Coming Out Of The Closet

Recently, the media has been paying a fair bit of attention to families practicing extended breastfeeding. Extended breastfeeding is a broad term that covers mothers and children who continue their breastfeeding relationships past the age of 1 year. Mothers who encourage and support nursing toddlers are frequently maligned in the press as curiosities, weirdos, or hippy nutcases.

I disagree. I think there are far more of us who practice this than anyone realizes — the fear of public shame often silencing discussion. I think we do ourselves a disservice by not sharing our experiences with other mothers, by discussing this topic in a much broader forum. How can extended breastfeeding be seen as anything other than “freaky” if we don’t normalize it by bringing it out in the open?

I don’t know very many people who set out when pregnant with the specific intention of nursing a toddler.

Joy In The Simple Things

Last night I took Boy#3 to the park while his brothers went to Cubs. He had his first encounter with the slide (which led to many subsequent encounters in the ensuing 20 minutes). By the end of the evening, his immense joy and excitement in going down the slide over and over had me in stitches.

Review: Mox Mittens*

It’s Winter and I am sure may of you can commiserate with me when I say that trying to convince a toddler to keep his snow gear on SUCKS. Mittens are the worst, in my opinion, as they are so easy to take off.