Ben & Cielo

this past week was a lovely week. the weather was mild, our lawn is like a jungle, and the town is full of students. random. but true. we also had Ben and Cielo visiting from Seattle. what an amazing week. where once upon a time we would drink/dance/talk all night - we now spent the time playing with the babe and updating each other on our lives. the most amazing thing was seeing them interact with Harlow. i always knew that Ben was amazing with kids. i have seen him hang out with kids a million times and they are always smitten with him. what i didn't know was the Cielo is a baby whisperer and made Harlow fall smitten in love with him...to the point where she wouldn't even look at me (HER MAMA!) because she couldn't take her eyes off Cielo. it was pretty amazing.

Ben and Harlow watching the ducks at the Cummington Fair


Cielo and Harlow in love. she was so comfortable with him at all times. she just wanted to snuggle in and love/sleep.


what i also didn't know was that Cielo wanted a baby so badly. half the reason he is going to school is to get a good paying job so that he can adopt a baby. how amazing. we went to an annual GBLTI family BBQ at Look Park in Northampton on Sunday. sadly, there was only one family with two dads. but it was still amazing to see all the families with two moms. and kids ranging from newborn to young adult. it was so great to see all the love within the families and the kids playing together. it was really great. and inspiring. and touching. we all felt happy to have gone and excited by the reality of queer family functioning in so many different ways. and, true to form, Ben had all of the kids in love with him. he was leading a group of kids around the park on a bug hunt. they loved it!!!



i love my family and i love my "chosen family." it's wonderful to be a piece of such a wide array of people. and even at 5mo, Harlow is loved in so many ways by so many people. what an amazing way to grow up and see the world. i feel like she will be forever supported in her life and her choices and her goals. and she will have a million different people behind her being her greatest fans. it makes me feel all sorts of love for family...regardless of how that family comes to you.

wow. i have a lot of feelings lately. ha! on a side note, we went to the Cummington Fair on Saturday. Cielo was enthralled with the ox pull. i like the cow barns (they're HUGE!) and beating everyone at the games. Ben liked the never ending lemonade. the day was a hit!

look at these two giant squashes.



mama won Hlow a Doozer. she has yet another new love!

all day cells

my most favorite thing about being at work is getting cell phone updates from Gen. these past few weeks i have been producing a little bit less milk when i pump everyday as well. so on top of cell phone pics, i have been getting videos of the hungry baby cry. it's heartbreaking but does the trick. i looooooove my Harlow cell phone pics. these are a few of my favs from this past week.

in trying to lure Harlow into rolling over, Gen tries placing the bottle to her side. it's not as mean as it looks. i promise!


she loathes "tummy time." in order to get out of it, she often just face plants into things until we pick her up.


looking as cute as a button on her way to the county fair.


this one makes me beg to know who stole my infant and replaced her with such a grown up babe?


the only thing i love more than my daily cell updates is picture of Harlow nursing. it is truly the most amazing bond. and while some days it is frustrating to never be able to put her down - there are other days that are just magical. she is such a big girl now. last week when we were at the farm picking up our share, she ate while i picked tomatos! amazing. with the umbrella, i am reminded of a very different picture of me that was taken by Bunty in Michigan over four years ago involving a red umbrella and some fabulous jewels. oh how times have changed.

the great roll over

as you know, Harlow had zero desire to roll over. none. zip. then this weekend she started rolling to her side in order to play with her feet more. then, last night, in front of me/Papa/Ben/Cielo - she rolled over and back again...twice! now she is on a roll (get it?). it's like she always knew how to roll. maybe she did and was just messing with us.

oh, this 4th month

yes, i know, i have bragged and bragged and bragged about my amazing baby. i told you about how she sleeps through the night and how she has slept through the night since day one. i have talked about her calm personality and her ability to be thoughtful (like Pa) even as a newborn. i have told you time and time again about how she never really cries all that much. at all. now i am starting to think that i should have kept my mouth shut!

months 1-4 were amazing. they brought true all of the things that i write about above. tons of sleep, very little crying, and calmness all around. month 4 has been a tricky one. it started out with a bang on our trip to Michigan for 30/40/30. Harlow was amazing on the flight. true to form, she slept almost the entire way and then smiled through the landing. she barely even made a peep and charmed all of those around her. the first few days in Chicago she was great as well just as she was the first few days in Michigan. then all seemed to take a turn at the end of the Michigan stay. she was fussy, screaming all the time, starving, and clearly in pain when trying to eat. i chocked it up to teething but i think there may have been a yeast issue in there somewhere as well. regardless, it seems to have been a rough spell since that trip. while still a generally calm baby that takes things in thoughtfully (again, just like Papa) she has been much more fussy this fourth month. and much more demanding of what she wants. she is also going through a change in her sleeping habits. while she used to go to bed around 11pm and sleep right through until the next morning...she is now demanding to go to bed earlier each night and then waking up fitfully at all sorts of wee hours of the morning. sometimes she wakes up and i can feed her back to sleep. but, more increasingly, she wakes up and then just wants to lay between us and "talk" for a few hours. super cute but super tiring. also, i must say that we have swaddled since birth and i have feared the end of the swaddle since that time as well. i swear by it and know in the depths of my heart that that is why she has slept so soundly all of those months. now, she suddenly wants no part in it. girl wants to move and flail. we have decided that starting today there will be no more swaddle. yikes. yikes. and yikes. but we do have to make that transition. better now than later. and since she is asking for it, i suppose that means she is ready. i am also wondering if her swaddling as inhibited her development in learning to roll over. she still has no interest in rolling but is doing great sitting by herself and standing if you give her something to hold.

these last few days before she turns 5mo have me praying that we revert back to those easy baby days/ways.

on the flip - she is ever adorable and learns more every single day. we started doing the sign for "milk" just a few days ago with her and she already understands it. she will be crying but if you do the "milk" sign in front of her face she will cease crying, smile, and look at the bottle/breast. it's pretty amazing to see.

as per usual, i am still completely smitten. in fact, i get mkore so each and every day. who knew you could love something so much?





and...i have just been informed that there is a thing called the "four month wakeful." who knew??? clearly not me. a light bulb just totally went off.

the adoption!

completely forgot to write about the adoption. it was on 08-11-10. we didn't invite anyone because we didn't really see it as a big deal. Gwen was clearly the parent since conception. making it legal just seemed like a formality. my mom even said that it hadn't occurred to her because Gwen was clearly already the parent. but when we showed up at the Northampton courthouse on 08-11-10, i suddenly had the feeling that i wished we had brought a witness. or six. the funny thing is that another lesbian couple from my birth group was also doing their adoption that very same morning. what a coincidense. the "trial" was very sweet. the judge was this sweet little woman that loved Harlow. she had Harlow picked a pen out of a stack and then she signed the adoption papers with that pen and gave us the pen to keep. the best part was that the big and beefy security gaurd grabbed our camera and took pictures of the entire event. it was really sweet. after the official "trial" for the adoption, we went into the court office where all of the office workers gushed over Harlow and smiled warmly at us. they made us a little plaque with a Poleroid of the adoption in. it was really a very sweet experience. it made me wish that we had invited our family, our chosen family, and all that made it possible to have Harlow.

so, in leiu of you all being there - i just want to say thank you. we all know that Gwen was the parent long before conception but Harlow is officially and legally hers now. thank you to all of you that supported us, help us, shipped things in the mail, and stood by us. we love you all.

who am i?

lately i have been thinking a lot about who i've become. over seven years ago when Gen and i got together i told her that i never wanted to do "couple things" with her. i was a performer, Gen was a producer, we were people that stayed up all night in the city. now here we are owning a 220+ year old farm house in Western MA with our hybrid car and our hybrid baby. we talk about farm shares, homemade baby food, natural household cleaners, and cloth diapers excite us. to top it all off - we just hired a PT nanny and are very seriously considering a mini van. do we need a minivan with only one kid? not so much. but wouldn't it be amazing to stowe-n-go all the seats to cart the dogs around while still having a seat for the baby? and wouldn't it be cool to cart all our friends around? and wouldn't it be cool to...you get the picture. it's shocking to suddenly find yourself at 32 years old with a 4mo old baby and a crazy house to try to manage. when did this all happen and will we ever be able to take off for a weekend again? it's wild to see things change so fast. and, lord knows, all of this is going to go by in the blink of an eye. in fact, i can't believe that Gen and i have been together for well over seven years now. that seems like an eternity. and now we're tied to this kid for life. wild wild wild. and when do i stop being forever exhausted???

i know that life will all slow down sooner or later. until then i am trying to take in the few peaceful moments that i/we have. i am trying to get back into yoga. i am trying to relax and not speed through life. i am trying (and struggling) with not always having to have something to do. i'm wanting to get my hands dirty in a garden, take walks, and sit by the water. it's a constant struggle but so worth it in the long run. currently i am most easily finding peaceful moments nursing the little monkey. here we are last week in Michigan in a house right on the lake...



...my new favorite picture. hopefully it will remind me to slow down. on the flip side - i am liking growing older. i like my wrinkles, i like my gray hair, i like what age can do.

oh how times moves on...

things are progressing so rapidly. out little monkey is more than four months old now. it's wild how fast that happened. it's even more wild how much she has changed. she started as a little blob that just ate and cried. now she holds herself up, lifts her head to the point where i can see she has a neck (!!!), laughs, talks back, holds her own bottle, and practically changes her own diaper. okay, well that was a fib. but you get the drift.

on Wednesday night she sat up by herself for the first time. SHOCKING since she has shown zero interest in rolling over at all. seriously, i have seen other babies her age rolling in ciricles. she just lays there happy as a clam (a rectangle shaped clam). but she sat up by herself on Wednesday - and for a good amount of time to boot. then today i get a cell phone pic from Gen where she is standing and holding onto her bookshelf (see below). i am shocked and awed. maybe she will just go right to walking and skip that menacing rolling stage. maybe she will go her entire life without ever having an inkling to roll. who knows. what i do know is that this baby is a giant 16.5lb monster at 4mo and i love love love every roll of her!

birth class reunion!

we had our birth class reunion today. i wasn't really looking forward to it since Gen had to be in Boston shooting. but i am super glad that i went. it was great to see people. soooooo amazing to see people without bellies but with babies. it was actually pretty cool. and they were all so damn cute (proof below). our teacher had us all introduce the babes and then tell our birth stories. in my head i was not too excited as i have successfully avoided it for month now. and i am used to just crying when i tell it. but most of the stories were so beautiful. from instant birth (just a few hours) to a community of family at the birth to water birth...the stories were so great. i kept tearing up because they were so beautiful but also because i knew i was going to have to tell mine.

Sarah C was there with Tinian and handsome little Weston. i've known for four months now that she also had a hard birth. in fact, she had 68hrs next to my 65hrs. but in all truth, i had never heard her story. she was one of the first to tell. i felt so much strength in her story and was awed at how powerful she must have been to get through it. i really just kept feeling that she was so strong and i was happy for their amazing family. then i realized that perhaps i was that strong too. it gave me strength to tell an elapsed version of my birth story and not feel sorrow around it. and it felt good. because we did get through it and it was amazing and powerful.

one of the husbands in the group summed it up best, "i used to always think that humans were powerful. after watching my wife give birth i know that it is only women that are powerful." ha!

the babes...



Weston and Olive clearly fell in love. or...Weston fell in love with Olive's shirt.