Sorry, Not Sorry
Parenting is hard. Can I get an amen? This generation of kids faces so many threats on so many fronts that parenting and raising up children who are kind and present and strong while keeping them safe from cyberbullying and sex traffickers and people in our own country’s leadership feels like a never-ending game…
Surviving Every Stage of Postpartum
I’m in that sweet spot where my babies sleep through the night and don’t have accidents, but I still have family and friends who are having these precious babies that I can snuggle and shop for and then give back. It is magical, but it has me thinking back to my own postpartum experiences.…
Hi, my name is Gretchen, and I’m a Type 1 Perfectionist
My fingernails look like they’ve been painted with a chair. Smudges and smears and outside the lines. Why? I am a perfectionist, so what’s the deal with my ratchet nails? One word: stillness. I hate being still. Thus, I NEVER wait for my nails to dry before I am off curling my hair or folding…
Freedom Reminders
As a girl growing up in the heart of the Midwest, the Fourth of July primarily meant one thing to me: parade candy. The thrill of having to dart into the street dodging Clydesdale hooves and the ambulance that might have to be my ride if I risk my neck for that jumbo tootsie roll…
Muscle Memory: Kid Stuff I Can’t Do Anymore
I wrote a couple of weeks ago about being confident with your mom bod and taking your kids to the pool. I stand by my previous assertions, but swimming with my kids has also reminded me that my body has forgotten to move in certain ways. Total muscle dementia. I may not be a…
On Staying Quiet
Have you ever felt like you are choking on all the words you cannot say? I find myself feeling just that way today. An internal war between fighting for what is just and true and right and being quiet, still, and merciful in the face of mistreatment. I gotta say I don’t know how…
A PSA to non-teachers and advice for our younger selves
(Sixth grade (?) Gretchen) A friendly PSA to all non-teachers out there: Summer is NOT a paid vacation. For every time I wanted to scream and curse but didn’t. For every pencil, I loaned and never got back and for all those that I glued ugly, fake flowers to and found broken to smithereens…
Swimming Pools, Mom Suits, and Creator Dysmorphia
Currently, I’m sitting at a local swimming pool. This was a choice made under great duress. I am, by nature, not a “pool person.” Because I am super fair complected, afraid of bugs, and easily annoyed by small children who don’t belong to me, this makes sense. I am all for staying in my own…
Shower Musings, Pokemon, and Love
Remember that time I wrote a blog and told ya’ll to expect to hear from me. That I was all about standing up and speaking out, and then I went radio silent for the next three mos.? Life, amirite? But seriously, as a writer, I long to write all the words. Unfiltered. Prolific. Shakespearean if…
Both…and…
I don’t know about you, but my life is chalked full of contradictions. The older I get the more in-focus and ridiculous they seem. For example, I hate the cold, but I’ll probably never leave Iowa where it is a balmy -4 degree wind chill today. Here’s a good one: I am an introvert who…
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