Before we had kids Noel and I went on a lot of adventures and I was frequently saying things like, “This is fun, but don’t you think the zoo/hike/beach/airplane/whatever will seem so much more exciting when we have kids?” Then Noel would say, “Yeah . . . ” trying to hide the fact that he thought I was crazy. Now that we have kids we do a fair amount of whining about how hard it is to go on adventures…
Pro: When kids are really little they can fly for free. Con: You have to wrestle a wiggly baby for the duration of your flight. Pro: Ariline workers will often take pity on you and check your carry-on luggage for free when you ask nicely. Con: Kids are too little to help carry any any of the baggage and even though they’re so tiny they require A LOT of baggage. Pro: Kids clothes are tiny, so you can fit a lot…
Sometimes it just isn’t okay to wait 42.8 years/until your children are teenagers/for the millennium to use your ipod again/sleep more than three hours uninterrupted/expect “responsible” adults to do their jobs. Instead of riding out what life is dishing, you have to charge at it hard. Fortunately, I’ve got a fair amount of spunk and some top notch googling skills, so watch out world here I come. To all my fellow warriors out there, keep up the good fight! PS…
Last night, Noel and I were folding laundry when we heard a rustling noise coming from Cooper’s room. We opened the door while grumbling about how he really should be asleep by now and then burst into laughter. The sound we’d heard was the wrapper of a granola bar. A granola bar he had stashed away earlier and then retrieved to sit at his little Ikea table for a civilized midnight snack. When we first opened the door a look…
After it was established that we did indeed have health insurance, everyone in our families was pretty excited when we broke the news that I was pregnant with Cooper. Amid all the congratulations, one comment sticks out in my memory though. “You know they cry, right?” Noel’s grandma asked us. Yeah, we’d heard that was a common problem with babies, but it didn’t stop us from wanting one. Three years later, when it’s been a really long day (or night or…
I’ve always been one of those people that liked to be busy. When I was in college I always had at least two jobs, took a full load of classes, managed to regularly feed my exercise addiction, and was still able to maintain some semblance of a social life. Being constantly on the go really did give me an adrenaline high. I loved having a full calendar and testing the limits of how thin I could spread myself. Having kids has…
Well, it was bound to happen eventually. Friday around noon Audrey and I were talking in the kitchen during my lunch break. Cooper had silently wandered off as he often does presumably to drive cars or shoes on our unmade bed. Except he wasn’t. I heard him coughing in the bathroom and went to check out what was going on to find a pool of bright red liquid all over the bathroom floor and in the tub as well as…
Sometimes when people find out we go camping with a two year old and a four month old they’re a little shocked. Reactions range from admiration to wondering if a call to child protective services is in order. Fortunately nobody has done the latter…yet. Nevertheless, Audrey and I love being outdoors so even though we don’t make it out as much as we used to, we have gone camping several times with the kids. We just got back from an…
Being outdoorsy gets sort of complicated when you have kids. Long hikes tend to turn parents into pack animals, backpacking is impossible, and even car camping becomes increasingly difficult with all the paraphernalia kids seem to require. But, because we don’t want to take a 10-15 year hiatus from the things we love, we absolutely refuse to give up just because things get more difficult. With Noel’s sister, Danielle, in town this past weekend we decided it was the perfect…
If someone were narrating my life, I’m sure the moment Ellen was placed in my arms the words, “She suddenly realized life would never be the same again” would have been uttered. I feel like having a new baby in the house makes me rethink everything. Big things like my parenting skills and my spirituality, as well as little, unimportant things like my fashion. Life never will be the same again, but that’s part of the excitement of living, right?…