I have an essay called “The First Time Around” in an anthology that is coming out soon, From the Heart: A Collection of Stories and Poems from the Front Lines of Parenting. It compares my first year mothering to my first year teaching high school and explores the desire for a do-over, to fix all the mistakes you made the first time around.

So now I am a week and two days into parenting a second child and feel compelled to document this slice of now with a Venn diagram. Alas, I don’t know how to do that on Wordpress and have only so many (how many is never something I can predict) minutes until I will be called to nurse again, plus writing lying down is not the most comfortable thing. So I’m just going to make some lists. Please excuse the lack of parallel structure.

We’ll start with that thing about positions by giving a shout out to the few things that I look back on fondly from my first weeks after my son was born in 2006 via c-section (for a breech position and short cord that prevented him from dropping).

Positives about baby #1’s first weeks

• I could sit. Seriously. A c-section hurts a whole lot, but once you’re upright, you’re cool. I cannot wait to sit without pillows delicately arranged or frozen peas in my underwear.

• I had only one child. There was no monstrous four-year-old lurching around, slamming into his parents, kissing the baby ad nauseum, or needing to be taken to the park to preserve family sanity.

• My husband did everything. I don’t think I changed a diaper for two weeks. (See above that we didn’t have another child to take care of).
  

Similarities across both experiences

• I still have trouble sitting up from lying down and getting up to stand from sitting. It doesn’t hurt in my gut like it did when I was cut open, but the truth is I have no abdominal muscles now anyway, and it does hurt my bottom to switch positions.

• I love looking at my baby.

• Every day is a bad hair day.

Positives about baby #2’s first weeks

• At home! Sunshine instead of yucky florescent light, no strangers waking you up to poke at your progeny, no separation from the baby for hearing tests, no people bringing me (who is gluten-free and dairy-free) a cheeseburger the day after abdominal surgery and the next day, when I begged for something I could eat, telling me, “It’s hard to accommodate special diets.” In the hospital?

• No drug hangovers!

• Milk coming in right away! And like gangbusters! What a concept! After three years of nursing my son, I found out there was still a lot I didn’t know about breastfeeding! But apparently I do know how to get a baby to latch well in any position. No trips to the lactation consultant this time, at least not in the first week.

• A calm baby who seems comfortable in her own skin. Maybe just her temperament, but maybe from coming on her own terms or helped out by the flower essences I took during labor and gave her right after or the essential oils we used. I’m sure actually getting nourishment helps, too.

• Friends helping out — with food, with support, with childcare. And a whole lot of baby clothes.

• Having something of a clue as to what I’m doing and a lot less anxiety about what I’m doing wrong.

• Having a little boy who looks adoringly upon his mother and sister (with a head that seems a lot bigger than it did two weeks ago) and says sweetly, “It’s nice having a new baby.”

Although we are not media-free, I’ve avoided full-length feature films and had not considered taking my son to a movie before the age of six, at least. It just seems like way too much stimulation, not to mention the whole Waldorf thing about media stifling kids’ imaginations.

But when I saw the trailer for the movie Babies after a friend suggested we moms go as a night out, I felt like it would be a good thing for my husband and me to see together to jazz up our anticipation of baby #2 (as opposed to just wondering how the hell we’re going to handle such a drastic change). Then, thinking about paying for childcare to see the movie, I considered that maybe our four-year-old would enjoy it. And heck, it was only going to be 79 minutes!

So today, knowing another pregnant friend and her husband were taking their two daughters, we went as a family, arriving about 90 seconds before the lights went down so as not to have to waste any preschooler patience (and just because we are never early to anything).

It was great. Well, the last 20 minutes, the boy managed to tip over a chair (this was a drafthouse theater) and try out sitting in at least three others, a redheaded Goldilocks. But other than that, he saw lots of cool things. There were tons of animals and four amazingly different locales and ways of life. And four babies just being babies.

I love that his first experience of a movie was of one without narration or fast-paced cartoon images. I love that he just watched and for the most part appreciated — life just going on. He laughed, he said, “Aw” a lot, he asked a bunch of questions. He saw a whole lot of breastfeeding and tender mother-child moments, which I think is great considering he’s getting a sister in some four weeks.

As for his parents, we were struck (as many almost-upper-middle-class white parents in the Western world might be) about how silly are our notions about doing things solely for our kids and spending so much time reading to them and reading about parenting. Not that I’m never going back to a Music Together class, but how can you not remark on the juxtaposition of those white folks in a San Francisco rec room singing that Native American chant “The earth is our mother, we must take care of her” against images of the boy in Namibia (who needs no instruction other than simple living to understand that concept) gleefully dancing to his mother’s clapping.

I don’t mean to essentialize as though rural folks are all inherently good and simple and us selfish and complicated American consumers are just burdens on the world. That’s not a very nuanced analysis. But I do agree with my husband’s assessment of the film shortly after we got home: “Kind of makes you feel stupid for wanting anything.” Yes, and sort of embarrassed for letting the entertainment or edification of a child become so darn much its own thing instead of letting the child learn by observing and participating in  its community.

There’s more to process, but I’m glad my husband and I saw the film together as partners expecting a child. We’ve already referenced the film several times, including in a childbirth prep class. And I’m glad we took my son to help him see the idea of having children as something people do everywhere, and also to see that people live in a lot of different places and ways.

Having someone in from out of town helps you see where you live with new eyes.

When my brother-in-law visited, I was kind of psyched that after my husband picked him up at Union Station, they got enjoy a lovely drive through the District — past the monuments — at dusk on a perfect summer-feeling evening (not very April-feeling, but still about as nice as it gets). I felt some pride in the fact that they found delicious gelato in Georgetown on a Friday night and that our visitor enjoyed the next day’s trip to MOMs, the natural food store we frequent most often.

And yet, I appreciate what living in a log cabin in rural Maine affords my BIL and what kind of rhythm that can foster. Sometimes I feel like I should live in the woods instead of just in a house that backs up to the woods, but I know I value urban life and convenience too much. I love being able to walk to a mini downtown, even if its restaurants are not organic. The grocery has some decent produce, and the library is right there. It feels like a community. And when Metro is not delayed or overstuffed with tourists, I think it’s pretty cool that I can hop on it and in less than 15 minutes, be at the American Art museum across the street from the library I attend an ICAN meeting.

This weekend, I was wary of track work delays on the Metro, so I decided to drive up to Bethesda to work the Holistic Moms table for a Celebrate Mama event. Now that downtown is one hoppin’ place. Lots of cool shops and restaurants. But even if we could afford to buy a home there — our house would probably sell for an extra $200K if it were plopped down in that zip code — I don’t think I would ever want to dress well enough and be cute enough to fit in.

So there is my living-on-the-border self. Not a homesteader, not a chic city girl or hip suburbanite, either. I liked driving up on Massachusetts and Wisconsin Avenues and seeing all the urban, cultural stuff going on. But it was busy and a little overwhelming, so on the way home, I took the Beltway to the GW Parkway, and I enjoyed the quiet serenity of the tree-lined and river-lined route, even though it was probably a couple more miles.

Although sometimes having too many options gets overwhelming (can anyone say Internet?), I do find that I like to put myself in the position of having them.

Tell people that you might need help, and they come through!

This has nothing to do with my last post about mood blues, which aimed to say that no one can help me but me. No, I’m talking about offers from other mamas to help out with my son this summer, when I’m expecting baby #2 in early August.

I wrote a post on DC Metro Moms blog the other day about missing out on sending my son to summer (day) camp with the two friends he went with last year. Since I wrote that piece, one mom has agreed to send her child to camp with mine for four weeks of the summer, and at least five moms have come forward to offer to have my son over for playdates while they or their babysitters watch him – before or after the baby. Truthfully, they admit, it would be good for their kids, too, because they are not going to have as much social time in the summer. Who can afford a nanny and camp when school is so expensive and there is a second child who can’t go anywhere yet? But still, the generosity has been inspiring. This just might help me learn to take people up on their offers to help. What a concept!

Read “Dissed for Summer Camp,” the original post on DC Metro Moms Blog.

Originally posted at DC Metro Moms.

After a week home with a son who was just sick enough to have to stay home from preschool, followed by a weekend of the biggest December snow ever in D.C., I was ready to get out o’ town on Christmas Eve. The cab that took us to the airport for a week with family was driven by a man who explained that his youngest son, too ill to go out in the snow, was kept busy by his two older brothers. He gestured to my almost-four-year-old son, “He needs a brother or sister.” Ahem.

Nosy, but right. I don’t really love the dynamic the three of us have going on at home these days. Life was very different (read: much more fun) with the two other toddler cousins, their parents, and grandparents around the first half of our holiday visit. It kind of sucks that this happens only once or twice a year.

Managing three kids under four in one unfamiliar house was challenging and requiring of some adult supervision, sure. But my son was playing, all the time, and it usually didn’t involve me. This was a major bonus. I can’t even believe I’m saying this, but I actually took a nap. Twice. I might as well have been fed grapes by a golden-chested god . Three cheers for cousins!

…

Read the rest of this post at DC Metro Moms.

We had a lovely holiday today. After a very busy Thanksgiving hosting four adults and two teenagers, I enjoyed not having to do a whole bunch today while at my in-laws’. But I did make the pumpkin pies, and they turned out delicious!

Check out this (newly updated) recipe for Gluten-Free, Dairy-Free Pumpkin Pie on my food and health blog, Inexact Science: Raising Healthy Families.

It’s great to make something I enjoy when other people around me are having foods that are no-nos for my body. But it’s really great to hear that other people enjoy my creation, too. Glad I made two pies!

Happy holidays, and happy, healthy eating!

So I called my friend to check on her after she’d emailed earlier in the week that she thought her baby would come soon. “I didn’t have a chance to write you back. How are you doing?” She’s hundreds of miles and several states away now.

“I have a baby.” Having given birth just hours earlier, she picked up her cell phone and gave me the skinny. I know people talk on cell phones in hospitals. But I did not seriously expect to get a new mama fresh from labor picking up like she might have been in the middle of putting away groceries like I was.

Congratulations, S!

I’m thankful for a delicious turkey from Polyface Farms (and a husband and in-laws members who cooked it), fabulous pastured eggs from our local farmer, and nobody pushing my son to eat foods that aren’t good for him.

I’m also thankful for health, a home large enough to stuff a bunch of people into, the resources to buy healthy food, family, friends, my healthcare practitioners, and Holistic Moms Network.

And no one complaining that our dishes don’t match.

I’m also grateful for my husband and in-laws for taking my son to the park (and later again out to the madness that is consumerist Friday) so that I can have a few moments alone.

Phew!

See a longer post about gluten-free holidays in my column at the Washington Times Communities: “Reading Ingredients: Tales from a Health-Conscious Mom.”

Also check out my posts (with recipes!) on GFCF pumpkin pie and GFCF hazelnut flour rolls at my other blog, Inexact Science: Raising Healthy Families

So what do you do when a near-elderly neighbor gives your kid a Toys R Us catalog (along with a few other Sunday inserts) as though it’s a gift?

After my husband accepted this offer, I ought to have put the stuff in the recycling bin immediately. But they went onto the floor of the car, and before I knew it, three-year-old eyes had latched onto them. “I want that Elmo magazine!”

(Don’t go thinking we have any fuzzy red bug-eyed animals around these parts. But he knows the character from friends & neighbors.)

So now he’s practically memorized the 80-page leaflet. At first, I was sick to my stomach with the comments about what he wants for Christmas. Yikes! Crunchy don’t play that! I just hosted a screening of Consuming Kids, for crying out loud!

Now he’s gotten more involved, requesting I whip up a whole family: “They are doing hair cutting. I want that to play with my brothers and my sister.”

Uh, he doesn’t have any siblings, and if he gets one, there are not going to be any S’s at the end, if I have anything to say about it.

Today, we were cleaning out the car in the driveway when said materialist neighbor drove up. “We’ve got that funny magazine,” Boy Wonder announced. “The toy catalog,” I translated for some inexplicable reason.

She must have been thrilled and went on to ask, “Did you see some things you want for Christmas? But you know you have to be a good boy, don’t you.” The kid has never heard the word “good” from us Alfie Kohn disciples.

I just chuckled and hoped she would go away. Eventually, she did. Now I’m wondering if I can disappear the toy catalog without my son finding it in the recycling bin and having a fit over how cruelly I threw away his prized possession.

I might just have to burn it and bury the ashes in the woods.

This post originally appeared on DC Metro Moms on March 19, 2009

Surviving the unexpected guest

Maybe it was the yoga. I had just gone to a good class at the gym with a new teacher and was making plans to have this become a regular Monday morning activity. Then I remembered that next Monday I was going to have a few friends over for my son’s day-before-birthday playdate — nothing fancy, no Evite; just a throwback mass email with an offer for snacks, cake and, if it’s nice outside, bubbles and sidewalk chalk.

Seeing as I had almost forgotten my own son’s birthday, I had no problem cutting my friend some slack when she arrived with her 3-month-old in one hand and her toddler’s paw in the other. “It’s not today, is it?” she asked as the girl dropped a handmade bear card on my porch. “I knew it. I’m already an hour and a half late, and if I can get that good a parking spot, this must not be right.” She apologized and seemed ready to turn around, but I was happy to find myself glad to see her and to be able to say without hesitation: “If it’s going to make your life easier to go home, that’s fine, but if you can stay, please do.”

It was nice to know someone else got something wrong; other people’s errors always help me feel safer being human. It also helped that my house was not the clutter-fest it is almost all the time, mostly because we’d had an architect over the previous day to see if we could afford to permanently fix the problem of a postage-stamp-sized living room. The place needed a good vacuuming, and I’m sure it was not up to a lot of people’s standards, but it met mine. I avoided being discovered in my usual state of squalor!

And I suppose I was excited that my son would have some distraction. Our kids are at the age — over 2.5 — when they can actually entertain each other if they’re not fighting over toys. Interventions are sometimes required, certainly, but it is nice to be at the point where it’s easier to have two around than one. If my son and I had just been alone, I would have been sure to hear requests to nurse (we’re closing in on weaning) or to give my son other attention my not-yet-breakfasted self wasn’t up for. Plus this was a day I needed to get dinner into the crock pot early so I wouldn’t have to do anything come 5:00.

So I told my friend to sit outside the kitchen and we caught up as I cut up veggies and she nursed the baby with roughly one third of her brain and kept an eye on the kiddos with the other third. It was honestly a delight to catch up with her in a way I’m sure we won’t have the opportunity with more folks here next week. I even let her see my upstairs (and I’m hoping she was too busy looking at the half-made bed to notice the dirty underwear hanging off the hamper until I flicked it in). And all without raised blood pressure!

In my imagination, most people can handle this kind of impromptu sharing of space all the time. My neighbor doesn’t even flinch when my son pushes his way into her always-neat yet toy-stocked house. For me, daughter of parents who never had friends over, that kind of ease in hosting is something I’ve never known, and I’m usually so damned disorganized, I can’t stand one more variable. My son lights up when people appear and accepts unplanned fun as fun, but for me, it was pretty exciting just to handle a drop-in without sweating during or after. Maybe this mama’s finally growing up.