

Labor of Love and Loss
I was thrilled when I found out I was expecting my second child. I wanted nothing more than to give my daughter a sibling. The moment I saw the positive sign I instantly bonded with the growing life inside of me. I perused big sister books; I imagined how life would be with two children and joked about the trials and tribulations that awaited us. I was full of hope, excitement, and anticipation. That hope and joy was shattered when I lost my pregnancy. The world suddenly fel

Little Baby's Caramel Apple Monkey Bread
Today I am 36 weeks pregnant with Little Baby. This is the point when most women excitedly think about their new baby coming home—and they stress over the imminent labor that is coming and plan for the upcoming months of blissful chaos. I am doing many of these things; I feel electric with excitement, I am obsessed with this little lady—but I am also consumed with fear. We lost our first daughter, Willa, at 40 weeks; she was big, strong, perfect. But she passed away. After a


The Dead Baby Box
A couple of weeks ago, my husband and I took the week off of work together to clear out the clutter in our home. It was a whirlwind marathon of pulling all like items out, placing them onto the living room floor, and thanking each no longer needed item for its service. We dutifully followed this process and donated many bags and boxes of our stuff. We then put everything we wanted to keep into its new uncluttered “home” within our home. There was a definite sense of triump


What If There's No Reward?
I was never the type of woman that imagined how many children I would have, their genders, names and birth order. My first pregnancy was completely unplanned and I wasn’t married to my partner yet. It didn’t come without challenges, but in the end we had a healthy baby boy. After about three years we felt well prepped to add another person into the mix. We got pregnant on the first try! Perfect, they’ll be about 3.5 years apart and we would have an early fall baby, such a nic

Dear Gwen Stefani- Your Joke Sucked
Dear Gwen, I get it, April Fools jokes can be tough to think up. You don't want to go too hardcore, then people get hurt. You don't want to be too soft, then it's not funny. I'm sure you thought, "I know something harmless and shocking! I'll announce that I'm pregnant!" I doubt you realized that a fake pregnancy announcement is neither harmless nor funny. So... your joke kinda sucked. A lot of people have trouble understanding why fake pregnancy announcements are hurtful. Tho