cup of tea: Browse The Strips

Friday, March 18, 2011

Lynn's Comments: One of my neighbours easily deduced her expanding condition when she began to lose weight. Seems that every time she had a bun in the oven, she became so nauseous she couldn't eat and had to take supplements. During the first trimester, she went down 4 sizes - which was OK, as she was a healthy size to begin with. Not me. As soon as pregnancy happened to this corpus (not so delecti), mild nausea was accompanied by a ferocious appetite. I craved everything and ate everything and appeared to be "term" at 6 months. I was so wide, I sat sideways on the shower seat. My mom in law threatened to lock the fridge. I think I gained 50 pounds with Katie and then it took me 9 more months to work it off! It's strange how obsessed we can be about weight and body image. Even though she was sick so often, I envied my neighbour her ability to maintain her curves when she was pregnant- and she, on the other hand, would have given anything to be ME!

Thursday, August 11, 2011

Lynn's Comments: My mom did say things to make me feel like a kid again. I felt as though she was watching everything I did; wanting to correct me or give advice. I had been living on my own, coping with all kinds of challenges and I wanted to feel like her equal. It didn't take long before the old sandpaper formed between us and we had to make sure there were no match heads in the middle!

Sunday, August 31, 2014

Lynn's Comments: Listening to Katie talking to her dollies, I realized I was hearing myself. Her choice of words, her phrases, inflections, and body language, had all been learned from me. I'm sure I was parroting my mother when I directed my children, and now that I'm a grandmother, I'm waiting to hear if my granddaughter will talk the way HER mother does!

Wednesday, May 6, 2015

Lynn's Comments: Raising kids is a career. It's the most important one there is. It's unpaid and often unappreciated, but it sets the rules and the temperament for the next generation. Whenever I heard a woman say, "I'm just a homemaker" or "just a housewife," I grit my teeth. Like all women who must take time to earn a living, I relied on good daycare to help me raise my children, but I was a hands--on parent. I earned the "mom" in "working mom."

Sunday, June 21, 2015

Lynn's Comments: Strips like this brought messages of hope and sympathy from moms all over the world. The one criticism I received was, "So, where did Elly find the time to have cookies and tea?"

Thursday, January 28, 2016

Lynn's Comments: It's strange to be reading this again and writing notes on the subject because this: I have just sold my big lakefront house and have purchased a small townhouse. I get to move in this spring!

Wednesday June 20, 2018

Lynn's Comments: Nobody tells you about this side of childbirth. Sitting down becomes a challenge…as do other things too personal to describe!

Wednesday July 25, 2018

Lynn's Comments: It’s interesting to be reading this in 2018—a time when house prices have skyrocketed far beyond our wildest predictions, at least in Vancouver and Toronto.

Tuesday July 7, 2026

Lynn's Comments: In reality, my mom had bowel cancer. Her surgery was extensive, and it left her with a body that didn’t work the way it used to. This, too, became an adventure as she learned how to live with a colostomy and a new diet.