I Would Walk Five Hundred Feet

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / 3 Comments

I am all about allowing Sprout to develop at his own pace without pushing him. But on the last few weeks, that pace has picked up significantly. This week, Sprout truly started walking!

He first got on the move at around 7 months, when he started scooting backwards. While I thought it would be a short phase – surely he would get bored with going backwards – he didn’t seem to mind.

In fact, it took him almost two months before moving forwards appeared to occur to him. One day, something just clicked – Sprout got his hands and legs coordinated and was on his way. Once he started, there was hardly a learning curve. It was as if he had been practicing in private. Right around the same time, he started pulling up on everything he could get his hands on – the couch, the coffee table, the curtains, our pants, my hair (Ouch – I am not Rapunzel.).

Following the same pattern, he crawled and pulled up on things for a couple of months, showing little interest in walking until near his first birthday. He “cruised” by hanging on to furniture quite well, but didn’t try to bridge gaps he couldn’t reach across or stand on his own. He would walk from place to place if we helped him, but he didn’t seem that interested in it.

But then, about a month and a half ago, walking with our help was all he wanted to do. He’d sit on the floor and raise up his hand, indicating that he wanted a finger or two to grab onto. Once anchored, he would twist his leg out from under him, place one foot down, and then squirm a bit to get the other one in place. Soon enough, he was so solid with our help that he was walking both inside and outside, over all sorts of surfaces. Playing with any his toys paled in comparison to walking! Chris said that some days, his back started to give out from having to lean over so much.

Despite his new-found love, Sprout was totally uninterested in walking independently for several weeks. Just over two weeks ago, he walked for the first time on his own after we let go of his hand. But even then, he was very hesitant. He would only take “steps” if Chris or I were very close by with open arms.

Suddenly at church last week, he decided he had quite enough practice and it was time to strike off on his own. He was walking all over the place, now unafraid. While he still didn’t like falling, he could walk well enough on his own to actually get somewhere without tumbling every few steps.

Since then, he’s been practicing his skills every chance he gets. He still likes holding mommy or daddy’s hand, but lets go as often as not. Sometimes when he’s walking on his own, he keeps his right hand in the air, steadying himself with our virtual support. He was even chasing a little girl on the lawn at our Town Square yesterday afternoon. She looked more disappointed than he did when he fell, circling back and holding out her arms to help him get up.

While he falls very little considering how recently he started walking, it’s still a lot compared to an adult. His reaction really varies, ranging from not caring at all to wailing immediately. (We’ve already had some dramatic ones.) When he does seem distraught post-fall, describing his feelings for him (“Oh, that hurt to fall down, falling down is scary.”), a technique from The Happiest Toddler on the Block, has actually helped quite a bit. After a brief whine, he’s usually satisfied and waves his hands to request help getting up.

Although he can’t do them on his own yet, he’s obsessed with steps, both crawling and walking up them. On our way to the playground yesterday, he spent so long stepping on and off of the sidewalk curb that the kids that had been playing there left by the time we arrived. When we were in Peru, I joked that the Incas discovered the stair and said, “Yes, that’s what we will build our empire on.” I despise climbing stairs, but he would have fit right in.

Now he’s intently focused on his next skill – climbing. Before he started walking independently, he actually showed more interest in trying to climb – lifting his knees up in the air and trying to get footholds – than walking. In fact, he climbed up to the couch using my leg as a step-stool before he took his first steps.

For big steps or climbing up the rocks in our Town Square, he holds on to both my hands and lifts his foot up above his waist. If we don’t shift his weight for him, he’ll put all of his weight on our hands, making him near-perpendicular to whatever he’s climbing. He doesn’t seem to mind – he must have it in his blood from me rock-climbing while he was in-utero.

I’m both proud of and nervous about his passion for climbing. While walking is a big deal, he can’t really access any household items that he couldn’t previously. But once he starts climbing – especially if he progresses as quickly as he has with the other skills – we’re doomed.

Now, Sprout is definitively a toddler – there’s no denying it. I love walking with him now, despite the repetition, and look forward to walking all sorts of places with him in the future.

Riding Along with Kidical Mass

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / Leave a comment

Last weekend, I led our second Kidical Mass Rockville ride and it went great! We started off at the Rockville Swim Center and wandered around the surrounding neighborhood. As a personal bonus, for the first time ever, Sprout smiled while he was in the trailer with his helmet on. Plus, he fell asleep part-way through the ride, meaning that he had least got a bit of a nap in.

Check out my post about the ride, along with a photo of the group, on the Kidical Mass Rockville Blog!

Firsts for the Fourth

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / 1 Comment

While America celebrated Independence Day over the July 4th weekend, we celebrated a number of firsts with Sprout.

My in-laws visited for the holiday, eager to spend time with Sprout before our August trip with them. They saw the trip as a bit of a “practice run” for Disney, testing out how he’d do with a variety of new experiences.

The first was staying up far past his bedtime to watch fireworks. He had actually seen fireworks before, but he was only two weeks old at the time. Then, we couldn’t bring him anywhere crowded because he hadn’t received his vaccines yet and I couldn’t muster much effort anyway in my sleep-addled state. So we just walked over to a pedestrian bridge less than half a mile away to see the town’s show half-blocked by buildings.

In contrast, this year we trekked up to lovely Frederick, Maryland, which hosts a huge 4th of July celebration at its city park, complete with bouncy rides, bathtub races, tons of food trucks (not the fancy ones), and a big fireworks display. Despite the other entertainments, the very first thing I noticed was how retro their playground was. After reading so many stories about how playgrounds are becoming overly safe to the point of monotony, it was refreshing to see metal slides and a merry-go-round! They even had a sand pit, where Sprout had his first feeling of sand between his toes as my mother-in-law helped him walk through it. Later on, we visited the petting zoo exhibit, where he got up close and personal with some goats. While he was mostly curious about them, it didn’t help when the farmer wrangled the baby goats out of the enclosure without a warning, causing all of the kids – human and not – to freak out.

After wandering around, we settled down to wait for the fireworks. With Can’t Stop Believin’ played by an adequate Journey cover band as our soundtrack, I tried to keep Sprout from wandering onto other people’s blankets and stealing their stuff. Just as he was experiencing new things, I too had to lighten up a little. As the culinary choices were limited, I tried to feed him some quesadilla (cheese has protein!), but he was totally uninterested. Instead, he managed to find his appetite for my Italian ice, slurping it down. Since he hadn’t eaten any dinner and we were outside any resemblance of a normal schedule, I let him eat as much sugar and red dye as he wanted. To quote my mother-in-law, “It’s July 4th!”

Despite missing his afternoon nap and the fireworks starting more than an hour after his bedtime, Sprout managed not only to stay awake until the show but more impressively, be in a good mood. He would have been a disaster if we had been at home, but there was enough people to look at that he forgot how tired he was. He even held out throughout most of the fireworks, watching them with the intense gaze that he’s turned to everything new since the day he was born. It’s a look of: “This is fascinating, but I’m not sure what to make of it yet. I’ll gather more information.” That was, until the finale. The continuous and overlapping booms put him over the edge and he burst out wailing. Fortunately, once the display was over, he calmed down and promptly fell asleep in his stroller despite the obstacle course-like path back to the car.

The next day, we continued the festivities by visiting a local outdoor mall that has a train ride, a carousel, and paddleboats. In my family, the mall is best known for the place where we did slow walking laps around the pond to induce labor when I was three days past my due date. Needless to say, this time around was much less stressful. To see how Sprout would potentially handle rides, my mother in law wanted to bring him on the carousel. Chris sat Sprout on a horse, holding on to him from the side, while I rode an eagle next to them. Much like with the fireworks, Sprout’s expression was observant without being outwardly happy. I have a suspicion this is going to be a common look at Disney. While he didn’t smile, I think he enjoyed it – he certainly knows how to let us know otherwise – and I suspect he would become much more obviously joyful as he got used to it. He was pretty impassive the first time we pushed him on the baby swing at the park, but now he grins in response.

That night, my in-laws got to be the guinea pigs for another first – the first time someone other than Chris or I put Sprout to bed. After a lot of bedtime drama that involved Sprout whining loudly at me for more than a half-hour a night, Chris recently switched to putting him to bed. But it would be a whole different challenge for someone else to put him down. Would he be worried that we weren’t there? Would he cry and reject consolation? Would he want to continue playing with Grandma and Granddad? Whatever happened, we wouldn’t be there to find out, gallivanting around D.C. baby-free. We bar hopped, going from one to watch the World Cup to another to play chess and skeeball. We wandered downtown, popping in a candy shop with adult confections, watching a street dance / acrobatics group that half-failed at their tricks, and listening to a jazz band on a corner in Chinatown. We finished the night with dinner at a fancy restaurant, eating Fruits de Mer and fois gras. The time was just for just the two of us, where there were no dishes to be done or baby monitor on in the background. It felt like a big sigh of relief. Fortunately, bedtime went just fine, at least according to my in-laws. They didn’t elaborate and I didn’t ask for additional details.

The last day of their trip, we trekked to the town pool. Sprout loves splashing in the bath, but that’s quite different from even the kiddie pool. After slathering him up with enough sunscreen to let you walk on the sun, we put him in a disposable swim diaper and headed off. Much to my surprise, his shorts were already soaked when I lifted him out of his car seat, five minutes later. Lesson learned – disposable swim diapers are designed to allow pee to flow through, not hold it in. Ick.

Despite this knowledge, I still waded into the kiddie pool, holding Sprout’s hand so he could walk. He was hesitant at first, looking up at me for reassurance. I’m constantly telling him not to stand up in the tub, so I’m sure he was confused by me encouraging him to walk through water. But once he caught on, he thought it was great, combining bath time with his current favorite activity, leading us around so he can practice walking. The fun only increased when they turned up the little fountains. Of course, he chose the one that had another kid at it who wasn’t interested in sharing. To avoid a showdown, I finally picked Sprout up and relocated him to a different fountain. Even when the kids were all at their own fountains, they kept eying each other and wondering what was so awesome about the other fountain that the other kid was using it. I spent an absurd amount of time at the pool as a kid, so I hope this is only the first of many visits.

From fireworks to fountains, Sprout had an eventful Independence Day weekend.

Breastfeeding Week: Open Letter to Advocates Against Covers

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / 2 Comments

I believe in being positive, especially as a parent, but sometimes I get frustrated. I get angry when people are being oppressed, when someone is reinforcing prejudicial societal patterns, or when people are putting others in unnecessary pain. Rather than making Chris listen to me rant (yet again), I’ll write an Open Letter addressing whatever is making me angry.

As you can imagine from this week’s topic, I’m a big supporter of breastfeeding. I truly believe that hospitals, the medical institution in general, and all of society should support breastfeeding moms far more than they do, starting with placing the baby skin-to-skin immediately to accepting women feeding children in public. (Mega props to the Pope for furthering this cause.) I managed to breastfeed my son for a full year and am only now just tapering off. But I do have a reoccurring issue with how some advocates frame the issue of breastfeeding in public. While I appreciate that they don’t want to be shamed for nursing without a cover, I feel hurt by the way they refer to the idea of mothers covering themselves up. Terms like “breastfeeding burqa”, implying that I’m denying my baby fresh air (even though that article is pretty funny), and phrases like “I would never put my baby under a blanket!” make me feel as if I’m not “doing it right” or letting down feminists by wearing a nursing cover. While I think they intend to make nursing a more accepted activity, by denigrating a tool that enables many women to breastfeed who wouldn’t otherwise, I think they could be driving mothers away instead.

Personally, there is no way I would ever be able to breastfeed after a couple of weeks if I didn’t have my nursing cover. I am an extremely modest person; just scheduling the posts this week gives me the shakes. So when I started nursing Sprout in public, I became hyper-aware that people would be thinking about my breasts, even if they couldn’t see them. And that totally freaked me out. I was so nervous that even with the cover, I tried to make myself as invisible as possible. I sat in the back of the church instead of our usual spot; I fed Sprout in the car at an outdoor mall instead of on one of the many benches. There is absolutely no way that I could have started feeding him in public if there was the chance anyone would see my bare boobs, nipple exposed or not. And as any nursing mom knows, you absolutely need to feed your baby in public. Bathrooms are not appropriate places to bring hungry babies. So if it wasn’t for my nursing cover, I would have breastfeed my baby for a drastically shorter period of time. I suspect I’m not the only one in this situation. Now, some advocates would say we should just get over our neuroses and throw off societies’ restrictions. But it’s damn hard enough being a new mom – why add more emotional and social burdens than necessary?

Beyond the modesty issue, I wonder if Sprout himself would be able to eat in public places without the cover. He’s been a very observant, engaged baby since the day he was born. As a result, he’s always been easily distracted while eating. His very first night, I struggled to get him to latch as Chris and I talked. A moment after Chris left the room, he latched on perfectly, his attention no longer split between eating and our conversation. Even if he wasn’t too distracted in public to latch on, he would constantly be breaking his hold, exposing more nipple than a wardrobe malfunction would. He still does this when Chris walks in the room while I’m nursing. Even if I wasn’t quite modest, that would be a whole lot of public nudity and unfortunate leakage.

Beyond my personal experience, assuming people have the social capital to nurse their babies in public without a cover is a privileged position. Women of color and poor women already have huge societal burdens put on them and shouldn’t need to feel even more judgment. People are more likely to feel like they can make disparaging comments to them than a white, middle to upper class woman. Lastly, the consequences of social approbation are likely to be more severe for people who have less power to push back. While a manager of a restaurant or pool may give a more privileged person a warning first, they may go straight to kicking out someone who society already undervalues. Plus, these groups are already less likely to breastfeed, so they should have access to anything that might help them do it.

In general, we need to support breastfeeding moms in whatever way they choose to breastfeed. Shaming women or denigrating blankets or covers only harms new mothers that are trying to do the best for their babies and themselves. There’s enough judgment out there – let’s stand in solidarity in a positive way.

Breastfeeding Week: On Feeding, Formula, and Failure

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / 2 Comments

“This is not a canister of failure.” That’s what my husband said as he held up a brand-new can of baby formula.

I had worked so hard to avoid feeding my son formula. I pumped four times a day on weekdays in addition to nursing him three times a day (morning, evening, middle of the night). I had built up so much supply in the freezer that Chris completely relied on breast milk while I was away on a business trip. I considered the single time my mom fed him 30 ml of formula while we were out to dinner an anomaly.

So when Chris told me that we were down to just a few liters in the freezer, my heart sunk. Although we had gotten through the trip with some supply left, Sprout vastly increased his milk intake the following week. Each day he drank more and more and I simply couldn’t keep up. If I was staying at home and nursing him, my body would have adjusted, but there was no way to pump more than I already was.

I just had to face the facts; Sprout was going to have to drink formula, whether I liked it or not. Coming to terms with this forced me to consider why I was so obsessed with Sprout only drinking breastmilk.

Part of it is that I really do believe breast milk is better than formula. Breast milk is easier to digest than formula, has just the right variety of nutrients and is simply the best food for babies. But I mainly drank formula as a baby due to my mom not getting enough breastfeeding support and I’m fine. Similarly, I would never say to another woman that supplementing breastfeeding with formula is wrong.

Part of it is that I really hate supporting the companies that produce formula. They’ve run huge marketing campaigns in developing countries convincing doctors to provide formula and women not to breastfeed. While breastfeeding is the best everywhere, formula feeding can downright dangerous in developing countries where women may not have access to clean water to mix it or a way to sterilize bottles. In addition, it’s shameful to be telling someone to buy something over a free option when they may not have enough money to both buy it and pay for their other kids to go to school. But as much as I try to avoid it, I still buy plenty of other morally dodgy items (Cascadian Farm cereal, owned by General Mills, jeans from the Gap), so it wasn’t just that.

A lot of my disappointment in needing to supplement came down to simple pride. I was genuinely proud that my body could feed my baby and I believed that through sheer will alone I could produce all the milk he needed. After all, if I just tried hard enough and was just dedicated enough, I could overcome the limitations of the pump and therefore, of returning to my job.

But it simply wasn’t true. I couldn’t force my body to do something it wasn’t suited to do. To feed my child, I needed to set aside my pride.

So Chris started feeding Sprout formula, mixing it with breast milk. And the world didn’t come to an end. Sprout liked the formula just fine and continued to increase his intake, far past what I pumped on even my best days. I kept pumping as much as I could and doing the best job that I could as his mom.

Now that I’m winding down pumping (thank God), feeding him formula and now cow’s milk doesn’t seem like such a big deal. But at the time, admitting that I couldn’t do it all myself was So Damn Hard. But sometimes you just need to accept help, even if it’s from a can.

9 Things I Wish I Had Known About Breastfeeding from the Beginning

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / 3 Comments

9 Things I Wish I Had Known About Breastfeeding.png

I took the breastfeeding classes at the hospital. I read the relevant sections of the pregnancy books. I even practiced positioning with a teddy bear. I was ready for breastfeeding. Or at least I thought I was.

As it turned out, I actually was – I managed to nurse both kids for an entire year. But all of the preparation in the world didn’t teach me some lessons that real life imparted. Much of the literature on breastfeeding goes one of three ways: technical “how to” descriptions, lyrical meditations on its beauty, or warnings about its difficulty. My experience didn’t match any of those. Both times, it was a mix of the painful and easy, the boring and beautiful.

Here are a few things I wish I had known from the beginning:

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Confessions of a Hipster Mom

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / 1 Comment

I’m a hipster parent and I’m not afraid to say it. While I would have been loath to call myself one in the past, these days it’s hard to deny it.

The word hipster carries a lot of baggage; it’s somehow transformed into an antonym of itself. While it once meant someone who only liked things ironically, it’s somehow morphed into meaning someone who likes things a little too much and too sincerely. We’ve gone from unengaged Brooklynites who mock silly t-shirts by wearing them to hands-on politically active West Coasters who show their love for silly t-shirts by wearing them. (And still others just use it as short-hand for a person of the Millenial Generation.) While some of the outward signs of hipstersdom – like “quirky” old-fashioned names for your kids – hasn’t changed much, the fundamental attitude has. While I hated the old version that involved “punching down” by making fun of off-beat folks, I fully support embracing your own brand of weird.

So what led me to embrace my hipstersdom? The show Portlandia. From the Battlestar Galatica obsession to the free-range chicken to the parenting books fiasco, I’ve shook my head, laughing, “That is so true” an absurd number of times. I grow my own vegetables, advocate for bicycle rights, read feminist blogs, spend Saturday mornings at the farmer’s market, patronize local businesses, diaper my kid in cloth diapers, buy second-hand clothing, and own multiple pieces of jewelry featuring birds. While the show’s characters are over the top, I know in person or have at least read online some lesser version of almost every one of those characters, including the dumpster divers. (We once bought a carton of eggs from Dumpster Diving Guy before we realized what was going on.) My friends do things like bake donuts shaped like mustaches and talk about throwing out the entire monetary system and replacing it with a system of their own making. While Portlandia is gently poking fun at this lifestyle, I like it because it’s ultimately a love letter to my type of people.

Even though I don’t live in Portland, I think it’s especially worth embracing off-beat sincerity as a parent. If there are two absolutely necessary skills for being a parent, it’s sincerity and the ability to love people for who they really are, no matter how odd. You can’t ironically love a kid – it’s just an oxymoron. Similarly, you can’t really love someone if you don’t accept their quirks. And if there’s a group of people in the world who are full of quirks, it’s kids. Even people who grow up to be the most normal, boring, well-adjusted people are weird as kids, simply because they have a perspective that’s so different from adults. Some of the funniest mom bloggers chronicle these “special moments” – My Four Year Old is Weirder than Your Corgi and Horrifying Conversations with Mini on Rants from Mommyland are two of my favorites – and they are definitely worth celebrating.

I also like that hipster parents live out their values. While this can get overly self-righteous or judgmental towards others, knowing what you value and teaching those values to your kids through your relationship with them is something that’s too often left out of discussions on parenting. Kids see enough sarcasm and irony in society; knowing their parents actually believe in certain ideas like justice, respectful dialogue, and good music is rather reassuring.

While hipster as a term and culture have changed over time, the need for parents to love their kids sincerely never will. To paraphrase Austin’s famous slogan: “Keep parenting weird.”

Guest Post: St. Francis, Love, and Letting Go

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / Leave a comment

I have a guest post up at my awesome church’s blog reflecting on the Saint Francis’ prayer and how it relates to parenting. Even though I’ve been saying this prayer every morning for years, I never quite understood the depth of it until I became a mom. Also, the post is illustrated by a really cool picture of St. Francis, my favorite saint.

Here’s the first two paragraphs as a preview…

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“Let me not so much seek to be consoled as to console / to be forgiven as to forgive / and to be loved as to love.”

While I repeat these words – part of the prayer colloquially known as Saint Francis’ prayer – every morning, they truly get put to the test at night. As the mother of a one-year old, I’ve gained a much deeper understanding of these words over the last 12 months. After rocking a newborn as I paced the house to catching snatches of sleep upright on the couch because it’s the only way my baby can get any himself, I now understand that as a parent, this prayer isn’t a request – it’s a rule.

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Read the rest at the Church in Bethesda blog!

10 Tips for Feeding Your Child Great Homemade Baby Food

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / 1 Comment

10 Tips for Feeding Your Child Great Homemade Baby Food. Want to make your own homemade baby food? These tips will save you time and energy! (Photo: Baby holding an avocado.)

Cracking open a jar of baby food, I wrinkled my nose. The ingredients seemed fine – nothing unhealthy, certainly nothing unsafe – but the smell wasn’t exactly appetizing. I was definitely glad that I wasn’t eating it. I was also really grateful that jarred baby food was a back-up plan for us for the most part.

That’s because for both of our kids, we prepared homemade baby food ourselves. Here’s what we learned in the process.

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Happy First Birthday Party Sprout!

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / 4 Comments

Happy First Birthday Party, Sprout!

A birthday – especially one as momentous as a first birthday – deserves a party. Of course, Sprout’s first birthday party was more for us than him, but getting through a full year as parents is also worth celebrating! It all turned out well in the end, but the party definitely confirmed that I am not a Pinterest mom.

I love hosting and having parties, but I’m not the fondest of preparing for them. Most of the time my main contribution is washing the loads upon loads of dishes that Chris dirties in his quest for culinary bliss.

But this party was fundamentally different from our former shindigs. Most of them have been in the winter and this was in the summer. We wanted to invite a lot more people than usual, so we could include not only our friends but also our relatives and church folks. As we can’t fit that many people in our small house, we rented the pavilion at a park across the street from our house.  Because we wouldn’t be right next to our kitchen, this (thankfully) limited Chris’ culinary ambitions.

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