times. The message is clear: whether it’s drinks or music or dancing, any activity you can bring your kids to that doesn’t revolve 100 percent around their entertainment and needs is just plain wrong. The only fun you’re supposed to have around kids, if you listen to these sanctimonious types, is the kind that comes from putting together puzzles or playing Candy Land for the 195th time. Or - shudder - listening to Kidz Bop.

When I was a kid, my siblings and cousins were rounded up at a family members’ house and sent to the play room to amuse ourselves while our parents hung out and did grown-up stuff (talking=boring!). Babies and toddlers would stay with the adults and get passed around, and the older kids and grown-ups might intermingle or they might not, but it was understood that kids and adults could co-exist in the same place and each have their own kind of fun.

But in this day and age, the family hangout has largely been replaced by separate activities for grown-ups and kids: if you’re going someplace that might include adult fun, kids stay at home with a sitter, and if you’re planning an event for kids, it should by definition NOT appeal to grown-ups. What you end up with is kids and adults being separated into their own little worlds and wanting to poke out their own eyes from boredom whenever those worlds collide. Gee, what a treat for everyone involved.

Our lives are so often consumed by our kids: what they’re eating, what they’re wearing, what they’re playing. Why should we feel obligated to get a sitter every time we want to do something that’s not completely geared toward children? As long as everybody keeps their wits about them - which yes, you can do if you drink, or dance, responsibly - what’s the big deal? It’s your right not to have a drink or shake your booty around your kids if you feel like it’s not good for them. But please know that I can have fun, do grown-up stuff and still be a responsible parent. And no, I don’t try to relive my adolescence through my kids. I already went through youth once, and the kids are welcome to it. But as much as I want them to have their own kind of fun, I also want them to see how the adult world works. And that’s not going to happen if we only spend time together at Chuck E Cheese.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got to go reserve tickets for a Baby’s First Martini party.

Just kidding.

–cross-posted at the Chicago Moms Blog

Okay, so it’s November 30, and as you can see I did not blog every day this month. A few things happened that got in my way and overall it’s been a much busier month than I anticipated.

I also did not finish a novel. However, after intially dropping out of NaNoWriMo, I decided to opt back in…sorta. No, I did not write 50,000 words of junk just to get it on a page, but I did add over 21,000 words to 17,000 I’d already slowwwly written on a novel I started back in 2002–revising as I typed (I’ve realized that I, personally, can’t do it any other way. I would rather take more time with a first draft than face an enormous rewrite later).

38,000+ words of a novel and more attention to fiction in the past month than I’ve given it in four years? Well, that’s definitely something. I may not win any t-shirts or trophies or get a banner to put on my site, but I may actually finish this thing, and it may actually wind up being somewhat readable. I guess the take-away lesson is to figure out what works for you…and just do it. If you end up writing more, writing better, or branching out into a new kind of writing you’ve always meant to tackle but just haven’t found the time, it’ll be way worth the effort. And, at the risk of sounding extremely cheesy, you’ll be a winner.

From my column this week:

When you look at the reality of a mom’s busy - sometimes hectic - life, you can see that it isn’t always easy to stay upbeat and positive.

Circumstances and events both big and little - like that stressful parent-teacher conference or the diaper that exploded while waiting to check out with a full cart at the grocery store - can add up and start to bring you down, until you just want to dive into a bag of M&Ms and stay there until they’re all in college.

It may sound trite, but I’ve found that a little dose of gratitude - focusing on what’s going right in your life and what blessings you enjoy - can provide some perspective and help lighten moods when even a glass of Shiraz can’t.

Of course, when you’re swimming in the depths of diapers and homework, it can be hard to even start to come up with a list of things to be grateful for. I’m having one of those weeks myself.

In these circumstances, I find that taking a “well, at least X didn’t happen” approach can be helpful. No matter how bad the situation, after all, we can always be grateful that it wasn’t even more awful. In the spirit of the Thanksgiving season, I’d like to share my list of recent Things That Could Have Been Worse:

It Was Pretty Bad When: During a trip to Target, my toddler decided his cart seat belt was a torture device and spent the entire trip pulling on it and screaming at the top of his lungs.

But At Least: I could legitimately pretend not to hear her when the cashier asked - twice - if I was SURE I wouldn’t like to open a credit account and save 10 percent off my purchase.

It Was Pretty Bad When: My kids (and my sister’s kids … and my brother’s kids) got a 24-hour stomach virus during our last family get-together

But At Least: I got sick too, so I got to stay in bed while Jon cleaned up all the vomit and washed the sheets and towels.

It Was Pretty Bad When: Owen wrote all over our off-white sofas with a pink marker.

But At Least: I got to test the trick of using shaving cream to get out stains of furniture, and found out that it works. (Blot, apply the cream for 30 minutes, scrape off and blot again - try it next time your kid applies marker to fabric!)

It Was Pretty Bad When: My fourth-grade son brought home a math worksheet so confusing that he couldn’t figure out how to do it, and worse yet, I was incapable of helping him with it.

But At Least: I - er, I mean HE - totally aced the vocabulary and spelling words.

It Was Pretty Bad When: My second-grader ate all his remaining Halloween candy and then bounced around the room non-stop for an hour.

But At Least: He removed the chocolate temptation from the house - otherwise I may have done the same thing.

It Was Pretty Bad When: I got a call informing me that one of my kids had been - how shall I put this - showing his “junk” to other kids on the playground.

But At Least: He was wearing new underwear at the time.

I don’t know about you, but I’m feeling better already! From now on, I’m going to try to use this tactic while I’m in the thick of any parental crisis. For example, if my 4-year-old throws a public tantrum because I won’t buy him a new toy, I’ll think “Well, at least his head isn’t spinning around!”

Of course, there is always a big potential drawback. Any time you say “well, at least my child isn’t doing X,” chances are good that he or she will start doing that very thing. That might even include revolving heads.

I guess I’ll play it safe and simply say that I am grateful that right now I have four healthy children who - most of the time - are charming, adorable, fun, and make their mom glad to be around every one of them.

And for those other times? I’m grateful for Shiraz.

In honor of Thanksgiving, over at LargerFamilies.com we’re writing about gratitude all month. What does “being thankful” mean to you, and how do you cultivate a sense of gratitude in your own homes and lives? Come on over and tell us!