Moving to Full-Time Daycare (Plus a First-Boyfriend Throwback) – Ep. 227

Shanna

Hi, welcome to Big Fat Positive with Shanna and Laura. On this week's episode, we have our weekly check-ins, we have our special segment, Throwback, where I tell a little story about my first boyfriend and we wrap things up with our weekly BFPs and BFNs. Let's get started. Hello, everyone. Welcome to Episode 227. Hi, Laura. Hi, Shanna. Oh, you sound like a frog. What's going on?

Laura

Ribbit, ribbit. Well, I've lost my voice this week. Yeah, blame it on the preschool plagues, the daycare. I don't know. There's nothing that rhymes with daycare. But yeah, I feel more or less OK. I was coughing a lot and so I lost my voice. I feel like this happens to me like once a year now. Like any time I get sick, I lose my voice, which is a fun new development, especially when your primary occupation is being a podcast host at the moment. Real apologies to listeners if this is an unpleasant sound for you. It's unpleasant for me too. We can be uncomfortable together. But as such, I'm not going to do too much talking today, but I do have a few things to check in on.

Shanna

All right. All right. So how are things going over there?

Laura

Um, well, okay. So, uh, in a, in a grief update, I actually think that part of the reason I got sick is because, um, part of my like self-care has been that I've decided to throw myself into my lawn replacement project.

Shanna

Oh.

Laura

Uh-huh. I've talked about this before. I'm doing something called sheet mulching. Did I talk about like the process, like exactly what I'm doing or just the fact that I'm getting rid of my lawn?

Shanna

Yes, I think you did because I remember you talking about digging and making a trench around the sidewalk for all of the wood chips.

Laura

Did I talk about the cardboard?

Shanna

That I have no idea. Are you boxing up the sheet mulch or what's with the cardboard?

Laura

No, so the cardboard is essential to the sheet mulching process. So what you do is you get a bunch of cardboard and you lay it on top of the grass and that helps block the light. And then you put the mulch on top of it. And then eventually the cardboard and the mulch break down into like basically like a nice compost for you and you can plant into it. I had already gotten a ton of cardboard from like my buy nothing group and my mom's group, but it turns out it wasn't enough. So like this week I like went kind of a little crazy. Like I think it was a little bit of like the grief process where I was just like, I need to finish this now. And I sourced a ton more cardboard and I covered the whole thing up. Can I send you a picture? Yeah. Okay. I sent you some pictures.

Shanna

All right. Wow. That is a lot of cardboard.

Laura

Yeah, it's a lot. It's 1800 square feet of overlapped cardboard that I had to like peel all the like tape off of, you know, because I was trying to be like secondhand, you know, reuse, recycle, blah, blah, blah. But that comes with like packing tape. So I had to like peel all the tape off. But anyway, that's just the second step. The next step after that was acquiring the mulch and spreading it. And that's where I went crazy this week. I rented a U-Haul pickup truck and went to a city-free mulch site in Griffith Park. And I thought it would only take one truckload, but it ended up taking four truckloads. I sent you a picture here of myself in front of one of the truckloads.

Shanna

How did you get that in the truck? Did you just use a shovel?

Laura

It turns out a pitchfork is the way to go. After my first truckload that took an hour and a half to load, by the way, I'm doing this loading all by myself, it took an hour and a half and I was like, there's got to be a better way. And so I Googled it and people were like, you need this. What did they call it? I ended up buying something at Home Depot called a manure fork. It's like a pitchfork with really wide tines, a really big pitchfork. but they called it like a mulching fork on the internet, which is what I did. The only help I had was the fourth and final load was deposited into the truck bed by a very friendly truck driver who was driving a front-loading machine to load up the mulch site. He was like, you want me to give you a scoop? I was like, oh, please, thank God.

Shanna

Oh, that's amazing.

Laura

So that was a lot faster. And then Corey actually helped me spread two of the truckloads, but the rest I did myself and I don't think it's a coincidence that after like frantically doing that for two or three days, I am now like got sick and lost my voice.

Shanna

Yeah. Are you sore too? I imagine like that's a lot of shoulder activity.

Laura

Very sore. Yeah. Although not as bad as I would think. Like honestly, lugging around these clingy Velcro children like gives you a lot of upper body workout. And honestly, it felt really good to be like out in the sunshine, you know, working in the yard. Like it was one of those things where I, you know, kept thinking like, my dad would have really liked this. You know what I mean? Like he would have been really proud of me. Like not only am I doing good, hard, you know, quote unquote honest work. Um, although he believed all work was honest work, but you know what I mean? Like getting fresh air, but he also like was very much into ecology and recycling and all that stuff. So he would have been so into it. So yeah, so anyway, but now I have no voice. I wore a mask the whole time, but I still think little particles of mulch invaded my sinuses.

Shanna

Lots of dust, I'm sure.

Laura

So much dust, yeah.

Shanna

Yeah.

Laura

Anyway, so that's my grief update. I've been pouring it into physical labor. Mm-hmm, sounds good. And then the kid update for this week, it was really interesting. So last week, the week my dad died, I get a call from Sebastian's daycare and it's his teacher and his teachers like, so I wanted to ask if you were going to up Sebastian to full time or if you wanted to keep him on this part time schedule. As a reminder, I had him at from like nine to twelve thirty every day. Oh right and I was like oh well I don't know you know I'm like I didn't want to tell everyone like my dad just died I'm not making big decisions right now but I was just like well I don't know and I thought we could just decide later and she's like well. We have a spot open but if he's not gonna take it we're gonna need to offer it to someone else so if you could let me know by the end of the week.

Shanna

Pressure.

Laura

Pressure. I was like, fuck, man. I didn't want to have to make a big life decision this week. You know what I mean?

Shanna

Yeah.

Laura

And it was really tough. And I talked to Corey about it. And we were just like, I think we have to take it. you know like it nine to twelve thirty was nice to start with but it's just not enough time to really get much done you know by the time I drop them off and then it's it's like three hours you know and you know how fast three hours goes oh yeah so you know we realized we'd be you know kind of ridiculous to not take it. And we didn't know how soon a new one would open up. But yeah, I mean, it definitely like kind of threw me for a loop because it's this thing where it's like, oh, so what does that make me if my kids are both in like full-time care? Like, I don't think that makes me a stay-at-home mom anymore, you know? Right. And I don't know if I was, I mean, I've been producing this podcast and taking little gigs here and there.

Shanna

Yeah. Well, do you think you can take that time? I mean, maybe it's a positive that he's going to be there longer, because now you'll actually have more time to yourself for a little while every day to, you know, be with yourself and grieve and do what you need to do before you jump into things.

Laura

Yeah, hopefully. I think I need to talk to Corey too, because he's sort of like any, you know, any leads, you got any gigs, gig opportunities coming up. And I'm like, dude. Can I have a week? I understand where he's coming from. You know what I mean? It's money anxiety. I don't think he sees it as pressure. He's just inquiring, but it just sucks. I know the financial reality of where we're at is that like, and especially with adding this daycare cost ends, like I do need to start drumming up work. But yeah, I mean, maybe I can take like a week or so to just chill. I don't know. I also like fully anticipate the kids being sent home sick, like in the next week or two. So like, who knows? But yeah, I don't know. I just like, it's been an interesting week for that. So yeah, we, we accepted it. So next week, he starts full time. which we're probably just going to match.

Shanna

Well, that's kind of exciting to move into this new phase and have more time to yourself and I definitely encourage you to take some time to take a load off and relax and go through what you need to go through, you know, before jumping in. Because if you try to jump into finding work right now, like clearly you don't have the energy or anything to really go for it right now. So it's probably not gonna, you know, be very fruitful anyway. So there's something to be said for like recharging before you dive into something. And tell Cori I said that.

Laura

Okay, I'll tell them Shanna says so. I would love to dwell on this more, but I don't think I have much more in my voice. So I think I need to give my voice a little rest and find out what your check is for this week.

Shanna

things are good here. Cece is two months away from being four, right? So yeah, I cannot even believe it. And it's finally like, I don't know, she's finally seems like a big kid to me. I don't know that something recently, I don't know if she's gone through a growth spurt, some kind of emotional, mental leap, or probably all of it, right? Just suddenly, when I pick her up, I'm like, holy moly, you're heavy, you're tall. I don't know, she just really feels like a bigger kid to me, and I'm so sad about that because she was my baby, and she seemed so little for so long, and now she's almost this big four-year-old,

Laura

No, totally. She's your last kid unless, you know, something weird happened.

Shanna

Oh, my gosh.

Laura

He woke up. I tried to put him in his size three pants, and they were like Capri pants on him all of a sudden. So I had to go out and buy a bunch of 4T pants for him. And I swear it happened overnight. And so, yeah, I don't know. As they approach 4, it's interesting.

Shanna

Yeah, it really is. She's doing the same thing with her pajamas, like all her little footy pajamas. Her 3Ts, all of a sudden, her little toes are like pushing the boundaries of those footies. And I'm like, no. So yeah, she's growing up and getting big. The other check-in over here this week cracks me up. This week, they really got hooked on the idea of wanting to set up a lemonade stand and literally sell lemonade to the neighbors, right? Like an actual business thing outside and blah, blah, blah. And I'm such a curmudgeon. I'm just like, really? Okay. I kept kind of putting it off and I don't know. Finally, I was like, all right, fine. We'll do lemonade stand. We have this like little lemonade stand tent thing that they got for Christmas last year. So we have like the structure for the stand. but we need to make the lemonade, right? They wanna make it from scratch.

Laura

You guys live in a cul-de-sac too, so it's not like you have a lot of through traffic.

Shanna

Yeah, yeah, exactly. I mean, I guess we could go set up on the corner, but I don't know, just everything, just blah.

Laura

So you didn't like explain to them elaborate health code violations or anything?

Shanna

No, I didn't. I was just basically like, this is like, we just can't do this. So we made our lemonade, lots of little fingers stuck in the lemon pulp and everything. Right. So I'm definitely like, we can't serve this anyone. The lemonade was delicious. Like the recipe we used was perfect. It was really good. And so I was like, here's an idea, girls. You won't have to get dressed. Let's set up the lemonade stand in the backyard and we can sell it to each other. And I'm just waiting for them to be like, no. But somehow, someway, this went over well. I was so excited. They're like, yeah, OK. I know. And so I was like, we need a menu. And so she wrote out a menu. The options were. lemonade with ice, lemonade with no ice, or lemonade with a straw. And so she wrote out this menu and we even made garnish.

Laura

I'm surprised there was no lemonade with fridge ice, lemonade with crunchy pellet ice.

Shanna

The crunchy pellet ice machine has been retired to the garage. I don't use it anymore. What? Shanna. I don't know. I was cracking my teeth. Like, I went to the dentist. She's like, you've got chips in your back teeth.

Laura

What?

Shanna

Are you kidding? No. And she didn't say, like, why? Like, she didn't offer a reason why. But in the back of my mind, I was like, I've been chewing too much ice. I just knew it. And that kind of turned me off of the ice.

Laura

Oh my God, can I have your ice maker?

Shanna

Probably, it's filthy now. It's been in the garage for a while.

Laura

Cory would kill me. I already have two ice makers in my fridge, so I think I'll have to pass.

Shanna

Okay, here are the photos.

Laura

Oh my goodness, look at CeCe. She has a shirt on. I see.

Shanna

Yes, she is dressed.

Laura

And she has a beautiful looking lemonade with a wedge of lemon on the rim. Oh, how cute. Elle did not get dressed, but she is wearing like cat ears or something.

Shanna

Yeah, it's really cute. Oh my gosh, the menu I sent you. I didn't notice that she put a price on there. Did you see the price?

Laura

Oh yeah, the traditional 56 cents. Lemonade. Okay, we got lemonade. Ice with straw. No ice with straw. No ice with no straw. Ice with no straw.

Shanna

Yeah, yeah. No one in our family was poisoned either, thank goodness. That's good.

Laura

That's good.

Shanna

So yeah, nice little traditional childhood thing that we did as a family in our own little way.

Laura

Awesome. That sounds very wholesome. Save the health code violations.

Shanna

Yes. All right. So that's my check in for the week. Should we move on to our special segment?

Laura

I think we should.

Shanna

Okay. So last week I was talking about crushes, right? Like Ella's starting to have crushes and I was like, oh, I started having crushes like around first or second grade. And that got me thinking about crushes and boys and boyfriends of my past. And I dug up a little story for y'all on that topic.

Laura

Ooh.

Shanna

So despite my interest in gentlemen in the early years of my life, no one was ever interested in me. I was not good with boys. I was awkward. I was kind of nerdy, right? I got self-conscious when I got glasses around third grade and just felt like a nerd. And I was way too picky, right? Like, oh God, I had crushes on like the hottest guys in school. And of course they never gave me a second glance. So that's kind of like how I grew up for years. No boyfriends, no dates, no nothing. And by the time I got to high school, I was like, goddamn desperate to have a boyfriend. I was just like, come on, like everybody is dating and everyone's got somebody. But it's like the boys that liked me, ugh, I didn't like them. And it was just always like this drama for me personally. And finally, when I was 17, it was like right after my junior year of high school, I found myself a little boyfriend.

Laura

Ooh.

Shanna

Yeah.

Laura

Was he Johnny Appleseed?

Shanna

Good old Johnny meet you know what let's call this guy Johnny. Oh, that's good That's not his real name, but we'll call him Johnny I went out to a park one day with some friends like I don't know is a Saturday or something we just wanted to like have a picnic in the park and Some friends of theirs came along and this guy Johnny was there and he was older. Okay, so I was 17 and And I'd say he was maybe 20. He had already graduated high school. I know. He did go to my high school, right? But a couple of years previously, so he was older than me. He had already graduated. And he was cute. Not my typical type, right? I was kind of a goody two shoes kind of girl. Maybe more into studious artistic type guys and he was a little bit different.

Laura

Okay, so wait, what did Johnny do with his days? He had graduated high school. He was living on his own. Did he have a job? Was he in college?

Shanna

I don't know. I don't remember. No, he was in college. He was home. He was home for the summer from college. Oh, I see. I see. Yeah. He went to college up in Flagstaff at Northern Arizona University, and he was home for the summer and living with his buddies or whatever. I feel like he was kind of like, what the hell did he do? Like repair motorcycles or something? Honestly, that could have been another guy I dated. I honestly don't know what this guy did. I don't know. So I have memories of like going out to TGI Fridays, you know, for dinner with him, like going to like the little local fair, you know how like little traveling fairs take over parks and like set up like rides and games and stuff. I have memories of doing that. But what I was really surprised by is that my parents were really quite accepting of this situation. Maybe they were desperate for me to have a boyfriend too.

Laura

You were a smitten Shanna.

Shanna

Yeah, I was a smitten kitten. So by the end of the summer, it was time for Johnny to go back up to college at NAU. And it was kind of like, all right, well, let's keep talking and see where this thing will go. And he's like, I'll come down and visit you on the weekends and everything. I was like, OK, awesome. That's great. I started my senior year with a boyfriend. Woo, that's all I could have ever asked for, right?

Laura

Yeah, you show up and you're like, I have a boyfriend. He just doesn't live in town.

Shanna

Yeah, yeah, everyone's like, sure, Shanna.

Laura

He lives up north.

Shanna

Yeah, your fake boyfriend, Shanna. So a couple of weeks into the school year, Johnny comes down from Flagstaff to Phoenix where I'm living. He comes down for the weekend and we've been in touch and it's like, I want to take you out while I'm there. And I'm like, yay, like we're gonna have a date and whatever. So it's like Saturday, he comes and he picks me up from my house. And he's like, oh, first I want to like swing by my buddy's place and like say hi to them or whatever. And I was like, oh, okay. So this is like the same apartment he was living in this summer, right? Like where his friends are living. So he brings me over there and a bunch of his guy friends are there hanging out and it's me and him and those dudes. And I'm kind of like thinking, okay, like, when are we going to go to TJ Fridays?

Laura

Oh my God, trying to be the cool girl was like such a 90s thing.

Shanna

Oh, yeah.

Laura

So much pressure to be the cool girl who didn't act weird or needier, you know, just hung out with the guys. I swear my whole teenagehood was just defined by that.

Shanna

Yeah. Now that I think about it, yeah, like you just want to be chill. It's like the word that keeps coming to mind, like I'm chill, like I'm cool with all this.

Laura

If I had a better voice, I would go off on a rant about how that like is so anti-feminist and how it's like how women are trained to like be in their place and blah blah. But my voice sucks today. So I'll just leave it as it sucks. Go on. So you're being the cool girl in his apartment with all his roommates.

Shanna

Yeah, so it's like, and he doesn't just come by and say, hi, like he comes by, he sits on the couch, he like settles in. I'm just like, what is happening, right? So this is the beginning of me feeling confused about what's going on. And so we're hanging out and then all of a sudden his buddies are like, you know what we should do? We should like hit up ABC. And I'm like ABC. I know what ABC is. That's the Alaskan Bush Company, which is a local strip club. And I'm like... Oh my God.

Laura

It's called the Alaskan Bush Company. Yeah.

Shanna

This is kind of like an 18 and up strip club in the area. I knew of it. I'd never been, of course. I was 17 and not really into that kind of thing. And I was like, oh.

Laura

It didn't fit between your softball games nicely.

Shanna

My softball games, my flute practice.

Laura

Your musical theater.

Shanna

Exactly. Although I wasn't playing flute at that point. Anyway. So, you know, I'm thinking, oh gosh, you know, too bad for Johnny. Like he's taking me out on a date. I guess he's not gonna, he's gonna miss out on this opportunity with his friends. And then his friends start pressuring him like, hey, Johnny, you should come with us. And I'm like, but like he's in town and like we were going to go out and he appears to be in a pickle. He doesn't really know. which way to go. He's not like agreeing to the strip club. He's not like fully agreeing to our date. He just seems kind of wishy washy about it. And I'm like, all right, come on, like, let's go to our, let's go. And that his buddy is like, Johnny, come here, pulls him aside down the hallway of the apartment and And they disappear around the corner.

Laura

What? Oh, my God.

Shanna

I'm like, dude, you like said we were going to take me out. Now you're like going off with your friends to the strip club of all places. And I went off like he was stunned to silence at how I was just like, telling him off like that was complete bullshit like we are done like you don't do that to me that's fucked up and we get to my house and I hop out and I slam the door and I'm just basically like bye forever and he's like but I'm like no that's messed up so I go into my house you know I'm back way sooner than expected my house meaning my parents house and my mom's like what's the matter what happened And I flop on the couch and I just burst into tears. I wasn't crying up until this point. I was just pissed and telling this idiot off. And I just like the floodgates open. I'm crying my eyes out, like probably hyperventilating and like telling my mom everything that just happened.

Laura

Yeah.

Shanna

Johnny. Never saw him again.

Laura

Very disappointing, Johnny.

Shanna

Yeah.

Laura

Yeah, because your mom, you know, she could have gone straight into trying to fix it too, you know, like, you're better than him. You don't need him. Let's go out to dinner. Just you and me. You know what I mean? Like, she could have, those are all my instincts, like, coming from a, like, Gotta fix the emotions side of the family. But yeah, that's awesome. That's really, really sweet. And the fact that you remember it means a lot. Have you talked to your mom about it since?

Shanna

No, she'll probably hear about my memories of this for the first time listening to this show. Interesting. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, thank you mom for being there for me that way. And I have to say, like that is one of my favorite characteristics about my mom in general, like my life growing up is what an amazing listener she's always been. And how much she emphasized like the importance of listening to others. Like that's always something she taught me is like, listen to what other people say, like don't just talk all the time, like just listen, like hear what others have to say. And another thing, like I think that made it easy for me to tell Johnny to go fuck off is that another thing my mom always told me, even when I didn't have a boyfriend for all those years, is when you do have a boyfriend, don't settle for someone who treats you like shit.

Laura

I think that's great. I also feel like, especially when we were growing up, there's a lot of being taught that you are sort of defined by your relationship status. And I remember feeling very desperate for the state of having a relationship. You know what I mean? And I definitely could have used that talk. As you know, I ended up with some bad relationships, not Corey. Corey's wonderful. But before Corey, I definitely have kissed a few frogs. They were worse than how froggy my voice is right now. But yeah, I mean, your mom obviously did a good job because you are a great listener, like one of the best listeners. No, it's true. And you also like found Steve and like held on to Steve and Steve's just like the nicest guy, you know what I mean? Like Steve is just so caring towards you. And so yeah, good job, Shanna's mom.

Shanna

Yeah, I will say there were some red flags with old Johnny that I did ignore in the beginning because I really did want to have a boyfriend and he was cute and everything. Johnny chewed tobacco and like spit into like a cup, you know, like that kind of gross stuff. Like he was a smoker, which I obviously, I was not a smoker. Like that was not my thing. Like there was definitely some things I was like, ew. Oh, well.

Laura

End of the road for Johnny. Have you tried to like Facebook stalk Johnny?

Shanna

He friend requested me years ago, probably like 10 years ago, and I never accepted it. I mean, it's probably fine to be his friend. I just like at the time I was like, I don't know. I don't really need to be this dude's friend. And I think it's like still sitting in my pending friend.

Laura

Too funny. Oh my God.

Shanna

It's still there. I don't care. I honestly don't care what he's up to and he doesn't need to see what's going on with me, so.

Laura

That's very mature of you.

Shanna

Yeah. Once I put up a hard boundary, it's pretty solid.

Laura

Very mature of you. I would not be so mature. I'd totally want to scroll his whole Facebook page.

Shanna

Anyway, that's my story. Shall we move on to our BFPs and BFNs?

Laura

Yeah, I think we should.

Shanna

We're back and we wrap up every week with our big fat positives or big fat negatives of the week. Laura, what do you got for us?

Laura

I have a BFP.

Shanna

All right.

Laura

Okay. So this is a BFP that I get to like be so excited about on the podcast because I cannot show any reaction to it at home.

Shanna

Oh, let me guess. Eating related?

Laura

Yes.

Shanna

Aha. Tell us.

Laura

So Augie sort of out of the blue is suddenly trying some new foods.

Shanna

Yay.

Laura

New is kind of an air quotes because these are foods he used to eat, but hasn't eaten in like a year.

Shanna

Uh huh.

Laura

Okay. So here's what he tried just this week. He had pate pasta with like a red bolognese sauce, like a beef red sauce. Yeah, he actually asked for salad on his plate. He didn't eat it, but he asked me to put salad on his plate.

Shanna

Mm hmm.

Laura

And he ate kidney beans that were tossed in smoked paprika and salt, like with zero comment. It was just in the middle of the table. He just started like eating them.

Shanna

Wow.

Laura

I mean, that may not sound like much to people who don't have picky eaters, but like I was internally losing my shit. Like I'm sitting there watching him eat the penne and trying not to like Do a little dance, you know, and I'm just like, I can make pasta again. Like pasta can be a thing we can do as a family. And, uh, yeah, you know, actually one of the things that got him to eat it was I wasn't, I was trying not to pressure, well, I made penne for the family and I had like dino nuggets for him on the side. And I was just eating my penne and I was like, you know what, uh, Augie, you know what I do with my penne? I think this is kind of funny. I put it on each little tine of the fork. So they're like sticking straight up on the fork and then I eat it off. And he said, I want to do that. So I gave him a fork and I gave him some penne and he did it.

Shanna

Right, right. It probably feels good for him to have the independence to choose what he wants.

Laura

Yeah, exactly. Exactly. And how much of it he wants, you know? I mean, I just think it all comes back to you like he's just such an independent kid, you know what I mean? And he was just really pushing back on any pressure we put on him even when it's like positive. Anyway, I'm stoked about that. I hope it's a trend that continues. I'm trying not to get ahead of myself. But yeah, it's a little glimmer of hope.

Shanna

That's so exciting. Is he still eating lunches that you make for school? Or how is that going?

Laura

Yeah, he has basically the same thing every day. He has a sun butter and jelly sandwich with the crust cut off and then like sides, like pretzels or the sides change, you know, it's like, but it's all snacky stuff that's safe, like fruit, pretzels, chips, like stuff like that. He's not allowed any nuts at school or anything that's like added sugar. So, but yeah, he just eats like the same thing for lunch every day and he's happy with it. So yeah.

Shanna

That's exciting.

Laura

Yeah. Yeah. So, um, knock on wood.

Shanna

Yes. Fingers crossed it continues to go well.

Laura

Yes. Yes. So anyway, that is my concise BFP because, um, you know, uh, I can't talk. So now it's your turn. What do you have at BFP or BFN?

Shanna

I have a BFP, a big BFP.

Laura

Ooh, what is it? I'm sorry, I really do feel enthusiastic, but I can't express enthusiasm. Here, I'm gonna try, ready? Ooh, what is it?

Shanna

Okay, this weekend I spent two nights away from the family up in the mountains at mom camp.

Laura

Oh, mom camp. Yes. I'm only, I'm just a little bitter because this is the group that I've been trying to get into for like four years and they wanted me, but yes, go on. Go on about your mom camp.

Shanna

I know. It would be a bigger BFP if you could come and you were there. We're going to get you in next year. Okay. I talked about mom camp years ago when I was pregnant. I went. When I was seven months pregnant, I went to this retreat. So I'm part of this parenting group on Facebook that is pretty tight knit. I've been in it since I was six months old. And a few years ago, they started doing a retreat for the moms in the group where they rent out like a summer camp area with like cabins and there's recreation and all kinds of stuff for two nights. You can come up and get away from the family and stay with a bunch of moms and just like have fun. And I did that when I was pregnant and it was fun, but I didn't have a great time. I was very pregnant. It was up in the mountains. It was hard for me to breathe, you know, in the altitude and blah, blah, blah. So I'd been reluctant to go back.

Laura

That sounds really nice. It's very hard for me to imagine two nights away at this point. I mean, it's just such an intensive parenting and not voluntary intensive parenting. The kids won't fucking sleep parenting. You know what I mean? It's just so hard to imagine so like I can see like something like that a couple years or not be like, oh, that would be so nice. Just only have myself to take care of for a couple days.

Shanna

The age of my girls was perfect for this. It would have been hard for me to do the last couple of years. I mean, the pandemic kind of like put this off anyway. But yeah, like when Cici was younger, you know, I wasn't ready really to do that. But now that she's almost four and Ella's six, I was like, easy peasy. Like I have no anxiety about Steve solo parenting all weekend. And he didn't have any about it either. It was really fun. And one of the highlights was they have a talent show on Saturday night where some of the moms can sign up to do whatever thing they want to do. And I signed up because I was like, oh, I'll tell a story. I like doing storytelling. And I could not figure out a story to tell. You have five minutes, right? I'm like, I really couldn't figure out a story that I wanted to tell. And at the last minute, I was like, ooh, I made this TikTok rap for our TikTok page.

Laura

That sounds really fun and also it reminds me I've been wanting to ask you if you want to go to the moth with me again sometime.

Shanna

Oh yeah we should we definitely should are they still doing events like.

Laura

I don't even know they are there not as frequent as they were before the pandemic but they've started doing story slams again and I'm like I really want to go and put my name in the. Hat and just try again like because that's something I really used to just love doing. And you know, I've been thinking more and more about like how to reconnect with myself, you know, like do things that I enjoy and like that was one of them, you know that. So yeah, but I don't want to go alone. So do you want to go to the moth with me again?

Shanna

Yeah, let's do it. Yeah, being on stage in front of people again definitely reminded me how much I love doing that kind of stuff too. And so I think that would be really fun.

Laura

All right, awesome. Well, I'm so glad you had fun.

Shanna

Yes. And we will get you into this group and you will come with us next year to the retreat.

Laura

I'm not holding my breath at this point.

Shanna

Anyway, I think that's it for our show. Do we have a five star review to read?

Laura

Oh, we do, but I think you should read it because I don't think my voice is going to do it justice right now.

Shanna

All right. This is from LacyCK22. The title is Love This Podcast, Five Stars. I started listening to this podcast when I was trying to conceive and couldn't stop listening. It is a fun and light conversation about their life experiences as moms. It was so nice to get a sneak peek into what I was in for. highly recommended to any moms wherever they are in their journey. Thank you, Lacey.

Laura

Yes, thank you so much, Lacey.

Shanna

We appreciate that so much. And listeners, if you haven't had a chance yet to leave us a review, could you head over to Apple Podcasts and drop us five stars and say a few things that you love about this show? We really appreciate everyone for taking time to leave us those reviews. If you have any stories about first-boy friends that you want to share with us, you know we would love to hear them. Laura, where can everyone reach us?

Laura

We are on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok at BFB Podcast. We have a website, BigFatPositivePodcast.com. If you want to send us an email, just send it to contact at BigFatPositivePodcast.com. And you can always throw a voice memo in there. We love those. And finally, if you want to join a super cool group of people on the internet, just search Facebook for Big Fat Positive Community. It's a private group, so you have to request to join. Answer those two membership questions so we know you're not a robot, and then we'll send you straight through.

Shanna

Our show is produced by Laura Birek, Shanna Micko, and Steve Yager. Thanks for listening, everyone. Have a great week. Bye.

Laura

Bye.