So Lila gets an invitation to a schoolmate’s birthday sleepover and before she can tumble off the bus good, she’s shoving the little glossy card in my hand: “Can I go, please, please, puh-leeze, Mommy?”

All that begging and you’d think I don’t let her go anywhere.

And er, um, you’d be right.

Yes, I raise my hand and readily admit that I’m a play date blocker. Like, on the highest levels. If I don’t know your mama, I haven’t been to your house for any significant length of time, I haven’t a clue who all lives there, and your kid’s home-training is a little questionable? Nope—my kid’s not coming over.

When we move out of this house we're only taking one crib with us. That's right: someone's getting himself a Big Boy Bed.

I'm not THAT nervous about it. For one thing, he's been sleeping in twin beds at both grandparents' house for over a year now. He still doesn't know what to do with a pillow and scorns the concept of blankets (WHY?) but he doesn't freak out and he falls asleep, and the thing I suppose most people worry about -- falling out -- has never happened. And if it did? Eh. He'd survive. I'm sure the spill he took on our front sidewalk today produced worse injuries than a potential bedtime crash.

Last week I posted some thoughts about the state of our public school system. I had just come from a great speech and I was all fired up for reform, improvements, and making quality education available to everyone...especially my own kids. Laylee had been complaining of boredom and, although she talks frequently about how much she loves her teacher, I was worried that in first grade, she was already falling prey to a broken system. I wondered, "Maybe the whole way that education is set up, funded and supported in this country is not meeting her needs and although I feel optimistic that change is on the way, maybe it will come too late for the current generation."

I didn't realize that education reform would be such a hot button issue. I mean, I know that people have wildly differing views on how we should conduct reform but I didn't think that stating it was needed would make people feel hurt or offended. I thought, "Obviously if nearly 30% of American students never graduate from high school, then something is wrong." If, as Jeff Raikes stated in his speech, "Right now, in the midst of a historic recession, there is a gap of at least 12,000 jobs in STEM fields in Washington [State]. Double-digit unemployment, yet STEM industries have to look overseas for workers," then something needs to change to prepare American students to step up and fill those jobs.

Is Nora (at 7 weeks in this pic) already getting gypped? 

I am the second child in my family and always felt like I got plenty of attention but now that I have my own second child I am suddenly feeling…short shrifted. How could I not have been? Not only was I the second child, I was the second girl. And I had colic! Obviously I got the hand-me-down clothes and never sat shotgun, but it’s more than that. With your first baby, motherhood is so new and exciting and scary and all encompassing. Number two is exciting, of course, but there just isn’t as much time to revel in it. Because you’re divided—your attention is divided, your patience is divided, your threshold for crap is divided (though, miraculously, not your love...that just doubles). You can’t possibly be everything to your number two because number one is still there demanding that you make him pancakes...with strawberries not bananas! 

In our little family the SCS began before Nora was even born—if it weren’t for the project pregnancy blog (and the Cheetos cravings) I would barely have noticed I was pregnant. I never even got on the web to see if she was the size of a lemon or a squash or a grapefruit. With Alex, I couldn’t tear myself away from that stuff. And since her arrival 8 weeks ago today, she has continued getting quietly gypped.

Here’s how:

I'm a perpetual procrastinator, which is a huge challenge for me especially since I'm a writer -- my career hinges on my ability to meet deadlines. But I've always felt I do my best work under intense deadline pressure -- a lot of creative types say that. It's like I purposely wait till the last minute to start something, knowing I'm going to make myself completely nuts trying to finish it on time.

I think my proclivity for procrastination is what caused me to wait to marry and have kids till I was older. If you consider the fact that I went out with my now-husband four or so years before we actually started dating, it makes perfect sense. And then I subsequently jammed just about every major life-altering decision into one-and-a-half year's time: serious relationship, engagement, marriage, pregnancy, promotion, house, car, puppy, baby, etc. Like I said, I work well under pressure.

My mother wasn't a touchy-feely kinda mom -- at all. I mean, she gave a kiss or two here and there if you were saying goodnight or heading off to a sleepover or something, but all that hugging and smooching and laying in the lap and stuff? Yeah, not so much. She loved me, no doubt. But she wasn't loving.

And really, that was okay, because I had my Dad for the handholding and the skipping and the giggling and stuff. The man just loves kids, but he absolutely adored me -- reminded me every time he folded me into his strapping embrace -- his heartbeat keeping time with mine -- or held my hand while we strolled through the mall, licking on strawberry and butter pecan ice cream cones, my tiny feet keeping double time to match his stride.

He lived to make me laugh. And feel loved.

And I did.

And I do.

And I promised myself that when I became a mother, I'd extend the warm and fuzzy to my babies because kissing on them and hugging on them and loving them up was, thanks to my daddy, as natural and beautiful as summer rain.

So with that pretty vision of rainbows and stars and hearts and whatnot dancing in your head, try to help me understand how in the hell I ended up here:

My day started at two in the morning when Phillip and I blearily turned to look at each other and he said, "Am I dreaming? Or is Molly singing?"

It was. And we were up several more times after that, for what reasons I can barely recall. The morning -- actual morning, not still-dark morning -- was a blur of uneaten breakfasts and a bath in which half the water somehow ended up outside of the tub. At one point I announced to the living room that Mommy needed to lie down for a minute, and promptly collapsed on the couch. But the kids just thought this was a fantastic game of Poke Mommy! and Climb On Top Of Mommy! and Wipe Our Snotty Noses In Mommy's Hair!

This morning I sat at a breakfast fundraiser for the Pacific Science Center in Seattle. Surrounded by business leaders and philanthropists, I felt strangely out of place because although I was invited as a member of the media to cover the event, I had really come as a mother, a mother hoping for answers and ideas, a mother frustrated with the gaps I'm already noticing in the public school system.

Although we decided not to homeschool our children, Dan and I are not naive enough to expect the government to be responsible for their complete education. Our philosophy has been to take what we can from the public school experience and fill in the blanks at home, following the kids' interests, using the questions they ask as an opportunity to study and learn together. However, Laylee, who has a passionate curiosity for all things scientific, often comes home and describes school as "boring." She complains that she's not learning enough and I think she's right.

When I was childless I’d often see frazzled moms out with their misbehaving kids and think, OMG, that will never be me. Nick and I would gawk at the temper tantrums and the screaming parents and the three year old at the 4-star restaurant glued to a DVD player with ear phones the size of donuts (true story—it was on our honeymoon in Maui) and we’d talk about how we would never allow that. We were going to be Perfect Parents. Well, now that we have kids of our own, I realize that all bets are off….

You don’t need a Playboy editor to tell you that Americans, in general, are obsessed with their looks. And you certainly don’t need me, a new mom, to tell you how much more women are aware of their appearance -- Every. Single. Aspect. Of. It. -- after giving birth. One of the most common questions I get about working at Playboy is, Do you compare yourself to the women in Playboy, and how does it make you feel? If I spent my time at work comparing myself to the women in Playboy, it would probably make me feel like giving up all together. The women in Playboy – especially our Playmates – are beyond beautiful, and for some reason much smaller in person than they appear in print and online. So, I’ve never been particularly fond of comparing myself to Playboy models, though to be honest, I’ve also never felt that it was a fair comparison – they’re much younger than I am, and many of them (though not all) have had plastic surgery. Plus, the girls you see in Playboy are airbrushed, like any model in any magazine -- hey, if I could Photoshop myself in real time, trust me I would be all over it.

I pass no judgment on plastic surgery whatsoever – I don’t frown upon it, nor do I condone it. I have friends and family members who’ve had all kinds of things done, from the invasive (boob jobs and brow lifts) to the cosmetic (Botox). And though I had never seriously considered having plastic surgery myself – which is surprising considering where I went to high school it was the norm to have your nose done over winter break the year you turned 16 – post-having children, it’s something I am actually thinking about. This topic comes up a lot amongst not just my girlfriends, but my married guy friends too.