Ages & Stages

I've always been a let's wait and see, go with the flow kinda girl. Every once in a while though I get something in my head, and boy can I be stubborn. It's just how I am. After 30-some years I've come to know myself pretty well.  I was very aware of this particular personality glitch, as I like to call it, when I decided I wanted to try a natural birth. I knew that it would be very easy to become dangerously stubborn about it…so I read. I read about BOTH sides of the coin - medicated and unmedicated births. The most helpful thing for me was reading other women's birth stories. I must have read hundreds. Doing so...

Disclosure :: This post is sponsored by Little Z's Sleep Consulting.  Getting Your Baby To Sleep Well {Little Z's Sleep Consulting} You're tired. Like really, really tired. Your baby wakes up 4, 5, 10 times a night. You put the baby down for a nap. Twenty minutes later, baby is awake again. Baby seems to always fuss. And once you get him in his carseat, he seems to fall right asleep. Of course. You're just wondering what's going on and why he won't sleep! Sound familiar? That was me. Tired, frustrated, and did I mention tired? Funny thing is, I thought I had the baby thing down. I was on kid #3. I thought I knew it all. I'd been through it...

Discipline can be a touchy subject among moms.  And while all moms have experienced the good, the bad and the terrible when it comes to their children's behavior, every mother has her own tactics for how to discipline her children.  Unfortunately, the inevitable tantrum at (insert public establishment here) or the awful morning meltdown that can make even the earliest risers late for school and work is the dread of mothers everywhere.  And, as your child is screaming at the top of her lungs in the check-out line, you become the mom who silently judges the behavior of someone else's children and ponders, "How did she get so lucky to have such well-behaved children?" Well, I'm here to report that good...

First thing's first, I did not set out to become a minimalist. In fact, I’m still not completely certain that I am a minimalist in the true definition of the word. I can claim two things though: clutter stresses me out, and I like simplicity. When I was pregnant with my daughter, I did like most first time mothers do. I went to Target, got one of those lovely registry guns, and shot the crap out of that thing. Literally, if something was in the baby section and had a barcode, it was going on my registry. I registered for everything from bottle warmers to Baby Bjourns (yes multiple, even though I was only having one child), a Rock 'n'...

The storm came in hard and fast rolling right over our yard and house and disappeared just as quickly. All that was left was the menacing cloud hanging overhead like in a cartoon. The afternoon sun was already peeking out from its edge, illuminating the last rain drops and rendering the world in HDR. (High Dynamic Range, i.e. super colorful and detailed, for all you non - photography nerds). Inside, Jake was giving me grief. His pitiful cries were not quite so pitiful after 30 minutes straight, and my frustration level had reached a climax. I snatched him up and walked outside to sit with him on the swing on our patio. I knew that being outside always calmed him...