Sidecar Your Crib: A Co-Sleeping Solution

My newest piece for Raise Vegan is one for all the pregnant people and exhausted new parents out there.

For me, the hardest part about co-sleeping with Tzivia right in the bed was that I like to pull my blankets up all the way over my mouth. Obviously, this wasn't going to work with a newborn in the bed, so I abruptly had to change my habits. I started wearing a fleece blanket as a hat (see below) and sleeping in a cardigan (to keep me warm but be unbuttonable for nursing in bed) so I could leave my blanket safely at my waist, but I just was not getting any sleep that way.

When we put Tzivia in the sidecarred crib, it was a total gamechanger.

Trying to keep comfy/warm without smothering her (pre-sidecarred crib)

Death, Contests, Drag Queens

Remember that time Tzivia saw Charlotte's Web and asked me if the kid who played Charlotte died at the end too?

Well, we went to Pride last weekend, and Tzivia was really taken with the drag queen who was MCing the Pride performances. So we watched a bunch of YouTube videos featuring drag queens, starting with Kids Meet a Drag Queen:


She was really enjoying herself, as she's very into performing right now, and it was cool for her to see a kind of performance art she'd never seen before.

We were watching a faceoff between two drag queens, a clip from RuPaul's Drag Race,  and I was trying to explain to her about contest TV shows, about contests in general. We really haven't stressed the ideas of "winning" or "losing." (When we play Candyland, whoever makes it to the Candy Castle first is like, "C'mon, everybody, come party with me at the Candy Castle!") Her main contexts for contests are the watermelon-eating contest from last year's 4th of July, and the little green peas on bikes in a "race" in the book LMNO Peas.

Anyway, I thought I'd explained contests well, but her response was,

"So if the judges don't like the performance as much, then that's the person who dies?"

I love my kid.

Should You Rethink the Gender Reveal Party?

"Should You Rethink the Gender Reveal Party?" is my newest piece for Raise Vegan, but it's not about veganism. Raise Vegan has an awesome private Facebook group (Vegan Pregnancy & Parenting) with over 40,000 members, and people are constantly posting about "gender reveal parties" and "gender reveal cakes." I've been one of the voices commenting to suggest, at the least, rephrasing, and I thought it was about time time that I wrote it out in a shareable article that really explains the issue.

Tzivia before she had gender

"Clive is a Nurse" and other books by Jessica Spanyol

These Clive books by Jessica Spanyol are amazing!!!!! I received some free copies to give out at my Kaleidoscope Play & Learn group, and I'm obsessed! Charles and I are so used to changing pronouns in books in order to give Tzivia representations of adventurous girls and caring boys. These simple books manage that, but more than anything, they just show kids being KIDS without any of the weight of adult's gendered expectations. Just a diverse set of playful kids playing pretend with each other. If I wrote a children's book, it'd be a lot like these. Maybe someday.

Thank you, Jessica Spanyol! We also (super-randomly) have her book Carlo Likes Colors out from the library right now, which we've enjoyed as well. But our library doesn't carry the Clive books (yet?)

Tzivia's Art!

I am so freaking amazed by this. Librarian Martha asked the kids to draw a picture (and narrate the words to their parents) about what they wanted to do this summer, and Tzivia stayed late working intently on this triptych.

 

Part of what whoas me about it is how much she responded to a topic rather than just randomly drawing. 

 

The Ferris wheel is something she's saved up for in her piggy bank to do in Seattle, and she said she drew Dada being on it because she wants to make sure he's there too (instead of just me and her going to Seattle while Dada works at his new job). 

 

Tree-climbing is a new passion of hers, especially since her new 5-year-old friend tried to teach her a few weeks back. She's not very good at it yet, but she's very enthusiastic about it. I love the way she drew the tree. First, she just drew a tall, straight line and said it was done, but then she said, "Wait, one more thing," and drew all the branches.

The last picture is her learning to put on her shoes all by herself, which is something I'd just suggested we should work on, as I was putting her shoes on her at home, before rushing off to Library Time.

Is Veganism Too Good to be True?

My newest piece on the Raise Vegan site is called Could it be Possible? Is Veganism Too Good to be True?

It was equally inspired by all the awesome factual research that keeps showing veganism is healthier and better for the Earth, but also by the fake news I keep seeing on my FB feed. Much of this fake news is anti-vegan (or has nothing to do with veganism), but I've been dismayed to see vegan-promoting pseudoscience/lies as well.

Me with my too little ones, in the rain at the Farmers' Market

Facts don't try to take sides, but the facts keep being on the side of veganism.

So let's tell the truth: Veganism rocks!