When my husband and I first began to share earlier this year that we were expecting our fourth baby, the immediate reaction from most was, “Wow! you guys will need more space!”

Last year, we proudly purchased our first home. After years of working and saving, we landed in a two-bedroom townhome just outside of Salt Lake City. It is smaller and older, but it is also in a walkable area away from the city bustle, and it is ours. We happily moved in with our three young girls and our Great Dane, relieved to finally be in the housing market.

Contrary to what most expect, I don’t feel cramped in this space. And, while I know we will outgrow these walls (I don’t think our three girls will want to continue sharing a bedroom with their younger brother), I don’t anticipate the upcoming addition to make me immediately loathe the closer quarters. There are plenty of concerns on my mind as I near the end of this pregnancy—postpartum recovery as a mom of three and continuing to meet my 18-month old’s needs, to name a few—lack of space just does not make the cut for this list. Let me tell you why.

# 1) My kids spend most of their waking hours outside—without me.

I realize that I am privileged to live in an area that makes it safe and attractive for my four-year-old and six-year-old to play outside mostly unattended, especially because we do not have a fenced-in yard. Our townhome community has spacious, well-maintained common areas that are much more appealing than any indoor toy could be. What is the main attraction? Other children. Now, lest you assume that we moved into a new development teaming with young families, let me set the record straight. Most of the residents in the community are single adults. In fact, during our first week, I thought my kids were three of maybe five total children in the broader neighborhood.

However, as I allowed my older two to venture out into the common areas with less and less direct supervision, they emerged from the woodworks—another six-year-old suddenly less interested in her iPad, another four-year-old whose mom is more comfortable with her playing outside now that there is a group of kids and an additional set of loose adult eyes on them, and a three-year-old who begs his mom to take him out when the other kids run by his window. It’s a small crew, but it’s enough to keep their legs and imaginations running for hours every day.

The layout of our townhome community is a wonderful example of how infrastructure can ease the parental load.

I will also note that this mode of operation is in effect all year long. Having spent part of my own childhood in Canada, I have yet to see the temperature drop so low that it is truly “too cold to go outside.” As the Scandinavians say, “there is no such thing as inappropriate weather—just inappropriate clothing.”

#2: We’ve chosen faith over fear when it comes to material goods.

We carefully gatekeep what is allowed into our home. Recognizing each material item that comes through our door as an additional responsibility, we accept only those things that will add a high level of value. Our children do not need very many indoor toys. Besides the rotation of two or three works that hang on the walls, artwork and schoolwork is quickly digitized with an iPhone shot, if it’s worthy, and then goes to the recycling bin. My husband and I both have capsule wardrobes. Of course, we own some seasonal items, but we operate under the assumption that our God knows our needs. If we steward his resources well and look to him, we can loosen our grasp and don’t need to clutch so tight to things that we could possibly need in a year or so. If we truly do need something at that point, he will provide.

#3: Our children’s bedroom is for sleeping only.

There is actually plenty of room for three children in one bedroom when sleep and adjacent activities are the only ones conducted in that bedroom. Besides stuffed animals, we don’t allow toys in the bedroom. The toys are kept in storage closets, and a rotation of them is available in the living room. They do not know differently and have never complained about this arrangement. We will even be able to fit a second crib into that room once this baby comes while leaving plenty of room to maneuver around.

#4: We embrace creative storage solutions.

This is more of a practical note than a way of life. We are big fans of IKEA. It probably would not be possible to hold five people and two hybrid work schedules in 1100 sq ft without furniture selected for the particular space. Selecting beds and couches that also offer storage can make a small space completely workable. Online shopping also makes it more realistic to find furniture that precisely fits the dimensions of your space, like this double desk my husband and I found on Amazon that transformed a landing at the stop of the stairs into our shared home office.

While perusing through IKEA in preparation for our move, I was floored by the words I encountered near an exhibit of a nursery. On the wall, in big bold letters, it read: “NEVER NOT ENOUGH SPACE: There’s always room for another little one to love.” This felt like a radical proclamation for any modern corporation to make.

Perhaps, particularly as Americans, we need to re-consider what is really constraining us. Is it high housing costs and the resulting lack of square footage? Or, is it poor infrastructure, consumerism, a dearth of creativity within the space we do have, or a way of life that is too centered around our private spaces? I certainly do not have the answers, and I’m by no means declaring that our way is the best way. However, it is a way, and for us, it is a way of freedom, contentment, and community.

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Letters From a Small Home Series

About Out Loud

Around here, we’re big fans of bold, honest, and a little provocative conversations. On Out Loud, you can expect weekly reflections on motherhood and Christian culture.

Today, realtors are more likely than ever to tout homes as big as 4,000 square feet for young couples who are just starting out. It quickly begins to warp the perspective, and some might come to expect a shockingly large space to meet their basic needs.

The US, Canada and Australia show the biggest average home sizes; these countries brag homes that offer the most square footage per person. Magazines that offer decor inspiration and storage tips are created with these spaces in mind, and a quick flip-through can leave those who live in much smaller spaces feeling as if they are trying to do the impossible. This influence on visual media often drives a sense of normalcy in terms of home size for 2026 that hasn’t existed in most of the timeline of humanity.

Looking back not so far into the history of the US and Canada, people lived in close proximity, inhabiting small spaces. Go far enough in American history, and you’ll meet nomadic people with homes that they could carry on their backs or move easily. North Americans who lived in inclement weather established what was akin to a row house, which we know as the Haudenosaunee long houses.1

The homes of the Iroquoian-speaking Haudenosaunee, for example, were divided by family units, highlighting the cultural importance of clan relationships and reliance. Longhouses on average were between 800 and 4000 square feet, depending on the family units and the purpose of the build. This offered about 40 sq ft of space per person in the home.2 Toileting was not done in a long house, nor was washing or laundry. Cooking, during the summer, was also done outdoors, often in semi covered spaces. information should be understood with the concept that perfect direct comparisons cannot be made due to the evolution of nature of work and education in the home.

Realtors these days are likely to recommend a minimum of 400 square feet of space per person, a 10 fold increase. Even when you account for activities that were considered outdoor work that aren’t now, it doesn’t add up. So how did these people live functionally in these tiny spaces?

One answer: vertical storage.

In a long house, the sleeping and light work areas were elevated off the floor; above them existed a nearly equal amount of space to do more involved work such as sewing, weaving baskets, pottery, and beading, as well for children to play. This layout increased personal space to around 70 square feet. It isn’t a lot, but it’s nearly double than would have otherwise been available. The vertical trend didn’t stop there. The dividers that sectioned off the long house were walls between sets of fires. These dividers became a place for hanging items, such as personal possessions. Animal skins that were being processed indoors or unused cookware also had a home on these walls and hanging from rafters.

In the scope of a modern home, much of the space is encouraged to be low. TV cabinets are a foot and a half high. Couches are low and squat. Sideboards with no hutch are popular as well as long, sprawling countertops and islands.

For families that are trying to make smaller spaces work, this becomes an instant problem of storage. Looking at the photo of the long house, it seems very clear where things can be hung, or shelves created to store extra items.

• Define the items that often cause issues with clutter. Is it clothing? Books? Toys? Canning jars? What is the clutter that creates chaos in your home?

• Think of a wall or door as upward square footage. Don’t be afraid to use all the way to the ceiling, even if that means you need a stepladder to access the items on the top. In our home, a narrow and tall book shelf sits behind a door on a wall with less than 3 feet of space. While the door can no longer open to its full 180-degree as intended it is able to remain opened at about 130-degree angle which is still comfortable access to the room.

• Be willing to be wrong about where vertical storage will work. We reuse and rework spaces when we need to. Our daily-used school books, games and hanging items now live in what was previously a coat rack area. Now, that space is our homeschool storage, housing items for my three children, my nephew, and our cooperative learning guests. We have since relocated the coat rack area closer to the main entrance, even though it partially impedes a window.

• Be creative! Our backpack wall includes the small pink and orange packs which are our “grab and go” bags for hikes or car trips with snacks, entertainment, first aid and a spare set of clothes that is workable for all the kids. We use hanging shoe racks on the front and back of many doors, including the bathroom, to hold shampoo, brushes and other items.

Living in a small space is something that should be normalized, because it’s the reality for many families. Even in large spaces, using vertical storage just makes sense, and helps make a house feel less cluttered. It gives a compact, easy and convenient way to store items that allows for free space in other places and for life, creativity and love to flourish.

Era is a mom of three special needs kids who loves tech and stories around the fire. She is currently in her deconstructionist era and examines the intersection of homeschooling, religion and culture in her Substack.

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Letters From a Small Home

About Out Loud

Around here, we’re big fans of bold, honest, and a little provocative conversations. On Out Loud, you can expect weekly reflections on motherhood and Christian culture.

Nara Smith is not a tradwife. She was never a tradwife.

The internet has collectively lost its mind over her recent interview with Alex Cooper on Call Her Daddy, during which Smith said that she was never a tradwife and resents being connected to that ideology. If you don’t know, Smith is an influencer who popped off on social media in 2023 for cooking incredibly elaborate meals in couture and speaking in a soft and soothing voice. To date, she as 4.9 million followers on Instagram, and 12.6 followers on TikTok.

In one video, which Smith referenced during her interview, she says that her children are craving bread and jam—so she goes on to make bread and jam from scratch. As in, she bakes a whole loaf of bread, then uses fresh peaches to make jam, and presumably ten hours later feeds this to her children who by this point have eaten through the sofa in hunger.

Sounds ridiculous, right?

Because it is. And it’s embarrassing that Christian commentators on Substack and elsewhere ever took her content as a serious push for the traditional, complementarian ideology associated with the tradwife movement.

It’s helpful to define a tradwife (for people like my father, who recently told me he had to spend time looking up the term when I wrote a different article about the phenomenon). A tradwife is not simply a woman who cooks, has several children, or enjoys traditional femininity. Tradwife ideology presents male-led marriage, domestic motherhood, and clearly divided gender roles not merely as personal or practical preferences, but as the proper, God-ordained order of the family—and, often, society.

What Smith built on social media is different. It’s a business and brand based on her love for pretty, if not a little ridiculous, outfits and cooking. And her cooing voice. Like all influencers speaking about their success, she demurred during the interview, saying that she accidentally stumbled upon all the various elements of her brand that made her content go viral.1 It seems uncouth for an influencer to admit that they understand social media, understand what people like to watch, and played around with their content until it took off. Instead, we all agree to a joint delusion that growing a social media brand is always a happy accident and never sought after. That’s fine.

Regardless, what Smith performs on social media is not—and has never been—a coherent promotion of tradwife ideology.

I would know. I am the perfect demographic for the tradwife algorithm—in my child-bearing years, white, basically a stay-at-home-mom, Christian (and married to a pastor, so like, super Christian!). My socials are filled with other young moms talking about their fourth pregnancies and homeschooling and toddler management. Frankly, I love these accounts. They inspire me to spend less (because, how else do you afford four children on one salary in this economy, if not through frugality?). They inspire me to rejoice in my children more. They remind me to find strength in scripture. They also remind me that it could be worse (I could have four kids instead of two).

And they are definitely living into a particular ideology that is traditional, Christian, and, if not outright complementarian, then definitely male-led. These women do not advertise themselves as tradwives, but their content is grounded in an identifiable traditional Christian ideology.

Is there anything wrong with a mother on social media living out her values, even if they are translated through the screen as traditional?

This is a loaded question. I’m fairly confident that most of the women I follow on social media whom I would classify as trad wives are not that interested in “converting” other women to their ideology. They are living a life they enjoy, that aligns with their values, and their content is therefore a natural promotion of that lifestyle.

There is a difference, though, between depicting one way of life and prescribing it as the only faithful way to live.

There are women who view choices such as natural family planning, whether you stay home with children or work full-time, and whether you send your kids to public school, private school, or choose to homeschool as core indicators of a woman’s faithfulness. Not only are they tradwives; they firmly believe every woman should be one too.

Unfortunately, the brand of Christianity most interested in the trad wife ideology is really having its moment right now. Doug Wilson, conservative Reformed evangelical pastor and self-described Christian nationalist, is loud and proud about topics such as the US becoming a theocracy and “household voting,” and he has recently gained access to powerful political audiences. His wife, Nancy Wilson, and daughter, Rachel Jankovic, are making the podcast rounds,2 promoting their brand of fundamentalism and growing the reach of traditional ideology. Vice President JD Vance has also made repeated comments suggesting that marriage, parenthood, and the traditional family should hold a privileged place in American public life.

In these circles, how a woman lives her life—whether she works, how many children she has, and how those children are schooled—is not left to her own imagination or conviction. There is a right and a wrong way to be a woman and to mother, and the right way is the traditional way.

This makes tradwives—and the ideology they subscribe to—feel dangerous, because there is a sense that the ideology is being intentionally pushed onto the general public with the support of leaders serving in the highest offices of government.

I think this is one reason Christians outside these fundamentalist circles feel the need to loudly distance themselves from tradwives and provide sharp critiques of the ideology that drives the persona. Writers such as Tia Levings—whose platform serves as a sort of watchdog for the harms caused by fundamentalist and patriarchal Christianity—feel compelled to ring the warning bell on tradwives as often as possible.3

Personally, I’m on board with ringing that particular warning bell. There is real danger in telling women that there is only one faithful way to live. Fundamentalism often treats motherhood as a woman’s highest calling and her womb as the most important part of her body. It can also leave women especially vulnerable to dangerous living conditions: when a woman has many children, little financial independence, and a husband who is the sole provider, leaving an unsafe marriage is not easily done.

That context—that a woman can become trapped by tradwife ideology—is one of the best explanations of why people are suspicious of tradwife content. When domestic femininity is part of an explicitly political and theological agenda, even an apparently innocent cooking video can begin to look like propaganda.

But, the existence of a real and politically ambitious tradwife ideology does not mean every highly feminine mother online is advancing it.

Those of us who grew up in the age of social media can usually distinguish performance from genuine belief. I don’t doubt that Smith subscribes to her own version of traditional womanhood. She has four children and presents a highly stylized version of domestic life. I was shocked, as I read more about her in preparation for this article, to learn that she is only 24 years old.

But I don’t for one second believe she set out to promote fundamentalist Christian ideology through her content, nor am I convinced that her content inadvertently promotes it. I don’t follow any tradwives who spend hours in the kitchen in full glam, concocting elaborate meals.

In practice, the tradwives I follow wear thrifted outfits and talk a lot about finding peace amid the chaos of parenting littles. They also live in humble homes that look lived in. Through the screen, their lives do present as spiritually meaningful—there’s as sense that the financial, physical, and emotional sacrifice they are making is sanctified. But, they are living materially ordinary lives. Smith’s content, by contrast, is fantasy: couture, absurdly labor-intensive recipes, cinematic lighting, and the central joke that she is doing all of this as though it were perfectly normal. (In fact, I always felt that her content was satirical.)

What I’m getting at is, at some point, the tradwife conversation starts to feel like a witch hunt. A woman wears a feminine dress, cooks for her family, and speaks softly online, and suddenly commentators are searching the frame for evidence of Christian nationalism.

In a rush to create great distance between that brand of Christianity and our brand of Christianity, I have found that commentators can sometimes…. get ridiculous. We really don’t need to comment on everything. Sometimes, it’s just a performance, and that’s okay. I hate to sound like an annoying Zillennial—but it’s really not that serious.

Smith understood—or learned—what people wanted to watch: beauty, domestic absurdity, and the pleasure of seeing something made slowly and intentionally on a platform built for careless consumption. She turned that formula into a wildly successful business.

We can call it performance. We can call it branding, fantasy, marketing, or even nonsense. What we shouldn’t call it is trad.

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Recent Posts

About Out Loud

Around here, we’re big fans of bold, honest, and a little provocative conversations. On Out Loud, you can expect weekly reflections on motherhood and Christian culture.

3

Tia Levings, Writer

Is Nara Smith Gaslighting Us on Call Me Daddy?

Do you feel that cultural shift? The trad wife influencers want us to believe they were never doing what they did—or at least, “we didn’t mean to take it that far…

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a month ago · 149 likes · 7 comments · Tia Levings

This is not a great time to write this article, because last week my box of mangos was confiscated by the post office.

Let me explain.

Every year, my grandmother mails all the grandkids around the country a box of mangos from her trees. If it’s a year with a good and healthy yield, we might be lucky enough to get two boxes. This was one of those years.

That box of mangos is more than a fruit shipment. The moment I receive my yearly box, I am transported to my grandmother’s house in Miami. The smell alone ushers memories of Saturday mornings before church, crowded in the kitchen sipping an ice cold batido de mango for breakfast. Or of cloudy humid afternoons, sucking a juicy mango pit outside, chin and hands orange with the sticky juice. I remember summer days with my cousins, climbing the tree and teasing each other about the iguanas that would “bite us” (those poor iguanas were more terrified of us than we ever were of them).

Yes, more than a fruit shipment, that box of mangos is a connection to my home and my people.

This year, I received my first box and immediately introduced—with various levels of success—the joys of sticky mango to my baby and toddler. I made mango popsicles and mango juice and sucked the mango pits and froze mango puree. Then, I excitedly anticipated my second box. Except, last week I received a call informing me that my box was stolen confiscated by the post office.

Yes, I did cry over the mangos.

Because right now, as I write this, I’m sitting at a cafe near my home in Northern California, more than 3,000 miles from my grandmother in Miami. I’m also about 2,500 miles away from my parents, brother, and other grandparents in Tennessee.

My husband is a pastor, and currently serving in a church in rural California. We moved here in 2023, before we had kids. Three years later, we are two kids in and living in a little home in a cul-de-sac with sweet neighbors. We have a pretty charmed life here—with a beautiful community of friends, in a church with a great pastoral staff who are also some of our best friends, in a neighborhood with coffee shops and ice cream parlors and a cute park all within walking distance.

And yet.

My family is far, and my heart aches for them.

Parenting without family nearby is difficult. I didn’t know when we moved here, not understanding the absolute all-consuming project that raising children is, and also, having grown up surrounded by family. As a child, within the distance of a quick drive, we had my paternal grandparents, who were part of our core nucleus. In the same town also lived cousins and other extended family. My maternal grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins all played a big role in my life as well, as they all lived within driving distance and factor large in my holiday and summer memories.

This is not the reality my children are being raised in. Our closest family members live in Southern California, a seven hour drive away. From there, it only gets farther.

I miss my family, and I miss the childhood I had that my children don’t.

So, this is not an article about how living far from family is hard, but worth it. Frankly, I’m not convinced it is. In fact, I’m fairly sure it isn’t. But sometimes, the distance can’t be helped. And so, here this is an article about how to logistically and emotionally survive one of the most difficult seasons of your life—parenting small children with no nearby familial support.

Life and Home Organization Reigns Supreme

I have what the internet is calling a Type B personality. My natural state ranges from slight to complete chaos. My car, my drawers, my calendar, my makeup drawer, my closet—it is all a mess. At least it used to be.

Now, I run my house akin to how I imagine a militant Eastern European grandma runs a kitchen—no excuses or grime to be found anywhere. My schedule is the law, the calendar is the rulebook. I can’t have a messy home, because I no longer have three to five hours twice a month to get my life in order. Those chunks of time just don’t exist if I want to sleep a reasonable amount. So I really just can’t let things get out of control.

Some things that have helped me keep my life organized:

1. Adopt a rhythm of picking up. The room gets a quick pickup every morning (10 minutes). The toddler picks up all the toys every evening while I tidy the living room (10 - 20 minutes, depending on how cooperative he is). The kitchen gets cleaned at night (30 minutes). I have a small home, so these are fairly easy and quick tasks for me, but if you’re diligent with your rhythm, you shouldn’t be spending too much time on any of these tasks, and your house will always be relatively tidy.

2. Have separate baskets for your laundry categories, so you never have to sort. My grandma told me this, when she came to help me after I had my first and saw Doug dump a massive bag of laundry on the floor and try to sort it. “You don’t have time to make a mess,” she said. “Buy a basket for every category and keep it sorted from the start.” She was right. We have a three-part hamper in our room for whites, colors, and darks; a delicate hamper in the closet; and the kids if a hamper for their clothes in the room (it’s small so that their load never gets too big, and we wash all their stuff together).

3. Use a shared calendar. We have a pretty strict work schedule. Doug knows not to schedule anything that he can’t do with the kids or that requires interrupting me on Mondays or Thursdays, unless he’s checked in with me first. I also know not do schedule anything on the other days of the week without checking in with him, because those are his work days. When we are scheduling things that require anything from the other person, or that are a shared family event, we put them on our shared calendar. We both have our notifications set up so that we get pinged when someone adds something to that calendar, which gives us the opportunity to ask questions and get on the same page.

4. Start a shared note for groceries, packing, party planning, etc. Our grocery note is just a running grocery list that we can both update, that way whoever goes to the grocery store (Doug) has an updated list always. This is such an easy hack. We do the same for packing. We recently went to Mexico, and I made a master packing list of everything we needed for the kids. Things get checked off as they’re packed, and it helps us not forget anything.

Obviously, there are many other small rhythms that help keep our life organized. This all fees a bit militant, and it is. Honestly, this is a part of raising children I do not enjoy, and I look forward to devolving back into a little slob when they’re older/grown.

Intense Communication is the Key to Life

My husband and I have always been good collaborators, but parenting has really taken things to the next level. We have now systematized parts of our communication. (Such as with the aforementioned shared calendar and notes.)

Once a week we schedule a date night, which includes some administrative components as well. Before getting to the cute and fun part of the night, we whip out our calendar and look at the upcoming couple weeks to make sure we didn’t forget to loop each other in, or to offer reminders on upcoming events.

Date Nights Are Non-Optional

You heard me. They really aren’t. Nothing sucks the joy right out of a romantic partnership than feeling overworked. These early years of parenting are so physical, and feeling-overworked is common. Every week, we schedule a date night. We only actually leave the house for these about once every other month. The other weeks, we order DoorDash after the kids are in bed and enjoy uninterrupted conversation for a couple hours. We put our phones away, ask each other six questions to help get the conversation going (every week, the same questions!1), and usually end with a board game or a card game or a movie. When we do get a night out, we enjoy it fully. But honestly, home date nights are nice.

Some creative ideas we’ve also enjoyed: Bake a dessert together; organize a pizza night with cut ingredients and pre-made dough; learn a new board game together; sit outside and enjoy the sunset with a beverage.

Remote or Flexible Work Will Save Your Sanity

I understand this is not an option for many people, but I can’t personally fathom our life without the flexible jobs we are privileged to hold. We do have the option of putting our toddler in daycare through our church’s preschool (even though we don’t currently use it, it’s nice to know we can if we need to), but remote or flexible work is important even without daycare.

When you don’t live near family, unless you’ve lived in your town for many years and have already built a solid and trusted community (more on that later), there is no one to pick up the slack. Sick child at school? You need to pick them up. Extracurriculars to participate in? You need to take them. Doctor’s appointment? Ding, ding, ding, we have a lucky winner (it’s you)!

All the extras that pop up on life when it comes to kids are on you. Remote or flexible work will make this so much easier to manage, because a job schedule will be one less thing you need to work around.

You Have to Invest in a Community

A couple of months ago, Doug and I went on a date night to our local steakhouse. This is an annual date for us, and it’s a splurge we both look forward to. That day, we dropped off the kids with a family from church whom we love and trust. We left them our minivan so that they could drive the kids home and put them to bed, and rode off in their (much nicer) car. We got the steakhouse and were greeted by a girl my husband knows from youth ministry, who also happens to work at the restaurant. We chatted with her and then ordered more food than we could possibly eat. We had a gift card, so we decided to splurge.

When the bill came, someone had anonymously paid for us! Both my husband and I left speechless and deeply grateful for the extravagant blessing of having a luxury paid for. We decided to walk off the 10 onion rings, eight ounce steak, mashed potatoes, and asparagus (and that’s just what I ate!) by strolling a few blocks to our town’s summer market, and immediately ran into a park friend who was there with her family. We chatted with them for a few minutes and made plans (her and I) to take the kids to the nature center the following day. Doug and I continued walking around and ran into three other groups ofpeople we know from church.

We still had some time when finished at the market, so we decided to browse Costco. We walked in and almost immediately heard, “Hey man, where’ve you been?” It was one of the guys Doug plays Rugby with. We chatted with him and his wife for a bit (Doug has been pretty absent from the team since we had our second, and the guy encouraged him to come when he can).

We drove home that night and came home to sleeping babies, grateful for a simple evening full of good food and good people.

Community doesn’t just happen. It’s been slow growth for me, because I come from a big extended family where my cousins are my baked-in best friends. Who has to make friends when you belong to a small gang of people who are forced to like you? But living far away from family I’ve had to learn to really accept and embrace people who are willing to be a part of my life, and to pursue community as well. My community doesn’t replace my family, but it’s a daily reminder of God’s grace and goodness.

Put Them Kids on a Routine

Here’s the thing: when you’re raising kids, your margin quickly disappears. All the time that exists between tasks is eaten up by little people who need a cuddle or a snack or are struggling to pull down their shorts and about to pee on the floor. When you live near family, you’re able to factor some margin back into your life. Maybe the babies go to grandma’s house a couple mornings a week. Or maybe the grandparents do a fun weekend with the kids once a month. This is no small thing, because while the margin from your daily life may be gone, you have a chunk of time to look forward to when you can get some tasks done, sans kids.

When you live away from family, this is likely not an option for you. You may have the occasional babysitter, but predictable time away from your kids (at least when they’re little), is not a reality. This is why a routine becomes so important.

When you have a routine, you have the ability to build in some margin into your day. We know that, predictably, both children will have 2 hours of quiet time, at the same time, every day. Our kids still nap, but we are also training the toddler to stay in his room until the Hatch turns green—whether or not he wakes up before. He has books and stuffed animals to enjoy in there, so it’s less jail-like than it sounds.

Likewise, he is learning to stay in his room until 7 am every morning. I wake up at 5 am to enjoy quiet time every morning, and Doug wakes up at the same time to work out. We need those uninterrupted hours to be emotionally available to the children throughout the day. Knowing that I have two hours in the morning, and two hours in the middle of the day, really helps me get through hard days. And, there are some tasks I need to get done without the kids around, so the routine helps ensure that I have that time.

Hire Help When You Can

This is self-explanatory. We hire out our house cleaning and lawn care.2

Go Out With Your Kids Alone, Often

I know moms who absolutely cannot handle extended outings with their children. Of course, I don’t have this option. Doug is a youth pastor and will have at least one (usually more) trip out of town every year. Not having family around to help out when he leaves means that I need to be able to go through life with my kids, by myself.

I go to the park with them, to restaurants, grocery shopping. And, not every outing is enjoyable. But every outing is an opportunity for us all to learn how to handle ourselves in public, and make the next outing more successful.

I also fly alone with my kids, because my work is remote and Doug’s isn’t, so I have the ability to go see my family out east for an extended period every year. In order to make this happen, I have to be comfortable (or at least able to), fly alone with my children.

Make Sure Someone Has Access to Your House Keys

This is just one of those practical things you may not think about until it becomes life or death. (Such as, you’re four hours from home and suddenly remember that you forgot to the feed the cat. You won’t be back for five days, so the cat will actually die if you don’t figure it out. Suddenly, you’re calling young men you know to see who is willing to break into your house and save your cat.)

Schedule Regular Calls With Family

We FaceTime family regularly. This is non-optional, and built into our routine. Part of maintaining the close familial ties is making time to catch up.

Train Your Kids So That You Can Easily Accept Help

This is controversial, but it’s so important to me that I can’t exclude it.

To thrive as people and in our marriage, Doug and I need to go out alone, without our kids. This includes date nights, and it also includes overnight trips or weekends away.

Fortunately, our parents are able and willing to take care of our kids for days at a time so that we can have little getaways. There is also a church family in town that we trust to care for our children, and they will offer us date nights where they put the kids to bed so that we can stay out late.

This is possible because our kids were sleep trained. They can take a bottle from anyone (and yes, I bottle trained my breastfed babies very early to ensure they never rejected it), and they don’t require us to lay in bed with them in order to fall asleep.

Our bedtime routine is easy: pajamas, book, bottle, bed. That’s it. Anyone can do it, and we let anyone who wants to put them to bed (such as, when we have company over and a baby-loving teen girl asks). We also keep a steady routine during the day, so anyone can take care of our babies because they are comfortable as long as they are within their routine.

Take the Overnight Date When Your Trusted Caregiver Offers It

And this leads me to the last one. I know too many parents who don’t go on overnight dates until their kids are way older. You can be this person, but I really don’t recommend it.

I think this is especially important when you’re raising kids away from family, because it’s an all-consuming job with no reprieve. Your partner can become just that: a partner, as in business, as in class project, not as in romantic. We are lucky that we have amazing parents who we trust with our kids. So whenever they come to visit, or we go visit them, we schedule at least one night away from the kids. Sometimes this is just us two, grabbing a burger and heading to a hotel. Sometimes we’re getting together with friends. Either way, it’s us, having fun together, not thinking about them kids.

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Living small was never our goal.

Though we live in a 700-square-foot house as a family of five, we didn’t necessarily intend for this to be the case. Like many families, we chose our house because of its location. We wanted to live in a certain part of town and our house is what was available at the time. When we moved in, we were pregnant with our first baby and our family quickly grew from two to five. My husband and I lived in a small 400 sq ft apartment before we moved into our house, which made it initially feel quite roomy. But now, as a family of five, it often feels cramped. I’ve learned a few things in the last six years that have helped our space not only feel livable, but have helped create our house into a beloved peaceful sanctuary.

Of course, we use pretty much every inch of our two bedroom and one bathroom home—from keeping baskets of dry goods on top of our kitchen cabinets to storing off-season clothes under our bed. People often ask how we manage to live in such a small space and my answer is simple: We use places in our home for storage that are typically overlooked.

Finding surface areas to put a pretty basket is key. For instance, I have the prettiest thrifted baskets on top of our refrigerator housing kitchen towels, supplements and medicines. The refrigerator top serves as an extra (and fairly large) shelf and the baskets keep our items organized while bringing eclectic beauty to a space that would otherwise be left empty. As for our under the bed storage, we specifically bought a bedframe that would allow us to keep bins underneath. We rotate our clothes with the seasons as we live in an area that has very cold winters and very hot summers, requiring us to own an assortment of clothes. And, unsurprisingly, our bedroom closet is small. (I rotate the kids’ clothes too and keep them in the shed, but more on that in a bit.)

While I try to use all the space our home has to offer, my goal is for it to look tidy, intentional, and, most importantly, not cluttered. Baskets and boxes with lids, cabinets with closed doors; these help achieve that goal.

One thing I never expected to do was rearrange the furniture the way I have. I have moved our living room couch every which way possible, trying to find the most ideal configuration for the season we’re in. As our family has grown and our needs have changed, our spaces have had to change along with us. Our family has swapped bedrooms not once, but twice! Originally we set up a nursery in the smaller of the two bedrooms. After our second baby got older, we decided to give the kids the bigger room and set it up as a bedroom and playroom. Not long after, our family grew once again, and we switched back so that we could have a bigger bed and add a crib in the master bedroom, and the smaller bedroom didn’t allow for that. The prospect of moving furniture around can feel overwhelming, but I’ve learned to think outside of the box to make our home function the way we need it to.

Our precious tiny home doesn’t have a garage but we do have a 8x10 foot shed in our backyard. This space has been a game changer for us, in terms of storage. We keep everything from the kids off-season and toys for toy rotations to luggage, tools, coolers etc. My husband built and installed shelves that fit the space perfectly to help us keep it organized. We use it like a garage and it helps us keep our indoor space organized.

I am often evaluating and reevaluating each room and thinking through what we can do to optimize the space. That’s part of living in a small home. Nothing I do is revolutionary, but it is intentional. Living in a small space can be hard. I won’t sugar coat that reality, or pretend I don’t occasionally get frustrated or angsty about the size of our home. But then, I remember all the reasons we are living the way we do and step back to evaluate what we can do to make the space more peaceful.

Our home is really such a sweet place for our family.

Madelin is an ordinary mom passionate about nourishing her family with good food, good books, and lots of love. Follow her work here.

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A much-beloved and be-hated tradition in the United States of America, among a certain set, is absolutely despising the country that gave them life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

This hate exists year-round, but it gains a special energy around July 4. It’s almost a sport, or a competition, to see who can post the most un-American, contemptuous statement on the country’s annual Independence Day celebration.

You know the posts. The black square with white text: “There is nothing to celebrate.” The infographic reminding everyone that America was built on stolen land. The meme about fireworks terrifying pets, veterans, and wildlife. The thread about immigrant families separated at the border. The post that says, “Actually, this is Sioux land,” or Seminole land, or Cherokee land, or whatever Indigenous nation is local to the person posting. The inevitable anti-Trump caption, which, to be clear, I am not here to dispute. The general mood is: America is racist, imperialist, capitalist, violent, hypocritical, and embarrassing.

And listen. Much of the critique is not wrong. America has treated immigrants shamefully—throughout its history, and especially under the MAGA majority. America did steal land. America became an economic powerhouse on the backs of enslaved people. America has broken treaties, toppled governments, interned citizens, exploited labor, and wrapped truly heinous sins in patriotic language.

But it is so, so ironic because the right to publicly and happily abhor your country is not available to everyone. In fact, it is a right protected by the Constitution of the country so happily being condemned.

The irony is that, while some posters will glibly say “America is NOT free” (true story), no one is actually being dragged out of their apartment for posting, “I hate this country.” No one is disappearing for making a joke about the president. No one is required to pretend that the fireworks move them to tears.

That is not nothing, but its absence is lost on Americans, who know nothing but freedom.

I am the daughter of Cuban immigrants. So when I hear people speak casually about hating America, I hear it with a particular kind of ear. I do not hear criticism and think, How dare you. I hear criticism and think, Do you understand what a luxury it is to say that out loud?

Because where my family comes from, public contempt for the government is not a casual Tuesday. It can cost you. I remember one incident, when I was a kid visiting Cuba. My cousin was telling me something about the country, and I blithely said, “I hate Cuba!” She ran to the window and shut it, nervously saying, “You can’t say that here.” I didn’t understand, being a daughter of Cubans, but an American. But in Cuba, vocal criticism of the government could cost your job, your safety, your ability to travel, your family’s peace.

This does not mean America is innocent. It does not mean our sins are less sinful because other countries are “worse.” It does not mean immigrants, or the children of immigrants, or anyone else should simply be grateful and quiet.

But it does mean that freedom of speech is not theoretical to me. It is not an abstract concept. Freedom is the difference between running to shut a window and writing a paragraph on the internet calling the president an embarrassment.

I am not one to yell, “Leave if you don’t like it!” I don’t believe love of country requires silence. In fact, I think the opposite is true. The people who love a place are often the ones most unwilling to lie about it.

But I would like to offer some perspective.

To be clear, we are under bad management currently. Donald Trump is embarrassing and an embarrassment to the nation. He is embarrassing when he berates allies in public, when he makes threats about Greenland and the Panama Canal as if foreign policy were a real-estate negotiation, when he turns serious meetings with leaders like Volodymyr Zelenskyy into media spectacles, and when he speaks of America like it’s just another business with his name on the building. He is decidedly American in his obsession with money and self, but un-American in every way that would make us proud.

Nevertheless, the above paragraph is sponsored by the First Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America.

This might be a surprising take from me, considering my last article, in which I pulled no punches when I wrote:

When it comes to families, America is a nation of liars … The lie is that America, as a nation, values children in any meaningful public sense. We do not. The nation has arranged itself around markets, weapons, individualism, and nostalgia, then called the result freedom. We have made family life both sacred and impossible. We have turned children into symbols while refusing to build a society in which they are safe.

But the just and intelligent criticism of one’s country—criticism protected, again, by our Constitution—is not the same as the vitriol I see every year: shallow in its critique, steeped in the ignorance of someone who has only ever known freedom, and sometimes so incoherent it gives me secondhand embarrassment.1

The truth is, many Americans would be shocked by how quickly they missed America if they were to leave it.

They would hate waiting in line for hours just to pick up a package, as people often do in countries with slower, more bureaucratic postal systems, only to reach the front and discover the package is not even there (“come back tomorrow,” they’d be told, unapologetically). They would hate waiting for public transportation in the heat or the rain, as I did for many years in South Korea. Or, having to walk four miles to cross a border during a protest that shut down vehicle travel, as I did in Chile. They would hate that you might get casually clipped by a car for not walking close enough to the edge of the road, as I did more times than I can count in various countries.

They would hate weathering life without artificial climate control, as much of the world does. They would hate hanging their clothes to dry because dryers are not as common elsewhere. They would really hate walking half a mile down a hill to refill a clean-water dispenser, then hauling the full container back up the same hill (looking at you, rural Tanzania).

They would also feel the social difference immediately: the friendly smile to a stranger that goes unreturned, the bump on the sidewalk without the obligatory “excuse me” or “pardon me,” the lack of easy small talk, the absence of that particular American casualness that makes the world feel, if not always kind, at least approachable.

Americans are used to convenience, space, efficiency, air conditioning, big appliances, big stores, big parking lots (big everything), customer service, personal bubbles, and the assumption that a stranger is likely to smile back. These are not universal conditions. It’s very American-coded—as we seem to assume the world revolves around us—to think they are. No, these are cultural luxuries. And like most luxuries, they are easiest to dismiss when you have only ever known them.

I often tell people, America is not terrible, nor is it a utopia. It is, as with most other developed nations, good at some things and truly terrible at others.

One thing America is very good at—still—is offering upward mobility to incoming immigrants.

In just one generation, my family went from working minimum-wage service-industry jobs to being teased for watching Netflix while writing little articles and receiving a paycheck for it. We are a family only one generation removed from immigration, and yet between us we have hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of education. My grandparents, after only a few years in this country, purchased a beautiful home. So did my in-laws. In fact, I have cousins who have been in the US for barely a decade—and who came with very little—and already own several properties.

And not just that: our families have had the luxury of becoming, and feeling, quite American.

This is the American immigration machine at work. When it works, it works very well—better than almost anywhere else in the world. And it absolutely changed the trajectory of my family’s and my life.

All of this to say that, even under bad management, America isn’t all bad. I like living here right now, although I don’t think I’ll live here forever. But wherever I go, I won’t forget what this country gave my family, and what it gave me: a future.

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On Monday afternoon, June 22, while I rushed around the kitchen trying to get dinner on the table for an impatient baby and a demanding toddler, an 18-year-old who had just graduated high school walked into our local library in Chico, California, less than a mile from our home, and opened fire.

Earlier this month, he had marched across a football field on a hot Friday afternoon alongside some of the youth my husband ministers to. Now he was inside the library where we go for story time.

This is the library where we gather with dozens of other toddlers and parents while a teacher named Summer tenaciously sings and reads through the chaos. It’s where we spend hot afternoons when we need to cool off, or rainy mornings when the house fails to contain all the energy within it. Our library has a cute and fair-sized children’s section, including a puppet stage, a soft mat with dinosaur toys, and shelves with dozens of Spanish books. I have often sat on the floor in front of these shelves with my toddler, perusing books about tractors and monster trucks, reading to him while the baby naps in the stroller. The children’s section is right by the front entrance.

The gunman—a teenager—killed two people, one of whom was a man protecting his partner’s daughter. At least one other person, a child, was injured as well, before police apprehended him.

“It’s not guns, it’s people.”

That is the phrase repeated so often after our schools, churches, libraries, parks, mosques, synagogues, concerts, are targeted in mass violence. Guns, they reason, are only weapons. Tools. Objects that can serve as protection as much as harm.

That phrase is meant to end the argument on gun control by pointing to the inefficacy of controlling weapons. What is gun control against a nation of enraged people?

What indeed.

But that phrase offers no absolution. More so, it’s an indictment. Because if the problem is not the guns—if it’s the people—then we still have to ask the question:

What is wrong with Americans?

What kind of country keeps producing people who shoot children, worshipers, shoppers, students, and library patrons? And, what kind of nation refuses to take action when its children are not safe, even in their schools, even in their churches, even in their libraries?

This was the second active-shooter situation our Northern California county has weathered in less than two years. In December 2024, a 56-year-old man opened fire at Feather River Adventist School, injuring two kindergarten students before killing himself. I was newly pregnant then. I ran to the press conference as the only denominational reporter covering the incident, and struggled to control my erratic emotions while the sheriff spoke of the injured children, of the man who wished them harm, of the weapon he acquired to inflict terror in a school yard on a Wednesday afternoon.

Following the Feather River incident, one of our local school boards discussed the option of having armed personnel on campus as a way to preserve safety. Arming more adults may make some people feel less helpless. I understand the terror that fuels the instinct. But it does not answer the deeper question of why American children require armed defense to learn, pray, read, or play.

When it comes to families, America is a nation of liars.

The lie, of course, is not that Americans do not love their own children. They do. The lie is that America, as a nation, values children in any meaningful public sense. We do not. The nation has arranged itself around markets, weapons, individualism, and nostalgia, then called the result freedom. We have made family life both sacred and impossible. We have turned children into symbols while refusing to build a society in which they are safe.

Politicians speak grandly of family values. The administration has celebrated tax breaks and baby bonuses. Political leaders and pundits alike pontificate over what parents should do, what mothers should be, what fathers should provide, and what children represent. Children are invoked, grandly, with much sentimentality and conviction—when they need votes, outrage, or moral cover.

But then children are killed in their classrooms. They are shot in their churches. They are endangered in schoolyards. They are threatened in small local libraries where the puppet stage sits near the front entrance.

No, America does not love its children in any meaningful public sense. It loves what the rhetoric of children does for it. It loves the symbol of the family. But it loves “liberty and freedom for all” more than safety as a shared responsibility. It has built a country where citizens buy weapons to protect themselves from their neighbors and then call that freedom.

Make no mistake, America’s gun violence is not normal among peer nations. The United States is the only country in the world with more civilian-owned guns than people, with an estimated 120.5 firearms for every 100 residents. Its firearm homicide rate is vastly higher than that of other wealthy countries. One peer-reviewed comparison of high-income countries found that America’s overall homicide rate was seven times higher than its peers, largely because its gun homicide rate was more than 25 times higher.

Mass shootings account for fewer than 2 percent of US gun deaths, but they reveal the same national truth. Under the traditional definition of public mass shootings, the United States has experienced more of them than any other country. The Violence Project, using a narrow definition of public mass shootings, counts more than 200 such attacks in the country since 1966, killing more than 1,400 people and injuring more than 2,200.

And contrary to popular discourse, the problem is not only illegal guns. According to The Violence Project, nearly two-thirds of US mass shooters obtained their firearms legally.

During the 2024 election cycle, conservatives ran hard on the family. They positioned themselves as the party of parents, babies, tradition, and household stability. It is easy to believe they were always the family party, while liberals shunned traditional families in favor of independence, but that is an oversimplification. One need only look at the early Obama-era Democratic Party to see that progressives also once ran campaigns that spoke directly to families.

Still, much has changed in the past decade. In the last federal election cycle, conservatives successfully established themselves, at least rhetorically, as the party for families.

And for good reason.

The economy needs families to thrive. And this is not a sentimental claim as much as a structural and practical one.

Like much of the world, the United States is aging. Birthrates have fallen. More adults are living alone. More people are delaying marriage or children. Many who want children cannot afford them. In many circles, this is framed as cultural decline or selfishness. But for many families, the explanation is much less abstract: rent, medical bills, childcare, student loans, unpaid leave, unsafe schools, and the exhaustion of trying to raise children in a country that treats parenting as a private hobby with public consequences.

Other developed nations do not support families because their governments are kinder or altruistic. They support families because functional societies require care work, and care work requires time, money, safety, and social stability.

The United States, by contrast, remains the only OECD country without a national paid parental leave policy. Childcare costs continue to rise. Parents are asked to absorb the full cost of raising the next generation while politicians use the image of the family to flatter themselves.

So the contradiction is not subtle.

We say we are worried about children, then ask parents to bear the cost of raising them alone. We say we value mothers, then send many back to work before their bodies have healed. We say fathers matter, then design work and leave policies that treat caregiving as optional. We say children are precious, then accept armed violence as the price of public life.

This is the nation we live in.

The hypocrisy is abhorrent, especially in Christian circles. The same people who claim to love babies — stop the baby murders! — often despise the children and adults those babies grow up into. They defend life in the womb, then oppose the social protections that might sustain that life outside of it. They speak of innocence, then abandon children to unsafe schools, unaffordable homes, inadequate healthcare.

Last year, I wrote about Marcellus Williams, the latest victim of state-sanctioned murder. The irony was clear then, and it remains clear now: some of the same Christians who insist that men like Marcellus have a right to life will deny them the basic societal protections that could change the course of their lives, then advocate for their execution by the state, not calling it murder, but justice.

This is the same moral incoherence that runs through so much Christian politics in America: the language of life without the structures that sustain life.

And now, again, we are here.

Another shooting. Another press conference. Another community—my community—trying to understand how a place of ordinary life and simple goodness became a place of terror. Another man dead because he protected a child. Another set of families whose lives have been carved in half into before and after. Another library, another school, another sacred public space added to the long and growing list.

And still, we will be told that the problem is not guns.

Fine.

So then, then let’s ask what kind of people we have become. Let’s ask what kind of country we have built. Let’s ask why our children need armed adults standing guard so they can learn their letters, sing songs, check out books, pray, or play on a schoolyard.

Let’s talk about why the children’s section at the library is by the front entrance, and why that detail now feels unbearable, the only thing I can think about.

I do not want to live in a country where story time requires armed guards. I do not want to raise children in a nation that mistakes foolishness for freedom.

And I do not believe any country can call itself pro-family while accepting, again and again and again, that its children may be shot in the very places built for them.

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I had something different written for today’s introduction of a new series, Letters From a Small Home, but I started thinking this week about cultural expectations in regards to our homes and square footage, and I had to write this instead.

In response to the initial post that inspired this series, a few people went pretty heavy on the “your house isn’t small” and “you’re so privileged” takes.

And that’s fine. People are allowed to say that. They’re also not entirely wrong.

I am privileged. My family has a safe, stable home. We have three bedrooms, each with its own closet. We have two full bathrooms. We have a garage. We have a private little yard, even if it is not a very usable yard for small children. It’s too small for a play structure or a trampoline or any of the classic suburban kid amenities, but it is still a private outdoor space, which is more than I’ve had in some places I’ve lived.

My current home is, by far, the largest home I have lived in since I was a child in Florida.

So why does my house feel small?

I think part of the answer has less to do with square footage and more to do with culture.

Aside from having lived in Florida, Nebraska, Michigan, and California, I’ve also lived in South Korea, the United Arab Emirates, and Tanzania. My housing situation in every place I’ve lived has been different: a room in a shared housing space in rural Tanzania, a war-era apartment in urban Korea, a single-family home in Northern California, and many variations in between.

In some places, our housing was objectively much smaller than what I live in now. When my family of four lived in our very small, very rundown apartment in South Korea, we were not living some spacious, minimalist dream. The apartment was cramped. It was old. There was a massive hole in my bedroom wall, and the kitchen sink electrocuted our midriff whenever the faucet was running. It was not charming, cozy, or whimsical.

But we also didn’t spend a lot of time in the apartment.

We walked everywhere. We spent time in the courtyard. We went to the mall. We went downtown. We occupied public places as a normal part of daily life. Our furniture was smaller, made to fit a city apartment. Our life naturally spilled outside the walls of where we slept.

The apartment did not have to contain the whole of us.

This has been my experience in many places outside the US, and it’s also true in many denser metro areas within the US. Homes are places where people sleep, cook, rest, and gather, but they are not always expected to hold the entirety of family life. Life happens in markets, sidewalks, parks, courtyards, public transit, plazas, cafés, churches, neighbors’ homes, and other third spaces.

But in much of the United States, the home is asked to do a lot more.

Most places are not walkable by design. Daily life is organized around private transportation. People drive to school, drive to work, drive to the store, drive to activities, drive to friends’ houses, drive to parks. Family life is often centered inside the home and around the private yard. Kids have playrooms. Families have bonus rooms. Yards are populated with swing sets, trampolines, pools, outdoor kitchens, patio sets, bikes, scooters, sports gear, and all the things meant to make home the central place where life happens.

So of course American homes are bigger. They have to be, in a way, because we have built a culture where the home is often expected to be the village.

The home is where children play, where adults work, where guests gather, where toys are stored. It’s where exercise equipment and Costco groceries live, where hobbies are perfected. The home protects one of America’s highest values: privacy. It’s where entertainment happens. It’s where the family retreats from a world that is often not designed for community.

As a society, we have prioritized space, privacy, and independence. We see this in our neighborhoods, our zoning, our politics, our transportation systems, our fences, our garages, our long driveways, our cultural obsession with being left alone.

Americans love to be left alone.

And I understand the appeal. I really do. But one of the things I love about living in a smaller home, and something I hope to explore more in this series, is that it has reminded me what it means to build a life that intentionally and necessarily spills outside the home.

Our yard is not big enough to contain all the energy in this house, so you’ll often catch us playing in the cul-de-sac. On any given evening, my toddler is running after a ball while I chat with neighbors who have come outside to sit on their porches and enjoy the sunset.

Every morning, we walk to the park because there is no play structure in our yard for my children to enjoy. That routine, born mostly out of necessity, has led to friendships. We have park friends now, people we see and meet up with regularly. We recognize the same people on our walks. We are getting to know our neighbors.

Thankfully, we live in a pretty walkable area, and we take full advantage of it. We walk to the coffee shop less than half a mile away. We walk to the grocery store about half a mile away. We walk to the Mexican restaurant, the ice cream shop, the dry cleaners, and the UPS store in the same shopping center.

Our life has spilled outside the home because it has to.

Our home is big enough to offer comfort, safety, and privacy. But it is not big enough to contain everything. And I am beginning to think that maybe this is not only a limitation, but a gift.

Because we don’t have an additional playroom, we have had to limit toys to what fits in a small cabinet. And because of that, our two-and-a-half-year-old can put away all his toys by himself. There are not endless categories or bins or complicated systems. There is just a manageable amount of things, and he knows where they go.

Because we don’t have a second living room or bonus room, we had to make a choice about the television. We could either let it sit at the center of our home, becoming the focal point of our life together, or we could put it away and only take it out on weekends or for special movie nights.

We chose to put it away.

So now music and books sit closer to the center of our home life. Not because we are especially virtuous, but because our space forced the question. That, to me, is one of the interesting things about a small home. It asks questions—about priorities, about family culture, about each other—that larger homes sometimes allow us to avoid.

Questions like:

• How much stuff do we actually want to manage?

• How much privacy do we need?

• How much convenience are we willing to trade for simplicity?

• What do we want at the center of our family life?

• Where does our life happen when our home cannot hold all of it?

This series is not meant to be a competition over who lives in the smallest space. It is not meant to romanticize housing insecurity, overcrowding, or the very real stress of not having enough room. It is not meant to deny that, globally and historically, many of us are living with more space than most people could imagine.

But it is meant to make room for an honest conversation about the homes we actually live in, the societal expectations we’ve inherited, and the ways our spaces shape our family cultures.

So yes, small is relative. Small is cultural. Small is personal. Small is sometimes a square footage number, and sometimes a feeling that overwhelms you when the whole family is in the kitchen at 5 pm and everyone needs something from you.

My home is not small in every context.

But in the context of American family life, with its big furniture and big yards and big storage expectations and big ideas about independence, it is on the smaller side. And living in this home has changed us. Or better, it has reminded me of all the things I learned when I lived outside the US. It has pushed us outside. It has made us prioritize. It has made us notice what we own, what we use, what we value, and what we expect a home to do.

That is where Letters From a Small Home begins.

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What makes an article go viral? This is a question I’ve asked myself a lot this month, as my birth stories article hit nearly 200 likes. What’s funny is that I usually put a considerable amount of time and work into my articles—but not this one! This one I wrote in about 30 minutes while Doug ran out for a quick errand after the kids were in bed. I’m proud and excited for the growth my account has experienced thanks to the attention the article received, and also feeling confused about what people actually want to hear from me. So anyway, aside from that piece . . .

Recently in Out Loud, a reflection on an OG trad wife, and why Burke’s novel fell so short in contributing anything serious to the conversation. Also, a fun little story on the day I regretted becoming a mom! (Don’t worry, 2.5 years in and I’m fairly happy with my choice.) This was the month for stories, because I also published a funny anecdote on the lucky dogs who get strolled around even when they have four perfectly good paws for walking (Your Dog is Not Your Child). A Substack conversation inspired an article with some quick tips on training your kids to eat in restaurants. And I ended the month with some thoughts on modern motherhood: Is our nostalgia for a “simpler childhood” founded in reality?

Over on SPECTRUM, I wrote an article my dad called “boring” on the changes coming to the federal student loans program, and how it impacts students who want a private education. (A more positive review from my husband: “It really put your skills as as journalist on display, because no one wants to read about finances.”) In my monthly column, I asked the question: Why do so many Christians feel comfortable with the corruption of the sacred? And on the Podly Women podcast, we hosted dual episodes on Modesty Culture and Beauty Standards.

This month, I spent most of the month committed to solving the “7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle”. I’m several years late on this book, so I know you probably know where this is going. What the heck was that ending?

I’ve also almost finished Burden’s marriage memoire “Strangers.” Guys, I hate to say it, but I’ve seen one picture of her husband and, well, he absolutely looks like the kind of guy that would do all the things she talks about in her memoir. The man basically has a red flag tattooed to his forehead.

On Substack, I read some great articles this month, but “Am I Okay With Being a Fat Mom” by is the only one that brought me to tears. “Instead of Moving to Europe, You Could Just Live More Like a European in the U.S.” by was another favorite, because it developed a conversation Doug and I have all the time about how we want to live a life we love now, instead of wishing we were somewhere else (which, take it from someone who has lived in a lot of somewhere elses, will not solve much for you). This month I also discovered ’s writing, and I’m all the better for it.

If you’re hanging around, please consider upgrading your subscription to paid. I’m a writer by trade (it’s my job!) and every paid subscription continues to make this work sustainable. Upgrade Here.

About Out Loud

Around here, we’re big fans of bold, honest, and a little provocative conversations. On Out Loud, you can expect weekly reflections on motherhood and Christian culture.

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When I think about my childhood, how happy and simple and beautiful it was, what I often remember is Sabbath afternoons. Every Saturday after church, we’d gather at my grandmother’s house for the best meal of the week. We’d come home from church, change out of our scratchy church best and into comfortable shorts and t-shirts, and hover in the kitchen, waiting for the food to be warmed. Congrí, corned beef (which pairs surprisingly well with the cuban rice and beans dish), boiled yuca with mojo, my mother’s perfectly seasoned salad, and my grandfather’s sweet limeade made from limes plucked right from the yard—these are the flavors of Sabbath afternoons. After the meal, we’d watch “The Prince of Egypt”, or a couple of the Family Entertainment Bible films, and then head out for an afternoon park stroll. Usually, by late afternoon, the Florida heat was not too bad, making a walk in the park enjoyable for everyone. No swimming or sports on Sabbath, but we could roam about until sunset, at which time we ended the Sabbath with a worship, consisting of a song, a Psalm repeated together, and a prayer. Then the party started. We’d usually head out for dinner and then to Blockbuster for a double feature.

My parents and grandparents worked a lot during the week, but every Sabbath, I knew that we had 24 hours—from Friday sunset of Saturday sunset—with no commitments outside of church. Twenty-four hours to be together, to play Bible games and gather with friends and eat good food. Twenty-four hours of rest.

When I was a kid, I didn’t think anyone else—aside from Jewish people, whom, not knowing any personally, I thought little about—kept Sabbath. Today, Sabbath discourse is all over evangelical social media. I’m not sure if it was popularized by John Mark Comer and Jefferson Bethke,1 but it feels like since they published their Sabbath books in 2019 (The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry and To Hell With the Hustle, respectively), Sabbath keeping is decidedly in. I thought, back when I read their books, that Sabbath was a fad and would eventually be forgotten again. But, six years later, it’s remained in focus for many Christians.2

I have to admit, I’ve watched the rise of Sabbath popularity evolve with complicated feelings. On one hand, I’m glad Christians are rediscovering Sabbath, and all that comes with it, even if there’s a lot of coloring outside the lines in terms of what Sabbath practice means. On the other hand, as someone who grew up Seventh-day Adventist, I want to laugh a little every time Sabbath is presented as some fresh, revolutionary spiritual practice. Some of us were raised with Sabbath so deeply embedded into our lives that we could feel it arriving before the sun even went down on Friday.

Adventist theology surrounding the Sabbath is central to the movement, and goes back to the very origin of the denomination. In January 1846, Joseph Bates, an Adventist patriarch who emerged from the Millerite movement, first presented an end-time emphasis on the Sabbath, which was confirmed by Ellen G. White—a controversial figure even with the denomination that is nevertheless officially considered a prophet by the church—in a vision months later. On June 27, 1850, White had a seminal vision foundational to much of Adventist eschatological teachings. In the vision, she saw the pope change the day of rest “from the seventh to the first.”

Thus, the Sabbath became one of the most important tenets for Adventists and, for many Adventists, the Catholic Church became a kind of prophetic nemesis.3

To be clear, many modern Adventists hold these beliefs lightly, if at all. Sabbath remains a part of the weekly rhythm for most Adventists like myself, but the stringent rules that governed how past church members kept (Adventist jargon for properly respecting Sabbath) the day are now seen as guidelines. Forty years ago, you would not have seen an Adventist in a restaurant, community gathering, or sporting event on a Saturday.4 Adventists believed that Sabbath was salvational, meaning that proper keeping of the day was a requirement for end-times people entering heaven. In fact, the seal of God referenced in Revelation—which most Biblical scholars, including many Adventist theologians, agree is the Holy Spirit—is still believed by many Adventists to actually be the keeping of a seventh-day Sabbath.

I say this with love, and as someone formed by this tradition: when it comes to Sabbath, Adventists definitely lost the plot a bit.

For Adventists, a proper keeping of the Sabbath was a tangible expression of our identity and role in preserving God’s truth. There was beauty in it, absolutely, but there was also pressure. As a child, I knew Sabbath was supposed to feel different and sacred. But I also knew that there were rules, spoken and unspoken, about how to keep it correctly. The day that was supposed to be about rest was also in reality a test of one’s faithfulness and commitment to God’s commands.

This unique understanding of Sabbath—that it holds special truth and sets certain people apart for God—in my opinion, has clouded the beauty and blessing of Sabbath, jealously shrouding it in exclusivity and piety. Like many Adventists, I’ve journeyed in my relationship with Sabbath, from my childhood in a traditionally Adventist home to my college years, disregarding it as a day to remembered at all. Today, I hold what I consider to be a deeper and truer sense of the day.

In fact, I’ve come to see Sabbath as much more than a theological marker. To me, Sabbath is a perfect picture of God’s heart, and a radical call to justice.

Finding Justice in Sabbath

I see God’s heart for justice baked right into the Sabbath commandment. While the text of the commandment given in both Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5 differs slightly, the core is repeated in both versions almost verbatim:

“On that day no one in your household may do any work. This includes you, your sons and daughters, your male and female servants, your livestock, and any foreigners living among you.”

Integral to the Sabbath is not working, not making others work, and not allowing anyone—even animals or visitors—to work. Without rest, there is no Sabbath. There is a great equalizing factor, a strong social justice component in the command to rest. From the boss to the worker to the animals, all are to find an equal measure of rest on the Sabbath.

For humans, not working can take work. In ancient times, Pharisees built layers of rules to ensure no work was done on the Sabbath, but in doing so, they stripped it of its justice. Sabbath observance today varies widely, but I’ve noticed a more dogmatic conversation around Sabbath emerging in some Christian spaces, one that mirrors the traditional Adventist communities I grew up in. In those settings, it is easy to become a slave to the Sabbath rather than a recipient of its blessing. Rules—a long list of things you should not do, listen to, or watch—take center stage.

In other communities, including Adventist spaces, Sabbath is treated as optional. We check our email in the morning, go to church, then maybe head over to Olive Garden for a mediocre Italian lunch. If our kids play sports, we skip church altogether to spend Sabbath on the sidelines, cheering them on. Church becomes what we do when we have nothing else going on, rather than the rhythm around which the day is built. And Friday night? That’s no longer part of the Sabbath experience.

In both scenarios, we’re missing the Sabbath blessing.

The Sabbath commandment is prophetic, though perhaps not in the way Adventist church founders originally understood it. It speaks to the human condition—our inability to rest, to simply “be still.” It addresses our tendency to seek identity in work and personal achievement. Through Sabbath, God prophetically offered us justice long before we even constructed the society that would so desperately yearn for it.

, in his 2019 Atlantic article “Workism is Making Americans Miserable,” described “workism“ as a new religion, one “promising identity, transcendence, and community.” True, the Girl Boss era in which this was written is long past, but we are still reckoning with a culture desperate for a stable identity, and achievement remains a siren call. Scroll Instagram Reels on any given day and you’ll likely be bombarded by people sharing their latest optimization hacks through a “Sunday Reset” or “My Morning Routine” video, affirming the status quo of work as self-improvement, self-expression, and self-worth.

I’m not immune to this. As a writer, mother, freelancer, editor, chef, recreation director, preschool teacher, household administrator, snack distributor, and professional finder of lost monster truck, rest rarely feels natural. There is always one more email, one more draft, one more task, one more errand, (one more lost monster truck), one more way I could become slightly more efficient or useful. Even my rest can become an optimization task.

I think that part of the problem is that we now have apps and metrics to track success in every are of our life: health, social capital (social media), our baby’s growth progress, you name it, there’s an app for it. Even our religion can fall prey to optimization, through the gamification of Bible reading or time spent in prayer.5 We strive to improve, earn more, and optimize outcomes. But, work and achievement aren’t fulfilling our souls. We are more burned out, tired, and anxious than ever.

Sabbath commands us to stop, rest, and reprioritize. Put aside the phone, the apps, the job, the household tasks, even the social calendar that keeps us so busy acting out community that we’re failing to connect in any meaningful way. “Stop,” God commands us. “You are good, and it is enough.”

Growing up in an immigrant church, I witnessed Sabbath as the great equalizer. Our congregation included doctors, psychologists, janitors, teachers, waiters, and diner cooks. Yet on Sabbath, gathered in the pews wearing our Sabbath best, we stood as equals. Titles, professions, calendars—it all faded away, replaced by the shared experience of rest and worship.

Maybe that is why I can’t fully let Sabbath go, even when I am frustrated by how my denomination has handled it. Beneath all the rules, beneath the end-times charts and prophetic anxiety, beneath the debates about what counts as appropriate Sabbath behavior, there was something profoundly beautiful happening every week. People who spent six days being sorted by class, labor, language, education, immigration status, and income gathered together and submitted to the same command: stop.

Sabbath is justice.

And not just for us, our family, our community—for everyone. Modern Sabbath discourse often omits the fact that no one—visitors, workers, animals—should be forced to work on the Lord’s day.

Justice for All

Sabbath for the Israelites was broader than a weekly rest. They experienced Sabbath as a cycle of seven days, seven years (Shemita, the Sabbath year), and 50 years (Jubilee which occurred every 50th year after seven Shemita cycles). This broader cycle paints a vivid picture of God’s heart for justice.

In Deuteronomy 15 and Leviticus 25, we read about Shemita, when the Israelites were commanded to let the land rest every seventh year. The food the land produced was available to all, and all debts were to be forgiven, offering a clean slate for all Israelites.

Every week, Sabbath equalizes us—whether CEO or struggling journalist, we are all offered the same measure of rest. As Sabbath calls us to cease consumerism and work, even our income disparities should not separate us. Shemita took this further, bringing justice for slaves, workers, and landowners alike. Jubilee, after seven Shemita cycles, extended this justice even more by returning ancestral land lost in debts owed and breaking the cycles that lead to generational poverty.

In Deuteronomy 15:4-5, God says:

“There will be no poor among you; for the Lord will bless you in the land that the Lord your God is giving you for an inheritance to possess—if only you will strictly obey the voice of the Lord your God, being careful to do all this commandment that I command you today”

God’s vision was one of radical justice and equality, his command provided a practical plan to eradicate and prevent poverty.

Here’s something I’m wrestling with: When I pop into H&M on Sabbath and walk out with a trendy crewneck, I’ve participated in the capitalist cycle of exploitation. A store manager had to come in and open the store that day, and a clerk working a five-hour shift on Sabbath sold me the crewneck. Taking it further, trace that crewneck to its creation and someone in Bangladesh was paid less than $4 a day to make it for me. But if we all stopped once a week and refused to participate, what would happen to the capitalist machine? What if we took a year off from consumerism every seventh year?

This is where Sabbath becomes uncomfortable for me. It is easy to critique the Adventists who turned Sabbath into a checklist for salvation. It is harder to admit how often I want Sabbath to accommodate my convenience. I want the justice of Sabbath, but I also want the restaurant meal, the Target run, the last-minute grocery pickup, the easy convenience that depends on someone else not resting.

It’s true, my individual Sabbath practice may not disrupt the system, but it’s an act of resistance that aligns me with God’s desire for all people. And, a cup fills up one drop at a time. If collectively we modeled it for the world, it could inspire a radical movement of justice—the justice God envisioned with Sabbath.

Justice for us. Justice for others.

Justice for the earth.

At the end of each creation day, God said, “It is good.” He loved his creation—people, trees, animals, the land. He loves it all. In fact, one of his first commands was for humans to care for the earth (Gen. 2:15)

During Shemita, the Israelites let the land rest. In this age of Christian climate denial, it’s radical to see God as the great climate activist, prophetically commanding rest for the earth before it needed it. Yet God, in his wisdom, built into the Sabbath cycle justice for his loved creation, rest for humans and the planet. He envisioned a world in which we would care for each other and for what he made, bask in the glory of creation, and protect it.

On our weekly Sabbath, we can linger in the beauty of God’s creation, aligning with God’s command to rest as he did, enjoying his creation as he did. Sabbath offers us the opportunity to appreciate the beauty of our wondrous planet, and Exodus 20 urges commandment-keepers to keep the Sabbath as a remembrance of God’s creation.

Adventists, like many other Christian denominations, experience infighting—progressives and conservatives are struggling to find common ground. As a pastor’s wife, I rarely comment on these internal conflicts specifically. But let me say this: phrases like social justice and climate justice should be part of the Adventist vernacular. “Seventh-day” aligns Adventists with the justice God established in Sabbath. We love the Sabbath not because it is our ticket to Heaven someday, but because it is bringing God’s justice to Earth, right now.

Really, this is the Sabbath I am trying to recover—not the anxious Sabbath of my childhood church community, not the discarded Sabbath of my college years, not the Instagrammable, self-serving Sabbath of evangelical social media, but the Sabbath of Scripture: a day that interrupts exploitation, loosens our grip on achievement, protects the vulnerable, honors the earth, and reminds us that rest was never meant to be a privilege.

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Around here, we’re big fans of bold, honest, and a little provocative conversations. On Out Loud, you can expect weekly reflections on motherhood and Christian culture.

5

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3 months ago · 644 likes · 119 comments · Freya India

One of my favorite memories of my mom is not a single moment, but more a conglomeration of mornings that merge in my mind as a single memory: watching her do her makeup. I remember sitting on my parents’ bed, quietly watching while my mom stood in front of her mirror, carefully applying lip liner and lipstick.

“When you start wearing makeup,” she’d say, “you won’t need a lot of lipstick because your lips will be pink. The color will fade as you get older, but don’t rush it.”

My mom was effortlessly beautiful, and I spent a lot of time worrying that, because I was white where she was dark, because my hair was red where hers was a rich dark brown, almost black, because my eyes were a swampy green where hers were a deep chocolate, I’d never be beautiful like her. But mostly, I just liked watching her rhythmic, steady movements, applying blush or eyeshadow. I’d get lost in the peacefulness of the process. It’s funny now that such a simple memory brings childhood nostalgia for me.

Recently, I was chatting with friends about our summer days as children, what we did when we were home from school and our parents were at work. It occurred to me that my brother and I were likely home alone for a few hours every day, and probably from a young age, because all the adults in our life worked and we didn’t spend much time with a babysitter. No one worried about it much. I remember mornings plopped in front of the TV, or playing pretend with a stuffed animal. Once an adult did arrive home, we were free to roam, riding our bikes around the neighborhood with our neighbor friends. We’d go several blocks away, to a road with a steep hill—or as steep as you’ll get in Florida—just to zoom down and perilously press the brakes right as we reached the bottom intersection.

As an older kid, a teen, I remember writing a quick note on paper for my grandparents—“gone to the mall”—and walking out the door, simple as that. I’d walk to my friend’s house and “pick her up,” and then together we’d walk to the mall.

These memories all bring with them a sense of simplicity. It was, in so many ways, an uncomplicated slice of time. The days before smartphones made us instantly accessible all the time; before GPS trackers helped us locate each other always. A time before social media exposed us to all the bad things happening everywhere, all at once.

Our moms, the mothers of the 90s and early 2000s, lived a different reality than the one we live in as parents. One where kids were not just allowed, but expected to roam outside with neighbor kids; where not knowing where your kid was for a few minutes or hours wasn’t something to strike immediate fear in your heart. A reality that was, in many ways, simpler. Or at least, that’s how it felt to us as children.

Which is likely why Instagram is full of reels of women recreating the 90s aesthetic. One creator, Shannele of @reelmomstuff, has even built an entire brand around the 90s childhood. She has an old-school, clunky TV with a VCR, a collection of all our favorite childhood VHS tapes, and a room with all the posters you wanted in 1997.

This is not to hate on Shannele, whose content is mostly fun, if a little too hyper for my taste. And she certainly isn’t the only one selling us a version of the 90s childhood. The butter mom aesthetic, the Nancy Meyers living rooms, the DIY accounts that try to replicate the lived-in character of an older home in a quick week-long remodel—they are all reaching for the same thing: nostalgia for a simpler time.

This content is also capitalizing on our fears as mothers. The fear that our kids will suffer from anxiety brought on by overuse of technology, that they won’t have the opportunity to engage in the type of risky play that fosters self-confidence and independence, that they’ll fall prey to the loneliness epidemic due to our lack of village. I regularly find myself spiraling because we don’t have a big backyard with climbing trees and plenty of dirt. How will my kids ever learn to climb a tree? How will they grow an appreciation for dirt and mud and messy play? Will they ever have a neighborhood posse to ride around with? What will become of them and their family ties, with us living so far from their cousins? If all their local friends are screen kids, who will they have to run wild with? Will the neighbors call the police on me if I try to send my kids on an independent errand? It’s happened before!1

Are you tired reading that paragraph? If you’re a mom, you’re probably also living with those thoughts, fending them off multiple times a day. The social media discourse doesn’t help. There’s a lot of pressure to give our kids the childhoods we had.

We want our kids to know the simple pleasure of a popsicle eaten outside after a summer afternoon full of play, sticky juice dripping down their hands. We want them to play with the hose, and drink out of it when they get hot because it’s easier and more fun than running inside for a cup of water. We want our kids to practice tricks on their skateboards for hours on end with a ramp they cobbled together, or to try to make wings for their bike and take it to the highest hill, pedaling as fast as they can to catch air.2

We want innocence and joy for our children, and we’re filled with anxiety at the thought that the beautiful, simple childhood we had isn’t available for them.

But I wonder if my mom, below her carefully applied makeup and easy confidence, felt the same for me.

When my brother was a toddler, before I was born, a man at church was found to be molesting little boys in the bathroom during the worship service. Parents would innocently let their boys run out for a quick potty break, never thinking of the danger their children were running into. My mom always references this moment as the reminder she needed to not trust anyone with her children. We were carefully watched as kids at church, not allowed to sit with anyone other than our parents or grandparents, only allowed to visit the homes of a couple of church families, not even allowed to join in on overnight church activities without my parents.

Then, when she was pregnant with me, a little girl who lived in my grandparents’ neighborhood went missing. She was found days later in a drainage ditch just a few houses down from my grandparents’ house. A family friend had abducted her, abused her, and then shoved her in a trash bag and dumped her body. This story was told to us as a warning, a reminder not to trust anyone, not to go anywhere with anyone, to be cautious always.

These stories lived in my mom’s head rent free. I know this because she occasionally brought them up as warnings. A specific memory has always stayed with me. One Saturday after church, we had guests at the house, which was very normal for us. I was learning to play piano, and I wanted to show off my skills. The piano was in the formal living room, and I invited one of the young men who had been invited to the house to come listen to me play. He sat next to me on the bench while I clacked out a song. My mom peeked in, and gently but quickly ended the piano session. She took me into a room and reminded me sternly that I was never to be alone with anyone other than a trusted family member.

Nothing happened, but as a mother, she was in constant vigilance.

I am now the mother. My children are my heart, walking outside my body. I want to give them the best of everything. Most of all, I want to protect them from the ugliness of the world. When I was little, my mother protected me. She sheltered us from the things and people who could harm us. She, along with my dad and my grandparents and my aunts and uncles, built a cocoon around me and my brother and my cousins, so that we could live in the magic land of childhood for as long as possible. A land where popsicles taste sweeter and, if you believe hard enough, your bike may just learn to fly.

I’m not really sure motherhood was any easier for my mother than it is for me. I’m not really sure being a mother has ever been easy. Maybe every generation of mothers has had its own version of fear, its own stories lodged in the back of the mind, its own reasons to hover near the doorway. Maybe what changes is not the weight of motherhood, but the shape of the world we are trying to protect our children from. We carry the burden so that our children can be unburdened. We fend off the world so that they can have magic.

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4 months ago · 132 likes · 156 comments · Anna Keating

Let me get right to it: eating out at restaurants with babies and toddlers is not the cute, whimsical dining experience we grew accustomed to before becoming parents. Nothing kills whimsy like a toddler grabbing at your cute white shirt with grimy hands because he wants your attention, while you’re trying to shush your shrieking baby and pointedly ignore the glances other patrons are throwing at you.

Yes, this is a real anecdote.

I do love eating out, though. It’s absolutely one of my favorite things; it turns an ordinary day into something special. And when I had my babies, that was one thing I was just not willing to give up.

I also get annoyed when I’m in a restaurant and kids are crawling all over the floor, banging spoons on the back of a shared booth, eating with their hands, and making a mess everywhere while their parents get up and leave with only a minimal attempt at cleanup. So teaching my babies to sit in a restaurant is a high priority for us, and an ongoing project.

Here are some things that have helped us achieve a modicum of decorum with our nine-month-old and two-and-a-half-year-old.

Eat meals around your family table.

This is probably the easiest way to start training your kids to eat in a restaurant. We eat every breakfast and dinner at the dining table, and lunches at the counter. When we eat at the table, we follow etiquette rules. For us, those rules are:

• Wait to start eating until everyone is seated and we’ve prayed.

• Eat with your utensils, unless it’s food meant to be eaten with your hands.

• Only one small car at the table—not an endless amount of toys—and if you drop the car or push it away, no one is going to grab it for you. It is deeply annoying for the parent, who is also trying to eat, to retrieve a toy over and over again.

• Stay seated until everyone is done eating, and sometimes after as well. The table is an opportunity for conversation and connection, even for the smallest family member.

• On that note, this is also an opportunity to teach kids not to interrupt. We share conversation, but when mom or dad are talking, we don’t automatically pause to acknowledge the interrupter.

• And yes, these rules apply to the baby as well.

No screens at the table, ever.

This is something we don’t even think about much, because we’re a screen-light family and we do not allow our kids to use personal devices. Ever.1

I’ll admit, though, that when we’re around other families, we’re more relaxed. If another child is playing with a tablet or watching something, and it’s not inappropriate, we don’t insist that our child look away. If an older family member pulls out his phone at a restaurant and starts showing our toddler car videos, we usually don’t interrupt.

We have that luxury because we don’t live near family, so these moments are rare for us. When we are with family, it feels like a luxury and a special occasion. The rules are different, because we want those visits to feel fun and memorable for our kids.

But, this is probably one of the most important steps in training your children to eat in a restaurant. A child who cannot self-entertain or sit with their boredom will not be able to sit peacefully in a restaurant. Our toddler will pretend his cutlery is a train and “drive it” under the napkin (which is a tunnel), and this little game will keep him entertained for a long time. That type of creative play and attention span is a trained muscle, and a screen will quickly undo all the training you put so much effort into.

Brave the restaurant, even in the hard seasons.

With our first, 15 to 20 months was a tough time to eat out. He was mobile and impatient, and it was hard to keep him seated and peaceful in restaurants. We had some bad meals, including meals where we frankly just gave up and left, but we kept attempting it.

Because on the other side of every bad dining experience, there’s a lesson learned. And what makes the hard seasons hard is that we don’t compromise on our standards. The toddler is still expected to behave.

Which brings me to the next item.

Keep your expectations high.

I think kids are more capable than we give them credit for. We expect good behavior in restaurants, regardless of age, and we don’t compromise those expectations for difficult seasons.

Currently, our baby is proving to be a difficult restaurant eater. He shrieks when he’s hungry and shrieks between bites because he doesn’t want to wait for the next bite. He also shrieks when the food is good, or when it’s too hot, or when his brother makes a funny face. Lots of shrieking coming from that 20-pound bundle. It is honestly funny at first, and then quickly becomes frustrating and annoying.

When we’re eating out and he starts shrieking for food, we quietly and firmly remind him to be patient, to use his inside voice, and to respect the establishment. This does nothing, because he’s nine months old and literally does not understand language, but someday soon he will understand, and it’s important that he knows screaming in a restaurant is not appropriate.

In the meantime, there are restaurants we won’t frequent with him because we don’t want to ruin the vibes with a screaming infant.

Frequent casual eateries first.

If your kids are just learning proper restaurant etiquette, or if they are in a difficult season, avoid nice restaurants. It’s polite not to ruin someone else’s dining experience.

Right now, we choose to visit our favorite Mexican spot, which is casual and has outdoor dining, or other similar restaurants, because the baby absolutely has no chill and does not know how to behave properly.

This does not mean our rules in these places are relaxed. The goal is still to get the baby to a point where he can eat out in other places. It just means we don’t have to stress too much if he’s shrieking, because no one really cares.

Every outing is a training session.

Consistency is key to training your kids. Every time we eat out, it’s an opportunity to practice proper etiquette. Every time we sit at the table at home, it’s a meal where proper manners are expected.

Of course, this makes eating out a chore some days. But, the good days make every hard meal worth it. You know, kids are great at finding cracks in your armor. If they see that you’re not committed to the project, pretty soon you’ll be at Olive Garden and your five-year-old will be crawling under the table, picking at noodles he dropped earlier, while you wonder what went wrong. So, stay committed to the training. Because . . .

The results are worth it.

Finally, it will all come together. We have good seasons and bad seasons, but overall we can see how our kids, even though they’re still so little, are learning to be pleasant dining companions.

Of course, expectations have to be realistic, but overall we can enjoy eating at a restaurant with our kids. Even the baby is having more good than bad days lately. And I know that in a few years we’ll be able to enjoy nice meals, in nice settings, with our kids whom we genuinely enjoy spending time with—hearing their little thoughts while we share good food around a nice table.

And that’s worth building toward.

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Last month, my husband and I were strolling Carmel-by-the-Sea, a seaside town on the Central Coast perfect for anyone with a shopping addiction, when I had one of the funniest interactions I’ve had with an older person in a while.

My husband had gone into the only bookstore in town1 to purchase a couple books I had flagged for him, while I stood on the sidewalk rocking the stroller with our two sleeping children. My brain was empty as I mindlessly looked down the sidewalk and rocked the stroller, so likely I didn’t hear the Little Old Lady when she called me the first time, because by the time I heard her, she was speaking rather loudly and looked a bit annoyed.

“Are those dogs or children in there?” she asked me, pointing a finger at my stroller.

I blinked several times, trying to process her question. I looked at my double stroller, wondering what would make her wonder about the species housed within. Then I laughed awkwardly.

“Children!” I left out the “of course,” but it was implied.

The Little Old Lady looked gratified.

“I’m glad to see a stroller with children.”

At this point, I was truly confused. When I see a stroller, I assume there are children within. Not knowing what the polite response to her was, I gave her the white girl smile. You know: closed lips, corners uplifted, shifty eyes hoping for the interaction to end.

The Little Old Lady was undeterred.

“I retired here, and I like to walk around and take the bus. I live just a block that way,” pointing down the road to where I only saw more shops, “and I see a lot of strollers. They all have dogs.”

“All of them?” I asked rather helplessly.

She nodded emphatically. “Every one. I have grandkids, you know.”

I did not know, and I also wasn’t sure where this conversation was going, and I was still thinking about the hundreds of strollers in Carmel transporting dogs.

“Well, not all of them,” she continued. “There’s also someone with a cat, and they also have a stroller for it.”

At this point, my sense of humor came to the rescue. This is ridiculous! A town full of strollers for dogs! And a cat!

“It’s good to see a stroller with babies,” said the Little Old Lady gratified. “You know, every time I see the dogs in strollers, I think it’s not natural. Dogs need to walk, they need exercise, they should not be in a stroller.”

Although I agreed with her, on principle more than reason, I couldn’t help but inject something about dogs with very short legs.

“Those are house dogs,” she said assertively. “Or purse dogs. They don’t need a stroller.”

Well, she would know, being a Carmel resident and thus exactly the type of woman who would know all about dogs and dog breeds and what dogs need.

At this point, she decided she needed to leave. She asked about my kids’ ages—“You’re a busy woman!”—and continued on her way.

Leaving me thinking about all these dogs in strollers.

I live in California, so of course I’ve seen my share of dog strollers before. But, being from Northern California, I definitely see many more child strollers than animal strollers. It’s probably something like a 20 to 1 ratio. I’m sure the Little Old Lady was hyperbolic with her assertion, mostly because I saw plenty of children in strollers in my two hours of strolling through town, but she seemed so sure of herself. Although, many of the people who live in Carmel are retired and wealthy, and thus seem to be the demographic to carry their dogs around in strollers, and maybe that’s who she was talking about.

A town full of doggy strollers doesn’t actually seem so bizarre. In fact, when I visit LA, I have also seen plenty of young people with dogs in strollers. Dogs in strollers at the farmers market, dogs in strollers at the coffee shop, dogs in strollers at the restaurant patio. On that note, I’ve even seen unhoused people with dogs in their strollers.

And really what I want to say here is: It’s ridiculous.

A dog is a dog, not a human. It’s a pet, an animal, to be cared for, of course, even loved deeply. But it is not a child, and it should not be socially cherished in the same way a human child is cherished.

I don’t want to add to the rage-bait content suggesting that people are simply replacing children with pets. According to in 2017, the data at the time didn’t support this notion. (Although in the same article he suggested there may be an argument that pets were replacing spouses as companions, making the phrase “he’s a dog” a little too literal.) Rather, as people marry later, and therefore have children later, we fill our need for caretaking and companionship with a pet.

But newer data suggests that maybe, in the nearly decade since, we have made the jump from acquiring pets as companions while delaying marriage and children to actually considering pets adequate replacements for children. Findings from one poll revealed that 82% of pet owners agreed with the statement, “My pet(s) is/are like my own child.” Most of those same respondents—72%—said they talk to other people about their pets as if they were their own children.

That kind of language has consequences. Most pet owners want their pets to be allowed into more shops and commercial establishments. They want more pet-friendly businesses. They want to take their pets on more plane rides. They want their pets allowed in more public parks and green spaces.

In other words, the pet-as-child framework doesn’t stay private. Now, it’s not the preference of a few people on the margins. Rather, it spills into public life.

And that is where I start to get annoyed.

I own a cat. Her name is Pepita, she’s black and white, very furry. We shave her once a year because the fur is overwhelming, and we get her vaccinated. She has seen the vet 100% more times than any cat I owned as a child has. By all accounts, she is spoiled.

But, she is a pet. I own her. She lives in my house, and she is my cat, and if we hit financial difficulty and can’t afford to take her to the vet someday, she will just not go to the vet. Whereas I would go into financial ruin to provide my child with whatever level of medical care they needed. See the difference?

I think part of the problem here, and this is something I’m still thinking about, is that I see a grander theme at play. This isn’t only about fertility decline, or annoying dogs in public spaces, or even the maddening feeling that my baby is less welcome in some places than someone else’s dog.

This is about human dignity.

As a Christian, I believe human beings are created. Designed, with a little of the divine in each of us. But I don’t think you need to be a Christian to believe that human beings are special. What is the anti-AI movement, what are conversations about AI regulation and creative labor and automation, if not attempts to protect something distinctly human? We believe, collectively, that humans matter simply because they are human.

And as such, caring for a human child is a high calling. Raising humans into beautiful and loving and productive adults is sacred work.

A dog, a cat, while a loved part of the family, is not a human member of the family. And it feels deeply incongruent to put the life of an animal in the same moral category as the life of a human being.

Not because animals don’t matter. But because humans do matter, so much.

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About Out Loud

Around here, we’re big fans of bold, honest, and a little provocative conversations. On Out Loud, you can expect weekly reflections on Christian Nationalism, culture, parenting, and family.

It’s Mother’s Day! If you’re reading this today, the day of the mother, I’m currently frolicking across the Mendocino Coast bluffs, baby in tow, toddler running wild. We came out to the coast this weekend for a youth retreat, which I love because our youth families are cool and the Northern California seaside is one of my favorite places on the planet.

Ten years ago, when Doug and I were first married, we lived only an hour away from here. We’d sneak away to the coast on random afternoons, sitting on the big boulders by our favorite beach, watching the seals play in the waves. Two and a half years ago, when we first became parents, this coast, now a four-hour trip for us, was the first long trip we did with Luka. We bravely crossed the mountains with our six-week-old infant—a four-hour trip extended to seven hours—in late November 2023, and had what turned out to be one of the worst trips of our lives. Now, whenever Doug and I think about Mendocino, one of us will look at the other with something between a smirk and a wince, and say, “Remember that one night?”

Yes, we remember. That one night, in that one Italian restaurant, with that one screaming baby. Our baby.

So, in honor of Mother’s Day, here’s a story of the day I wished I hadn’t become a mother.

Picture it, Sicily, 1914. Just kidding, it was November 2023 in Mendocino, California. My 29th birthday, and my second month into motherhood. This was our big venture into the world with our first baby. We live in the valley, four hours away from the coast, and that is a long trip for a new parent with a newborn. We drove the windy roads, stopping frequently to nurse, and planned on four nights in a cabin on the coast.

We love Mendocino. We lived not far from there for three years when we were first married, and it’s a cozy, nostalgic place. I love that coast especially in the fall, when it’s more likely to be overcast and windy and a little haunted. A trip to the coast is always an adventure, but from the beginning, I felt that this trip would be different.

The thing about traveling with babies is, it requires a lot of stuff. That was my first clue into just how much our lives had changed. Doug and I are known to hop in the car and drive off for multi-day adventures, bringing little and even sleeping in our car. Before Luka, we would have said we were going to the coast, thrown a couple of pants and sweaters into a duffel, and run out the door.

The night before we left on this seminal trip, however, we gathered at the table for an hour. Yes, that is 60 minutes, during which all we did was plan everything we needed to bring to make this trip work out. Bottles, pumps, bottle warmers, 50 outfits, swaddles, stroller, bassinet. If Target sold it in the baby section, we were bringing it. It took us about three hours to pack the thousand things we thought we needed to bring, but as new parents, how are you supposed to know what actually keeps a newborn alive? Even now, two kids in, we’re still surprised at just how much stuff the kids require to make life function.

We knew, of course, that it would be a slow trip. Lots of nursing in scenic locations and, well, not much else. Which is exactly how it panned out. I was still waking up multiple times per night with the baby, so I was tired, and more than that, weary. Early motherhood can really take a toll on a person, or is it just me? The workload felt never-ending. I struggled to feel like I, body and soul, belonged to myself anymore. I couldn’t sleep when I was tired, or eat when I was hungry, or use the bathroom when I needed to, because, for the first time in nearly three decades of life, someone else’s needs always superseded my own.

For me, one of the most difficult adjustments in motherhood was that the time to relax, the big exhale that usually comes at the end of a long day, never seemed to arrive. Before kids, we might have a hard, long travel day, but the moment we got home we could just dump the bags, sigh out the stress from the day, and cozy up in bed. If we went camping, the packing might feel like a lot of work, but then we got to go on the adventure, with little else on our mind. But in parenthood, there is never the sigh of relief or the “little else on our mind.” There is just more work, more mental lists, more to do. Had a long travel day? Now you get to settle down your overstimulated baby for an hour when you get home, and maybe even have to wake up multiple times in the night with him afterwards. Have a vacation planned? Leave the book at home, because you will be watching, directing, diverting, corralling the entire time.

If it sounds terrible, it is. It really is, but then you get used to it, and you grow, and somehow you become this incredibly competent version of yourself you didn’t know existed, and somehow it stops feeling like only endless, exhausting work, and starts feeling like life, and the joy somehow makes it all worth it.

So anyway, we made it to Mendocino without incident, and then spent the next day meandering up and down the coast. The second night there was my 29th birthday. “Let’s eat out,” said Doug. I love a meal out, and I love feeling spoiled on my birthday. After a day of nursing, burping, rocking, and generally tending to a little baby, I was ready, on my birthday!, to have a moment that was just about me. We walked into a small Italian restaurant, and they only had outdoor seating available. No problem, we thought. It was evening, maybe 7 PM, and chilly with the ocean breeze, but they had great heaters and we were hungry and ready to enjoy a meal with our new baby to celebrate my first birthday as a mother.

Luka hated it. I mean, he reacted viscerally to being in that restaurant, to the point that I felt personally attacked by him, as if he had planned to hate it just to ruin my birthday. Almost from the moment we sat down, he started crying. We tried rocking him, I tried nursing him, we tried helping him to sleep. None of it worked. After bravely pretending it wasn’t the worst evening of our lives for about thirty minutes, we admitted defeat. Our food arrived, and Doug stood by the table rocking Luka while I scarfed down my pasta. He took two bites of his dish, we paid the bill, and we dashed back to the cabin.

I cried. Doug stewed silently. Luka kept crying.

It felt like insult added to injury. Not only was motherhood hurting me physically—sore nipples, sore third-degree tear, sore core—but I was also feeling rather harassed. I couldn’t eat a meal in peace, I couldn’t enjoy a quiet bathroom break, I couldn’t even take twenty minutes to drink a cup of coffee without a baby needing something from me. And now my birthday, ruined by this tiny, mewling thing.

In that moment, scarfing down my chicken alfredo, swallowing more than I was chewing, with a baby fussing and wanting more of me, always, always more, I felt that my life had ended. I don’t think I’ve ever felt true depression, but that night, I felt dark, and heavy, and overwhelmed in a way that saw no end.

The good news is, I’ve adjusted. Which has the feel of saying “I’m fine” one too many times, but it is true. When I had Marco last year, I remember a friend visited us at the hospital the day after he was born and laughed because Doug was sleeping in my hospital bed while I sat in his assigned recliner with a crying baby, my breakfast growing cold while I tried to get him to latch. I was unbothered, and in that moment I realized: I really am a mother. My comfort, my needs, would not always come first—not because they didn’t matter, but because love had rearranged the order of things. I don’t feel personally targeted by this small child anymore. He doesn’t know any better, and what a privilege to love someone so much, and to be loved with the purity only a child can offer. And it all felt normal, and two kids later I have no regrets.

But Doug and I still reference that dinner, with dark humor. “Remember that one night in Mendocino,” he’ll say. “I thought our life was over.”

Me too. But it wasn’t, and it’s better than either of us could have imagined.

Motherhood is amazing that way. I went into it full of anticipation, excited for the little human who was joining our family. Then, the shock of it overwhelmed me and made me regret ever lying with my husband. But slowly, without realizing it, I was growing. My capacity was expanding. My character was deepening.

I guess the moral of the story is that motherhood did not end my life, though for one dark birthday dinner in Mendocino, it felt like it had. It did end a version of me. But that’s okay. I like this version more, actually.

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About Out Loud

Around here, we’re big fans of bold, honest, and a little provocative conversations. On Out Loud, you can expect weekly reflections on Christian Nationalism, culture, parenting, and family.

Let me tell the story of a real trad wife—not the influencer kind, or the linen-aproned fantasy staged for monetization, but the kind of woman whose life was shaped by the traditional values that are now being repackaged as harmless societal aspiration.

This trad wife was born in the 1940s, not in an American, tree-lined, smoothly paved suburb, but in a thatched-roof home nestled in the Cuban countryside, where the air hung heavy with the smell of mangos, where farm-fresh eggs were not a commodity but a way of life and work began with the sun. Her father was a happy and simple man, the kind who would sit in the portal in the afternoons, enjoying the evening breeze and quick with a laugh, unruffled by the worries—the rumors of war, the harsh economy—plaguing other Cubans of that era. She was cherished by her mother—a strong woman to balance out her complacent husband—maybe too much. As a girl, this trad wife was never allowed to learn to swim, never allowed to ride a bike, kept home from school after a basic elementary education. Her mother worried after her safety, and desperately wanted to shape her into a proper girl. Still, the trad wife found ways to run free and wild. She loved an adventure, loved climbing anything that looked climbable, loved the little hidden places on the farm where a girl could briefly belong to herself, and even broke her arm one day while playing in an old wooden wagon attached to a temperamental mule.

When she was a teenager, the trad wife was introduced to a Christian denomination that changed her life. A friend invited her to a youth congress, a big tent meeting where hundreds of Cuban youth gathered under canvas in the thick heat, fanning themselves, singing hymns, wiping sweat from their faces, and listening to sermons about Christ’s soon return. She was baptized at fifteen—convicted that Jesus was coming soon and that one should live a set-apart, committed life to reflect this—and promptly removed all the gold jewelry her mother had carefully chosen for her on her quinceañera, an act that troubled her mother and caused conflict. She refused to work on the Lord’s Day, and still only a teenager, married a man who was also part of that denomination. Within her first year of marriage, she conceived a son.

The trad wife discourse has made its way back into popular culture, this time with an emphasis on the Christian of it all, thanks to Caro Claire Burke’s sort-of-entertaining, definitely frustrating novel Yesteryear, where a social media trad wife gets a healthy dose of the life she’s made millions peddling online, à la Ballerina Farm or Nora Smith.

In all this discourse though—if you’re against it, featuring the dangers of ideology that limits women or the ways Christianity can be weaponized to keep women dominated; if you’re for it, leaning on data that shows that conservative men and women, those most closely affiliated with trad wife ideology, are happier than their progressive counterparts—we’ve failed to take an honest look at not-too-past history, at the mark the traditional values that inform this lifestyle left on the women who had no choice but to live by them.

Purportedly, that’s what Burke was trying to do in her novel. But Yesteryear never really gets there. Its Christianity feels thinly understood and its judgment arrives too quickly, likely due to the author’s nonreligious upbringing and failure to approach her topic with any gravitas. Instead of an honest exploration of how traditional ideology impacts real lives, we arrive at a confusing conclusion that fails to land any sort of critique at all. The characters in the story are flattened into familiar types: the domineering, abusive husband; the shallow, vapid wife. What gets lost are the complicated women who actually lived through the world today’s trad-wife fantasy borrows from—not even a century ago.

So, when I read Yesteryear, I instead thought of this woman, a woman who has deeply shaped who I am.

Today, we discuss raw milk and vaccines and epidurals with the carelessness of people who have only ever known choices. For this woman, living in rural Cuba, the choices were limited. Milk had to be boiled to be made safe—and no one argued over whether or not it should be. Vaccines for every disease were not widely available, and you took what you could get. Forget about the epidural, every woman got offered the “natural” childbirth experience, sans bathtub.

When this woman got married at the age of 18, she moved to her husband’s homestead. He lived on the family farm, in a small, simple house he built for them. A man with a strong independent streak, he insisted on building this house so that his wife would not have to live in the family home, already crowded. His family—parents, sisters, brothers—lived on the farm as well, and privacy was a cherished commodity. Cuba’s economy was difficult, so while the husband farmed all day, the trad wife took up sewing. She was a beautiful seamstress, and her work was steady. She sewed by a window light, bent over fabric for hours, gently guiding thread through endless cloth.

Then she had the baby. Babies are hard work, and they’re a woman’s job. They wake up at all hours and require lots of milk, and in a time when the only diapers available were cloth, laundry took up a lot of a person’s time. She was in a traditional marriage, one where, as the mother, she was responsible not only for the children but also for the care of the home. She woke up at night with the baby, no clock in sight to help with sleep training, no app to track ounces or diapers, just a tired mother and her breasts and her infant, and the dark, quiet of the night where everyone else slept.

In the morning, she struggled to keep her eyes open, not even having the Cuban comfort of a hot, sweet coffee to steady her into the day—coffee being one of the things her religion did not allow. She cared for her baby throughout the day, changing dirty diapers that required washing by hand, feeding the baby on demand, and also making food for her little family—while keeping up with her sewing business. Some days, she could barely stitch straight, pricking her fingers so many times they were red and swollen by afternoon.

She was lonely, as all the other women in the family were also engaged with the endless tasks of keeping a home going—the cooking and cleaning and laundry, always laundry, a cyclical chore of scrubbing waste from fabric by hand, rinsing and wringing and hanging and folding. There was not a lot of time for camaraderie.

And every weekend, the house had to be ready for the Lord’s Day. A beautiful meal prepared for after church, a sparkling home where the angels could be comfortable—angels don’t like dirt, you know—a clean baby and clean wife and church clothes pressed and ready to go.

Not just any church clothes, either. One had to make sure they were beautiful and clean, but also appropriate. Modest.

I’m told of another woman, from the same time, who attended the same church as the trad wife and was forced to stand on the table in her home every week so that her husband could measure the length of her skirt. This woman eventually ran away from her family, leaving behind her children, and struggled to make a life afterward. Her story is told in hushed tones, a warning for other women who think to attempt a breaking of the mold.

But the trad wife tells the story differently. She saw the desperation, the loneliness, and the isolation. The woman, says the trad wife, was living in an impossible situation that was slowly killing her, an abusive family that cared little for her as a person. She was subjected daily to rituals of inspection and surveillance and humiliation, ensuring she presented to the world as the perfect Christian wife. It’s a sad tale, but if there’s a warning there, it’s for what happens to women in a society that cares more about ideology than people.

What of this trad wife’s husband? Was he abusive? Was he a good provider? Was he a harsh husband? Was he willing to sacrifice himself and his body for his family? Yes. He worked the land until his body absorbed the shape of the work: hands hardened and cracked, back worn, tenderness buried beneath endless duty.

Flat critiques of trad wife ideology fail to see the complexity of people. They want a villainous husband, a misogynist who thrives by standing on his wife. But that framing misses the ways men are trapped by traditional values, too. The way those values limit how they love and receive love, the way they pin a man’s worth to his success, the way men then spend their bodies over endless years of work trying to live up to that measure.

When I had my own baby, this trad wife, my grandmother, came to help me settle into motherhood. She stayed with me for two weeks, holding my baby, folding tiny clothes, moving through my kitchen with the competence of a woman who had spent her life making homes run smoothly and beautifully. Between feedings and dishes, she told me what her own early motherhood had been like. The never-ending work and heavy responsibility. She warned me not to have too many children—two is enough, she said. She urged me to keep my work, something for me. She marveled at my husband, who helps in all things house and parenting, and even though I’m raising children far from the support and help of my own family, she assured me that I am already in a better place than she ever was because I do not carry the burden of making a home alone.

I think often of the stories my grandmother has told me—of a wild childhood constrained by her mother’s ideals of what girlhood should be, of beautiful community alongside endless housework, of the unequal responsibility placed on women, and of how difficult it was to find a life outside the expected, the traditional.

The women who lived these lives were not wearing costumes. They were not content for the masses. They are not simply symbols in someone else’s argument about feminism or Christianity. They were women with sore hands, hungry babies, tired bodies, tangled faith, and very little room to ask whether the life expected of them was the life they would have chosen.

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Hey, it’s good to see you here! Let’s connect on socials (well, I’m really only on Instagram). This newsletter is fully supported by readers. Your subscription of any level is a boon. Thank you! If you find yourself frequently enjoying these essays and want to be a part of building the community, please consider becoming a paid subscriber.

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About Out Loud

Around here, we’re big fans of bold, honest, and a little provocative conversations. On Out Loud, you can expect weekly reflections on Christian Nationalism, culture, parenting, and family.

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BIG NEWS: SPECTRUM recently released a new podcast which I have the honor of producing and participating in! Called Podly Women, it features a group of women coming together to unpack some of the hottest and heaviest topics in Christianity. Our latest episode is on modesty culture.

Recently in Out Loud, thoughts on the importance of brave motherhood. Also, a reflection on the uselessness of mom guilt. And finally, a little sassy essay on my epidural-free births, and a woman’s right to brag! Over on SPECTRUM, I wrote about the energy crisis in Cuba, and how the local church is surviving (dare I say thriving?) in the midst of it. A true testament to my people’s ability to resolver. For my column, I wrote an interestingly controversial article on God’s command to care for the earth (and why Sabbatarians should be specifically invested in creation care), and opened a little window into my heart as a mother with my column titled “A Mother’s Blessing in Song.”

What a month. I started March with a bang, by flying cross country with my two small children BY MYSELF. (Of course, my epidural-free birth gave me the confidence to do so!) Also in March, we launched the Podly Women podcast. So far, we’ve tackled singleness in the church, the mainstreaming of erotic lit, and modesty culture. Unpacking difficult topics that impact women is one of my favorite things. Doing it with a group of sharp women is heaven.

I’ve also started working on some time-consuming articles, which is one of the reasons I’ve been largely absent on here. There’s only so much writing and reading and researching my brain can handle. I’m working on a sexual misconduct piece, a worker’s right issue article, and a private university affordability article that reveals what I consider to be shocking details about the financial aid practices of a self-supporting institution (meaning, an Adventist institution that isn’t directly associated with the official church).

This is also only the beginning of our busy season in terms of youth events and travel, so while I love Substack and have scheduled writing time for myself, I may be publishing less than usual.

What I’m Reading: I always like to listen to a show while I work, and lately I’ve been recycling Call the Midwife episodes, a show I started watching when it first premiered over a decade ago. It suddenly occurred to me that I can also read Jennifer Worth’s memoir series, and what a joy those books have been. She’s an engaging writer, and her storytelling justifies many of public health policies currently under fire (such as SNAP, access to safe abortions, and medicare).

Have ideas for Out Loud? Topics you’d like me to cover? Send me a message.

If you’re hanging around, please consider upgrading your subscription to paid. I’m a writer by trade (it’s my job!) and every paid subscription continues to make this work sustainable. Upgrade Here.

About Out Loud

Around here, we’re big fans of bold, honest, and a little provocative conversations. What you can expect from Out Loud:

• Near-constant attacks on Christian Nationalism

• A Christian perspective on marriage, parenting, politics and beyond

• Roundups of Natalie’s favorites

• A sprinkling of bookishness and other cultural commentary

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You know something I think I may die without doing? Run a marathon. My cardiovascular health is something I’m working on, but let’s say I’ve never been one to hike and talk. Or jog and talk. Or walk fast and talk. Which is saying a lot, because generally I don’t stop talking.

Running a marathon isn’t in my future. I know people who run casually, and then I know people who run marathons. A marathoner, if you will. Somehow, the upcoming marathon always makes its way into the conversation. And, I get it. If I ran nearly 30 miles in the amount of time it takes me to watch one of the “Lord of the Rings,”1 it would be a big part of my personality, and a huge talking-point for me.

So anyway, this is about my epidural-free births.

To be clear, I don’t think there’s a right way to give birth. The right way is the way that gets the baby OUT. By 37 weeks, I am begging for an induction. With Marco, I would have swept my own membranes if I could, just to do it as frequently as possible and stimulate labor. He came at 40+1, and every day past 39 weeks felt like a special kind of hell.

So, this is not a judgement on however you, or your wife, or your best friend, or even your dog, gave birth. Did the baby (puppies?) make it out? Is mom okay? Great, sounds like it was a perfect birth.

But, I gave birth twice without an epidural, and I think I should get to talk about it at least as much as your neighbor who runs marathons talks about their next race.

One question I’ve gotten a lot is, why did I do it? I’m not what one would call crunchy. I gave birth in a hospital. I attended all my OB appointments and took medication as suggested during my pregnancy. I’m not overly suspicious of the medical system.2 So, why not embrace modern medicine fully?

Well, my mom didn’t get an epidural. Not that I received pressure from her not to—she didn’t do it because she was scared of the needle, and it wasn’t much deeper than that—but we all want to be like our mommas.3 Also, and this is probably reason number one, I wanted to see if I could. That’s it. It wasn’t some deep-set conviction. I really went into my birth with open hands; I would try to not get the epidural because I wanted to see where my limit was, but if it got too bad I was open to getting it.

Then I had a precipitous labor with my first, so actually the epidural wasn’t even an option. I got to the hospital 40 minutes before the baby was born, and by the time they confirmed that I wasn’t just a first-time mom who couldn’t handle early labor, Luka was making his way out.

It took me nearly two years to work through that labor (meaning, until I had my second baby, who is 22 months younger than my first). It felt like something had happened to me. I did not feel empowered; I understood that I had not really done anything extraordinary (aside from, you know, birthing a human that I also grew). Kind of like someone who runs 30 miles because they’re being chased by a hungry lion. The choice is: run or die. So they run. It’s not a great achievement, it’s basic survival.

I gave birth to Luka without an epidural because there was no other option. I was pushing Luka out while a tech used an ultrasound to insert an IV, so that I could get Pitocin to help with the afterbirth (and I also ended up receiving Fentanyl to help repair my 3b tear, and I also nearly lost 1000 mL of blood so I’m grateful for that tech and that IV). It was fast and furious,4 and then we struggled to nurse and before I knew it was pregnant again and oh my god.

Here I’ll reiterate: however you gave birth was the right way to give birth. But, for me, giving birth without an epidural does feel like an important part of my story, and in retrospect, it feels like a necessary part of my journey. I am not a girl who dreamt of motherhood. I never imagined myself with children, and when I got pregnant with Luka I did worry about my capacity to mother. I worried that I’d struggle with all the changes, I worried that I wouldn’t be nurturing, I worried that I couldn’t evolve. I worried, simply, that I didn’t have it in me.

And then nursing Luka was so hard. My milk took a while to come in, and when we did nurse it hurt. We made it through, and went on to nurse successfully for 13 months, but it was hard going for the first few months.

Even though I felt like birth largely happened to me, and even though not having an epidural ended up being less of a conscious choice and more of an unavoidable side-effect of my fast labor, it did make me feel like somewhat of a bad ass. While Luka traveled through the birth canal, I traveled to somewhere. I can’t explain it, but when I came back, I was a mother. And so, when motherhood felt impossible—which it often did in those early months—I leaned on my strength as a woman who survived a precipitous labor, who pushed out a nearly nine pound baby using brute strength and no relief. That woman could do anything.

When I got pregnant with Marco, I expected to have a similar birth story. They say births only get faster. I certainly hoped it wouldn’t go any faster, but I assumed I’d go into labor spontaneously and have a baby reasonably soon after. Due to struggling mentally during my pregnancy, I scheduled a 39 week induction. I needed an end-date, and anyway, I figured, I probably wouldn’t make it that far. I ended up moving that induction to 40 weeks due to my doctor’s travel schedule, still thinking all the while that I wouldn’t make it to my induction date (seeing as how Luka was born at 39 weeks following a spontaneous labor). Frankly by the end of my pregnancy with Marco, I didn’t think much about the do or don’t of the epidural. My thoughts were less sophisticated, more along the lines of, “GET HIM TF OUT!”

Of course, Marco’s birth was completely different. After weeks of prodromal labor, my water broke at 39+6. Nearly 24 hours later, I went in for my scheduled induction with no contractions. After confirming that my water had indeed broken (it was more of a leak than a rupture, so I wasn’t completely sure) and that there wasn’t a lot of amniotic fluid left, we decided to walk around for a few hours and to induce labor at 7 PM if things didn’t get going on their own. That’s exactly what we did. My toddler was at home with my mom, who happened to have flown in the night before, so I was free to focus on Marco’s birth. We walked, we watched “Gilmore Girls,” I bounced on the ball, we ate Chipotle, and then a burger. Generally, it was a nice time. And at 7 PM, they hooked me up to the IV and got the Pitocin going. I told the nurses that I would attempt another pain-med free birth, and my nurse was so supportive! She set me up with wireless monitoring, got the tub going with essential oils, strung some twinkle lights in the bathroom and turned off all the overhead lights in the room, and then disappeared. I think throughout the labor she checked in maybe twice before the pushing began, but I’m not sure, because as soon as that Pit kicked in, I went to a different dimension.

Let me be clear, Pit contractions are like being in transition for the entirety of labor. Transition is known to be the most intense part of labor, the part where most women say “enough.” And the contractions that Pitocin triggers feel like that, but the whole time. I was only on the lowest dose possible for about an hour and a half before my contractions became regular and they took me off, and that was enough to establish a labor pattern that absolutely wrecked me. Marco’s labor was less than five hours, so still not a long labor, but it felt like days and if he hadn’t been born in those four and a half hours, I would have gladly accepted the epidural. In fact, if I have another baby and I need to be induced with Pitocin, I will likely request the epidural along with the Pitocin. It hurts like a bitch, and after two pain-med free births, I think I’m bad ass enough.

I spent most of Marco’s labor in the tub, visualizing his descent and encouraging his birth. I used my husband as a human tension rope (and after the birth, had the audacity to look at his disheveled appearance in shock and ask him what the hell had happened to him?!). Around hour three and a half, I moved out to the toilet and requested a check. I was at an eight, and labored for about another hour before I got on the bed and started pushing. I pushed maybe twice, and Marco came flying out.

Unlike with Luka, probably because the experience wasn’t so shocking, I was back in my body as soon as he came out. I remember vividly that he emerged with the cord wrapped tightly around his neck, not breathing. So blue, making no noise. The nurse grabbed him by his ankle upside down (I assume to not put undue pressure on his neck), and urged Doug to cut the cord before immediately whisking Marco away, who was born with an APGAR score of 2.5 He did come back to us quickly, though, and was on my chest nursing in less than ten minutes. I was so present for the whole experience, bore the repair of my second-degree tear with only local anesthetic, and bled a little less. Generally, it was a much better recovery, and I was eating chicken fingers while cuddling my baby about an hour after delivery.

And this time, I really felt like a bad ass. I never had the urge to talk much about my epidural-free birth after Luka. But with Marco, I’d sneak it in whenever I could. Because what do you mean that I got an induction, endured those hellish Pitocin contractions, and still made it to the end without an epidural? What do you mean that I walked myself to our recovery room only two hours after giving birth? That I made jokes with the nurses and cuddled my baby and texted my family, mere minutes after delivery? That my nurse looked at me with dare I say a little awe and said, “That’s one of the most beautiful births I’ve ever seen”?6 These are things I am proud of, and these things bolster me in the hard moments. I am a fierce woman who birthed two large babies with the strength of my body. I’ve done an amazing thing! Twice!!

But I feel like I can’t talk about it.

When my marathon friends talk about their marathon, I am not receiving the message that I’m a fat cow who can’t run. I’m not really hearing anything about me. It’s about them, and the cool thing they can do because they choose to do it. They’re strong! They’re fit! They’re tenacious! And yes, a little crazy!

When women talk about their births, and if that birth includes an epidural-free experience, it somehow becomes derogatory commentary on all women who have chosen or needed an epidural during their labor. How dare you brag about your unnecessary pain? How dare you imply that you’re somehow better than other women for choosing to forego readily available medication?

I think maybe, we should be more generous toward each other, and not assume that someone else’s story is told to provide commentary about our life. My epidural-free births were amazing, and important to me, and also, all about me. Not about you. I like telling the story, and in doing so I’m simply sharing something I did that makes me feel very, very cool and capable.

If that bothers you, I don’t know, go run a marathon.

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I can’t scroll Instagram for 10 minutes without landing on a reel of a woman speaking to the camera about her life as a mom and, at some point, using the term mom guilt.

Moms feel guilty when they’re away from their kids. They feel guilty when weaning their babies. They feel guilty when they consider sleep training. They feel guilty for being scared of their kids choking during baby-led weaning.

And I don’t know, I feel like someone needs to say it: let it go.

Every Monday and Thursday, I leave my kids with my husband. Invariably, at some point, the babies hit a stage where they realize Mom is leaving and won’t be coming back for a while, so they cry. Their crying tugs at my heart, because they’re adorable and I love them and I love squeezing them and cuddling them. But it does not make me feel guilty.

What I do feel is the freedom of enjoying an uninterrupted cup of coffee. Excitement for the work ahead of me. Gratitude that I earn money doing something I love. Something close to happiness when I settle in with a long article in The Atlantic.

These, but not guilt.

Last year, my husband and I went on our first long vacation since having kids. We spent a week in Bonaire. Unfortunately, I was pregnant—unfortunate because I was sick and couldn’t dive. My parents took care of our toddler, and I did not feel guilty that he wasn’t with me. In fact, we didn’t FaceTime him once, mostly because we figured he wouldn’t understand the concept and would just get upset seeing us. We didn’t really ask for photos, either. We generally put parenting out of our minds.

It was amazing.

This weekend, I’m leaving for two nights for work. I’m excited. I have plans. Plans to watch Netflix. Plans to binge a book. Plans to eat momos. Plans to browse a couple of local bookstores and settle in for a long, uninterrupted writing session. Meanwhile, my husband will begin potty training our toddler.

Reader, I do not feel guilty.

Frankly, I’m confused about where the whole concept of mom guilt comes from.

You know what I do feel guilty about? The way I use my phone in front of my kids.

Some days, when I’m particularly tired, I’m prone to leaning on the kitchen counter and scrolling while my kids play in the living room. I don’t like it. I don’t like it for myself, and I don’t like what I’m modeling for my children. I feel guilty, but it’s not this vague, pointless thing called mom guilt. It’s an informative emotion telling me I’m acting in a way that doesn’t align with my virtues as a person and as a mother.

Guilt is a productive emotion.

Unlike shame, which clouds our perception of ourselves, guilt is temporary. It’s what we should feel when we do something wrong—wrong in how we treat others, or in how we treat ourselves. The point is that it informs us. It offers us the opportunity to course-correct. It is not superfluous.

So maybe instead of mom guilt, it should be called mom shame.

Either way, part of the problem is that parenting has become so performative, and for reasons I do not fully understand, mothers are especially prone to measuring their success, their morality, and their worth as caretakers by how hard they are working or how uncomfortable they are. Any form of freedom, any moment of ease, any decision made for the benefit of the mother is treated as a kind of moral failure. I’m not interested in that kind of mothering, and I refuse the guilt that comes with it.

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Around here, we’re big fans of bold, honest, and a little provocative conversations. On Out Loud, you can expect weekly reflections on Christian Nationalism, culture, parenting, and family.

My last published post was at the beginning of March. After posting consistently for a couple months, I just kind of . . . stopped. I have a lot of articles in the works for SPECTRUM Magazine, most of which require some research and at least one (but usually more) interview. So I’ve found it hard to really get it together for a Substack article.

In fact, I haven’t even been lurking on Substack. I haven’t had time to read my favorite writers, or catch up on the latest hot goss around here. Apparently this is the year of the memoir, however, because coming back today I see that Lena Dunham has now published her memoir—titled Famesick so presumably about how sick she is of being rich and famous?—and thank God because I was scared that Lindy West’s poly dumpster fire was still going to be trending.

You know, I’m sure that being famous (and by default, rich) gets exhausting. But, I’d like to give it a go. Mostly for the riches.

Celebrity memoirs that decry their fame generally generate an eye roll from me. The last one I read was Jennette McCurdy’s I’m Glad My Mom Died. She’s a good writer, and it’s a good memoir, and her mom was really a piece of work in the that way ultra-controlling mothers tend to be. But recently, I heard an interview with her on Call Her Daddy that was part of her book tour for her upcoming novel, where she talked about where she got the idea for the novel.

In the conversation, she basically said that after years of acting, and then taking a break to heal from it all, she now gets to do what she always dreamed of—be a writer. In fact, the initial ideal for her novel came into being years ago, in her twenties while she was on a train in Italy. She went to Italy to regroup and find herself again after years of acting.

Yes, I chuckled. Because, before this Italy tidbit I had heard about 45 minutes on her terrible mother. Now, if you’ve read the memoir I think we can agree that her mother was indeed batshit. But, and here’s the kicker, if it weren’t for her mother’s crazy insistence on Jeannette’s acting career, Jeannette wouldn’t have had the money to take a soul searching trip to Italy. She wouldn’t have had the money to work on her memoir for years, and then take a hiatus from writing, and then write a novel, and do little else in between. She would have been living a much more ordinary life, where writing happens at checks clock 6:01 AM before work or kids, in a modest 1500 sq ft home.

I wouldn’t trade my life for a mother who leaves me with the psychological scars Jeannette is walking around with. But, it’s ridiculous to not acknowledge that role her mother played in her current success. Her story is not a scrappy survival tale. She’s not rich and famous despite her mother, she’s rich and famous because of her.

So anyway, this is the kind of thing you can likely expect from me on here. My serious writing is happening on SPECTRUM right now, so make sure to check me out over there (and I’ll continue sending monthly emails with links to my work). We also launched the Podly Women podcast under SPECTRUM’s broader Adventist Voices podcast network, and I’m having a lot of fun with that. A quote from me in our upcoming episode: “They can’t even go to the beach without getting a hard-on!”

Check us out here.

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Hey, it’s good to see you here! Let’s connect on socials (well, I’m really only on Instagram). This newsletter is fully supported by readers. Your subscription of any level is a boon. Thank you! If you find yourself frequently enjoying these essays and want to be a part of building the community, please consider becoming a paid subscriber.

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You can also support my work by liking and sharing posts or leaving a comment—this makes a huge impact on the algorithm and helps others find me! And as always, if you share a post or quote, please tag me so I can see it.

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About Out Loud

Around here, we’re big fans of bold, honest, and a little provocative conversations. On Out Loud, you can expect weekly reflections on Christian Nationalism, culture, parenting, and family.

When I was 16, I went to live in a tiny village called Mago, nestled in the Tanzanian Kipengere Range. The story of how I got there involves a teacher with questionable ethics, a fundy boarding school near Moab, Utah, and a lot of teenage coercion. Suffice it to say that, after a little cajoling (from me) and a lot of sighing (from my parents), I found myself spending the first semester of my senior year in Mago.

I was there from September through December, during which time I managed to cut about 100 pounds of firewood with a machete, get chased by baboons while running along a mountain ridge, and contract a flesh-eating bacteria that ate away at my toes, causing my toenails to fall off before an emergency trip down the mountain to a Catholic mission hospital led to the comforting diagnosis of . . . something in Italian that constituted an intense course of antibiotics to resolve.

It was exhilarating.

And it was only possible because my mother was brave.

My mother, as an individual, is brave. She faces problems head-on and isn’t afraid of creative solutions. When I was a child and she began suffering debilitating stress-induced migraines from her government job, she suggested to my dad that we should “leave it all behind” and move to South Korea. Some people would simply find a new job. Not my mom. Her fearlessness in that decision—even when it led to difficult seasons for her personally—changed our family forever. For the better.

But, more than individually brave, my mother parented bravely.

She allowed my brother and me to board a two-hour train to Seoul on random Tuesdays as teenagers while she and my dad worked at the language institute. My brother and I—barely 30 years between us—ran through the city hunting down Mexican food (a near-mythical delicacy in Korea at the time) and Krispy Kreme donuts. She didn’t panic when we took cross-continental flights to visit family, even when we were stranded overnight in random cities with no in-country cell service and no AirTag tracking for peace of mind. When I begged to go to boarding school, she said yes—and didn’t let me see how afraid she might have been. When I needed her to stand up for me, she flew across continents and laid down the law with the school’s administration (“If you’re that concerned about my daughter’s body, feel free to fund a boob job. Otherwise, stop harassing her,” is family lore now). For a small Cuban woman with heavily accented English, my mother is ferocious and intimidating.

And when, at 16, I asked to live in a small Tanzanian village for a few months, she didn’t say no. She didn’t show fear. She shared in my excitement. She made me feel like I could summit Mt. Kilimanjaro if I wanted to (and I almost did, but the flesh-eating bacteria laid those plans to rest).

Her bravery shaped mine. As mothers, how much impact we have on our kids is debatable. I look at my own children and am astounded, actually, at how much their own person they are. But, it seems that while kids come out with a cooked personality, their character is malleable. I am by nature not a risk-taker, but my mother’s belief in me helped shape independence and courage. And research suggests that teaching our kids to be brave starts in infancy.

A 2023 systematic review and meta-analysis of 23 studies on early “fear transmission” found that children learn fear socially—by watching their parents. When caregivers display fear toward a new stimuli, infants and toddlers are significantly more likely to respond with fear and avoidance themselves. Fear, in other words, is modeled. It is learned behavior, and they’re learning it from us.

If you’ve ever parented a toddler, this is a nearly obvious conclusion. When a child falls, they often pause and look up, seeking to make eye contact with you before reacting. They’re asking: Is this a tragedy? Will I be okay? Should I be scared? How should I interpret this?

Our oldest son is a sensitive, cautious guy. He’s one of those toddlers whose tantrums don’t involve screaming, they involve an endless flow of tears. When our son tumbles down mid-run, his first instinct is to react in fear. I can see the tears forming, his lip trembling. As a mom, I usually want to scoop him up in a hug. Instead, unless it’s truly serious, I smile wide. “That was a big one!” I exclaim, with a smile. Then I wipe my knees dramatically. “¡Sacudete! Dale, parate y sacudete las rodillas!”

When he first started walking, he’d still cry and seek comfort. But now, more often than not, he gets up, sniffs the tears back, wipes his knees, returns my smile, and runs off again. He’s learning how to interpret discomfort. He’s learning that falling, while painful, is survivable.

In motherhood, sometimes the bravest thing we can do is manage our own reaction.

A 2012 study on maternal “overcontrol” found that when mothers excessively monitored or interfered in their children’s activities, those children reported lower “perceived competence.” I once heard it described like this: when we solve our child’s problem, or micromanage a task so that it comes out perfectly by our standards, we feel good. We did a good job. We helped. Could we say it gives us a self-esteem boost to feel like an accomplished mother? I think we could.

But what we may actually be doing is siphoning self-esteem from our children.

If they struggle through a problem or task—no matter how imperfect the outcome—it is theirs. And that sense of ownership builds competence. As the study found, a lower sense of competence predicted higher anxiety. In simple terms: when children are not allowed to navigate challenges on their own, they begin to believe they cannot.

Courage requires competence, and competence requires opportunity.

A long-term study of teens found something similar. Parenting didn’t directly create courage. Instead, it shaped teens’ self-esteem and their ability to manage their emotions—especially their ability to rethink or reframe fear. Those internal skills, in turn, predicted greater courage a year later.

Control and micromanagement make us, as mothers, feel better, but they’re not helping our children become more capable.

Which brings us to risk.

One of the uncomfortable truths in raising courageous children is that risk is unavoidable. And the older they get, the greater the stakes. The modern mother has been conditioned to believe that our job is to keep our children safe—harm prevention. Any harm to befall our child is a direct reflection on the quality of our parenting.1 If our child is uncomfortable, we have failed.

But research on risky play suggests the opposite trajectory. Opportunities for physical and social risk-taking—climbing, exploring, navigating unfamiliar environments—are associated with improved resilience, stronger risk assessment skills, better social competence, and lower anxiety over time. Some researchers like argue that the decline in independent play and autonomy correlates directly with rising anxiety rates in children.

In other words: eliminating risk does not eliminate fear. In fact, it may increase it.

My mother has since told me about the nights she lay awake worrying. She was afraid. She just didn’t hand me her fear. That remains, perhaps, her greatest act of courage.

A few years ago, I visited a special exhibit on Jane Goodall at the Field Museum in Chicago. It was beautifully prepared, a journey through her life. One section of the exhibit showed various pieces of correspondence from Jane, including a letter in which she recounted a childhood story that has stayed with me.

At four years old, Jane became obsessed with understanding how hens laid eggs. During a visit to her grandmother, young Jane was given the job of gathering all the eggs in the morning. It was then that this obsession developed. She asked about the mechanics of egg-laying—it didn’t seem to her that hens had holes big enough to pass the eggs. Dissatisfied with the explanations she received, she hid in a chicken coop all day to witness the process firsthand.

Meanwhile, her mother tore around the farm, searching frantically for her missing four-year-old.

When Jane finally emerged—late in the day, hay in her hair, exhilarated with discovery—her mother could have scolded her. She may have found herself uttering one of those ridiculous statements we parents never imagined we’d have to say. “I don’t want you to hide in the chicken coop for ten hours ever again!” Instead, she took a deep breath, swallowed her fear, and listened with delight.

Years later, that same mother accompanied Jane to Africa as a chaperone, making possible the journey that would shape conservation history.

I read that story long before I imagined having children. But even then, I knew that if I ever became a mother, I wanted to be brave. As brave as Jane’s mother. As brave as my own.

And now, as a mother myself, I’m beginning to understand: The hardest bravery is not climbing the mountain. It is standing at the bottom, steady, while your child climbs.

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Hey, it’s good to see you here! Let’s connect on socials (well, I’m really only on Instagram). This newsletter is fully supported by readers. Your subscription of any level is a boon. Thank you! If you find yourself frequently enjoying these essays and want to be a part of building the community, please consider becoming a paid subscriber.

Subscribe now

You can also support my work by liking and sharing posts or leaving a comment—this makes a huge impact on the algorithm and helps others find me! And as always, if you share a post or quote, please tag me so I can see it.

Recent Posts

About Out Loud

Around here, we’re big fans of bold, honest, and a little provocative conversations. On Out Loud, you can expect weekly reflections on Christian Nationalism, culture, parenting, and family.