Dear Sprout,
Just a few days ago, we celebrated your third birthday. You are no longer a baby and will be leaving toddlerdom behind soon. You became a big brother a few months ago, will be attending preschool in the fall, and just went to your first day of summer camp. I think both of us are feeling a bit bittersweet these days.
My son and his cherry-red bike loops around the park, over and over again. There’s not really anything exciting about the park, just following a narrow path along some grass, ducking behind the building with the bathrooms, twisting through the playground, and cruising by the pavilion. But he’s riding it as if it’s the Tour de France, pedaling his heart out with the joy of biking.
While we haven’t quite graduated to the road, I love how clearly he is in love with biking. As a kid who loved biking with my parents and a mom who finds freedom on the bike, few things could make me happier.
But I haven’t built his love of biking by myself. I’ve definitely had some help from the family biking community, a world-wide group of parents who love to bike and want to pass it on to their kids. Whether you want to know the best way to carry your kid on your bike or the best bike to purchase for your kid, here are some great places to get started:
Geekdom has not had a good reputation lately, with rampant sexism, racism, homophobia, harassment, and a whole slew of other offenses being made public. But attending AwesomeCon in Washington, D.C. this past weekend with my kids gave me hope for the future.
As I wrote about back in November, my church is going through a significant transition. While I seriously thought we wouldn’t continue on, a few members have really kept things afloat. During the time we’ve been looking for a pastor, we’ve had a series of guest speakers. Because our usual organizer, Jan, was going to be at her husband’s high school reunion last Sunday, she asked me to organize the service. Here’s the sermon I gave, based on the passages Acts 4:32-35 and Romans 12:14-16.
Finding true community is rare. Finding true Christian community is even rarer.
I found true Christian community in college, when I broke bread in the cafeteria with my friends and my hall mates of different denominations gathered on Sunday evening fouir prayers.
I found it in rural Maine, when Chris and I lived on a cooperative farm. We gathered each morning for bagels and to recite St. Francis’ prayer before serving those who suffer most.
But those were unusual circumstances. Those supposedly aren’t situations that you can find in ordinary “adult” life.
In fact, an otherwise wise person – a priest – told me I wasn’t going to find a church like those places.
And yet I have – here.
One of the biggest fears when I was pregnant with my second child was that I wasn’t going to love him as much as my first. And of course, people say, “Oh, I was afraid of it, but it just wasn’t true. I loved the second so much as soon as I saw their face.” Well, that hasn’t been entirely true for me. But upon reflection, I realized that it wasn’t such a bad thing. I write about why in a post on the Huffington Post: Why I Love My First Child More than my Second (For Now).
I love my firstborn more than my second.
I love my second and expect to love him just as much as my first – someday. Just not yet.
My second child was born just six weeks ago. Like all newborns, he eats, sleeps and poops. I’ve spent most of my time since then soothing him, nursing him, and reading. I just can’t gaze at my baby for hours on end.
May was Bike Month! Although it’s now June, I’m finally wrapping up my Family Bike interviews because I got so many responses from awesome people. Over the course of five weeks, I profiled Kathleen from Portland, Stacy from Buffalo, NY, Kate from D.C., Leanne from D.C., Sarah from Chicago and Mike from Fairfax, VA. Keep an eye out for a final post on the best family biking resources I know of.
This final profile is of Kristen Bonkoski, who lives in Salt Lake City, UT with her husband and son. She and her husband run the website Rascal Rides, which has the goal of #morekidsonbikes. You can also find her on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Today is the last day of May, which is National Bike Month! To celebrate, I profiled a number of awesome families who bike with their kids for transportation and recreation. So far, I’ve interviewed Kathleen from Portland, Stacy from Buffalo, NY, Kate from D.C., and Leanne from D.C. I planned on running one profile a week, but I actually received too many responses for the five weeks of the month! So I’ve got two shorter ones today and one final one later in the week.
“I want daddy.”
My breath catches in my throat. “Really? You don’t want me to give you a bath?” My voice cracks.
“No, I want Daddy for bath. Daddy, give mommy [Little Bird],” my older son insists.
Sigh. “I’ll give him his bath,” my husband acquiesces and hands me the baby.
I watch as my almost three-year-old (nicknamed Sprout) ambles over to the bathroom, where I usually need to drag him. I’ve always been the one to put him to bed, only relinquishing it to my husband on the rare occasion I’m out of the house. My husband follows him, pulling my son’s monster towel out of the closet on the way.
I didn’t expect it to be like this.
May is National Bike Month! To celebrate, I’ll be profiling some awesome families who bike with their kids for transportation and recreation. Later on, I’ll also highlight some excellent resources for family biking.
Here’s the fourth of my Bike Month family biking profiles, following Leanne, Kate, and Stacy. This interview comes courtesy of Kathleen Youell, who lives in the bike utopia of Inner SE Portland, OR. (If only we were all so lucky!) She has two children, a son who is almost eleven and a daughter who recently turned nine. While her family is originally from Sacramento, they moved to Oregon about eight years ago. She runs portlandize.com, tweets @kyouell and is one of the administrators of the PDX Cargo Bike Gang Facebook group.
Feeding and taking care of my child is an important, essential job. I need to keep reminding myself of this.
A few weeks ago, a friend of mine asked how I could keep up the blog with a newborn. That answer was relatively easy; I write on the phone while nursing. But the question he didn’t ask – why I’m keeping up the blog – struck me. There are pat answers involving maintaining my audience and SEO, but if it came down to it, I would ignore them. No, the reason I’ve kept writing is because it feels like important work.