As you have probably gathered I ask my Mom for advice more often than not - or she gives it to me as I'm venting to her (this is more than fair because I vent to her on a weekly basis). And more often than not I take her advice - or kick myself for not taking it. Lucky for me she isn't an "I told you so kind of person" but that doesn't mean she doesn't like to bask in her rightness when I'm happy with the results of her advice. One (unsolicited) piece of advice that I remember her specifically telling me, at a young age, was that I needed to have at least one child before I turned 30. You see my parents had me at 27 then my brother arrived, 7 short years later. My Mom always said that she found herself more tired and worn out (especially with two kids) after her 30's. Since I had always planned to be bare foot and pregnant as a career, having a kid before 30 seemed reasonable to me. I also figured that if I had kids earlier I'd still be fairly young when they went to college, which would work out perfect because I'd still be young enough to keep up with grand kids PLUS I'd have money and time to travel! WINNING! Hopefully my future husband would agree with this plan...
After Ryan and I got married we decided to take a few years to hang out together, establish careers, and buy a house. After all we had been dating just over a year before getting hitched and we were fairly young at that point. I had also grown out of my "baby machine" phase. Two years later Ryan and I decided it was time to make a baby. I had read that when women go off the pill to start trying it could take anywhere from six months to a year before fertilization. Knowing this we ceased birth control December 2006. It took exactly six months (and a really crazy Cinco de Mayo party) before we got pregnant. Since it would be our first child we scanned the Chinese zodiac** to confirm our families compatibility. I knew that if we had a baby 2008, the year of the Rat, and one in 2010/2011 the whole family would be complete. We didn't mind what gender the baby would be since it was our first and as long as we could plan the second to be opposite then we would have hit the jackpot! (click here to see how that worked out for us.)
According to the "ancient Chinese gender chart" we would be having a boy! Baby Bean would be arriving February 2008. He was such an easy pregnancy, I honestly forgot that I was even pregnant half the time. I didn't have any weird cravings except the urge to eat hot fudge sundaes at every meal. If anything, I was sad that I couldn't eat my favorite foods: beer, sushi, and deli sandwiches. It was sort of ok with me because I had already placed my take out order with Ryan so that all three would be waiting for me as soon as I got home from the hospital. FYI future Mom's: I read that drinking beer helps release your milk supply if you are planning on breast feeding. Don't quote me on it but whatever helps, right?!
I think the hardest time I had with that pregnancy was picking a name. With this in mind I didn't have a name picked out but had narrowed down the list to: Jacob, Lucas, Benjamin, and Alexander. Some days I wonder what Jake would look like and if he would have a different personality if I picked Lucas....
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| Jacob Ryan born February 17, 2008. I just want to snuggle with him all the time! |
For our second baby I had to plan more, especially if I wanted a girl. We wanted the kids to be closer in age but far enough apart so that they could have space from each other when they got to school. I was off the pill December 2009 but this time I had to be especially strategic if we wanted a girl. When you are 29/30 there are more boy months than girl months (of course!) so we tried really hard to get pregnant on the girl months. I even downloaded that stupid iphone application to tell me when I was fertile. It kind of takes the fun out of it but then again, this was business not recreation. We were getting to the end of the year and multiple pregnancy tests (and a crazy 30th birthday party) when finally, as luck would have it, we got pregnant!
It is so funny (and weird) to see your child as they grow up. Jake is such a mini version of both Ryan and myself that I'm really looking forward to what Baby Cash is going to look like and what kind of personality he's going to have. The more I think about it the more I'm looking forward to seeing my two boys grow up together. And after visiting with my midwife a few weeks ago, I'm more convinced that our family will be complete after Cash. But that could just be the hormones talking....
**It would probably help to know that I'm big on the Chinese Zodiac as well as the general Zodiac. When I was little and we'd go eat a Chinese food restaurant, one of my favorite things to do was figure out what everyone's sign was (with the help of that fun place mat.) I was born the year of the Monkey and I'm a Scorpio, two things that I believe explain me well. Ryan was born the year of the Dog and he's an Aries. Together we are a compatible match, I checked :)
*I should also let you know that I am not crazy, I just believe that if your signs explain who you are and who you are going to be then making sure your family matches well is reasonable. Of course you can't plan everything and just because you are all compatible doesn't mean you won't raise a serial killer...that's probably due to parenting as well. See so many things to think about when you have kids!
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