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We moved to a new house a few weeks ago and the other day a good friend asked me how I like it here.  “I don’t know.  The house makes me nauseous,” I answered.

“Oh, and my car also makes me nauseous, so do the streets and my backyard.”  There really was no other way to answer the question.  I think I love it here, but I need to wait another few weeks before I can know for sure.

First trimester is icky.  Thankfully, I haven’t thrown up (yet), but the head spinning in pretty frequent.  If I think too deeply about something like my house or where to go out to dinner on Friday, I might gag.  My morning sickness wasn’t this bad during my first pregnancy (and I’m hoping that a different experience of pregnancy might mean that I’m having a girl.  I know, it’s delusional, but let me hope.)  One more complaint to add before I change the topic – I’m also extremely tired.  “How tired?” asked my father.  “Well, on some days, it’s as if I woke up in the morning and took NyQuil and then tried to go about my day.”

My new neighbor told me that during her first (more…)

It’s a long title, but that’s the best way to say it.  Yesterday we celebrated Blake’s 2nd birthday.  It was fabulous.  Family friends, in the backyard at our new house, pizza, BBQ, music and fun.

The best part was that Blake was lovingly surrounded by all four grandparents and his great-grandmother.  What a lucky little boy!

During the party I was thinking about how next year at this time, Blake will have a sibling.  I wonder how this will affect Blake’s personality.  He gets so much attention right now, and he has since he was born.

One of our friends here yesterday has a seven-month old boy and she was saying how great it is that she just puts him on the floor with a ball and he’s happy playing by himself for an hour.  I overheard this and ran to tell her, “Appreciate this!  Do you know that not all babies do this?  Blake never entertained himself with a ball for more than a few minutes.”  She had no idea.  ”You mean every baby doesn’t happily play with balls for hours?” she asked.  ”One hundred percent, no.  It’s personality that defines how much a child can play by him or herself.”

Soon my theory will be put to the test.  Is it nature or nurture?   (more…)

Now that I’m out (aka made the pregnancy announcement), I’ve been asked that strange question, “Do you like being pregnant?” which is usually followed by a pressure-cooker comment like, “because I LOVED being pregnant!”  Hmm, what am I supposed to answer?  I’m fine being pregnant and I’m also fine when I’m not pregnant.  I don’t have strong feelings about it.  Heidi Klum says she loves being pregnant, so does Jessica Alba, but are they for real or just saying that because it sounds good?  A woman named Kat writes a whole blog taking the opposite view – I Hate Being Pregnant.

I wonder if people love and hate pregnant for the same reasons.  For instance, (more…)

Father’s Day is underrated.  People plan Mother’s Day for weeks, and sometimes months ahead of time.  But Father’s Day?  “It’s just not as big a deal as Mother’s Day,” says my husband.  So am I supposed to believe that, or should I make a big deal out of it anyway?

My husband deals with many of the same childcare frustrations that I have to deal with: early mornings, night wakings, difficult meal times, tantrums (hmm, am I making parenthood sound difficult?).  I do handle the majority of those hard experiences, but, still, he’s been pushed to edge of patience more times than either of us would care to admit.

Fatherhood isn’t the easiest.  So I’d like to give a shout out to my husband for being a wonderful dad to our son Blake.  You take the ups and downs while you play with him and share joyful activities together every day.  (more…)

I’m not talking about basic separation like leaving your child in the living room while you go to the bathroom (which is not always easy!).  I mean school or camp separation when you drop off your 2 or 3 year old and pick him up hours later.

Separation is a parent’s choice.  But how do you know when your child is ready?  I took my son to his first day of camp last week.  It’s a two hour program three days a week for two-year olds.  The other five kids in the group already separated, so Blake was only one who needed his mommy there part of the time.  I told him that he was doing a great job and that he could take as much time as needs to feel comfortable in the class.  I don’t want to push him if he isn’t ready yet.

While in the room with him I tried to be as boring as possible so he’d have to join the other kids and teachers to have any fun.  I’m hoping that after a couple weeks he will be fine in class without me, but if he’s not, then I’ll probably just take him out of the program and wait until September to try separation again.  Is that giving up too soon?   (more…)