Taking a trip out of the country without my kid rocked my world
I feel I’ve done a great job (or at least, one that I am very happy with) maintaining a sense of ME since becoming a mother, but it’s good to see that my son also has a sense of HIM that doesn’t depend on whether or not I’m there, physically guiding him through it. It’s a comforting thing to know that if you leave for a day or seven that your child will keep trucking on — and to know that he or she will also be over the moon when you get back.
An easy fix for slipping bra straps
Call me a prude, but I really can’t stand it when my bra strap starts to wander, letting the world know just what color and condition said bra is in. (Answer: generally not great.) In fact, it drives me nuts. I don’t want to have to constantly be adjusting and digging around. It’s just not… dignified.
The journey of trying to conceive with my wife has changed the way I identify as a mom
Even though Carly and I knew we would want to have children together, we never had serious how-to discussions until last summer. I had a dream that I was carrying Carly’s baby, and I wanted it so badly that I was crying about it as I shared my dream with her. This sparked our baby planning. Ideally, we would choose in vitro fertilization (IVF), pick a sperm donor, have Carly’s egg fertilized, and I would carry her baby.
How can I maintain ownership of my body while I’m pregnant?
I’m experiencing a bit of a problem — it seems like everyone wants to “own” my baby. What I mean by this is the off-hand, “Hey that’s my grandson in there, be careful,” when I walk down the stairs, or “My nephew should have an apple,” when I’m picking out my lunch. I know it is coming from a place of love but I’m struggling both with the immediate reaction of “What if I don’t want a freaking apple?” and the lingering feeling of flags getting staked on my belly from people claiming my child before he is even born?
Talk to me about your exciting pregnancy-friendly sports, and post-baby sport motivations
I recently had taken up breakdance, boxing, and roller derby in one go (sometimes all three consecutively on the same weekday evenings). I just found out I’m pregnant, and the downside to the pregnancy is that I’ll have to put some of my sporting activities on hold. How have other moms found the motivation after baby arrived to get back into sports again?
Our great adventure: traveling and starting a family
We left Seattle/Tacoma to try out Eastern Oregon rural living a few years ago, thinking that we would probably settle down and start a family shortly thereafter. We became small-town homebodies of a sort, and if there was ever a form of “adult nesting” out there, I think we were trying to practice it. We even rented a larger home expecting that the guest room would eventually turn into a nursery. All of this completely great because it was a future that we both truly wanted — a family life.
A day in the life of an organic farming family
I have been working on a photo documentary for a few years now. The subject is local natural and organic farmers/farming, and the concept is something that my husband Nick and I have been passionate about for the last six years. I am not exactly sure where it started… or how.
Reflections on the difficulties of pregnancy by a Roman Catholic feminist
Now that I’m actually pregnant, I’m realizing it’s not quite that easy. I actually really dislike being pregnant. I felt awful for the first four-and-a-half months. By “awful,” I mean specifically that I thought I was going to throw up at any moment around the clock. I often did, and when I didn’t I usually felt even worse. I couldn’t open my refrigerator door, I couldn’t cook or prepare my own food, I couldn’t food shop — the smells were too intense and the nausea was too debilitating. I didn’t feel like I was having a baby… I felt like I had become the baby.