rachel weisz is takin' the chill road

According to this reliable source,Rachel Weisz says that European women drink while pregnant and that it's "fine." (In England, "one to two units" a week have been declared acceptable for expectant moms). Nice to see a laid back celeb mom. If only Weisz' knowledge of fetal development was as rock solid as her performance in The Constant Gardener we could all imbibe with a little more confidence.

Posted by ceridwen at 2:08 PM | Comments (1)

Nancy Pelosi's To Do List

Thank you Judith Warner for always driving the question of motherhood stress and anxiety away from playground politics and back to real politics:

"... if, as Ms. Pelosi has repeatedly said, she’ll be taking up the speaker’s gavel 'on behalf of America’s children,' there’s a lot of work to do. For children can’t thrive if their families are stressed and, at every point on the socioeconomic spectrum now, it seems that American families are cracking at the seams. read more"

Posted by ceridwen at 1:39 PM | Comments (0)

breaking news

Forget the senate race in Virginia, forget rubbernecking Rummy's downfall and please turn immediately to the Style section of the New York Times for this important story: There are some affluent moms who like to get together on Friday evenings with some other affuent moms and their children and have a couple-- are you ready?--glasses of wine!

These suburban ragers are apparently a kind of rebellion against perfection. Is it really that big of a transgression? This kind of behavior to me is like, bare-bones civilized life (luckily a few moms and some sort of alcohol anthropologist from Brown chime in with words to this effect).

The article questions whether these parties are a throw back to the mothers-little-helper vibe of the 1950s. As I was reading about this parallel, I must say I wanted to reach for the vodka. The tone of the argument conjured a kind of Victorian cautionary tale of the mother who went "Gin Mad," abandoned her children and jumped in the Thames. Such a buzz kill. I guess there's some issue about motherhood not being fulfilling enough which is exactly *the point* of the wine-cooler community throw down.

My only real beef with the cocktail mother scene is, do we really have to have a "momtini" garnished with a pacifier? I'm not sure that represents a departure from parenting. And if there's some issue about the driving, where are the working dads on Friday night? This seems a perfect opportunity for them to "pitch in"!

Posted by ceridwen at 10:40 AM | Comments (0)