Taking A Walk Outside

Throughout my entire pregnancy I vowed to never waste money on a stroller. I'd always envisioned them as a cage that I put my child in, while I walked around free and happy. Family members offered to buy me one but I refused. What would I need a stroller for? I absolutely hated it when people were pushing them around in the local small stores and I saw them as a waste of space. How many times would I really use it? A total of three, maybe? Finally, Phillip's parents spotted one at a yard-sale and called and asked if I wanted it. The first thing out of my mouth was asking the price. "$5", they said. "Sure. I suppose $5 isn't too bad of a price and I can just send it off to someone else when I'm done with it." For months and months it sat at their house and everytime Phillip would ask if I wanted him to load it up I'd pretend I didn't hear him. Then, the weather started to get warmer, and I started to realize that I was living right across the street from a walking park. I gave in, and asked Phillip to bring it home. The next day, Alec and I ventured on our first walk. I never knew how much Joy it would bring to his face as I pushed him through the trees. Finally after a 30-minute walk, we parked the monstrous stroller in the grass and played. I don't really know what the meaning of this story is, besides the fact that I'm openly admitting that I am stubborn. I'm guessing it has something to do with how Alec reacted when he got to spend so much carefree time outside. No more getting swifted from hip to hip, no more getting handed off to Daddy because my arms felt like they were falling off. The prison I saw in the stroller was no longer there. So now, once a day and sometimes twice, weather permitting, I load my beautiful son up into his stroller, his safe haven for those seemily meaningless 30-minutes, and let him know what it feels like to be free.

Let's start from the beginning.

On August 30, 2007 my son, Alec Phelps, came into this world. I never really knew how much becoming a mother would really change your life. Sure, it's a baby, but aside from a few minor setbacks your life is just going to resume how it was before right? WRONG. I never knew how wrong I could be. All of a sudden I went from making sure I was showered and fed to worrying about things like if this little person has burped enough, or checking fifteen times a night if he's still breathing. The older he got, the more I had to worry about. So I turned to the internet to help me find ways to make me life alot less stressful. I wanted to find the best ways to take care of my little one. I soon discovered that even though I was going against everybody else's comments and "spoiling my baby" it was actually a well studied form of parenting called "Attachment Parenting." I was actually doing something right out of instinct and now I know to follow my motherly intuition to the end. Recently, this entails a dramatic life change for myself to better my child. I've become entirely more eco-friendly and have recently taken the PETA pledge to try vegetarianism for 30 days, and maybe even for the rest of my life. This is my journey on trying to sort out all the information I'm getting thrown at me and deciding for myself what's best for Alec. Enjoy! It's going to be a wild ride!