Huckleberries: Notes On A Napkin blog delivers for moms-to-be

If you’re expecting your first baby, you should click on the Notes On A Napkin blog written by talented Katrina Swaim/CdA for chuckles and common sense. Last week, she posted that there’s no need to hurry to the hospital when contractions begin a la “I Love Lucy.” She recommends a big plate of spare ribs, a baked potato and “the works” first because “there’s always a chance that you’ll end up with an emergency C-section, in which case those wonderful, loving maternity nurses who coached you through labor will be replaced by stern, unsmiling, ex-prison warden post-op nurses who sentence you to nothing but tepid broth and melted Jell-O for three days.” Natural childbirth is OK, continues Katrina. But epidurals are better. Again, Katrina: “Don’t be alarmed if, after your epidural, you experience a temporary compulsion to kiss (your anesthesiologist) on the mouth, set up a shrine in his honor, and/or name your baby after him.” Then, there’s the matter of weight gain. A woman enters the hospital nine months pregnant and leaves looking six months pregnant. After a C-section, Katrina was asked by a “friendly young man” on the elevator when she was due. “As punishment for his kindly meant comment,” Katrina recalls, “he was stuck for 20 more awkward seconds in the elevator with us, looking acutely uncomfortable while I sobbed and (my husband) glared at him.” Notes On A Napkin is one of three dozen locally produced blogs that comprise the North Idaho Blogroll of Huckleberries Online.