Mia started Kindergarten today. It’s the day she’s been waiting for, for years. Watching the bus go by from our living room window and asking me how many more days until she gets to ride it. It always felt like a someday, not a real day. But today’s the day. And my baby girl, the [...]
Author: Hannah Richards
“I Love You Mia Rose”
Mia Rose, today you are 5 years old. Not until 10:50pm, though. I remember the day well. The minute. For some reason I have this distinct memory of being so flustered that I didn’t know what to say right when you were born. Of all the things to worry about (6 people staring at my [...]
48 Hours of Our Former Life
It’s hard to remember what life was like before. I mean it’s hard to remember what I ate for lunch today and where my kids are and who’s watching them so - it’s not surprising that I can’t remember things that happened 5, 6 and 7 years ago. But I’m pretty sure it was pretty [...]
On camping with toddlers, and other circles of hell.
Last weekend, against my better judgement, I went camping. I knew from the beginning it was going to be a total shitshow, because that's basically the definition of camping. But my husband was all - we're making memories with our kids - and I was all - we really can't afford to take them anywhere [...]
An Ode to Working Moms
I've always said that I'm a working mom out of necessity. But not because of money. I mean, yes, because of money. But also because I would not survive 24 hours a day with my children. And neither would they. Stay-at-home moms you are something else. Truly. But just because I need time away from [...]
I’m Trying to Be a Better Mom and My Kids are Trying to Sabotage Me
So I haven't written on here in forever. It's probably because I stopped going to therapy since I can't afford it (isn't America great?!) and so I'm way less self-reflective these days (which is a nice way of saying self-involved) and have been pretty much in maintenance (survival?) mode for the past 4 months. I [...]
Happy Birthday Lucy
Today is Lucy's 2nd birthday. Or - the day after it. Or something like that. Her actual birthday is out there somewhere in the ether - between midnight on February 28th and the first moments of March 1st. My little leap day baby. Officially half way to her first actual birthday. But despite everyone's calendar [...]
On Aziz Ansari and Assault
I remember watching Aziz Ansari in Boston. He was a featured speaker at a marketing conference and I sat, at 8:30am, inside a crowded auditorium listening to him speak about modern love and feeling lucky to have found and married my husband without too much ado in the modern dating world beforehand. It hadn't taken [...]
The Annual Mall Photo Fiasco
Every year my sister-in-law and I take the kids to the mall for Christmas pictures. This is because we (or least I) am a self-hating narcissist. In the past we've made critical errors like attempting an outfit change during the session, scheduling the shoot during nap time, or taking the kids while they were toddlers. And [...]
Adventures in Power Outages with Toddlers
This past week there was a wind storm in Maine. The always over-reacting meteorologists told us there would "definitely be power outages." Yada yada yada. So we filled up some water bottles, considered running the dishwasher, and then decided, nah - it's only half full. We dug out a flashlight or two, and then we [...]