Real Talk with Real Moms || Growing Your Family

Hey, hey it's Friday! YAY! I don't know about you, but after two four-day work weeks, I realllllly needed five days to catch up on everything that needed to get done. And now my desk is perfectly in order, my inbox at net zero, and everything on my to-do list checked off. (Ha! I kid, I kid!) I'm really excited about this latest post in our Real Talk series, Growing Your Family, and really excited to hear from the other moms who are weighing in. How do you know when it's the right time to grow your family or if you even want to grow your family at all? Is there a right time to seemingly throw all of your freedom to the wind and take on one of life's biggest expenses?

We were at a dinner the other night when a couple who doesn't have children asked how we knew we were ready to start growing our family. Aaron and I just kind of looked at each other, no insightful answer in sight. As I thought about it more, the first one seemed like an easy decision in comparison to thinking about the second now. The back story: I always knew I wanted kids. I began teaching sunday school in middle school, worked at a day school in high school, and nannied my way through college. I've always been a kid person. Aaron wanted kids, too, but he had a lot less experience with them and was much more hesitant about it. I likely would have had kids after our first date (just kidding) but he needed more time to feel good and ready. We traveled a lot those first three years of marriage. Went out to dinner a lot. Stayed up late a lot. Slept in a lot. And generally just really enjoyed each other a lot. After three years, we had checked a lot of our "before children" boxes like a house and having good jobs. We had health insurance. We both wanted children. There was really nothing holding us back other than the huge change in lifestyle and freedom that we knew would come with it. Ultimately, the decision came down to Aaron being in a place where he felt ready and the fact that most of our friends had already begun to have kids. In hindsight, Aaron ever not feeling ready sounds so funny now, because he is literally world's greatest dad. (I'm always trying to convince him to be a stay at home dad, although I've had no success.) Friends having babies sounds like a kind of trivial reason to start having kids, but when their schedules start revolving around kids and you want kids anyways, it seemed better to all be in it together, and it was.

Baby Numero Dos: Our big, huge cross-country move and our decision to build a house from scratch have both impacted baby number two for some pretty obvious reasons. We definitely want another babe. I would love for Parker to have a playmate and friend at home as she gets older and hopefully one that's not too much younger than her. As someone who loves the toddler phase so much more than the baby phase, I even get excited about all of those new baby snuggles and getting to do that part all over again, this time with lots of family nearby to share in the snuggles! There's a lot up in the air now, though, so we shall see how that all unfolds. Mamas How did you know you were ready for another one? Any ideal age spacings?

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend! See ya Monday, friends!

Check out the other posts on Growing your Family from:

Catherine, The Life Styled || Alex, Ave Styles || Emily, The Refined Woman || Sam, Could I Have That? || Amy, Parker, Etc. || Eden, Sugar and Charm || Caitlin, Sacramento Street, Erin, Apartment 34