A dear friend of mine is from England, now living in the U.S.  She sat in my living room recently, telling me that one of the hardest things to get used to in America has been the way that people spend so much time in their cars. 

In England, she told me, life was centered around smaller villages.  Mothers walked their children to school, because they lived close enough.  They walked to the market, and to church.  And it would be nearly unheard of to drive for 15 minutes to go shopping.

I'm moving. Err, we're moving. My family is moving. Most of my family is moving. Argh, it's complicated so I'll explain.

About six months ago, I started leaving comments on some forum posts and blog posts suggesting we were "considering a move to the Chicago area" and looked for Chicago area bloggers to add to my feedreader. A couple of months later, that "considering" thing changed to something that seemed more real, so the children were told.

As I keep reminding anybody who will listen to me, I will - gods willing - give birth in the very near future. It will be my second time 'round the childbirthing block, but I gotta say: this part (the preparing to give birth part, and, I assume, the birthing part itself) is none the easier for having been there before.

My heart sank when this morning's segment on the Today Show started off with Hoda Kotb announcing "... the growing popularity of... 'mommy blogs.'" She used air quotes, and everything. You could've substituted anything bizarre and mystifying in the quotations, actually. "Alien bloodsuckers," or "giant pink sea monsters," for example.

I turned to my husband. "This is not going to end well," I said.

But first, let me back up.

Cate was yelling at me. Again.

Every day it’s the same story. I pick Cate up from school and she happily shows me the new trick she can do on the peddle car; the stone she dug up in the sand pit; how many times she can hop the jump rope on one foot. We find Eden and start the ten minute walk home. By minute seven Cate is screaming about something. Anything.

After reading Denise's BlogHer post last week that the gift of maternal health is the perfect Mother's Day gift, I thought "this really is perfect!" I blogged it and suggested that not only is it a great cause, but it is also a great consumerism/stuff-free gift, something that I feel, in our consumerism-driven society, is so important, but so ofte