Two Moms, Four Breasts, One Happy Baby

Before Lena woke up one morning and decided that she wanted to get pregnant, my plan had been to adopt our fourth child. And I began chomping at the bit to get the adoption process started when Zeben was still just a baby himself; I wanted to make sure that I still had a decent milk supply when our new baby came home. When the plan--which I should clarify was solely my plan, Lena was never exactly on board--changed, and it became clear that our fourth baby would come to us not through adoption but through Lena's body, I still thought about my milk supply. I knew that I wanted to be able to nurse the baby, even though we--as a family--wouldn't have the same need for me to breastfeed that we would have had if we had adopted a baby.

I actually remember the exact moment when I realized that if Lena and I each birthed some of our children, we'd potentially both be able to nurse all of them. It was the fall of 2001, and I was walking through the woods with our dogs, Toby and Sky, and fantasizing about the future (a common activity for me at that point in my life), which really just means that I was thinking about having babies. I imagined Lena and I each giving birth within months of each other, and then both of us sharing the breastfeeding of both children, and the vision just seemed so perfect. When I told Lena about my fantasy, she was less-than-enthused about the "giving birth within months of each other" part, but I still thought it was a pretty great idea, at least the joint-nursing part, if not simultaneous gestation.

About a year later, we found out we were expecting twins and, thinking back to my two-nursing-moms fantasy, I suggested to Lena that she might breastfeed the babies too. After all, we'd have two babies and we may as well take advantage of all the available breasts in the house. Lena was definitely open to the idea, but was not interested in messing with her hormones in order to induce lactation (especially since she was working as a teacher at the time and really wouldn't have any time to pump during the work day). We planned to wait until breastfeeding was well-established with my milk-producing boobs, and then introduce Lena's as "pacifier boobs." Of course, life with twin newborns was all-consuming and beyond hectic and it took forever for breastfeeding to be "going well" (I never had issues with supply, but had nearly every other potential breastfeeding problem over the first few months). I think Luke and Jaz were probably about 3 months old when Lena first tried to let them--and by them, I really just mean Jaz--latch on. The attempt lasted all of 20 seconds, if that. Lena screamed. I pointed out that the latch hadn't been quite right, but My Love was not interested in letting any little mouth near her nipple again anytime soon. Later she got our OB to agree that pregnancy prepares the nipples for breastfeeding, and that her never-been-pregnant breasts would not be able to handle the feeling of a baby sucking on them as well as breasts that had gone through the changes of pregnancy. I still don't exactly agree (plenty of adoptive moms induce lactation and successfully nurse their babies, never having been pregnant), but that one painful experience pretty much halted the "two moms, two babies, four available breasts" plan. I seem to recall Lena letting the boys latch on here and there as toddlers, but for the most part our first three children have always viewed Mama's breasts as the "not for nursing" kind.

Lena nursing Leo

When we conceived Leo, Zeben was 23 months old and still nursing quite a bit. Breastmilk remained his main source of nutrition well into his third year. While I otherwise might have encouraged him to cut back a bit (with Luke and Jaz, I stopped nursing them in the night at their second birthday, and soon after began limiting them to four nursing sessions a day), the fact that we were expecting a new baby changed my perspective on Zeben's nursing addiction breastmilk intake. I wanted to make sure to at least maintain my supply until the baby was born. I never suggested that Zeben start nursing more, I just didn't try to limit him in any way. Lena and I discussed what my breastfeeding role with Leo would be only vaguely; it seemed hard to predict what would feel right once he was born. I knew that I would want to be able to nurse him when I was alone with him, and I hoped that I would be able to at least comfort nurse him when he was older (for our kids, the vast majority of the comfort nursing has happened during the second year). But I also felt strongly about wanting Lena to be his real source of nutrition. One of the coolest things about breastmilk (in my opinion) is that its composition changes as a baby gets older. A mother's breasts make different kinds of milk for newborns, six-month-olds, 18-month-olds and 2-year-olds. While breastmilk of any "age" is, of course, wonderful for a human baby (and way better than artifical milk), ideally a baby will receive the type of milk designed especially for him/her. My body makes milk that is perfect for a 2-year-old. Lena's body makes milk that is perfect for a 2-month-old. We also knew that we would want to wait at least a few weeks before I offered my breasts to Leo, to make sure that everything was going well with Lena's nursing experience first (much like one would wait to introduce a bottle).

Leo and his Mama

Purely by coincidence, Lena's and my nipples are shockingly similar (and trust me, having helped dozens of women struggling with breastfeeding, I have seen LOTS of nipples, and there is a wide range of size and shape). It was no surprise to me that the first time I tried to nurse Leo, he latched on without hesitation. I wondered beforehand what nursing him would feel like, but it really just felt normal and natural, as it should.

Me nursing Leo

Most of the time if I'm holding Leo and suddenly feel the urge to nurse him (my instinct that he's hungry), I will search out his Mama (Lena), and hand him off. But if I'm alone with Leo, or if he's just recently nursed Lena and I don't think he's actually hungry, I will offer him my breast without thinking about it. I LOVE having the magical ability to soothe him anytime/anyplace, even if I don't necessarily have the milk supply to completely sustain him. When Lena starts working in the next few weeks, I will probably ocassionally offer Leo some of Lena's expressed milk using a nursing supplementer at my breast. But even without Lena's amazing milk on hand, I feel so much more confident when I'm alone with Leo, knowing that I can always nurse him if I/he need(s) to. This is also a key difference in making it feel like Leo is my baby as opposed to someone I am baby-sitting for. I have enough milk to tide him over if he's hungry and Lena's not home, or to spray on his bottom during a diaper change (or to spray at Lena during one of our milk mama wars). We were also happy to purposefully offer Leo some of my "toddler milk" when Zeben was sick, upping Leo's intake of antibodies to the illness.

Leo and his Mom

This evening, Lena was reading to Luke and Jaz in bed (as is their nightly routine), and I had Zeben and Leo downstairs. I got a La Leche League call from a new mom with a breastfeeding question, and just as I started talking to her on the phone, both Leo and Zeben started to fuss. Without thinking about it, I latched them both on and tandem nursed through my conversation. Lena came downstairs to this sweet scene of brotherly love:

My view
Note: Zeb is holding Leo's hand

I do still wish that Lena had been able to nurse our older kids in the way that I am now able to nurse Leo, but more than anything I'm just glad that we're FINALLY getting to live out my fantasy. Two moms and four nursing breasts really do make for one very, very happy baby.

Leo Star
2 months old

"Our Chother"

Lukas and Jasper turned 6.5 last week, and not only did I fail to take any pictures or blog about it; I barely even remembered to celebrate it. I've just been so busy and scattered lately that it slipped my mind (there are several other blog posts that I've begun and yet not finished in the last couple weeks; still hoping to finish them before September). Lena and my mom did take the kids out to lunch, but that was the extent of the half-birthday hoopla. Which, granted, may be MORE than what most families do in honor of half-birthdays, but I'm kind of crazy about half-birthdays . . . usually. I have not, however, failed to recognize that the age of 6.5 is about as good as it gets, so far. I am so very much enjoying this current developmental stage and if the kids choose to get stuck here for a while, I would be beyond thrilled.

Not only are Lena and I really digging our six-and-a-half-year-olds these days, but they are (likely not coincidentally) really digging each other (or "our chother" as they say, their last remaining bit of "baby talk," and one of my most favorite of their say-isms, used only in reference to each other). For the first time in about five years, I am feeling lucky about the fact that Luke and Jaz are twins, rather than wishing they had been born separately. It really does seem like a blessing that they came into this world together. Earlier today, I interviewed them about how they're feeling about being twins, and found out that they think it's pretty lucky too.



Zeben, as you may have noticed, was feeling rather left-out of the "twin talk" (one of the reasons why "twins" is not a household term in our family), I think realizing for the first time that Luke and Jaz share something that he does not. Thank goodness these sweet, sweet six-and-a-half-year-olds are so loving and inclusive with their little brother. Seriously, could this please not be a phase and rather be a whole new normal? I hope, I hope.

The Week In Review

I can't believe how difficult it's been lately to find the time to write. And then again, I sort of can. We've had some rather busy days, and my mind is full of a million buzzing thoughts, and the humidity has been absolutely terrible. Here's a taste of what's been going on in the last week:

-- I started my new job, working at Cradle--a maternal wellness center of sorts--two days a week. I am quite excited on many levels. I'm just so glad that such a place now exists in our city, and I'm glad that I get to be a part of it.

-- Zeben turned 2-and-three-quarters. No, we do not celebrate 3/4 birthdays in our family. But my mom, aka "Nama," was trying to get Zeb to say that he was "2-and-three-quarters" instead of "2-and-a-half," and Zeben looked at her like she was crazy and said, "Nama, you're talking about money. I am not money! I'm two and I'm Zeben!"

Zeb at 2.75

-- Lena and I made an offer on a house to buy, the offer was accepted, and we spent a hundred hours applying for a mortgage (yes, this means we may actually be preparing to move yet again in a matter of weeks). We are well on our way to becoming official grown-ups.

The sign in the yard of the house that might someday be ours

-- Leo fell asleep in his car seat on the way home from picking his big brothers up at camp. In the hopes of keeping him sleeping and not stuck to our hot, sweaty bodies, we brought him inside in his bucket car seat, and left him on the floor of the mudroom. When we went to check on him a few minutes later, we found he'd been decorated with monkeys by our 3 little monkeys.

-- Jaz lost a tooth. He now has three empty spaces in his mouth. He opted not to put his tooth under the pillow for the tooth fairy (who the kids know is not real, but still have fun "believing" in). He also inquired as to the whereabouts of his other lost baby teeth, "you know, the ones I left for the tooth fairy before, but that--since YOU GUYS are really the tooth fairy--you took?" and was somewhat appalled to learn that we did not choose to keep them for all eternity (perhaps others among you have had the experience of coming across a small box full of your old baby teeth that your parents had saved for you (WHY???), and feeling totally grossed out), and no longer had them, nor had any idea what we had done with them. Perhaps choosing to keep it safe himself is the best idea, even if it means that he doesn't get 6 quarters from us in exchange for the tooth.

-- Lukas woke up exceptionally grumpy on Monday and convinced us (and our friend Katie) to let him skip camp and go and "baby-sit" for Eli and Aryeh (Katie's four-year-old twins) instead. He had a wonderful time, and was positively giddy, and uncharacteristically helpful for the rest of the week. Sometimes you just need a little break from the regular routine.

You have no idea how hard it normally is to get a picture
of this kid with a genuine smile on his face
this week it was easy.

-- My Love celebrated her 32nd birthday. I made her her favorite cheesecake. We also had some friends over for a birthday dinner (you know, so that we wouldn't feel tempted to eat the entire cheesecake by ourselves), and had a lovely time enjoying steak, corn-on-the-cob, and cucumber salad while our 7 male offspring remained happily entertained.

-- Lena made a secret birthday wish. I have no idea what she wished for, but I'm fairly certain that the answer to last year's wish was sleeping peacefully in the hammock when she blew out her candle and made a wish yesterday.

-- Luke and Jaz were in the local newspaper again (I think this was the 5th or 6th time), this time as part of a feature about their fabulous farm camp (which, sadly, ended today, leaving us camp-less for the remaining 3 weeks before school starts).


-- When walking through town one evening, we accidentally ended up at a circus of sorts that was being performed on the sidewalk. It was very impressive.

Defying gravity

-- This one acrobat was hilarious as well as super strong and talented, and took some time to show of his outrageous muscles.


-- I caught Jaz looking awe-struck at the muscle man, and tried to capture his expression with my camera, but he intercepted out of embarrassment.


-- Leo is looking less and less like a little scrunch of a newborn and more and more like a real baby. He has rolls of chub and everything. And the smiles come easily now, especially in the first half of the day. He really is the best antidote for all of this craziness and chaos.

Leo
7 weeks

Leo
7 weeks

-- I fell asleep three times while trying to write this post. Yikes.

Upcoming Blog Titles, which should be appearing here over the next few days:

Two Moms, Four Breasts, One Happy Baby
Handmade for Leo
A Bakfiets Built For a Baby
"Pouch" and Other Tales of Playful Parenting

STAY TUNED AND STAY COOL!

Totally Gear-Smitten Mama

I believe that the whole baby-gear phenomenon is outrageously overdone in our country. People are led to believe that they need a room--or a house--full of things in order to properly care for a baby. And as helpful--or not--as this baby gear may be, I believe that there probably already exists enough of it that production of new products could stop today and still future babies of the USA would have plenty of gently used baby gear available to them.

Interestingly enough, my disgust with the majority of the baby gear market has also led me to develop a bit of a baby gear obsession. I enjoy, in a kind of morbid way, flipping through baby gear catalogs and feeling horrified by most of what I see. The whole concept of a "travel system," for instance, drives me insane. Products that--in the name of convenience--enable parents to have fewer and fewer reasons to come into physical contact with their babies infuriate me, especially when the products require that the baby be in an unnatural and unhealthy position for far too many hours per day. Due to the popularity of some of these gadgets, new parents are made to feel as though they, too, need the same gear that "everyone else" is using, and buy their own copies before their babies are even born, before they've necessarily had the chance to awaken to their own parenting instincts.

Along with baby-gear hatred, I have also developed a true appreciation for those few products that don't make me gag: the things that aren't ugly, aren't made of flimsy material, and are as basic as they can possibly be. I love our trusty bouncy chair for the simplicity of the design (any product that mimics what it feels like for a baby to be in a sling gets points with me), for the sturdiness and the lack of plastic or "baby" patterns, and the fact that it's now bouncing it's sixth baby without any signs of wear or tear. I love our twin stroller for many of the same reasons, adding also the fact that I can push it fully-loaded with one hand, and its secret ability to transport FOUR children at a time if bigger kids choose to sit on the footrest. I love our clip-on baby high chair that slips easily into a bag for transport and helps our little babies to join us at the table from early on.

In anticipation of Leo's birth, we really didn't have to prepare much stuff at all. We did get him a car seat, some new cloth diapers, and some tiny short-sleeved t-shirts (all of our other sons having been winter babies), but the rest of our preparation focused on the birth supplies. The only helpful thing--aside from our variety of baby carriers, which is too extensive to discuss in this context--in Leo's first weeks of life was an inflated yoga ball (sitting on one of these balls and bouncing is pretty much a sure fire way to calm a fussy baby).

But once Leo was a few weeks old, and we had gotten to know him a bit and had mostly settled into our new life as a family of six, we did start to wonder if maybe he was the type of baby who could use a particular piece of baby gear. Some babies--Zeben was like this--are so laid back that you can just put them down on the floor (or on a bed or in a crib) and they'll lie there happily until eventually they just fall asleep, while some babies require a bit more continuous attention. Leo is the latter kind of baby. And we began to notice, once Leo was three weeks old or so, that he really only stayed asleep if we were lying with him in bed, or wearing him in a carrier (and moving around, not wearing him in a carrier and sitting on the couch). And as much as we loved--and continue to love--lying with him in bed and wearing him in carriers, we started to wonder if it might be possible to have him do some of his sleeping in such a way that it wouldn't require so much of our physical involvement. I searched through the catalog of baby gear in my brain (where I store memories of all of the baby gear that I've come across in the past couple years), and decided that Leo needed a hammock.

The first baby hammock to enter the US market was the Amby Baby Hammock. It arrived on the scene not long after we survived Luke and Jasper's infancy, and the first time I saw it I remember thinking, "if only we'd had one of those!" Jaz and Luke mostly only napped in slings for their first several months of life, and the Amby appeared to me to be a self-hanging sling, or in other words, a way that I could have succeeded in having a sleeping baby AND some occasional personal space. I ended up purchasing one when I was pregnant with Zeben, figuring that it was nearly a guarantee of an easy-napping babe. It turned out that Zeben was absolutely an easy-napping babe, having nothing to do with the Amby at all. As I said above, he was happy to lie flat on his back all alone in a room and fall asleep, without nursing or anything. He was like an alien compared to our first two babies. Beyond feeling like we didn't need the Amby, I also felt like it was ugly (the large metal frame, the lace), not particularly sturdy, and not entirely straight-forward to use. Adjusting the angle of recline was difficult. Getting the baby in and out was bothersome. And there was only so far that you could swing the hammock before it would crash into the frame. I was not impressed. I think maybe Zeben napped in it once, but we quickly decided to sell it and free up some space in our kitchen.

Over the past year or so, there have been a few new baby hammocks entering the market, all of which have caught my eye and looked like an improvement over the Amby. When Lena and I decided that Leo might be a good candidate for a hammock, I looked into all of the readily-available options (the Miyo, the Happy Hangup, the Kanoe and the Hushamok) before deciding on the Kanoe. First of all, there's the name--Kanoe--and the fact that it looks somewhat like a canoe. Lena and I love to paddle (our whitewater canoe was our first joint-purchase, early on in our relationship), so the canoeish Kanoe had some appeal right off the bat. Plus, it comes in nice, simple colors of organic cotton fabric (no patterns, no lace). There was no frame required, and the hammock seemed especially sling-like (whereas some designs incorporate a mattress, which to me seems like it would kind of negate the point). After a week of debating, we took the plunge and ordered one for Leo.


When it arrived, I quickly set it up (simply by screwing an eye-hook into the ceiling and clipping the hammock on), and put our fussy baby in to try it out. Within minutes he had fallen asleep, and continued to sleep for the next hour-and-a-half.

Leo in the Kanoe
4 weeks old

Lena and I stood around with our jaws dropped open, wondering what to do with our unencumbered bodies. In the weeks since the Kanoe arrived, we have come to see it as a very useful tool indeed, especially since Leo is our fourth baby. Luke and Jaz love to push Leo in the hammock if we need to quickly rush around getting ready to leave the house, and it continues to be a wonderful way to get Leo to nap (though the vast majority of his sleep is still taking place on or next-to our bodies, as we feel it should be).


What's been surprising is that the Kanoe has also proven itself as a helpful tool with our third-born son. Zeben enjoys the hammock just as much as Leo does, and it has helped to snap him out of more than one difficult two-year-old moment. Any piece of "baby gear" that can be useful with a newborn and a 2.75-year-old deserves some recognition. The Kanoe is something that I can see happily hanging from our ceiling for years to come.


It's a little difficult for me to admit just how much of a gear-smitten mama I am. What started out as pure disgust--of any and every type of baby gear--has definitely blossomed into a bit of a love affair with some specific items. Companies like Kanoe give me hope. Maybe there is the potential for a paradigm shift about what stuff babies really need, and how to best care for them in a loving--and, sure, convenient--way. Plus, a product like the Kanoe could replace the traditional crib, the bassinette, the cradle, the bouncy chair, and the swing-o-matic, reducing the number of items an expectant parents feels like they need to buy while still fulfilling that American desire to buy something for their baby.

Kanoe, we love you.

For the Love of Blueberries

Last Saturday we joined up with some of our favorite and best pals for a very blue adventure. Meg, queen of the festivals (it's possible that her addiction outweighs my own), clued us in to the whereabouts of a new blueberry festival (different from the one we went to last year, and that we will attend again, this coming weekend), and we decided to check it out. I mean, why not spend an afternoon picking blueberries? Especially when they're the itty bitty wild blueberries (the favorite and best variety according to the five members of our family who are old enough to eat blueberries), which normally we've only come across fresh at roadside stands in Maine. We had never picked them ourselves before.

Finding the blueberry farm was a bit of an adventure in and of itself, though the directions were fine enough. But it was a ways away from our little farm in the valley, and so by the time we arrived at the festival, it was already nearly 4:00. We grabbed some boxes and rakes for picking, and headed out to the fields of blueberries.

It actually felt more like standing in a sea of blueberries, what with them being so blue, and so plentiful.


Luke and Jaz quickly figured out how to use the blueberry rakes, and made a significant contribution towards filling our box with berries.


The littler kids (Zeben, Aviva and Lisel) worked soley on filling their bellies with berries.


I had to take a break from picking myself in order to take about a million pictures of Liesl sitting picking berries and depositing them directly into her mouth. She's just about the cutest thing in the world, and bares a striking resistance to Sal in "Blueberries for Sal."

Leo was the only one of our crew who didn't get to partake in the blueberry deliciousness. But he did get to look cute wearing his blue hoody that perfectly matches his blue eyes.

We ended up with three boxes full among our three families, about 70 pounds of blueberries all together. We may have gone a little overboard. But we certainly won't have to worry about running out over the winter.

After the picking comes the equally-entertaining job of sorting. There is a conveyor belt sorter at the farm that we dumped the blueberries into and then examined them, picking out the leaves, stems, and tiny green berries as they came by.


For some of us, it was kind of like a conveyor belt of all-you-can-eat snacks coming by.

But, for the most part, everyone was very adept at purifying our harvest, and it was really nice to be able to come home with the berries already sorted, ready to go directly into the freezer. And blueberry cake. We will definitely be adding this oh-so-blue event to our list of "not to be missed" festivals.

My Favorite Blueberry Cake

• 2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup butter (plus extra for the pan)
  
• 2 and 1/4 cups sugar
• 4 eggs
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 2 cups fresh (or frozen) blueberries (or a little more)
  
• 1/4 cup all-purpose flour

1. Preheat oven to 325°F. Grease a 10 inch tube pan generously with butter. Sprinkle pan with 1/4 cup sugar.
   
2. Mix together 2 3/4 cups flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside.
3. Cream together 1 cup butter and 2 cups sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs one at a time, then add the vanilla.
   
4. Gradually add the flour mixture to the butter/sugar/egg mixture.
   
5. Dredge blueberries with remaining 1/4 cup flour, then fold into batter.
   
6. Pour batter into prepared pan and bake for 70-90 minutes (in our oven it's 80 minutes), or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Let cool in pan for 10 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack and cool completely (or eat immediately if you can't wait).

Enjoy!