We couldn’t find a childbirth class we liked so we made up our own
I knew almost immediately that the class was not what I was expecting it to be. I expected my husband to be a little resistant, but I also expected to feel like I should defend the class. I couldn’t. He said he hated how it all felt like a sales pitch for itself, that it tried to tell us, “Yes, you CAN have an unmedicated birth, but only with US!” and I agreed with him. He hated the format of the class, too — the instructor read us questions straight out of the workbook and we wrote down the answers. Not a good learning style for either of us. I don’t know how much of this is related to the method, and how much was our particular instructor. I know Bradley classes are great for some people. They just weren’t right for us.
Samantha & Steven: From gothic wedding to Horror-themed home life
To be quite honest, since our wedding, we have been living the normal everyday life! We have both focused a ton on our work and trying to advance our careers as well as customizing our house to our own style. Our house includes a Disney Haunted Mansion-themed living room, a Bates Motel bathroom, and a Horror-themed family room (to name a few). As for right now, we are so thrilled to announce that we are expecting a baby girl in December!
Building a nursery is how I maintain my sanity while trying to conceive
I was tired of feeling like I was letting my partner down. It didn’t matter that I knew he was disappointed in the situation and not with me. I still felt responsible. I didn’t need him to say anything, I needed him to act. So I gave him a responsibility: I asked him to do something for the nursery-to-be. Whatever he wanted. What I was really looking for was reassurance that he thought we’d get there eventually.
A downtown Seattle family photo session featuring a Dalek, umbrellas, and dancing
I first spied a few of the photos from this fun family session in our Flickr pool a week or so ago, and after seeing a few more I knew it needed to be shared. This family is basically the epitome of SO MUCH FUN — I love that their session took place at EMP in Seattle! This is the stuff of pop culture geekery dreams.
An emergency c-section birth story: preparing for the unexpected
My son Max was born on September 18, 2012 with several other first-born baby boys. According to the nurses, the days leading up to severe thunder storms tend to bring in lots of first-time births where the expectant mom’s water breaks. The day before, I had decided to work late in order to finish as much as I could, just in case baby came early.
It’s cool if you’re not a woman, and 9 other rules for dating my son
Since the advent of Pinterest and Tumblr, posts venting parental frustrations have been shared, pinned and reblogged with silent nods of understanding, uproarious laughter and the occasional GPOY tag. Now and then, I’ll come across a post intended as humor that really bugs me. When I look at what the post is really saying, it’s just passive-aggressive repetition of the tropes and assumptions that I don’t want to include in my parenting.
The road to acceptance for parents of children with special needs
With the birth of our son we joined the ranks of that undefined, amorphous, limitless group of “special needs parents.” Within the first days of the NICU I knew there would be challenges, but I could not ever imagine the constituency of belonging to such a group. A stat perhaps. A label. A stigma?
How can I deal with my partner’s baby-unfriendly quirk?
My husband hates lotion. He thinks it’s completely disgusting. I can’t even get him to wear sunscreen, despite his history of precancerous moles. Although this is worrisome to me, I’ve always chosen to avoid this battle. Which was fine until we had our baby four months ago.