Life + Self

Diving Back In

February 15, 2018 by Abbigail Kriebs Leave a Comment

There is no graceful way to dive back into blogging after taking nearly a year break. The desire to do it in such a way has proved paralyzing, so I decided to just start.

Here is a boring blog about what I’m doing these days that has no pressure to be awesome or amazing or paradigm-shifting or even that entertaining. You can completely ignore it and I will never know the difference, in reality. In my mind, I will have broken my radio silence and not feel the weight of having to do it again. Then I might be able to get back to writing.

Listening

Of Monsters and Men. It’s on my hypothetical List-capital-L to see them in concert in Iceland someday. This album is on repeat at least once a week here.

Watching

We just re-watched The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (one of my all-time favorites) and now I’m resisting the urge to book tickets to faraway countries because a 14+ hour flight with a baby sounds terrible. This is also why I’m listening to more Of Monsters and Men – they hang out on the soundtrack a lot.

Brooklyn 99 – delightful, silly fun at the end of a day where I have been primarily yelled at by a small child. It’s heartwarming in an unexpected way, but mostly slapstick. I’m pretty sure Kendra recommended this one back in The Lazy Sisters podcast days, and I pretty much always take her word on the good TV.

Reading/Cooking

I loosely made a 2018 goal to cook two new recipes per month in order to help us break out of the rut that we fell into post-baby. I also made the loose goal to read more selectively: less fluff, more depth. I accidentally combined the two and kicked off the year re-reading Bread & Wine, a collection of essays and recipes by Shauna Niequist. Niequist talks a lot in the book about hospitality (something I should set a goal around, but am too scared to) and allowing food to be a way to connect with others, not a way to show off. Her message reminds me again and again that this is not my natural gifting, so reading her book often is good for me.

I followed Bread & Wine up with a new-to-me recipe/memoir combo in Dinner: A Love Story by Jenny Rosenstratch. It’s delightful. I earmarked at least two dozen recipes that I want to try (hello meeting loose goal #1), and I loved her message about how making family dinner a priority tends to benefit the other areas of your life as well. From page 10 of the book:

“Things could not have been more okay—on the food front and beyond. I was starting to shape a theory about dinner. I found that if I was eating well, there was a good chance that I was living well, too. I found that when I prioritized dinner, a lot of other things seemed to fall into place… the simple act of carving out the ritual—a delicious homemade ritual—gave every day purpose and meaning, no matter what else was going on in our lives.” — Jenny Rosenstratch, Dinner: A Love Story

Ashley and I talk a lot about ritual on our podcast, and I am learning that my heart craves it in a way that I never realized until motherhood. Life at home alone with Arthur can be monotonous and feel like I’m treading water all day, fixing food and cleaning up after it and then cleaning up the toys and folding the laundry… it often leaves me thinking about “someday” when this is all over and I no longer have to change diapers. “Someday,” I have learned, can be dangerous.

I, too, have begun to feel that making a good dinner a priority at least 4-5 times per week helps keep me in the here and now, a ritual that I need in these days of tiny human wrangling, where progress seems to undo itself almost immediately.

I’ve read other things, too:

Truest by Jackie Lea Sommers – A near-perfect YA novel that I would compare to John Green’s The Fault in our Stars. Teenagers stuck in a small town in summer, smart, snappy dialogue, and people that jump off the page. If YA is your thing, don’t miss this one.

The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein – A read for book club. Not something I would have picked up on my own, but I loved how the narrator applied racing theory to everyday life, and all through the eyes and voice of a dog. Those passages were brilliant.

The Road Back to You by Ian Morgan Cron and Suzanne Stablie and Reading People by Anne Bogel – I read both of these to prep for an upcoming Chasing Creative episode on personality and creativity. Both good, solid reads on personality typing systems, the first about the Enneagram, specifically, the send a more general overview of some of the systems in general. Both short, to-the-point reads if you find personality interesting. I certainly do.

Doing

Trying to convince Arthur to crawl — forward.

Getting out of the house a little more for some alone time, something my introvert soul definitely needs. Mothering as an introvert is probably one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. I love Arthur dearly, DEARLY, but oh, time alone to think in full sentences and concentrate with all of my brain is necessary.

Writing at Hello There, Friend. Things about being different people at the same time, thoughts about advents and celebrations, and about tending the fires in our lives.

That’s all, folks.

I wrote a blog. I broke a months-long silence. I did not do it gracefully, but I did it.

And now I can write more.

Baby Days

July 18, 2017 by Abbigail Kriebs 6 Comments

I knew having a baby would be life-altering, but whew. These baby days are rough.

Arthur Scott made his world debut on April 18th – he’s three months today. And I say he made his debut, but really we forced his hand. Once he’d stuck around an extra 11 days, the doctor induced me on the 17th at 8:00 A.M…. and about 30 hours later we landed in surgery to physically remove the baby that would not come out. Stubborn at the first, huh Arthur? Let’s hope this isn’t a sign.

Arthur Scott

Baby Yawn Stretch Hospital Photo

I kind of figured we’d have it a little more together by now, three months in. But no one told me that you have to teach your child to sleep… or that it really doesn’t work too well until they are a few months old. Or that babies eat every 2-3 hours… for months, not just at first. I don’t think anyone ever told me that itty-bitty babies take four naps a day, either. That they are just not as portable as people make them out to be.

I knew that having a baby really alters your schedule, but I kind of thought it got better sooner than this.

Needless to say, I’ve not written six consecutive sentences since he’s been born, and I’ve only really picked up my camera in the last two or three weeks. I’m starting to feel like a human again, to get out of the house once in a while, with and without Arthur. I’m learning which cries are hungry cries and which ones are “I should have napped longer” cries, how to entertain him for the tiny windows of time he is awake and alert and not physically attached to me nursing.

He likes baths, thank goodness. He wants to see the world, which is marvelous. He’s slowly figuring out that our two cats exist and that they move. He often decides that sleep is overrated and then we all regret it later.

So he’s a pretty normal baby, from what I gather.

I’ve never spent so much time invested in the research and deliberation of when and how to get another person to go to and stay asleep. I’ve never done so much math in my life.

And, of course, I’ve never loved anyone so instantly.

While we’re adjusting, I’m trying hard not to be frustrated when there’s setbacks. But that’s a tough line for this over-analyzer to follow. I’m trying to spend time with other moms to remind myself that all of this is normal, that it is a season, that we will get through it. I’m listening to good podcasts, recent episodes of Chasing Creative where we’ve interviewed moms, and trying to minimize the amount of battery operated toys that enter through my front door.

And I’m slowly adding back in things that bring me joy. I’m working a little, taking a few more pictures, reading a few more books (e-readers are a gift to moms everywhere), and recognizing that drive-thrus were created for the parents of small children.

A day at a time, if my planner-at-heart self can manage it.

If you have kids, what new-baby things were you shocked to learn with your first? Any tips for entertaining a 3-month old or getting him to like naps?

P.S. I share things over at Instagram a little more often than here on the blog these days.

I’m Not Polite Enough To Pretend I’m Not Hungry

February 7, 2017 by Abbigail Kriebs 8 Comments

You know the drill: You go to a gathering of women.

It could be a girl’s night out, a bridal or baby shower, a book club, a Tupperware/Scentsy/[Insert name of wildly popular new product line here] party.

And then no one wants to be first in line at the food table – especially if it’s dessert.

We all stand around and pretend that we don’t need food to survive.

No woman will grab a plate and go through the line first. It’s a pretend-I’m-not-hungry stand-off, when in reality, most of us have hustled and bustled all day – or week! – long to get enough done to clear our schedules for this three-to-four hour soiree in which we are supposed to relax, have a good time, and just be ourselves.

And this is regardless if we are married without children, single, or have one or several children. All women these days are busy – the last thing we need to do when we gather with other women is to pretend, to waste our precious hours of community time not being who we are, or exclaiming about how much we don’t need to eat anything on the menu.

We need to eat. We need to keep up our strength in order to keep up with our schedules – and maintain our sanity.

I am not polite enough to pretend I’m not hungry anymore.

And not just while I’m pregnant. There have been SO many people who have made comments along the lines of “let the pregnant woman eat.” This is true, pregnant women are often hungry. However, so are regular women.

Let’s just let all the women eat, regardless of the state of their uterus. Sound good?

And women: let’s stop waiting. We deny ourselves a lot in life, and whether that denial is free evenings because we want to excel at our career or Saturday mornings because we are raising children or the new shoes because really we ought to stock the pantry instead, we shouldn’t feel the need to wait for someone else to make the move to eat.

If we don’t pay attention to our needs, it’s not a guarantee that someone else will.

I am not polite enough to pretend I’m not hungry anymore.

Will you stop being polite with me?