He's a good kid. Really.

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John's going through this phase where, if he gets too angry, he loses control and starts swinging.

10 Things I Love About Being Pregnant

I realized in my love/hate pregnancy post I just complained and didn't mention anything I love about being pregnant. Overall, I give a big thumbs down to pregnancy. But I do love:

10. Parking in the for “for pregnant women” spots. (Well, they’re only at Babies R Us... I wonder if they've started sell milk and bread?)

9. Not being able to do killer workouts.

8. Eating a bowl of ice cream every night. (You have to do that when you're pregnant, didn't you know that?)

7. Having a baby that makes no noise and requires no diaper changes or midnight feedings.

6. Hearing Ben say, “We need in a girl in this house,” after his initial disappointment (O.K., anger) that it wasn't a boy.

5. Watching Ben run around the family room singing, “We’re having a baby sister, we’re having a baby sister.”

4. Knowing I have one of my own coming as I hold, smell and kiss my friend’s four-month-old baby (no I didn’t eat him up, even though I wanted to).

3. OK, I admit it, I'm one of those pregnant women who can't get enough $ex.

2. Seeing my husband go out of his way to make my life easier, helping more and more with the kids, waiting on me, cooking more, and not complaining about it. (Now if he'd only change the kitty litter and take out the trash!)

1. Feeling kicks after a period of stillness and thinking, "There’s my girl.”

Ah, Pregnancy. You Gotta Love/Hate It

Pregnancy robs my body of all oils, and as a side effect, I can go five days without washing my hair and it doesn’t get greasy. Don’t ask me how I know this.

Brian had a long weekend, so he’s home today. But Friday, I did too much. It was Brian’s birthday, and I went grocery shopping with the boys, baked a Boston creme pie (Duncan Hines), washed and dried a bunch of lettuce and other vegetables, went up and down the stairs, to the pantry and the playroom, about a billion times.

By Friday night I had a backache and a strange pressure in my pelvis. Add to this an irresponsible four sets of forward lunges I did Thursday morning, which by Friday night left my legs and butt cheeks twitching with pain. (Hmmm... twitching butt cheeks, what kind of google searches will that bring in?)

A word of advice: If you have a strange pregnancy symptom and it’s midnight, DO NOT pull out your copy of What to Expect When You're Expecting and start reading about it. The book had me convinced my baby was about to fall out at any moment, and that I should get up and go to the emergency room immediately. Why do I even own that book?

I was too tired to move, so I just laid there and worried. The next morning I checked in with the doctors, and they told me to stay on the couch and monitor kicks. So that was my weekend. Poor Brian ended up dealing with the kids and everything on his birthday weekend. But we are relieved that the aching and pressure seems to have passed. I really wanted to just go in Saturday morning and be checked so I could relax, but they didn’t want to do that for some reason.

Yesterday marked the end of my 20th week of pregnancy. This pregnancy is going by VERY. SLOWLY. Late winter/early spring is always a slow time of year for me. Of course pregnancy slows it down to a crawl. And this weekend has renewed my miscarriage paranoia.

Enough complaining, though. We had the Starz channel for free this weekend, so we recorded a bunch of movies, including Cold Mountain. My mom came over yesterday and cooked us a steak dinner. Did I mention she’s the best?

It’s snowing here, Brian and the kids are watching Finding Nemo (which scared Ben last night so we had to turn it off -- the same kid who begged me to rent Iron Giant at the library last week). I’m going to get another cup of coffee. It should be a good day.

Let’s Keep It Real, Todd

We have three or four Todd Parr books, and the boys love them. I do too, for the most part. But two of the books have pages that annoy me.

Brian and I are not the most politically correct household. We have some of Brian’s children’s books from the ‘50s and ‘60s. One pictures a hunter shooting Harp seals (yes, Harp seals) and another has children playing cowboys and Indians with realistic-looking play guns.

I don’t go out of my way to show my boys hunters and stereotyping shoot-out scenes. Quite the opposite. I’m strict about what they can watch and read. Ben’s one of the few boys in his class who hasn’t seen Pokemon or watched a PG movie.

We also have lots of recent children’s books. Last year I stumbled on a huge sale at Bookcloseouts, 50 percent off children’s books, so I spent about $150 on a library for the boys. With this stock of books and trips to the library, I hope to instill in them a love of reading that will take them beyond the violent, sexist culture that TV teaches to children.

So back to Todd Parr. His books tend to be silly but they also appear to want to teach tolerance and acceptance. That’s great, but I think sometimes Parr takes these goals and oversteps reality.

For instance, in The Okay Book, each page has statements like, “It’s okay to cry,” “It’s okay to live in a small house,” “It’s okay to be scared.” Great message. But then there’s a page that says, “It’s okay to be skinny,” with “It’s okay to be big,” on the facing page.

When I first read this to Ben, he corrected me and said, “Fat! She’s fat.” Sure, "fat" is the more accurate word, but it’s not acceptable to call people fat, because it can hurt feelings. So I explained that to him. But my problem with that page is, why is it okay to call someone “skinny”? Isn’t that the opposite of fat, and hence just as offensive? If the fat person is “big,” why isn’t the skinny person “small,” or even “thin,” or “slender”?

Then there’s The Mommy Book. In this one, Parr explains that, “Some mommies drive minivans,” while, “Some mommies drive motorcycles.” “Some mommies like to cook,” while “Some mommies like to order pizza.” Then there’s the obligatory, “Some mommies work at home,” while “Some mommies work in big buildings.”

Before I even read this book, my all-time favorite babysitter read it to the kids, and her five-year-old daughter pointed out the obvious. “All mommies work at home!” she said, proud of herself for finding such a blatant mistake in a published book.

That’s right, Melissa, and I would guess that all mommies like to order pizza, too, at least sometimes.

Where Has the Quiet Time Gone?

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At the pediatrician last week, the doctor asked me where John slept and I told her his crib. "Do you like your crib?" she asked him.

Drumroll, Please ...

It's a girl! And everything else looks good, too.

The technician told us there's a 5 percent chance that it is a boy with hiding testicles, but I just covered my ears and said, "La, la, la..."

She has the back of her hand up against her forehead. I think she's practicing her dramatic, "What am I gonna do with these brothers?" look.

Pre-ultrasound Jitters

I’ve already said that I hope to have a daughter. Today, we go to Boston for the level 2 ultrasound. We should find out the sex. I’m nervous.

Of course, it’s a different kind of anxiety than the miscarriage fear. I want this baby, no matter what sex. I pray that it’s healthy, and that the rest of the pregnancy and the delivery go smoothly.

Also, though? I want a daughter. If this baby is a boy, then I will most likely never have a daughter. We will probably stop at three kids, and after three boys, the odds of baby four being a girl would probably be slim anyway.

I’m trying to prepare myself, to maintain my perspective on things so I don't get too upset at the sight of a little floating penis on the ultrasound screen. As long as it’s healthy, as long as it’s healthy ...

But if we do see that penis, I will be disappointed. Not devastated, just sad. Then I'll get over it, and start washing the blue and green newborn clothes for round three.

Please think healthy-baby thoughts for me today, OK? And girl thoughts. Man, I’ll be glad when this ultrasound is over!

Oh, Tivo. Why Do You Treat Me So?

When my husband first described Tivo to me, I said, “I want it. Now.” Ever since Ben came into our lives, our evening routine included me yelling, “Oh, yeah, Survivor’s on!” while getting Ben into his feety pajamas at 8:03 p.m., prompting Brian to fly downstairs to fumble with videotapes and set the VCR. Then we’d watch Survivor, only to find out we’d taped over That 70s Show. Aargh!

Also, Ben never watched TV for the first few years of his life. I liked to attribute that to my superior parenting skills, but in reality, the few shows that held his attention were never on when I needed them, and I had yet to build up my arsenal of 248 kids' videotapes.

A few months later, for our 10th anniversary, we got Tivo. In the year and a half since then, I’ve watched about 11 commercials. Yes, Tivo has changed my life.

Real-time TV just doesn’t cut it anymore. Sunday night, Tivo had nothing for us, so Brian and I ventured into live TV. We started getting into this show, Steve Somebody’s Amazing Tricks or something like that. But every two minutes, the commercials started, and then the announcer kept talking! Like, he wouldn’t shut up! So I kept hitting fast forward, and Tivo made that gong! sound, and I got all confused until I remembered: Real time sucks!

Many of the shows I now watch, I would never watch live. I’m not a cold-hearted person, but I do not have enough tears in me to sit through another entire episode of Extreme Home Makeover. As much as I love What Not to Wear, I can’t watch another ungrateful fashion ingrate sulk her way through her $5,000 spending spree. Though I do like to fantasize about hiring an interior decorator from Designer’s Challenge, I must pass on the obligatory trip to the tile/cabinetry/furniture store to watch these spoiled yuppies blow their budget. So, yes, I like the quickie that Tivo affords.

Tivo even makes baseball and football, the two sports that I hate the most, somewhat enjoyable to watch. A three-and-a-half-hour football game? Not anymore! Baseball, a slow sport? Not in my house! (Of course, winning the Super Bowl and the World Series didn’t hurt, either.)

But lately, Tivo has begun to taunt me. For instance, it:

• Insists on recording Intimate Portrait, even though I have given it no indication whatsoever that I would watch such a show.

• Keeps taping shows on Spanish stations. You know, shows in which people speak Spanish? I don’t speak Spanish.

• Tapes movies on pay channels that we don’t get. So, I’ll see Secret Window in the Now Playing list, get all excited (yeah, a Johnny Depp movie), hit play, and see... black. That’s just unkind.

• Stops recording high-priority shows on our Season Pass for no apparent reason. For the last two weeks, Tivo has refused to tape Arthur. Why? To make my life a living hell, that’s why.

• Takes 23 minutes to process any changes to the recording schedule, aka, the Season Pass Manager. So, say we are hunting around Tivo for something to watch, right? Then we choose something and hit record. Then, say we take the bait when Tivo offers to put the show on the Season Pass roster. Well, now we've done it. We have to get out a book to read, have sex (yeah, right, my husband would say), or (more likely) go take a nap before we can resume our TV watching. No really, the delay is that obnoxious.

Still, Tivo and I will never part ways. Even shows I watch all the way through, like the Apprentice, Survivor or the Amazing Race, benefit from zipping through openings songs, weekly recaps and, of course, commercials. I could never go back to fumbling with videotapes and being a slave to a network’s schedule.

So, Tivo? When I called you a piece of shit the other day, and threw the remote across the room last night? I didn't really mean it. Even though you mistreat me, I'll always need you.