Why Having Children (and a Full-Time Job) Ruins Your Life

I'm being cheeky, but it's kind of true. Going from one child to two (28 months apart) and going from part-time work to full-time work has been so, so hard. I get nostalgic for the person I used to be. I know lots of people who say, "Having kids doesn't have to change you!" For me, it's been easier said than done. 

I've been under so much stress that I've retreated into self-preservation mode. I'm less generous, less nurturing, less giving, less creative, less fun. 

Oy, it's painful to write all of that out! 

Of course I'm generous and nurturing and giving toward my children. That's part of why I'm in self-preservation mode. But even that isn't enough. I'm giving them my oxygen mask, but they see me suffocating. 

But it's not all doomsday around here! I'm on the upswing, which is why all of this feels so much clearer to me. 

Our Fall Break was really good for me. I had so much fun making our Halloween costumes and getting into crafting again. I used to make interesting things much more frequently, and it energizes me. I also found an awesome online parenting class that is giving me good insight into how to be more present for my children in order to help them feel more connected. I started physical therapy for my back, and I found a book focused on healthy eating that I want to try out in the next couple months.

I absolutely don't regret having two children, and I don't regret having them so close together. I just have to name out loud how hard it has been. I have absolute forgiveness for not being the best version of my self these past two years, and I'm grateful that I have a clear path for getting back on track!

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Plan for Holiday Cards

During our recent vacation, I watched the movie About Alex. It ignited in me a fierce commitment to stay better connected to the people who have formed the patchwork of my existence.

When I was in my twenties (and a much cooler person than I am now), I used to send out monthly Friends & Family updates via e-mail. I would share the highs and lows of what was going on in my life. They were a great way to stay connected with folks from all over the world.

Over time, I fell out of the habit of sending them. I was writing a lot about my life via this blog, and I was also using Facebook to update people. However, social media isn't the same. Sending out pithy updates (that may or may not show up in someone's news feed) doesn't really help me maintain a truly strong connection.

Although I'm not interested in returning to monthly updates, I do think a yearly update makes sense. Since it's going to be a yearly thing, I think it makes sense to send it out as a holiday card. I searched Etsy and found a variety of options:

• Card 1
• Card 2
• Card 3
• Card 4
• Card 5

The idea is that we would use instagram photos on the front and my letter would be on the back (those would be for my friends--Matt could send his own version to his friends). I'm going to have them printed via Costco in order to reduce the costs. I was compelled by reading this review of their service.

I'm not sure which one I'm going to choose yet (we'll definitely customize it to say Happy Holidays or Happy New Year rather than Merry Christmas out of respect for different people). As soon as our Halloween costumes are made, I'm going to start working on these cards. The last thing I want is more stress around the holidays!

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DIY Easy Knit Kid's Winter Hat

I can't believe I'm finally feeling the urge to craft again! Hooray!

I really want to make the boys some hats and scarves for winter. I searched Pinterest and was lured by many amazing options (like the one featured below), but in the end, I decided to go with the easiest pattern available: this one. 

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Recap of Our Pacific Northwest Vacation

 

What a trip! My friend and I joke that when you travel with young children it's not a vacation--it's a "trip."

But it was fun nonetheless!

I'm so grateful that our school has a two-week Fall break. We left on Sunday afternoon and arrived in Seattle late that night. In retrospect, we should restrict our travel to within our boys' typical windows of awakeness. They are not much fun when they are tired!

We stayed in an inexpensive bungalow that we found on Airbnb. It's really nice to have separate bedrooms for each boy; it increases the likelihood that they will sleep (we bring a noise machine for each of them when we travel).

On Monday, we explored the amazing Arboretum, which I highly recommend. Then we headed over to Chihuly Garden and Glass. We had been reading a book about it in the weeks leading up to our visit, which really built our excitement about the experience. Then we couldn't resist going up in the Space Needle.

The next day, we connected with one of Matt's awesome life-long friends and took a ferry out to Kitsap Peninsula. The car ferry in and of itself was a grand adventure. Once on the island, we played at the beach (yes, Henry did end up completely naked and in the frigid water) and even spotted humpback whales frolicking in the water.

Afterwards, we swung by the University of Washington. It's one of our traditions to stop by colleges when we travel, so that Henry and Tate develop positive associations with it. Henry has decided he would rather attend a quieter university, but we had fun. We ended our night at an awesome pizza restaurant, dining next to their chickens.

On Wednesday, we drove to Portland and stayed at an amazing guesthouse on a family-run farm. We had a big adventure on Thursday, which included a visit to a neighborhood park, a bike ride around the city (we rented bikes from here), and a stop at food trucks for lunch. Yum! I also recommend this dinner place for delicious pot pies: Pacific Pies.

Even with direct flights both ways, it felt like we had to spend a lot of time traveling to and from the Pacific Northwest, in part because we squeezed in two cities that were three hours apart. The experience made us re-evaluate our plans to rent an RV and travel to Big Bend for Spring Break. I'm thinking we should go somewhere (warm!) that has more of a homebase camp kind of thing (amenities that are family-friendly?) with the opportunity for day trips. Any ideas?

We also made sure to pick up an ornament for our Christmas tree tradition!

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Finding Sanity Amidst Wedding Planning Craziness

A colleague of mine is getting married soon, and I volunteered to do something off of her to-do list in an attempt to help reduce her stress. She asked me to sew 10 gift bags for her guests. 

With any DIY project, the prospect of doing it seemed much easier than the reality. At the beginning of the project, I texted her and asked, "If I have leftover fabric, do you want me to make more than 10?" Thank goodness she said no. The project was so hard! 

She wanted the bags to be lined, which complicated the process. Also, I ran out of fabric when I was trying to make 20 straps, so we had to take a strip of leftover fabric to the store and hunt around for the same fabric. 

Then there was the part where I couldn't find a safety pin and had to get creative about how to turn 20 straps inside out. 

Then there was the fact that I wasn't following a pattern so when I got to the very last part I found myself trying to sew through things that were too thick. So I broke my sewing needle. Twice. And then the safety function kept engaging, which required me to use a screwdriver to pull apart my machine and put it back together. Every.Single.Time.

The experience reminded me of a couple sections from my wedding book: taking shortcuts on things that don't really matter and crossing off non-essential items from the to-do list. I went back to read them and found them helpful. I shared them above in case you or anyone in your life is going through the stress of wedding planning and needs a little dose of sanity. 

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The End of the Summer Gardening Season

On Saturday we ripped up all the watermelon, cucumber, and tomato plants from our front-yard garden. It's such a cathartic process to purge everything. 

We had a pretty good season. We didn't stake our tomatoes well and bought the really sprawling kind, so those didn't go as well as they could have. Our watermelon plants got aphids, but they continued to produce a ton of watermelons all summer long. Next year we'll be more intentional about which kind of tomato plants we buy, and we'll do some proactive organic stuff to head off the aphids. 

Last year, I was so spent from work that I had no energy for the fall growing season. This year I'm feeling much better. Once we get everything 100% cleared out, we'll add compost and some new soil and then plant some stuff for the fall. 

The front-yard garden is working out really well. The dogs, chickens, and pigs stay out of it. We haven't had any issues with neighborhood cats or other animals. The automatic irrigation is the best thing ever. I was really worried about installing a garden in our front yard because I was afraid that I would be overwhelmed with the work, everything would die, and our yard would look terrible. It's not much work at all (hallelujah!), we get food all season long (hooray!), and our yard looks fine even when there's nothing growing (phew!).

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Racially Integrated Schools

I'm embarrassed to say that I just now got around to listening to the This American Life episodes about the importance of racially integrating our schools called, "The Problem We All Live with" (Part One and Part Two).

Here's the synopsis:

Right now, all sorts of people are trying to rethink and reinvent education, to get poor minority kids performing as well as white kids. But there's one thing nobody tries anymore, despite lots of evidence that it works: desegregation. Nikole Hannah-Jones looks at a district that, not long ago, accidentally launched a desegregation program. First of a two-part series.

I started my career working with nearly 100% children from low-income backgrounds. At the time, I believed that the best way to bring about equity and social justice for all was to serve as many underserved children as possible. 

As I grew and evolved as an educator, however, I came to realize that homogenous schools--even high-performing ones--are a "separate but equal" strategy. And "separate but equal" can never truly be equal. 

I also realized that if we want to dismantle racism and bring about social and racial equity in our world, diverse children need to learn alongside each other. They need to learn to navigate lines of difference and to appreciate and celebrate their differences. That is why Magnolia Montessori For All is an incredibly diverse school. I feel so fortunate that my own sons get to learn from children and families that are different from our own. 

If you haven't already listened to the series (at least episode one) please do it! It's really, really good.

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