While I understand the family pride that some might feel when they refer to themselves as “The Lees” or “The Browns”, I have not been persuaded that changing one’s last name to match her husband’s is important. I did not change mine, and my children have my husband’s last name. (My son has my last name as his middle.)

When I was dating my husband, I never fantasized that his last name would one day become mine. I don’t think that he did either, because he never suggested I start calling myself something else. About half my friends maintained the surnames they were born with after marriage. The tradition of name-changing is simply not one I was interested in continuing, and fortunately, there is no rule that says one has to.

I hear people say that they wanted the same last name as their children so that when they’re in school, there is no problem. Now that I have a first grader, I can say with authority that there is no such issue.

There is always a space on the form for the first and last names of everyone in our family. When I make appointments for my children, I use their names for them, just as I would if mine happened to be the same. When we buy airline tickets, we are seated together because the order is on the same credit card. I have never been asked to prove my relationship to my children in any out-of-the-ordinary manner due to my last name.

So while I have sacrificed the opportunity to purchase a return address label with our family monogram on it, there have been no moments during parenthood where I felt my choice was a bad one.

Do your children have your last name? If not, is it a problem?

Can you hear the baby squawking from where you’re sitting? I can. And it sure is hard to concentrate. Doesn’t he realize that I’m trying to write a blog post about him? Gah.

Okay, that’s better now. Where was I? Oh yes… Sawyer, my sweet baby love, my third boy, is about to head off to daycare and I am conflicted.

On the one hand, I am so relieved to be able to concentrate on work during working hours and not be shushing and nursing my way through conference calls or in-person meetings as I have been doing for the past five months. I am looking forward to trying to cram my work back into the school day rather than the unpredictable minutes of naptime or after bedtime. I am ready for a little bit of quiet. With my work being done during work hours, I’ll be able to better focus on my children during family time.

But then. There’s the other hand, of course. The hand that has gotten so accustomed to loving, bouncing, and comforting a small person every second of the day will be empty again. My almost-definitely-for-sure last baby is taking his first tiny steps out of my nest. Just writing that makes me stick my lower lip out into a frowny pout.

Taken today. Maybe THEY can get him to nap outside of the swing.

I love the childcare place where Sawyer is going. That’s not the problem. Milo, nearly five now, is in his last year of preschool in the same building and has assured me that he will keep an eye out for his little brother in the infant room. Making it even easier to trust the process, Milo started in the very same room with the same teachers when he was a blobby little baldy.

If I were speaking to a new mom friend worried about the daycare transition, I would gently offer that the first two weeks are especially painful for the mom. No matter how many babies she’s had. The baby will thrive in his new environment. I know this. I’ve seen it over and over. I might tell her about the first-day I left Holden with his nanny (also five months old, the very week I returned to work and started this site), and I had to run to the bedroom and cry when she asked me a few too many questions about his basic care.

But still I sit here with my frown, wishing that bitter pill of transition had already started working.

I grew up next door to a boy one year older than me. His parents hosted my baby shower, a co-ed barbecue that he attended with his wife and their one-year old son. At the shower, my childhood friend, now a dad and a recent business school graduate, spoke these words of wisdom to me and Ryan: First three months, no ROI.

It is true.

There is not a lot of return on your investment in a baby in the first couple of months. You endure physical pain, hormonal intensity, and a fair amount of overtime, weekends and holidays included. Finally, after a couple of months, the tiny paychecks start to trickle in. Baby smiles. Plumper cheeks to kiss. Eye contact.

Yes! This is what I signed up for!

And from where I sit now, I am rolling in the dough. I am drawing a full salary with these two walking and talking kids, who make the most mundane of tasks an adventure. Sometimes, a laugh riot.

Truths that were unveiled to me yesterday:

Brushing your teeth is more fun when you place a towel over your head to block your vision.

Placing coins in a parking meter is a thrill.

Getting your own spoon out of the drawer is cause for boastful announcements. “I can reach it myself!”

Kicking one’s small legs to the beat of Moves Like Jagger as we drive through the dark, sudsy tunnel of the carwash is a 3-minute party.

Being allowed to bring your two favorite books to preschool is no small delight.

Though the whining and bickering — still daily — can bring me down, it feels really good to think about all the dull things I do on a regular basis and how much more I enjoy them through the eyes of Julian and Scarlett. That joy is the return on my investment.

As part of a series sponsored by Hallmark, we’ll be posting monthly about the idea that beyond birthdays, Valentine’s day, and Christmas, everyday life is a special occasion, worth recording and reflecting on. Like it? Here’s another take from DesignHerMomma.

Ten years ago, Whitney and I ran the San Francisco Half Marathon with another friend. We were fairly fit in those days between running and biking but doing a half marathon was no easy feat.

Look how grainy pictures were ten years ago. That's me, Whit, and Ann

On that fateful day, I met the man who would become RookieDad Alec. A mutual friend introduced us shortly after this photo was taken. Since I was sort of in the middle of something (Umm, excuse me, I’m busy running here! Who cares about your friend?!), I didn’t pay a whole lot of attention to that cute guy. We officially met a few days later.

Is it already time to flashback to Sawyer as a baby? Well, he is just over nineteen weeks now so we can at least review the first quarter of his babydom.

According to my own bossyness, we should have completed all thirteen of the rookie moms weekly challenges within his fourth trimester, right? So, let’s see how we did!

1. Pretend you’re in Europe — I totally did this. Before I could sit (let alone sit and enjoy coffee), Sawyer and I walked to our neighborhood cafe. Extra whipped cream on everything please. Supporting evidence in foursquare. It counts.
2. Grab a buddy to go on a recon mission. Check. Well, I’m counting some of my previous experience as a mom-friendly nutjob always on the hunt for new and secret places to nurse and change a diaper.
3. Join or start a new mom’s group. Kinda sorta. This warrants a whole ‘nother post on whether or not I even want new friends these days. I *do* want some people in a similar boat to kvetch about sleep and swaddles, boobs and bottles. Stay tuned.
4. Visit a fabric store with your sidekick. YES! And I have been there a few times. Lucky me, the fabric outlet that I had never even been to before is a short walk in a baby carrier away. I loaded up the carrier with Sawyer and hand sanitizer; shoved my wallet and phone in my pockets; and came back with a small bag of material for various projects (that I assigned to other people to do for me).
5. Go to the grocery store for just one thing. Sadly, yes. And I still felt insecure and like I needed the practice.
6. Paint your baby’s feet for posterity. OMG, so cute! Alec and I did this right before his paternity leave ended. {sorry this photo looks like crap, I think I just broke iPhoto so bear with me!}
7. Take a postnatal yoga class, with your baby. No. I will accept this as my first failing. But in my defense, Sawyer and I did take an ass-kicking bootcamp class for seven weeks starting when he was 12 weeks old. Booyah!
8. Get a pedicure. Of course.
9. Go to a mom and baby movie. So much. Sawyer has seen several (high- and low-) quality films in his young life: Harold and Kumar Christmas, Moneyball, Our Idiot Brother, 50/50, Footloose, Alvin and the Chipmunks Chipwrecked, and A Dolphin Tale (with me, Sawyer, and Milo sharing a seat when we were the only ones in the theater).
10. Plan a mom’s night out. Yes, because of my awesome husband who is unafraid of putting three kids to bed.
11. Visit a friend or spouse at work. Yes. Sawyer and I nervously visited Alec at work. All was well except for the screaming in the mega-van on the return home.
12. Enjoy modern art. Okay, we didn’t exactly go to an art museum, but I did bring the little guy to the Air and Space Museum in DC. And it kind of sucked. I’m counting it.
13. Make a Modern Family photo. I did take a funny picture-in-picture picture (see above) but I did not have the skills to make it fancy. Nor did I actually leave the house! Fail, with flourish.

I’m going to grade myself pretty highly for tackling the first quarter of rookie mom challenges with my little sidekick. We were certainly living up to the spirit of the list — even if I regularly complain that my baby isn’t very portable and want Whitney to come to my house so I’m always near that beloved baby swing.

Is anyone else doing our weekly challenges? How’s it going for you?

My life is pretty darn good. I don’t have an iPhone or a personal chef, but my days are full of family, friends, interesting work, healthy children, and enough money to pay for a weekly date night. So it’s possible I have little understanding of what it feels like to be painfully jealous of others, because I can usually come back to the place of reminding myself that I have everything I need.

When I recorded this video, I had just read a few blog posts and comments elsewhere from people who described feeling so unhappy when they read about the successes and good times of their friends on Facebook, that they have to stop reading. I was feeling unsympathetic towards people who allowed a stream of enthusiastic status updates to tell them that everyone else’s life is better than theirs.

Despite what I said above, I can think of one particular thing that might drive me away from the constant stream of news and pictures from my friends. And that would be infertility.

Twice I struggled to conceive exactly when I wanted to. Though I was able to get pregnant about a year later in each case, I got a taste of the frustration and sadness that some women face for years. Since one of the main topics of conversation in my Facebook environment is children, their births, milestones, and silly moments, I really would understand if someone in my social circle who wished to have children but couldn’t decided that Facebook was giving her more bad feelings than good, and that it was better for her mental health to stay away.

What do you think? Does Facebook make you green with envy? Do other people’s vacation pictures bum you out? Or are there deeper issues surfacing that I haven’t considered?

Whitney and I have been friends for more than 15 years. Like her, I’ve been surprised that working together has been so easy. But I’m not surprised it has been so fun. The girl can walk on her hands and do cartwheels in either direction after all.

We go together like butter cream and cupcakes

Since she said all those nice things about me last week, I present seven of her posts that stuck with me:

I am a holiday card ho this year. (Ho ho ho!) — ok, seriously, who does this?

The one where we all judge Tom and Katie (and yet I’m the one thrown under the bus?!)

Inside our closet: What’s in my kids’ dress-up boxes, Whitney has an eclectic array of costume choices for her littles. It is fun to peek.

Moms on bikes (part deux). I love that she featured moms around the world cycling with small children, including one of my longtime buddies in Denmark, 9 months pregnant.

Create a Modern Family picture, this activity is based on a funny outing we did together. In an ironic twist, Whit lost all photographic evidence and sent her sister out to repeat.

3 parenting tips that have completely failed me. Because we live in the real world and not a magazine.

On housecleaning and toenail clipping.

Whitney wants our photographs to be beautiful but our words to be realistic. For me that comes through in this mixed bag of blog posts. What do you think?

I recently sat down with writer Lisen Stromberg to discuss motherhood, feminism, work, and other big, important topics. Who said what on Facebook that week never once came out of my mouth during the hour we spent together, so that was refreshing. But also, she asked me some questions I had never asked myself.

In interviewing me about my journey from girlhood to motherhood, she touched on something I hadn’t given much thought to before. Did my mother prepare me to have a career? Absolutely. Did my mother prepare me for motherhood? Um. Huh?

My mom and stepmom (and dad) all modeled positive relationships, gobs of affection, and enthusiastic willingness to do all that needs to be done for a child, from preparing endless mac and cheese to hosting creative birthday parties to sitting through long gymnastics meets. So in that way, yes.

Did I see motherhood as a role for which I was studying? No.

Frankly, I did not feel unprepared for motherhood. I felt very prepared, planned, and ready. (That doesn’t mean I found breastfeeding easy, by the way.) What I had not given any thought to was the logistics of working and having a baby who did not have his own job to go off to every morning. Somehow, I hadn’t considered what would happen at 7 am each day once my maternity leave was over. I didn’t have a clear picture of life with baby. When I finally realized my baby would be lounging around all day, not knowing how to feed himself or use words, was the first time I understood stay-at-home motherhood. It was not a thing I had seen growing up, nor aspired to as a young working adult.

What my mom certainly prepared me for was being responsible for myself. To work, save, and spend sensibly. To take care of my body. To surround myself with good friends, find mentors, learn on the job, avoid parking tickets, use birth control, present myself well to the outside world. Is there a more specific way she could have prepared me to take care of someone else?

I know everyone has a different experience. Do you think your family helped prepare you for motherhood as much as for other aspects of adulthood? Do you plan to prepare your children for parenting? Or is that even possible?

photo of my mom buckling my shoes, from my wedding: Kirsten Hepburn

Scarlett is four-and-a-half today, and one of my favorite things about her is the way she speaks. She has the voice of a chipmunk, for one — loud and high-pitched — but in a charming way, and two, she has a knack for inventing words that make so much sense to the rest of us that we start using them in our regular speech around the house.

Here are a few of my favorite Scarlettisms:

1. Yanky – this adjective describes a sensation to which we can all relate. When you are wearing a long-sleeved shirt and you slide your arm into a thin sweater and the friction between the two fabrics is uncomfortable, you might say, if you are four years old, “I don’t want to wear that sweater. It’s too yanky.”

2. Tearous – Scarlett was having so much fun with my husband, when she turned to him and said, “Daddy, when I am so so happy, sometimes I cry a little bit. I get tearous.” I think hearing her describe that event made him tearous himself.

3. Unsleeve – to turn a garment right-side out. One of the most common requests made by a girl who changes back and forth from regular clothes to leotards on a regular basis. “Can you unsleeve this shirt?”

4. Todding – this verb describes the act of a ponytail bouncing along as it’s owner walks or runs. Often seen on gymnasts in the 2-4 year old age bracket, the word derives from the term toddler, a child who walks funny and causes visible todding of their hairdos.

5. Shoot it out – another frequent request made to parents or any available adult with solid motor skills. Blankets and sheets that are being used for play with dolls, forts, or indoor picnic-related activities are hard to lay down flat, no matter how many times you shoot them out. “Mommy, please bring my green blanket and shoot it out right there.”

Happy four-and-a-half, Scarlett! May your favorite stuffed animals continue to be soft, not scrubby.

Reading Captain Underpants, building LEGO villages, and manning the baby gym. I’ll have to catch you tomorrow!

(While I hang out with my family, I am republishing a post from the 2007 archives for your entertainment. Enjoy!)

Last week, Ryan’s company threw a lovely holiday party. We were treated to a sit-down dinner at a well known fancy restaurant. With a babysitter I trusted, and a body that can finally fit in non-maternity clothes, I was feeling pretty happy as I took my seat at a table with three other couples.

I sat next to another mother of young children, and we talked comfortably for a couple of hours about all of the very important topics that once-hip women talk about — seeing live music in San Francisco, our interesting careers, and what to buy at Trader Joe’s. Oh, and why does no one ever tell you that all your hair will be falling out after you have babies? Yes, we covered all the good stuff.

Across from us, a couple of attractive newlyweds, probably bored to tears by our potty training tales, were charming and friendly. For a party full of folks I have never met, I was having a very good time.

Looking at the just-marrieds, I remembered the days after my own wedding, when Ryan and I could talk about nothing except how awesome our friends, family, food and festivities had been. “So,” I said to Mrs. Newlywed, “have you guys stopped talking about your wedding yet?”

“Can I be frank with you?” she said.
“Yes,” I said, leaning in with interest, hoping to hear that she cared little for her wedding, or that they didn’t actually have a wedding, so there was nothing to talk about. Something, I assumed, that would be related to her wedding.
“I went off the pill, that I was on for years, about a week before our wedding. Yeah, so you can tell where we are. Well, anyway, my hair started falling out because the impact of going off the pill is just like post-partum hormones.”

Apparently we had a misunderstanding about the topic of discussion.

My husband and her husband are in between us. Part of this conversation, but perhaps not wanting to be.

“So I just went off the pill,” she repeats. “Right, honey?” she looks at her husband to include him in the conversation. “Maybe a week before the wedding,” she tells us again. “Yeah, I just stopped taking it. Yasmin was the brand of my pill. I went off if it, and I was a total hormonal mess. Right, honey?”

Discomfort. I know my husband wishes he was not sitting next to someone who was sharing her birth control plans with us. He hates to be given too much information about people he doesn’t know. He could listen to women talk about hair coloring, vintage shoe collections, and George Clooney for a very long time, so it’s not that he has no tolerance for chick stuff. It’s the bodily functions. They’re private.

And the repeating — that was the worst part. She named the pill and continued to talk about it for at least three minutes. I was at first confused, wondering why she was telling me this. Then I remembered that the other woman and I had been talking about hair falling out postpartum.

I thought about the many conversations I have had with women I hardly know. One next to me in yoga class told me she got an anal fissure with the birth of her daughter. No problem. I’m not embarrassed or offended. But, if her husband was standing there, I sure might be. It’s not the way I believed the world is, but apparently there are some things I only want to discuss in the company of my own gender.

Tell me about your leaky breasts, your incontinence, your secrets to multiple orgasms. But don’t tell me in front of my husband.

As we waited for the valet to bring our car around and indicate the end of this very-much-fun-for-a-company-holiday-party, I told Ryan I was trying to shake off the discomfort of that birth control conversation. I think he was relieved that I felt the same way, as he does not want to believe himself to be a prude. And so we acknowledged together that there are some things that are not to be discussed in mixed company.

Morning, friends.  It’s your turn to talk!

I was going to open this conversation to ANY topic from sleep training to dealing with in-laws, but decided to narrow in on one that may be weighing on some of the newer moms: What are the rules of engagement for Santa Claus?

If the Man in Red comes to your house, does he bring all kinds of gifts or just stocking stuffers? Does he wrap or not wrap? If your kids are in school, are you preserving Santa’s rep against all odds, or do you think the believers are deaf to the naysayers at school? Is the guy at the mall actually Santa or just a helper? Do you and your partner agree on all these issues?

What’s on your mind when it comes to Santa?

(photo courtesy SF Gate)