Just when you get to a point in summer where you think — OK, I’m set for the season — Shopbop launches a mid-season sale and you realize you still have space for some newcomers. Below, my favorite finds from the Shopbop sale…
P.P.P.S. This post on my postpartum figure after mini’s birth is giving me all the feels now that micro is here. I completely forgot how long it would take to feel like my body is my own. I think it took a few months last time to get back close to my pre-birth weight, but around nine months to actually feel like myself (after I’d weaned mini, etc.) And even at a year, I would still feel occasional weirdnesses around my incision — it takes a long time for all the nerves to regenerate and I didn’t have much sensation around there for a long, long while. Anyway. A reminder to myself to be patient and generous and treat myself as I would a good friend…
By: Jen Shoop
Have I been living on Mars? What is Dillard’s and why have I always had the (apparently false) impression that it was a big step down from Lord & Taylor? I have recently been coming across the most darling pieces from their online collection while in the midst of some serious online shopping. Below, a few of my favorite finds:
+This mommy and me moment is very Dolce & Gabbana: this for mini, this for me. I am kind of dying over it. Almost enough to order them as a possibility for our family photo shoot at the end of the summer. (Is it too much?)
+This top is giving me major Brock Collection vibes…
+A great selection of heirloom-worthy Feltman Brothers pieces, a brand that has been around for a century and whose pieces I once wore! These are beautiful pieces for occasions like christenings and weddings. How sweet is this itty bitty dress, or this romper, or this dress for older girls? Meanwhile, this traditional girls’ dress is marked down to $40 and this little set (on sale for under $20!) would be such a sweet and traditional gift for a new baby — and fit for a prince! (More gifts/baby fashion ideas inspired by the royal baby here.)
My Latest Snag: The Rebecca De Ravenel Forget Me Not Earring.
Mr. Magpie surprised me with a number of thoughtful gifts for my birthday, but my favorite was this pair of Rebecca De Ravenel earrings in pink. I am in love with them and I cannot tell you the value of a statement accessory these days, when I am struggling to figure out what to wear thanks to being only a month postpartum and nursing constantly. Big earrings make me feel pulled together! In love with this and in love with him for picking them out — how thoughtful?!
Many years ago, at a tea party my mother hosted, I was chatting with a friend of my mother’s about some of the help I’d been giving my father at his law office. He had been working on a book that analyzed his experience fighting in the Vietnam War through the lens of war-time poetry from generations past, and I had served as his copyeditor and assistant during a break from graduate school. I also occasionally served as an errand girl, buying diet cokes and salted mix nuts from nearby Rodman’s grocer (local DC people, do you feel me?) or making him cold cut sandwiches in the small kitchenette off of his office. I commented on this facetiously to my mother’s friend: “You’d think I was making him an elaborate gourmet sandwich; he’s so appreciative. I just don’t know what he’d eat if I weren’t there. He’s kind of helpless in the kitchen.” I delivered this off-handedly, with what I deemed to be an air of drollness, and my mother’s friend stopped, looked me seriously in the eye, and said: “Oh, but Jennifer — isn’t it nice to be needed?”
I reddened and stammered in the face of her reproach. Later, I rolled my eyes as I retold the story to a sister, indicating that I’d thought she was being overly dramatic in the face of a casual conversation.
But I have carried her words with me for years. They bubble up at the most unexpected times, chastening me, softening me, reminding me of the gift of being not only wanted, but needed.
I have been thinking of this constantly in the past few weeks since micro has arrived, when on occasion, he will wail in his little bassinet despite having a full belly, a clean diaper, fresh pajamas, and a tight swaddle. And I will lift him and cradle him next to my heart and he will quiet, mollified by the simple act of being held and loved.
Motherhood can feel overwhelmingly burdensome — not in the sense that I am desperate for escape, but in the sense that I feel laden with responsibility, heavy with duty. But then I think of the words of my mother’s friend and I realize what a blessing it is to be needed at all.
Blast from the Past: On My Eight-Year Wedding Anniversary.
“…There isn’t much I can say about Mr. Magpie that I haven’t already written. (Let’s not forget the M Series, too.) But today, we celebrate eight years of marriage, and I am thinking to myself: how radical, how astoundingly improbable, how wildly fortunate it is that I managed to find someone who is perfect for me. Me! Idiosyncratic me! Who has rules for herself and sometimes (always) dwells too much on lessons learned the hard way and can get all worked up over a punctuation mark. Who expects a lot of people, cries at the drop of a hat, and worries about everything on God’s green earth. And him, who is somehow the most passionate and dispassionate person I know: he is convicted in what he believes with an intensity I’ve rarely seen elsewhere (“I’d rather kill myself than get a tattoo,” he once stated flatly, pissing off the mixed crowd of tattooed and non-tattooed friends we were with — GULP) but he is also calm, even-keeled, analytical in the face of decisions, whereas I am prone towards fretful emotionality. Yes, idiosyncratic us. And yet we are absurdly well-suited to one another, miraculously adjacent puzzle pieces. We share the same values, ambitions, sensitivities. Our personalities play together easily. We have opposite but complementary skillsets in all facets of business and personal life. And where we don’t see eye to eye, we mind the gap. In our eight years of marriage and fourteen years of coupledom (fourteen!!!), we have evolved together and independently in a way that empowers me to be the fullest version of myself.
And so eight years in, I think back to that night on the rooftop in Northwest D.C., and I think: “Yes. He was perfect for me then. But he is more perfect for me now.”
+I’m very intrigued by the Baby Brezza once micro is old enough to start on purees and the like. I *tried* to steam and puree food for mini a number of times but found it irritatingly onerous, especially when she routinely refused to eat the fruits of my labor. This seems like an investment worth making. Thoughts from fellow moms?
*Euphemism. Also — this post might be a bit much if you have not breastfed before; proceed at your own caution. (AKA: Dad, please stop reading here.) But one aspect of motherhood that has been deeply gratifying is bonding with other mothers who are going through the same thing — and hearing how they approached various snafus and learning that I am not alone in the wild swing of my emotions. And so I thought it might be helpful to share my experience over the past month…
*And separately, in the photo above, Hill is wearing these Roller Rabbit jammies. I always get a lot of questions when readers see him wearing them in my instastories! (Also available in a onesie/hat/blanket bundle here.) I adore this brand. Spendy, but they last! I find that they run TTS until maybe a year and then I have always needed to size up. Mini wears a size 4 currently.
Honestly, if you’d asked me what I wanted for my birthday some time last week, I probably would have said “a few hours where I am showered and not wearing nursing clothes.” I have felt like a total schlub the past few weeks; I’d forgotten how unkempt nursing makes you feel, with all of the soaking through clothes and pulling things down and up and chafing and applying ointments and pumping and — ugh. I feel constantly “undone,” even with the cutest nursing dresses!
But then I had a freak out. Micro started fussing at the breast at every feed, latching and then unlatching in fury, writhing around in what I deemed to be ravenous hunger. I was perplexed and upset — what was going on? Because I have had an undersupply**, I have had to supplement with formula at every feed and so, over the course of that day, after five minutes of having him latch, become enraged, and then push away from me in anger, I would often give him the bottle. I’d heard somewhere that if infants are very hungry, you might start them with the bottle and then switch to the breast, but even switching midway through the feed seemed to upset him. So then I tried pumping and found — to my shock — that virtually nothing was coming out. What was happening to my supply?!
Oh, magpies, how I fretted, tearfully. (I had also had a particularly exhausting prior night, up every hour or so to feed or change or soothe the baby, and I think the sleeplessness was wearing me thin.) I was suddenly terrified I’d never be able to breastfeed him again and there I’d been, blithely marching through my days complaining about feeling “unkempt” when I’d had no idea how brief my breastfeeding days would be, and how much I’d miss them once they were gone.
But let me backtrack and explain the ** above.
So.
No one knows anything about breastfeeding.
This is my informed opinion after two babies and countless conversations with friends, doctors, and lactation consultants, all of whom will give you differing opinions and advice.
In the hospital, I felt that breastfeeding was going swimmingly. Micro latched immediately in the recovery room and fed happily for hours every day. I took a breastfeeding class and met with a lactation consultant several times just to brush up and ensure that I remained humbled in this pursuit. I did pick up some tips, but I was also slightly miffed at the lack of concern the hospital seemed to have about the fact that I’d just had a c-section. For the class, the consultant was standing at the door of a room at the end of a corridor, waiting for me to push my bassinet into the room, and I felt as though she was waving me on as if to say: “Hurry up, slowpoke,” when I was, in fact moving as quickly as I could, bent over at a 45 degree angle in pain. Then I was asked to weave in and out of chairs and told to plop a pillow into my lap, horrifyingly close to my incision — this was within maybe 30 hours of having my son, and so I’d barely walked let alone sat upright in a chair. Of course, the movement proved to be good. It is true what “they” say: moving around expedites the recovery process, but it is never what I want to hear and “they” tends to be people who have never had a c-section and therefore do not know the agony of walking for the first few times, when it feels borderline superhero-esque to do so. (Also, I had a nasty cough and it was so, so hard to get through those coughs the first few days; I remember coughing midway down the walk to that class and I thought my stitches were going to tear open. Oh!) (Also, I just felt like complaining.) (Also, I think I was entitled to said miffedness.) Anyway, I kept telling Mr. Magpie how well nursing was going and how happy I was about it.
Then, on the third day, the nurses informed me that my son had lost nearly 9% of his birth weight and that they wanted me to supplement him with formula — “just until your milk comes in.” Apparently it is cause for concern if the baby drops below 10% of his birthweight, and so I nodded serenely. “OK, if this is what needs to happen, this is what needs to happen. Fed is best.” The next day, the lactation consultant swung by to check in on me and I explained the new protocol.
“Oh. Oh no.”
My heart dropped.
“Well, it’s just — if you feed him formula, you’re basically telling your body not to produce the milk he needs, and it will be hard for your body to catch up. I wouldn’t worry about his current weight — just keep breastfeeding.”
Oh.
I was in a quandary. Ultimately, I decided to follow my instincts and continued to supplement with formula at most feedings, especially if he seemed alert and hungry after finishing the nursing portion of his meal. I reasoned that I’d rather have a satisfied and growing baby than prioritize my personal preference to breastfeed him. And having a full, happy baby also meant that he would sleep longer and be calmer in general — a win/win, I estimated.
And so we supplemented at every feed.
When we took him to the pediatrician at five days of age, he’d gained back a lot of the weight he’d lost, and had even gained two ounces since leaving the hospital the day prior.
“That’s wonderful!” she intoned. I explained my goal of exclusively breastfeeding and she suggested that I “play around” with how much formula I gave him. “See if he seems satisfied with just your breastmilk; if he’s still fussy, feed him formula until your milk comes in.”
And so I tried for days to just breastfeed him and supplement when it seemed necessary. But suddenly I found myself feeding him every hour — sometimes even more frequently. I thought he was cluster feeding for comfort, but gradually it became obvious that he was just not getting enough and was extremely hungry. When I switched back to nursing and then following with formula, we eased back into a more manageable two-to-three hour cycle: he fed, I changed him and rocked him, he slept. Lather, rinse, repeat. Any time I’d drop the formula, he’d be fussing hungrily within an hour.
Well, OK. We were back to where I was with mini: a chronic undersupply. Selfishly, this discovery pleased me, as it suggested to me that I hadn’t in fact botched mini’s nursing by willfully refusing to attend breastfeeding classes prior to her birth, but that my body simply could not produce the amount of milk needed to support a growing newborn. I felt — and how outrageous is this? — a small parcel of guilt dissolve into thin air, and hadn’t even realized I’d been toting it around all this time. “Ah, that’s better,” I thought, happy not to have been totally at fault for the complexity of feeding mini.
When I took micro back to the pediatrician for his two week check-up, we saw another doctor in the practice owing to a scheduling issue. The pediatrician suggested I reintroduce pumping to help with supply — the same old song and dance that had sent me to the border of madness with mini. For those uninitiated, the idea is that pumping after feeding your child will tell your body to keep producing milk (breastfeeding is all about supply and demand), and even if nothing comes out at first, eventually the body will start producing enough to keep up. And so your day looks like this:
-7 AM: Breastfeed baby.
-7:20 AM: Pass baby off to husband to feed bottle while he is inevitably also trying to console your toddler, make breakfast, brew coffee, clean up a spill, keep the airedale out of the trash (“who left the bathroom door open?”), answer a work email, and maintain some semblance of humor amidst it all.
-7:25 AM: Jam the pump parts into place, change quickly into pumping bra, settle in on the couch, pump for 15 minutes while attempting to parent your toddler. Believe me when I say that ultimatums do not carry the same weight when delivered from a supine position, hooked up to a machine whose whir will haunt my dreams. Every threat feels half-assed. “Do not test me,” I say, as I sit, immobilized, strapped to a machine, entirely unable to follow through on threats of discipline.
-7:40 AM: Take baby out of husband’s hands to burp him and rock him to sleep. Eat three bites of cold, leftover egg from toddler’s breakfast plate while singing Frozen and cajoling daughter to have her diaper changed. Look down and realize you are still wearing a pumping bra (no shirt) and pajama pants with yogurt smeared down the side.
-8 AM: Swaddle sleeping baby and place in bassinet.
-8:05 AM: Rush to stow expressed milk in fridge and scrub all pump parts; leave to dry in kitchen.
-8:15 AM: Dazedly complete a mix of tidying up, brushing teeth, putting in contacts, playing with toddler, occasionally soothing baby, etc.
-8:55 AM: Take a breath. Because the loop is about to repeat.
-9 AM: Breastfeed baby.
Basically, you have little windows of maybe 30 or 40 minutes to get life done. Meanwhile, your breasts are sore, you are constantly changing in and out of the pumping bra, you are always cleaning the pump parts at the sink, while occasionally losing track of a piece or two and then dazedly attempting to jam them together as you wonder what you are doing with your life, and — for some reason, even if you are sitting next to your family while doing it, you find the pump horribly isolating and…demeaning? I can’t articulate why, but I truly hate pumping.
But, I took a deep breath and decided I’d try to pump to help with supply on a more limited basis. The doctor reasonably suggested I try pumping after daytime feeds — and just for a week, to see what would happen. I agreed, knowing I’d love to be able to feed him entirely on my own and deciding that it was worth the effort.
So for four days, I tried the pattern. I found it was incredibly difficult to stick to the routine with visitors coming and going and feeds often falling at highly inconvenient times — like right when mini was having a meltdown or getting ready for bed or just as we were about to have dinner. And so I was lax about it, and would try as best I could to squeeze in a few pumping sessions each day but not kill myself if I missed a few opportunities.
On the fourth day, my supply plummeted and I found myself wrangling a very unhappy baby, as I outlined at the start. I was completely confused — shouldn’t the pumping be helping?! And now I had destroyed my supply?!
I racked my brain. I searched for answers online. I wept to my angel sister, who sat on my couch and reassured me that it would all work out and that I was doing my best besides, although I couldn’t accept what she was saying and could only focus on the fact that I felt as though I was failing my son. I puzzled it out with Mr. Magpie. At first I thought I needed to be drinking more water. Maybe I was dehydrated?! And so I challenged myself to drink a full glass of water at every single feed. I also doubled down on the galactagogues, eating oatmeal and oat bars and drinking mother’s milk tea as often as possible. And then I thought back to the fact that he’d been awake every hour or so the night prior. Maybe he was extra hungry and going through a growth spurt? And so I was depleted because he’d sucked me dry? But this didn’t seem to explain why he wouldn’t latch for more than a few seconds without refusing me — and why I’d then be unable to pump anything, even though he’d not been nursing for long. And then I thought maybe he was angry with the speed of my let-down or flow because he was getting used to drinking from bottles. Mr. Magpie noted that there had been some “1 speed” nipples mixed in with the “0 speed” nipples, and maybe he’d gotten spoiled by the faster flow. Meanwhile, I observed that he seemed extra gassy — maybe it was the gas that was bothering him rather than anything about breastfeeding per se? Maybe I had eaten something that was upsetting him? Maybe the formula was messing with him? What if it was an allergy or intolerance that was just rearing its head now that he was drinking more and more formula? Finally, as I cried to Mr. Magpie about how exhausted I was by everything, adding that things had been better before we’d introduced the pumping to the mix — at least I was at peace with things and felt I was in a rhythm! — he mused that maybe the added stress of trying to produce more milk and sitting in a separate room and rushing around trying to get pumps in every day had left me stressed and therefore unable to produce as much milk, knowing — as a tenured dad — that much of nursing is psychological.
There were too many factors to consider, too many moving parts. And a girlfriend told me that her supply had slowed to a trickle one day and she’d had a similar freak out — but that it had returned 24 hours later, without any major changes to her diet or approach — and that maybe these things…just happen?
I do not know. I do not know!
But we decided a few things. First: that I would stop pumping, as we felt it was introducing way too much chaos and stress. Second: that we would try to only use 0 speed nipples. And third: that I would try to focus all of my energy on just feeding micro. “Let everything else go, Jennie. You’re putting way too much pressure on yourself. Your biggest job is caring for Hill. So just focus on that,” Mr. Magpie said. And so from 9 PM that night to 9 AM the following morning, I laid in bed and snuggled and nursed him. And things seemed to click back into place. At the 3 A.M. feed, I nearly cried when he happily latched and stayed latched. Yes, I still had to supplement, but there wasn’t the furious fussing at the breast. Two days later, he will still occasionally fuss during daytime feeds and so I find myself giving him the bottle earlier than I’d like on occasion. Sometimes I pump afterwards, knowing he’s not taken much from me, and am surprised to find nearly 2 oz. This says to me that maybe it’s more about let-down or flow speed, as he will almost always happily take the bottle instead. But then other times I persist in putting him back on the breast again and again and he eventually settles down — and those times, I think it’s more about gas pain that’s keeping him from latching for a longer period of time, or perhaps that I need to catch him before he gets too hungry.
So again. Who knows. I certainly don’t and no one else seems to, so I’ll continue to troubleshoot and beat myself up and worry just like every other nursing mother out there.
But my points are these:
1 // Breastfeeding is hard and confusing and there never seems to be just one solution. Ask three experts for advice and you’ll get three different answers. So go easy on yourself and do your best. Troubleshoot. Also, trust your instincts. (I followed none of this advice — I was in fact dreadfully hard on myself — and it was rough-going. Take it from me. Although: easier said than done.)
2 // Just a week ago, I was flippantly complaining about feeling “unkempt” while nursing — and now I find myself grateful for the disarray. Maybe not comfortable with it, but grateful for it. The entire experience was a reminder to count my blessings. Every single one of them. Even that bleary 3 a.m. feed.
Post Scripts.
Some new discoveries for my fellow nursing/pumping mamas:
+This would work if you’re comfortable with pulling down the top. I’d wear this specifically for pumping — you can slide your arms out the sleeves and pull down without having to step in/out or button anything. This fun little frock or this voluminous Marysia would work for similar reasons.
+OMG this Persifor dress is perfection! I love the forgiving shape, the button front, and all of the fun prints it comes in.
+Perfect for nursing and beyond — in nearly any circumstance. Wear with chic sneaks and huge shades or with smart flats and pearls or…well, virtually anything.
+You can never have enough of these loose-fitting boy shirts. Order a few sizes up to be extra roomy (and generous to yourself).
+If I had my druthers, I’d be wearing my favorite nursing nightgown and this robe all the live-long day.
+Not nursing friendly, but friendly to a pregnant or postpartum figure: this dress.
+If you are trying to build your supply, I think this mother’s milk tea works. With mini, I really liked these bars, but I found them less edible this go around — no idea why. I was just sort of choking them down, unhappily. I now eat any granola bar with oats in them. I have also heard via Hitha’s community that Mrs. Patel’s has some amazing galactagogue-packed snacks and teas.
I have been swooning over the charming flat-woven kilim shoes from Artemis Design ever since I spotted a pair on my chic girlfriend (and fellow woman of substance!) Inslee. I decided I had to reach out to get to know the founder of the label, Milicent Armstrong. Milicent has built her citizen-of-the-world brand drawing inspiration from world travel, and is best known for her “flying carpet shoes,” made from vintage Turkish carpets (how cool?! Love this take on sustainable fashion!)
Her imagination and hard work have garnered substantial attention; she’s been named a “most promising up and coming American Designer” by Racked and has won several awards from Boston publications (where she is based), not to mention a number of mentions in The Wall Street Journal, Town and Country, and Esquire. Perhaps most impressive, in my opinion, is the fact that she won her school’s “Kindest Student” award when she was younger — an accolade that speaks volumes about the type of woman she is.
I was able to connect with her to learn a little bit more about the woman behind the brand when she answered my modified Proust Questionnaire…
Your favorite qualities in a woman.
Self possession, kindness, and humility.
Your favorite heroine.
Joan of Arc has always been a favorite.
Your main fault.
Impatience. I need to learn to slow down and enjoy the present!
Your greatest strength.
I won my school’s “Kindness” award when I was younger, and I have always thought this to be an important quality. My ability to put myself in other people’s shoes and see things from all sides is a strength of mine.
Your idea of happiness.
Cooking a big stew on a snowy afternoon with my husband. Cuddling with my dog. Being on the water on a beautiful day. Getting wrapped up in a home design/decorating project.
Your idea of misery.
Hmmm…I definitely feel miserable when I am cold and wet or away from my family for too long.
Currently at the top of your shopping lust list.
Too many things! Mostly furniture, wall paper, and home improvement projects right now!
I shared some musings on turning 35 a few weeks ago, and — well, not much has changed except everything has changed and now I don’t have the time to wax poetic about the drifting of time because it feels like I’m in a weird time warp where I can’t believe micro will be ONE MONTH this Friday (I could sob — I never understood this sentiment from other parents, and didn’t even fully grasp it when mini was little, but now that I have a second, I feel a stab in my heart thinking: “Oh my God, he will never be this little again, and did I adequately obsess over his every grunt and movement and squirm? Will I remember the adorable little pucker he makes with his lips when — I presume — he is peeing? Will I recall that funny anxious cry he makes right before I feed him, when he is desperately rooting around?” I kept telling people he was “two weeks old” when he was in fact nearly three and continue to round down dramatically — “he was born just, like, ten days ago!” I want him to stay little and precious and needy forever.) and, at the same time, some afternoons feel like groundhog hour. Yes, groundhog hour — not day — in the sense that I’m on an infinite cycle of feeding, burping, changing, running frantically around to get things done, and then feeding, burping, changing…and sometimes those afternoons feel very long and tedious and I glaze over in exhaustion and existentialist empathy with Sisyphus and his rock.
But, enough on the alternately taut and slack experience of time.
I am 35 today and my God. I do feel it. Last weekend, Mr. Magpie dug up a bottle of rioja we’d bought in Spain over six years ago on our last major vacation (yep, six years ago — launching and closing a business, moving, and having two children will do that to ya?) and I made some braised lamb shanks and a potato dish to go with it, which was honestly far too ambitious for being three weeks postpartum, as the recipes involved such overly-fussy steps as making garlic confit and pitting olives. I was kicking myself when I was sweating in our little kitchen, moving things to side burners in order to pause and feed micro, trying to brown 1.5-lb shanks in batches with oil splattering everywhere (in short, the preparation of the meal may or may not have involved tears) — but it was delicious and honestly the most relaxed I have seen Mr. Magpie in a long while, as he has done 99% of the cooking in these parts and deserved a break. I had been determined to treat him to a major meal, especially since I’d botched Father’s Day by giving him an Apple TV 4K that I’d already given him the prior Father’s Day (I kid you not — #mombrain is real) and asked him to make his own dinner. (Is that so sad? That he selected and prepared a ribeye with oven fries to celebrate his own paternity? Ah.)
Anyhow, as we enjoyed the beautifully-aged rioja, which tasted like chocolate and something herbal I couldn’t quite put my finger on, Mr. Magpie pulled up some pictures of the two of us from our vacation in Spain and I could not believe how much I have aged in the past six years. In the photos, I looked rested, tanned, taut (the second time I’ve used that word in this post — it’s having a moment), and I had bangs and a big smile and a decent tan. By comparison, today I looked in the mirror at my unwashed hair and the dark circles under my eyes and my overall vaguely pale and gaunt mien and thought “oh, boy.” I’m trying to cut myself a lot of slack when it comes to “bouncing back” from having a second child but GOOD LORD, the distance between then and now is expansive purely from a physical standpoint. (Again, launching and closing a business, moving, and having two children will do that to ya?)
But, at the same time, looking at those pictures made me happy. Happy that we took the time and opportunity to travel by ourselves when we could. Happy that we were so happy then — though, truthfully, not as happy as we are now. Yes, these days are exhausting and overwhelming but we are also settled, which is maybe the most underrated aspect of a happy life — for me, at least. I know there are some who wander and roam and live a full and content Eat Pray Love life, but the snug feeling of being settled somewhere, with no major question marks or unknowns dangling over my head save for things like whether we’ll rent or buy or how long we’ll stay in Manhattan, which are — to be sure — the most fancy and fortunate question marks and unknowns to have in the universe — well, that is happiness, for me. It’s taken me the better part of thirty-five years to understand this, or — maybe — thirty-five years to get to place where I can stand still and look across my life and feel deeply satisfied. There are things I’d like to do and questions I’d like to answer and relationships I’d like to fortify, but when I just stand still and look at what I have, it is enough. In fact, it is more than enough. The richnesses of this life humble and overwhelm me.
OK, thirty five. I’m here, I’m humbled, I’m slightly greasy and under-showered, but I’m happy and ready for you.
Post Scripts: Things I Want Today.
This ultra-trendy dress. I feel like every single blogger and fashionista I follow on Instagram has been seen in it — and with good reason. It is darling.
Just ordered this in the “very charming” color — a petal pink.
These high-waisted shorts. My sister informed me that paper bag waists look good on approximately 1% of the population and I’m sure she’s right. But aren’t they adorable?
We were married in August — in the thick, hazy humidity of sump-like D.C., against the torpid buzz of cicadas and the breezeless but verdant landscape of the city’s Northwest quadrant. I remember descending the stone steps from the cool of my parents’ foyer to the black town car, my bridesmaids around me and the click of the camera whirring, and looking out at the immobile trees and stock-still grass in the lot across from my parents’ home, the sunbeams filtering through the umbrage of branches mottled and hazy and cloudy with moisture.
Against all odds, I love that stagnant August heat, probably or perhaps only because it is saturated with memories of summer spent in the backyard of my childhood home, all bare feet and too-short bangs and hand-me-down polo shirts and cricketsong and popsicle juice dripping down my arm and fireflies and the click-on-click-off of the air conditioner in that ancient stone house.
So I hardly mind the summers up here in New York, which present a similar weather profile, although here there is also the fetid stench of trash baking in bags on curbs and the throngs of tourists and the strange push and pull of not wanting to waste away in the apartment but also craving its air conditioning.
All of this to say: when I think of summer, I dream of a very specific wardrobe, one that it is all about breathable fabrics and loose shapes and below I am sharing what I’d like to add to beat the heavy heat of summer.
It’s 2:47 A.M. and micro’s urgent cries from his bassinet at my bedside hurtle me, inelegantly, from a deep sleep that feels agonizingly painful to shake off. I take a few seconds to gather myself, though the increasing ferocity and volume of micro’s cries force me from supine to upright in under a minute. I quickly arrange my necessities — my phone, the remotes, my canteen of water, and an oat granola bar, as I’m routinely ravenously hungry from breastfeeding at this hour — at my side, remove my bathrobe and micro’s swaddle (a desperate ploy to maintain wakefulness on both of our parts so that we can feed and return to sleep as quickly as possible), and settle in to nurse my boy.
This feed is a doozy. The one around 11 P.M. — even if I’ve drifted off before it — and the one at 6 A.M. are manageable. But the 3 A.M. feed is not for the faint of heart — at least not going on four weeks of interrupted sleep. I usually try not to wake Mr. Magpie during these feeds, but I had mentioned, off-handedly, that I might need to rouse him some nights for company, as I have several times fallen entirely asleep while feeding micro and woken with a bad crick in my neck an hour later, or with a half-finished bottle dripping into my lap, or to a wailing, half-fed baby looking for milk. Even with the TV on, I tumble into sleep with something like hunger, as if my body is grasping desperately to pull its mantle over my shoulders and my eyelids have turned leaden.
Without further prompting, Mr. Magpie heard me clambering around at 3 A.M. the following night and leapt out of bed with a sprightliness unseemly for the hour. I could have been hallucinating, but I think he might have danced while snapping his fingers as he walked around the foot of the bed to grab my canteen to refill it with water and prep the bottle for micro. When he got back into bed, he sat up next to me and dove suddenly into conversation about a competitor of ours from back when we owned a technology business, peppering his observations with humor that left us laughing out loud. It was an odd conversation for 3 A.M. made even odder by the fact that we were deliriously chuckling to ourselves, and as I studied his profile against the glare of “Very Cavallari” on the T.V., I thought — my oh my how time has changed us.
There was a time when we would not even leave to “go out” for the evening until 11 P.M. Nowadays, we applaud ourselves if we’re awake past 9:30 P.M. and we’re deeply thrilled with ourselves if we’re out of the apartment at such a “late” hour.
There was a time when serious, thoughtful conversations tended to take place during the intimacy of dinner hour, over a languid glass of wine — or perhaps after a meal, into the unfurling of an Arlington night sky dotted through with the blare of cicadas and the occasional roar of a car up Larrimore Street — not squeezed in anywhere it might fit over the course of the day and invariably interrupted by the needs of our children.
There was a time when 1 or 2 or 3 A.M. meant a late night slice of pizza on the way home, or the dwindling of a dance party in the living room of my apartment on R Street in Georgetown, or that time we slow-danced on the roof of an apartment building on Wisconsin Avenue right across the street from the National Cathedral, its ancient spires oddly befitting of the wild romance of the evening, or the quiet taxi ride back from wherever we’d been, windows down, the streets of D.C. whizzing by — all placid save for the flash of street lights and the blare of neon signs. Not sitting up in bed, fighting the urge to sleep, as we elbow our way through this hazy blur as parents to two young children.
I have been thinking a lot about us lately. About the many permutations of us there have been. About how obscenely fortunate I am that we have evolved in different ways and into different versions of ourselves that continue, improbably, to complement one another despite the fact that we fell in love when I was only eighteen years old and knew nothing about anything save for the fact that this man was a good man and I would do well to build a life with him.
There is a lot of static in my life right now — a lot of movement, a lot of change, a lot of chaos. But somehow sitting up at 3 A.M. with Mr. Magpie, enjoying his companionship, and thinking about just how far we’ve come together simplified things. It was as if I’d been scanning the radio for days, listening to the static crackle, searching for the familiar shape of sound, and had finally tuned into a crystal clear station. This man is a good man and I would do well to build a life with him. I am convinced that this is the through-line, the very center of the story of my life. For others, it might be the search for family, or matrescence, or vocation of one kind or another — but, as I told him weepily a few days after we got home from the hospital, I have loved building a home and a family and a life with him, and I have loved wandering through career changes and the purchase and sale of a home and the many complexities of adulthood at his side, but the main thing is — him. He is core and all else is peripheral, whether we are in our early 20s, streaming out of a bar on the Corner at UVA or in our mid-30s, feeding babies and laughing about some insider business trash talk from a phase in our professional lives that already feels as though it belongs to somebody else, so distant are its concerns from the fabric of my current life. The nature of a 3 A.M. party together may have changed, but nothing about the shape of our relationship and its centricity to my narrative has morphed.
How is this possible, I wonder? “The past is foreign country; they do things differently there,” wrote L.P. Hartley. How lucky I am that we continue to find our present in the same latitude and longitude, sitting right alongside one another.
+For Father’s Day, I ordered Mr. Magpie the COOLEST clothes from a new-to-me label, Todd Snyder. They are beautifully made and super versatile in my opinion — some menswear labels skew a bit too hipster for his classic/preppy style, but these pieces feel super adaptable. I bought him a pair of these pants in the rose color, these shorts, and this long-sleeved tee in the olive color, which looks amazing with his hazel eyes. Though the t-shirts are pricey, the pants and shorts feel reasonable.
+I also bought him a pair of these Patagonia “baggies” shorts in the spiced coral color, which are really more of a neon orange and give me major retro lifeguard vibes (love the shorter length!). I thought they would be perfect dad gear for mornings in the Hamptons, whether we’re playing in the backyard sprinklers or walking on the beach, and for weekends spent at the Central Park splash pads.
+I briefly considered buying him a pair of splurge-y Vilbrequin swim trunks, beloved by jetsetters who frequent Saint Tropez, especially since they make coordinating pairs for children, but knew he’d balk at the extravagance.
+A few of you have asked whether Mr. Magpie might write a post on cooking/cooking gear — I’m trying to convince him! — but in the meantime, you can absorb a lot of his genius obliquely through this roundup of our (…his) favorite cookbooks and this rundown of the best kitchen gear. Some additional thoughts on meal planning here.
+Speaking of micro, there are some great children’s sales right now, including at Maisonette (love these and these for micro and this swimsuit for mini), Jacadi (these! and of course any of their Liberty prints), and La Coqueta (this, this, and this are in my cart).
+I did end up ordering the coordinating FOJ Roller Rabbit jams for mini and micro. SO CUTE. There’s still time to order yours — Saks offers free fast shipping.
+These would be so cute for a backyard festivity. More backyard decor here.
By: Jen Shoop
As you may have gathered from yesterday’s post, attending to two children necessitates the cultivation of profound multitasking skills. (Can you feed one child with a bottle while buttoning the dress of another? Deter a toddler from jumping precariously close to the edge of the bed while pumping and shushing an infant? Etc.) I’m still figuring out how to pre-empt certain situations from brewing, and I know I’ll get there — it took me months to figure out how to walk our ebullient, strong Airedale while pushing a stroller through Central Park, but, I’ve learned, it’s all about a short leash and a sixth sense about what will attract her attention. (Also, a brisk — borderline breakneck — pace and occasional pep talks to myself.) I know I’ll come across similar strategies in the realm of child supervision. For those in similar shoes, a couple of things that have helped me to date as I navigate these foreign waters, and I’ll start first with things that have been helpful for the babes, and then move on to multi-tasking beauty and style finds:
+A door lock for our bedroom door. I want mini to feel welcome and invited to participate in the care of micro, and so I always invite her into the bed while I am nursing or snuggling micro. But. There is a time and place for everything and we were finding that she would often rush into our bedroom to check on her brother and inadvertently wake him up, or fling pillows all around our bedroom, or smear peanut butter and jelly fingers on my just-washed-and-ironed bedding. This enables us to prevent her from entering the room when we want her out by us. It’s inexpensive but smartly designed and less obtrusive than some of the other styles. (Still, an eyesore to be sure — but. Tradeoffs.) There’s even a “decoy” button that she routinely attempts to press, but she has not yet figured out how to unlock it — and I don’t think she will, as it takes substantial dexterity.
+A pacifier for micro. Mini used a Wubbanub for a short string of weeks and then tired of it. I’ve noticed that micro likes to nurse himself to sleep / use me to soothe instead of feed, a habit I want to nip in the bud before it takes too deep root. (How did I come to this conclusion? Because he’ll latch for a minute or two and then fall asleep and stay asleep. Or if he’s fussy for one reason or another he’ll want to go on the breast, and then he’ll calm down and doze — even if it’s just a few minutes after finishing a feeding session.) I’m testing out the pacifier and I have to say it has really helped with keeping him docile and asleep for longer stretches of time. I know pacifiers are polarizing among a lot of moms, but — every child is different and micro really craves the sucking motion, and I was finding that his “sleeping” cycles were always interrupted by fussy sessions where he’d either want to nurse for comfort or be rocked/held, and neither of those solutions were sustainable unless I wanted to be attached to him 24 hours of the day, so here we are. He’s liked the Wubbanub like his sister, and I also have this style with this pacifier clip in my diaper bag.
+It’s all about making things simple and efficient these days. So we have two bottle-making stations — one in our kitchen and one in our bedroom. For nighttime feeds, I pre-fill bottles with water and pre-apportion formula in one of these (also have one in my diaper bag) on my nightstand so I don’t even need to get out of bed. Micro is less particular about bottles/nipples than mini was, so we use a mix of these (my personal favorite because the wide “mouth” makes it easy to pour the powder formula in without spilling everywhere, and I’ve never run into a leaking issue), these, and these.
+I put together a bag of toys and activities for mini to use while sitting next to me during micro’s nursing sessions. That worked well for about two days — ha. She was really into this magnet set and these sticker sets in particular. Then she started tearing into them and scattering them all over the apartment and honestly I didn’t feel like it was a battle worth waging, attempting to enforce the fact that those were meant to be used “only while feeding baby brother.” So, now I often let her play with sending emojis to Mr. Magpie on my phone, which is endlessly entertaining to her, or offer her a snack and read to her right by her little activity table while I nurse. (It’s incredible how quickly you learn to breastfeed while doing other things / sitting in random spots.)
Meanwhile, some multi-tasking/life-simplifying items for this multi-tasking mom:
+I have been wearing a lot of Charlotte Tilbury’s Hollywood Flawless Filter. I dab it on over the top of my undereye concealer and tinted moisturizer, focusing on my under-eye areas, cheekbone, and the tip of my nose. I don’t know anything about contouring but this tends to make my face look a little brighter and more alive. (P.S. — This is in addition to my current everyday beauty routine.)
+Keeping everything in separate pouches so I can easily find what I’m looking for / transfer things quickly if I only have one child with me or no children (!! — has only happened like twice so far) with me when heading out the door. I use this for my own gear and wet/dry bags monogrammed for each child with spare diapers, changes of clothes, snacks, pacifiers, toys, etc.
+I really want to try this scalp shampoo and scrub in one. It looks promising for summer hair. In the meantime, I’ve been getting a ton of mileage out of my Lele Sadoughi headband collection. I especially love my denim one at the moment. And J.Crew has a cute dupe for under $30!
+In love with this gingham shirt — the shoulder detailing makes my heart sing! Also — nursing friendly, and would look adorable under a pair of white overalls or with some white skinnies.
+Wondering if the front of this shirt would accommodate a nursing mother…SO CUTE regardless.
+Speaking of nursing mother finds: this dress is kind of perfect. I’d wear it just as happily now as I would when I’m no longer breastfeeding. Chic and easy to wear with flats, slides, sandals, or even sneakers, appropriate for any circumstance, and just as easy to wear at age 22 as at age 82.
+Mr. Magpie gave me a beautiful Hermes scarf the day before I went into the hospital to have our son. He picked a print with personal significance and said too many kind things to me, and I still tear up when I have a minute to think back on it. A few hours later, my mother arrived in New York and gave me one of her own favorite Hermes scarves — one with peonies on it, which bears a personal kind of symbology in our mother-daughter relationship. And so I have been wearing a lot of Hermes scarves lately and I love that they can transform a ho-hum look into something extraordinary. I often throw it on over my shoulders when I’m wearing leggings and a cardigan over a nursing tank, or a simple tee-dress. I’ve written about this before, but these Tuckernuck scarves are a great buy for a lot less if you want that Hermes look without the price tag!
P.S. I promise not all posts will be on the subject of motherhood and life with two kids — but it’s all that’s on my mind right now. Bear with me!
By: Jen Shoop
There is so much to process — too much to process? — since the birth of my son nearly three weeks (!) ago, and life feels blurry and full and unwieldy and happy and overwhelming in both the good and scary ways. I have it on good authority from several mom friends that the entire first year as a mother to two is a wild ride, and that it’s difficult to get your bearings or attain any semblance of order for a long while. I’m beginning to understand what they have meant. The other morning, I woke with a splitting headache but could not find a pocket of time to grab myself Advil for over an hour. This may seem like an incredible exaggeration or eye-roll-worthy example of self-martyring, but I can assure you it was neither of those things. It was the routine and yet somehow frenzied cycle of feeding, burping, changing micro while chatting and negotiating with mini and also shepherding a dog in and out of rooms, balancing poopy diapers with a squirmy baby and the miscellaneous stickers and dollbabies that wind up in my pockets, kicking laundry into a pile on the floor, attempting to eat a bite of banana while wiping grimy yogurt-covered fingers off of micro’s bassinet and ensuring mini doesn’t hang off the edge of it as she so often does, causing it to teeter precariously to one side…!
The old dance of motherhood, in other words.
I keep thinking about the many Magpie mothers whose babies have grown up and who now tell me that they look back on these snuggly but chaotic moments of newbornhood with nothing but fondness and heartache. I therefore know — know! — I will miss this mayhem one day when life is quieter and so I am attempting to look at the entire situation with perspective and acceptance, and though I often fall short (ahem, our bed!), it grounds me to continue to return to those voices urging me to drink it all up in big, thirsty gulps. Mr. Magpie tends to be better at this than I, but — such is the way with most things between us, and I draft off of his success anyhow.
I felt unmitigated joy — glee, really — in the hours and days immediately after Hill was born. I felt better prepared for the c-section this go around and so was able to focus more of my emotional energy on him rather than the scary and unanticipated details of a c-section that I grappled with when mini was born. Recovery is not fun, but it’s been far more manageable this time, and I’ve been more distracted besides.
Caring for a newborn feels like second nature. His squawks and grunts are less anxiety-inducing, and I feel far calmer and more confident. I am disappointed I have an undersupply of milk again this time, although this discovery has made me feel less guilty about my experiencing breastfeeding mini — I had always thought my ineptitude during the first few days of attempting to nurse her had led to my chronic undersupply. Now I know that this is just how my body is built, and that supplementing with formula is a biological necessity rather than the result of an error of some kind on my part. But more on that another day. The point is that I knew what to do and was less emotional about all of the breastfeeding travails this time — and I enjoy nursing him, truly, even though feeding him often takes well north of forty-five minutes because he always needs a bottle of formula after.
But truly. Hill is heaven. I have passed many stretches of time staring at him, preening him, swooning over his every squirm. I love the way he puckers his lips and occasionally open-mouth smiles while sleeping. I love his furrowed brow. I love to brush his hair and laugh at his “little finance bro” look. I love his awkward and uncoordinated movements, the brief windows during which he is alert and confused and engaged at the cacophony of sound and smell and sight that constitutes the 1,000 square feet we call his home. (Oh, Louise.)
The more challenging part of this transition has been adapting to splitting my attention between two children. I have been more composed during these postpartum weeks than I was during the ones immediately after mini’s birth, a discovery I attribute largely to the fact that I did not take any intense painkillers after this c-section (motrin and tylenol — no narcotics) and that I was better prepared in general for this birth — but the handful of weeping sessions I’ve had have entirely centered upon my difficulty accepting the changes in my relationship with mini. Oh, my heart breaks and my eyes well up as I type this. I hear her wailing “Mamaaa” from her crib in the morning and cannot go to her because I am often mid-nursing micro, and cannot lift her from her crib anyway owing to the c-section incision anyhow. She often patters into the bedroom to say hello in the mornings, asking what I’m doing and reporting in on whatever activity she’s undertaking with Mr. Magpie. I sometimes find myself brushing tears away as she totters off, remembering how just a few weeks ago, I would stroll into her room with a cheerful “Good morning, angel!” to draw her blinds and pass her a sippy cup of milk, and we’d engage in the same handful of conversations, about the color of her sippy cup, about the Maileg mouse that had fallen on the floor overnight, or about the bee or butterfly she thought she saw in her room. (There was a stretch of two weeks where she talked incessantly about bees and butterflies in her room — she was scared of them, and we’d constantly reassure her they wouldn’t hurt her and that there weren’t any in there besides.) Now I often do not see her until she’s midway through breakfast and — as irrational as all of this sounds — it pains me, deeply, not to be caring for her in those small and motherly ways every morning. I selfishly want myself to be the first face she sees, the first hug she gets, the first conversation she has. It has been too abrupt a shift to being her part-time caretaker. She doesn’t understand why I can’t lift her to change her diaper, or place her in her crib, despite my best attempts to explain the cut on my stomach. She doesn’t get why I can’t immediately grab her hand to investigate the Lego tower she’s built because I am in the midst of soothing micro or changing his diaper or trying to shovel a bite of oatmeal in my mouth during an odd moment of calm. I find myself in a position of self-reproach when I decide to take the time to shower or make the bed instead of sitting down beside her to read to her or to compliment her drawing skills. I know that caring for myself is a part of maintaining a sense of perspective and calm, but my heart aches every night as I undertake a cruel kind of self-accounting, tallying up all the minutes I could have spent with her but chose to pass tidying or taking a minute to scroll through my emails or what have you. It has been tough. For two years, I was her world and she was mine, and now things have changed forever.
I re-read this and the rational part of me says: “Tsk, tsk. This is a brief season of life. You are doing the best you can. Millions of people have multiple children and everyone survives. You are being overly fussy, irrational. All is fine.”
Mhm.
Meanwhile, the emotive part of me weeps.
I trust that things will get easier, or more balanced, in this regard, especially once I am able to lift her again, and am a bit further out of the newborn haze and can afford to spend more one-on-one time with her. I have been able to find a few evenings where micro has been sleeping for a solid hour or two so I can just sit and read with her, or play with her Mailegs. Those stretches of time have been beautiful and reassuring.
But until the dust settles (will it settle?), I am here, both radiant with joy to have my Hill in my arms and aching with longing for my girl.
Post Scripts.
+I have been using and loving the Baby Bjorn mini. I feel like most carriers try to do too much — you can carry your child in 34 ways! and it doubles as a backpack! A car! A shopping cart! — but this one is designed straight-forwardly to enable you to carry your newborn baby. The front completely unsnaps, making it easy to get him in out, and I feel like all the clasps and straps are easy to use/adjust with one hand. Genius.
+J. Crew now carries Minnow swim. Mini already has several suits for this summer, but I want to buy her this one and coordinate with this bow.
+I still think the Bravado nursing bra is the best on the market. I know there are a lot of Coobie fans, and I do think it’s exceptionally comfortable, but I find the cups are hard to unfasten with one hand, which bothers me. I’m intrigued by these nursing bralettes from Lively. Super pretty and the neckline seems like a welcome departure from the higher neckline styles on all my other nursing bras.
+Mini just outgrew all of her shoes — and now I am finding myself needing to restock her footwear. I started by ordering her this pair of washed canvas Cientas in the pink. I like that they involve no laces or velcro! Maisonette has a few colors on sale, too. I may also buy her the t-strap style in navy (on sale!) — we had these in red last summer and they were so cute. A perfect style to wear with easy cotton dresses so she can run around easily but still look put-together. Also swooning over these for mini!
+This dress looks like the only thing I want to wear right now. Unclear whether it would work with nursing. It might? But, the bra situation is a puzzle…maybe would have been better as a maternity find.
+Speaking of dresses — I get dressed (often in many of the pieces I mentioned here) every day from head to toe, accessories included, and it makes me feel like a human. But by around 3 PM, I cannot wait to be wearing just a robe. It’s exhausting unbuttoning and rebuttoning and rearranging layers and negotiating with a nursing cover or swaddle or burp cloth. UGH. I just started pumping after daytime feeds to help with supply and it’s adding a whole extra layer of logistical complexity when it comes to dressing. I feel like I’m just constantly dressing, undressing, buttoning, unbuttoning, clasping, unclasping. AH. If it didn’t make me feel like such a schlub, I’d love to wear my uber-soft Eberjey robe 24-7 (I own it in the pink, but the black is on sale and far more practical anyway — I’ve already kind of destroyed my Eberjey one with nipple cream stains, which I did not know would happen!) Also eyeing this open-front robe, which seems like an easy solution when paired with a nursing tank and leggings for days spent at home.
+I’ve always been a fan of traditional swaddles — I tried a few of the velcro and zippered contraptions with mini and found that the velcro often woke her and that they were more complicated than helpful — but I am very intrigued by the Ollie swaddle after a few of you have recommended it. (And the reviews…!)
+Stopped into the Monica + Andy store on the UWS the other day — the CUTEST prints. Sometimes they’re a little too twee (?) or hipster (??) for my taste, but they’ve got lots of darling styles in right now. Love this.
+Unrelated to children: I love this skirt. I want to wear it with a gauzy white blouse or a simple white tank and my Hermes sandals.
+I had a lot of questions about a onesie/footie that micro was wearing the other day on Instastories — it’s Roller Rabbit’s heart print. I have several pairs by this brand for him and mini, too — the softest cotton and the cutest prints! I kind of want to buy this print for the fourth of july. A last minute splurge.
By: Jen Shoop
Currently, lusting after a ton of little white dresses (and also cream ones, AHEM, but mainly crisp, stark, summer-ready white). The stunning dress seen above is by Viktor & Rolf, but below — a few more budget-friendly and accessible styles I’m drooling over:
My Latest Snag: The $28 SZ Blockprints Caftan Dupe.
I mentioned this on Insta and in yesterday’s post, but this $28 caftan is pretty darn good. For those who have asked me — I’d say it runs true to size, maybe a little big (though aren’t all caftans by nature voluminous?), and the front plaquet runs just low enough to make it possible to breastfeed in it, though that could be because I’m short (5’0). (Unfortunately, my go-to SZ Blockprints caftans are not nursing-friendly.)
I wrote recently about making time to read, and how I’ve had to gradually overcome the powerful appeal of completion desire in order to set aside books that quagmire me. An exchange on that post with one of my loyal readers (heiii MK) left me thinking about the fact that I grapple with completion desire in other areas of my life, too — and that maybe I should figure out how to loosen the reins elsewhere.
For context, completion desire is a phrase I picked up while overseeing the design of a smartphone app intended to drive healthy financial habits among low-income teens through gamification. (This now feels like another life. More on my squiggly career path here.) Some of the game design experts with which I consulted introduced me to fascinating concepts like “leveling up,” “completion desire,” and various forms of reward and enemy design. It was startling to see how deeply game designers think about human psychology and the dynamics of risk, reward, progress — and how much these considerations revealed to me about how I tick. Accordingly, I’ve pocketed a lot of these phrases and applied them elsewhere in my life as usefully illustrative constructs. Completion desire or completion bias is one of them; HBR defined it well here:
“Human brains are wired to seek completion and the pleasure it brings — a tendency we term completion bias…finishing immediate, mundane tasks actually improves your ability to tackle tougher, important things. Your brain releases dopamine when you achieve goals. And since dopamine improves attention, memory, and motivation, even achieving a small goal can result in a positive feedback loop that makes you more motivated to work harder going forward.”
Parenting — especially the nurturing of a newborn — flies in the face of completion desire, as everyday tasks and activities are often interrupted by the wants and needs of my little ones, and interrupting a chore is often the safest, best path forward for them (and thus for us all). This has been a constant source of frustration for me, to be honest. I have found myself bizarrely obsessed by the state of our bed, for example. I compulsively make our bed every morning; it marks the official start of the day and leaving it un-made feels something like leaving my front door wide open. I’m uncomfortable — exposed? — until it’s done. But these days, I often need to wait until well after the day is underway to get it done, often because I necessarily prioritize washing my face and brushing my teeth over making the bed in the small pockets of time I find to myself. And then, once the bed is made, I am constantly re-making it throughout the day, as it’s my usual nesting spot for nursing Hill, and I’ve made it clear that Emory is always welcome to join me in the bed with her little bundle of activities while I’m doing so. This often means that she flings our pillows on the ground and musses the sheets, and it drives my Type A self crazy. And then I chastise myself for dwelling on such a ridiculous inanity. Who cares if the bed is mussed?! I’m here with my little family, figuring things out, and all is happy and healthy! The entire tumble of emotions here has made me pause and ponder how I can detach myself from my completion bias in the home.
Any other Magpies out there finding that completion bias is getting in the way? How did you overcome it?
Blast from the Past: Are You a Thought Leader or a Thought Follower?
“I listened to an otherwise unremarkable podcast the other day (#savage) in which the interviewee commented: “I am not a thought leader. But I am a very good thought follower.”
How honest and how lovely, I thought — first, to know oneself well enough to make such a pronouncement, and second, to perceive that thought followership can be a skill, too. It implies receptivity, an aptitude for listening. Open ears, a willing mind: beautiful things.
Am I thought follower or a thought leader, I wonder? Thought leader feels too grand for self-appointment, and I don’t see myself as a person of extreme conviction anyway. Yes, I have strongly held values and beliefs and opinions, but I am also impressionable and can change my mind over time. Further, I’m not the type to proselytize. (Except for when it comes to the glen plaid blazer you need RN. HA.) I’m far more comfortable moderating a conversation than I am standing on a dais.
But there is something else. I find that my way of understanding the world is by way of pastiche. My thoughts often dance around from input to input: a tidbit from a movie, an image from an Instastory, the purple-gray quiet of Central Park at night, a turn of phrase from a book, that mohair sweater on Jenny Walton during Fashion Week. I collect these breadcrumbs throughout the day and then spread them out in front of me and find the path between them.
Maybe I am neither follower nor leader, but a kind of wayfinder between the two.
What about you? Thought follower? Thought leader? Or neither?”
+Found the sweetest Paris-based Etsy shop that specializes in the most gorgeous bonnets and bloomers for little ones.
+Would love a few of these for Hill’s nursery, whenever we move.
+Currently eyeing one of these 9Seed cover-up dresses for putzing around the house — it looks sufficiently loose for a postpartum, nursing-dominated me. Should I spring for the striped one? It’s so me…
+A lovely Polo sale raging right now — extra 30% off! I am eyeing these relaxed-fit pants for Mr. Magpie. He owns nothing like them and is borderline allergic to athleisure (he actually did yardwork in polo shirts — I’m not kidding), but I think might come in handy as a father-to-two hitting up the playground circuit most weekend mornings. Also love this iconic button-down in the chili pepper red.
+Why are there so many darling children’s suits out right now?! Ahh! Love this two-piece set from Marysia. Could this be mini’s first bikini?
+Looking for some lawn toys and sprinklers for mini in the Hamptons. We must take full advantage! Any recs? Eyeing this one.
