Urban Moms

Since we live in the city, our surroundings are made up primarily of concrete and tall buildings, with a few random trees thrown in here and there. Personally, I am fine with this, since I have a nearly incapacitating fear of dirt and bugs. But my husband and I know that our son needs exposure to nature, so we try to take him out of the city on occasion.  

 

One of the major challenges to being a mom in the city is space. Namely, we don't have any.  My husband and I live in a small condominium with our 14-month-old son and our two cats.  And we're one of the really unlucky condo owners who have to survive with no extra storage space. Fortunately for me (and rather unfortunately for my husband), I'm a ruthless throw-it-out-if-it-hasn't-been-used-in-two-years and throw-it-out-if-we're-just-keeping-it-in-case-we-need-it and it-would-costs-less-than-30-dollars-to-replace-type person.  So I'm pretty darned good at cleaning and purging. Or so I thought, until our son was born, and we discovered just how much "stuff" a baby requires. I'm now a year into this parenting thing, and have come up with a list of the absolute essential items that I could not have lived without as an urban mom. 

 

One of my favorite things about living in the city is our proximity to great museums and fun cultural festivals.  Since we don't have to deal with a drive into the city or find/pay for expensive parking, and we can get home quickly in case of a baby emergency, it's much easier to be motivated to get out with the baby and to participate in all that the city has to offer.  

A few years ago, when my husband and I began to tell our friends that we had a baby on the way, we faced all the usual prospective parent questions: when was I due, was the baby a boy or a girl, did I plan to work after he/she was born. And we were also asked a question that surprised us: "So, when are you going to sell your condo and move to the suburbs?" This question came up on a number of occasions, and when we informed the questioner that we had no plans to leave the city, we often received some form of the following comment (said with genuine concern for our future child's well-being) "But how on earth can you raise a baby in the city?!?!" This is our story of doing just that.