Places to Go - Dumbarton Oaks (Washington DC)

Two weeks ago, on an incredibly beautiful Wednesday afternoon, the girls' school released early, so I decided we needed to visit Dumbarton Oaks (just outside Georgetown). The girls were not thrilled about my plan, rather, they wanted to Wii and ride bikes. I probably would have given in, but throughout the winter Dumbarton Oaks is FREE, whereas after March 15 it costs $8 for adults and $5 for children (aged 2-12) to tour the gardens. So my cheapness prevailed and I insisted we needed to go before the fees kicked in - luckily the girls LOVED it (I can never predict how well "forced" adventures will go over).

As soon as we arrived, P yelled, "mom, you made this sound like some boring old garden, you didn't tell me there was a CASTLE." The kids' enchantment continued as we explored the grounds - F spent the whole walk asking how much it would cost to live there, whereas P and her friend L, just pretended they did live there (I think the abundance of imagination might be the biggest distinction between kindergarteners and 1st graders). The kids all ran and ran, trying to read the map, yet anxious to see the newest spot of interest.

Now that spring has arrived, the gardens are no longer free, but they should be BEAUTIFUL right now, especially with the cherry trees in bloom. The estate also contains a museum of Pre-Columbian art, which we did not have a chance to visit. Metered street parking is located outside the entrance (we did not have a problem finding a spot). The gardens are only open in the afternoon from 2-6 pm (excluding Mondays and holidays). Click here for more information.



Andy Cao's Cloud Terrace art installation covered one of the patios with a net full of fake diamonds, which looked wonderful as the afternoon light bounced everywhere.

Things to Make - Natural Easter Egg Dye

We rarely dye Easter eggs (mom guilt). Often we vacation around this time, so I can use that as an excuse. But truthfully I hate hard boiled eggs and the obligation to eat several of them usually weighs me down, so I avoid the whole scenario. Luckily lately both Dan and T cannot stop eating any sort of egg, so without any excuses holding me back, we had a job to do.

I've wanted to make natural egg dye ever since reading this post. We borrowed the recipes used by Sweet Fine Day and the colors turned out beautiful and vibrant. And the kids' all loved following the recipes - now I'm trying to decide what to do with the leftover dye - any suggestions?

Here's the scoop:

Ingredients: red cabbage, red beets, turmeric, eggs (preferably white)

1. Follow the recipes below to make the dye:

Blue: Simmer 4 cups of water with 1 small red cabbage (roughly chopped) for 15 minutes.

Red: Simmer 4 cups of water with 2 medium red beets (grated) for 15 minutes.

Yellow: Bring 4 cups of water to a boil and stir in 1/4 cup turmeric. Boil for 1 more minute.

2. After each of the mixtures have cooled down, mix in 1/4 cup white vinegar and strain each of the colors into bowls for dyeing.

3. Leave the eggs overnight - refrigerated- in the color bath.

4. Eat (or, if you're like me, don't eat)


HAPPY TUESDAY EVERYONE!!

Things to Do - Random Links

(images above from our room at the Clifton Inn, Charlottesville, VA)

Around here, the arrival of spring is occurring quite slowly, as evidenced by the snow falling outside my window this morning. In honor of today's snow day, I thought I'd post some random links to start off the week.

As you've probably noticed, I changed the look of the blog somewhat - as much as I love toddler feet, we're past those days now. I went through several iterations before I came up with a header photo that felt right to me, right now I love the messiness of the above photo - the unclean counter, cookbooks left out, the wine bottle and kitchen towel in the background, crazy fridge magnets - because that's our life (for better or worse). And the spiderman mask just sort of completes it all.

Happy Monday everyone!! (And happy spring break!)

* Trippy.

* Documerica - "For the Documerica Project (1971-1977), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) hired freelance photographers to capture images relating to environmental problems, EPA activities, and everyday life in the 1970s." Many of the photos are currently on view at the National Archives, but if you can't make it to the exhibit the online collection is really impressive in itself.

* Leaning houses. For some reason, I really like these, even though the idea seems obvious enough (not that it ever occurred to me).

* Custom family portraits. Has anyone ever bought one of these? I'm somewhat tempted.

* My new favorite song. Seriously. Favorite. I. love. one. word. sentences.

* Snapshots from a surreal North Korean vacation.

* An around the world toy story.

* Spring. I really love this one.

* Perfection.

* Perhaps the most addictive blog ever (thank you Not Quite Grown Up for the suggestion!)

Places to Go - Clemyjontri Park (McLean, VA)

Almost every parent of a toddler throughout the DC metro-area has heard of or visited Clemyjontri Park, as it's sort of a 2 year old's version of paradise (minus the fact that the playground contains almost no shade or trees - making it scalding hot in the summer and extra cold in the winter). And I must admit the park is impressive in its HUGE colorfulness and variety, full of fake "roads" (made of that bouncy playground material, so nobody gets hurt), airplanes, motorcycles, cars, a firetruck, a bus, tons of swings, a plastic instrument section, a MAZE, and a carousel in the summer. It seems limitless, which is both Clemyjontri's blessing and its curse.

When the girls were little, we constantly received invitations for playdates and get togethers here. But as a mother of two small children, I found the whole place a logistic nightmare - F wanted me to push her on the swings, but where was P? Oh, crying because she fell off the firetruck, half a football field away from me. As I rushed to retrieve her, moms of only children glowered at me, their eyes clearly saying "how could you be so negligent? Where were you?" I felt like crying. No matter how hard I tried, the girls (aged only 13 months apart) always went in different directions, especially at Clemyjontri which offers so so many directions to choose from. And then there's the maze, a wonderful idea in some regards - but if you turn your head as one of your three children wanders in unexpectedly, a gripping fear engulfs every organ as you run through the giant playground screaming at everyone you see "have you seen my son?"

I started calling it the "only child" playground, because everyone there always seems to have an adult child ratio of at least 1:1 (more often 3:1 (apparently grandparents love to come too)). And I avoided it like the plague. Well, until now.

Last week, T and I went with some friends. And we stayed forever. I stood by as T and his best friend, J, put out imaginary fires, raced motorcycles, started a band, sailed on a "boat", and flew airplanes. He ran from place to place, overwhelmed and intrigued. A joy to watch. Which made me realize how in some ways I'm doing this whole thing backwards - most families start out with two adults and one little bundle of joy - bonding like crazy. Then (for some) more kids slowly add to the pack. But F was only 3 months old when I became pregnant with P. By the time F started walking, I could no longer see my feet. And I remember it being hard, in lots of ways. But I had no comparison metric, I didn't know anything else (other than the glowering moms mentioned above, who seemed so constantly disappointed by me). And we had fun together (sometimes frazzled fun, but still fun).

But, now, with my third child, I'm finally able to take him to the playground without any siblings. And as much as I loved the community and joy and love that comes with two, I must say hanging out with one is pretty fun as well. Especially at places like Clemyjontri Park.
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If you're interested, Clemyjontri is open every day from 7 am to dusk. The playground has a larg(ish) parking lot, which often fills on weekends (overflow parking is located across the street and around the corner, somewhat of a hike). The playground's unique design (ramps, wheelchair accessibility, wide openings) assures that children of all abilities can play next to each other. In the spring, a paid carousel operates on weekends. And in summer, the carousel operates daily. Bathrooms are on site. Click here for more information.



Years ago, all of the kids received dog hats as birthday party favors and for some reason they always wear them when I bring the camera, which drives me a little crazy.



Nothing like a porch swing to get the party going.



The bottom photo is of the dreaded/loved maze. So much fun, well, until it's not.

Things to Do - A Kinder, Gentler Rant

First of all, I need to stop. Just one more cranky post and I will return this blog to the "happy space" that I need it to be (hence the grateful lists). Not that anything is wrong with venting or honesty (and I believe in both those things), but this is my place for optimism. And I want to keep it that way.

Regarding the rant -it really was just a rant and while I feel that I had some interesting/worthwhile things to say, I wrote it from an angry place, without well researched arguments. And I'm fine with that. Since the rant posted, I've received quite a few emails and notes regarding Vivia Chen, who apparently quit lawyering and began blogging when "she realized that her favorite part of working on a transaction was planning the post-closing dinner." So it's not okay for a Princeton grad to dream of raising children, but it's fine for Chen to dream of planning a dinner? Um, I'm sure there's a message here. But can someone explain to me what it is? Those who live in glass houses . . . Whatever. I get it, Chen sees herself as different because she WORKS.

Perhaps as women we make too much of this work vs. non-work distinction. When money isn't the issue (and, obviously, this whole discussion changes radically when it is) then why does working in itself become so important? If you have a job you love, then do it. Of course. Or even if you just like the release, the change of pace, the thoughtfulness that working outside the home can bring, then please keep working. But if you believe that one must work just for the sake of working, I don't understand. Do you really think life ends when you leave the corporate world (or for that matter, that you can never return)? Find a hobby. Start a blog. Or even better, I know quite a few moms who couldn't decide between work and home, so instead of trying to find employment outside the home they founded their own businesses. And I think that's pretty awesome. Hence, why I LOVED this quote from Mary Louise Kelly's article - "So many of the women I know are blending work and family in ways our mothers and grandmothers never dreamed possible. This seems to me worth celebrating, not sniffing at. Dare I confess that I feel I’m accomplishing something just as meaningful now as when I spent my time scurrying between Pentagon press briefings? Or, to use an example from Sandberg’s world, should we automatically assume that the woman running the company is doing more with her life than the woman who has negotiated a three-day week?"

One of my best friends from law school works as a corporate lawyer at a major firm. She travels quite a bit for work (depositions don't come to you) and has two incredible children. She's amazing. Due to her schedule, most of the child-raising responsibilities fall on her husband, a fantastic dad. He can spend hours on the floor dressed as a prince or a king or a monkey, creating imaginary worlds with 3 year olds. Yet the other day, my friend said something that has stuck with me, "I just didn't realize it would be this hard - the maternal pull. I always planned on working full time and my husband is great with the kids. But I just can't believe how hard it is for me, to not be with them. I wasn't prepared for that." And I think that's the problem with this whole "have-it-all" philosophy. You can have it all. Really. But it's hard, not just logistically. But emotionally. And good parenting does not have anything to do with whether or not you work outside the home. Some of the best parents I know have full time jobs (three hours with a young child can be heaven, whereas eight can be hell). But I think we just want these wonder-women, these female pinnacles of success to acknowledge this.

And by "we", I don't necessarily mean the 37-year-old me, writing this now. I've made my own choices. I don't need Marissa Mayer or Sheryl Sandberg to explain their lives to me. But I mean the 27 year old law school student me, who assumed she'd just drop the kids with the nanny and dash off to an awesome job. Who assumed parenting would be easy. Emotionally easy. So while I haven't read Lean-In, and while at first the buzz and press annoyed me, the other day I finally watched Sandberg's TED talk and ending up a fan (who would have guessed it?). Along with some really good advice for corporate women (advice I desperately needed ten years ago), Sandberg does say, clearly, THIS IS HARD regarding her life as a working mom. I'm not sure why the press portrays her as a anti-women workaholic (and again, I have not read the book). She flat out states "I feel guilty some times. I know no women, whether they're at home or whether they're in the workforce, who don't feel [this is hard] sometimes. So I'm not saying that staying in the workforce is right for everyone." Further, "I know men that stay at home and work in the home to support wives with careers, and it's hard. When I go to the Mommy-and-Me stuff and I see the father there, I notice that the other mommies don't play with him. And that's a problem, because we have to make it as important a job, because it's the hardest job in the world to stay at home, for people of both genders, if we're going to even things out and let women stay in the workforce."

So instead of a rant, I'll end it on this note - this is the conversation we need to have, not the insults, not denying an education to people who disagree with your future plans, but rather, honesty over antagonism. Because as a SAHM I need people like Sandberg to show my daughters (and my son) that women can make it in the corporate world. Yet, I also feel that our children need people like me, to show that one can "opt out" if one chooses, that personal satisfaction and happiness exist in many different forms, that a job does not define who you are. And that whether it be a nanny, a father, a mother, a relative, or a daycare worker - someone needs to watch the kids (we can't just leave them in a dark room with food on the floor and a bowl of water in the corner). Like it or not, we're all in this together, even Vivia Chen and me (though hopefully we won't ever have to ever actually meet).

In pursuit of openness, sharing, and meeting new people, one of my favorite bloggers and friends* is creating a get together for lawyer moms with the goal of meeting regularly to discuss "a variety of issues facing lawyers with children, including career choices, work-life balance and raising children." Every mom with a law degree is included, regardless of whether you currently utilize it or not. So please come (time and place to be determined)!! I'd love to meet more of you and hear your stories as well. Click here to RSVP.

**Oh, and just in case you think this sounds fun/interesting/different but fear that it will be awkward, I want to assure you that Shannon is outgoing and friendly and easy to talk to. She can make anyone feel totally at ease. Plus she's super fun.