I remembered the planetary parade while the kids brushed their teeth, so we grabbed coats piled into the car wearing pajamas. At the beach, red, orange, and yellow bands decorated the horizon in the wake of the sun. Along with the waxing moon hanging above us, we were able to spot four of the five planets on display that night–Mars, Venus, Mercury, and Jupiter. We … Continue reading Searching the Sky
Now, If you have an award here for someone who can carry a trunkful of grocery bags into the house without breaking a single egg, I’m your girl. A prize for knowing how many bowel movements each child has had on a given day and what their favorite flavor toothpaste is? Bam. Award for forgetting to brush a child’s teeth or going way too long between haircuts and nail trims? Yep. But Mother of the Year? Even the statuette I’m holding looks exhausted and fragile. Wait, is this supposed to look like me? Did you guys model this after the picture of me picking sand out of my eyes at the beach last summer? Is this just another plastic action figure for me to trip on? Continue reading MEGOT Status
Motherhood is messy. It’s mounds of mac ‘n’ cheese and macrame art. Motherhood magnifies mere mortals, makes Marian martyrs out of mall rats. Motherhood is a masquerade, a mission, a mirror. It’s the ministry of missing mittens. It mutates and metabolizes, muddles minds and mesmerizes. It’s the merging of meek and mighty. It’s malodorous and melodious. It’s midwinter mud pies and midweek mayhem. Motherhood is … Continue reading [The Beauty of] M[otherhood]
We learned lyrics to the fight songsang them in a sea of strangers on Saturday morningsthen, fueled by victory or losswe looped arms around each other’s shoulders and swayed to the softness of the alma mater.They told us if we walked into a crowded bar inBrazil and yelled, “Go Green!” someone would respond, “Go White!”because that’s what it means to be a Spartan.And we believed … Continue reading Midnight Scream
My hair has fallen out two more times since I had my daughter. I have peed my pants on multiple occasions, sometimes in public, often while running but also from sneezing (always because I didn’t do enough kegels). Almost nine years into motherhood, my body is still capricious. Fickle. Unforgiving. But this body has also nursed three babies. She has cared for feverish kiddos while wiping her own drippy nose and made broccoli cheese soup from scratch with a toddler strapped to her back. This is the body that kisses foreheads goodnight and dances in the living room after dinner. My body has been on a journey, but she’s returning as someone I recognize, someone I can rely on. Continue reading A Body I Can’t Trust
My 5:30 a.m. wake-up call babbles through the baby monitor. I groan, never ready to start the day so early. My husband rolls to face me and asks, “Do you mind if I go for a run?” A good wife would say yes right away, I think. But I pause before responding with a sigh. “No, that’s fine. Have fun.” We both know I’m struggling … Continue reading Tell Me What You Need
Last year started out with a bang (or perhaps that was the sound of my front driver’s side tire hitting the curb in the Starbuck’s parking lot, which I thought was no big deal, which caused my tire to slowly leak during my hour-long FaceTime call with my mom, which caused me to be stranded when the call was over)! So from January I will … Continue reading To Keeping It All
Over the last couple of years I’ve made reading a priority again and it’s been incredibly life-giving. I read 28 books in 2022 and loved many of them. Here are abbreviated thoughts on each book along with links to purchase. All links are Bookshop.org affiliate links give me a small monetary kickback if you purchase. I post reviews on Instagram as I read, and I’d love … Continue reading 2022 Reading List
I. I started working at a nursing home when I was 16, and the first winter I worked there, I forgot to ask for Christmas off. The residents needed to eat, and it was my job to pour their drinks, roll silverware into napkins, and do the dishes. While most teenagers would’ve been really excited about time-and-a-half pay, I felt guilty for derailing our family … Continue reading Four Christmases
Married, thirty-something mother of three seeks friends. Continue reading Wanted: Friendship
Melissa Kutsche 