Etc.

Williamsburg, 2014

It's a gloomy day in Brooklyn but such is life!

I've ordered the boys' Halloween costumes, which may or may not be matching (you'll have to wait and see if I can wrestle our fellows into them.)

I made some butternut squash soup with apples and carrots, which was a success.

Axel is feeling better, but has now morphed into a screen-obsessed zombie, waking up this morning saying, grumpily: "Where's my pad?!" (iPad.) Uh oh.

And we are gearing up for a little East River State Park harvest festival this weekend, plus seeing Gone Girl, if we can muster the energy to stay out past dark...

Dinner Dilemma

Williamsburg, 2014

Ha, this pice, 'What if You Just Hate Making Dinner?' has been making the rounds for a while, but it definitely made me laugh.

I love food blogs and cook books with gorgeous photos of heirloom vegetables scattered over bread boards and all of the rest of it, but realistically? It's been a week of big deadlines and sick babies and ordering from Seamless, even though we also get Blue Apron deliveries and could in theory make something from scratch in about 30 minutes.

On the one hand, we're lucky to live in range of some wonderful delivery options. On the other hand, there is this sense that if you aren't making a wholesome meal every day you're failing in some kind of measure.

Still, that half an hour a day when we're supposed to be roasting Cornish game hens or somesuch happens to be when both boys are clamoring attention, so in order to cook I have to slap on Peppa Pig, and what do you know, I'm not supposed to do that either.

So which is it? Screen time, or dinner?

Technophobia

Williamsburg, 2012

So I mentioned the other day that as I get further into my pregnancy, I've sort of backed off on philosophizing about how I will be as a parent. Somewhere along the way it hit me that for at least the infant months, I am mostly going to be focused on keeping baby alive rather than testing the latest and greatest theories of childhood psychology.

That said, one thing I haven't stopped thinking about is screen time. When we move, Will and I decided we won't renew our cable package, but will instead watch handpicked shows online or via Netflix.

Some of this is because I tend to find TV draining. Not that I am above marathon sessions of Million Dollar Listing or that I don't find the show American Ninja Warrior oddly fascinating. That's just it. I have this stuff on "in the background," and then find myself feeling depleted and even stressed by all the noise, the commercials, the silliness of the shows themselves. I feel like it's a time suck, and also a vortex I don't want to fall into when the baby is here.

There have been a few threads on baby boards about TV, smart phones, and babies (here and here) that have made me think about this a bit more. And sure, the baby is probably not all that aware that The Real Housewives of Orange County is on while he's nursing. But then again, it's a habit that sets a precedent.

What I do know from seeing how my nieces and nephews have been raised is that children emulate their parents. My sisters-in-law barely watch TV themselves, and are rarely online or on their phones. As a result, I've never seen their kids entranced by an iPad or heard them clamoring to watch this or that show. I am sure eventually as they get into elementary school this will change, but I find it sort of lovely to see how their childhoods have been a little bit of a bubble from all the media they will eventually grow attached to.

So we're experimenting with cutting down on the amount of television we watch, hoping for the domino effect. For the record, I do get that I am writing about this on a screen, on the internet. Also worth noting, when I told my mother this, she asked if we were planning on raising our child as "a Canadian." Since "Canadians" apparently do suspect things like drinking herbal tea, becoming vegetarians, or banishing television.