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I grew up with three sisters and a younger brother. I’m the fourth of five. The baby girl. Accustomed to never getting my way as a child, but interested in everything my sisters did (curling hair? wearing glasses! doing homework! listening to the Indigo Girls? yes, yes, yes, yes). Somehow I always assumed we’d have tons of girls and *maybe* a boy in there. The ultrasound tech telling us that the baby was a BOY at 20 weeks with our oldest made me kinda faint inside. Boys equal noise, no snuggling, video games, rough housing, and running away from their moms. That’s what I thought. And my brother is a great guy, so I don’t even know where I came up with these ideas about…
READ MOREIt’s been a spring break from nature school so we’ve been out at the Lodge (#wholeparentinglodge on instagram), living it up with lots of daily dairy (the property is situated in a dairy valley, so, appropriate), me sewing during naps, and hiking while carrying the toddler who is certain he can walk safely in the forrest (false) more than any sane mid thirties mom wants to. My sewing for sanity project (my sanity, yes, that’s what we’re talking about) over at Whole Parenting Goods launched our summer leggings! With a new surprise accompanying them. :: headbands to match! My new summer offering! $5 and ship free with other purchases. My very reluctant model. When I’m out here with the kids, we eat lightly. Mostly things like…
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I could go on and on about how my kids have all cried and tantrummed so much this week. I could go on and on about how I’m tired and my husband has worked long hours and I just want takeout forever. But as I was mentally composing the most whiney mom first world complaint post ever, it hit me. I’m the problem here, not my circumstances. My kids have had a rough week, every single three of them. That’s developmentally normal. It’s spring; they’re squirrelly. But what’s not normal is that I’m not handling it well. I scream. I shout. I really really lose it. Over little, normal things. Yes, but Nell, you seem like this is just hard all the time. Didn’t you…
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I had the great privilege of being a guest on the Jennifer Fulwiler show on the Catholic channel on Sirius XM radio the other week. Afterwards, I felt so chagrinned. We were talking about living out the Pope’s latest encyclical, Laudato Si, and I totally lost my notes beforehand and experienced major mommy brain during and couldn’t summon up all the thoughts I’d had about the topic. Jen, will you ever let me back on the air??? But we did confirm that despite not compost toileting, you’re probably holier than Haley, right? 😉 The reason I wanted to talk with her in the first place was that upon reading the encyclical, I felt panicked. I need my heat! I need my a/c! Pope Francis seems…
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a few new things up in the shop this week. My mind has been so preoccupied with the suffering of my dear friends Laura and Franco and the loss of their twin baby girls. Please keep this beautiful family in your thoughts and prayers as they navigate this breathtaking landscape of love and loss. So the whole week has been a bit of a wandering. SuperBoy also has had a persistent cough/phlegm attack so he hasn’t been to his three times a week afternoon nature school. BabyLoves was up a few nights coughing (is there anything more sad than a toddler’s coughing?) so everything felt sideways. 1) Day in the Life linkup at Simple Homeschool. Link here. I LOVE reading how other at home homeschooling mamas’ days…
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I have read a few articles lately about gender inequalities at home–where moms, including working moms, foist the bulk of household work onto their capable shoulders either due to lack of cooperation from spouses or their absence. It got me thinking about how we divvy up household work so that my sons and daughter see mama and dada working together. When we were first together, before we got married, we talked about how we envisioned our lives in the actual day-to-day. As we were both working, the days were filled with motions, appeals, and paperwork. The evenings were divvied up with cooking and tidying and errand running. We fell into a pattern of who liked to do what, and who hated doing something the least,…
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