Moni Makai

Building a brand and a family

We’re Still Here and It’s Go Time

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We decided we would ride the good news wave with a little announcement… WE’RE LAUNCHING FRIDAY.

Yes, we are crazy enough to launch a business in the middle of a global pandemic. I have covered countless stories of people in my full-time job (editor for LinkedIn) whose businesses have been negatively impacted by the coronavirus. Millions have lost work (including my husband) and thousands have shuttered the doors on their dream businesses.

I know it’s an uncertain time, and a scary time, but we’re not one to fold under pressure. In fact, we typically do better under pressure. It’s the (former) competitive athlete in me. This has been a long, building process — we announced we were doing this thing three years ago — and we’re seeing it through. I’m giving myself and this business a chance, and I am really, really excited.

Designing Moni Makai --
Me with one of the first sets of samples at my factory in downtown L.A.

I was talking to one of my besties during a walk break last week. Luckily, I have amazing managers (the entire company is working remote until next summer, at least) who encourage us to step away during the day to help with our sanity. I’m admittedly terrible at doing this and I’ve even set an alarm to remind me to get up daily, and still I sometimes let it pass without doing anything.

“I don’t want to stress you out but,” she hesitated. “What are you doing with Moni Makai?”

It’s a question I’ve gotten a few times over the past few months.

“Oh my gosh, you’re not stressing me out. Thank you for asking,” I said. “We’re still launching, I just can’t find the time to get it done!”

I have said that line to my parents, as well, and truthfully it’s not 100% accurate. The reality is I haven’t made the time.

I had visions of putting the finishing touches on my Shopify site over coffee and wine, and pulling all-nighters after the kiddos were in bed. Needless to say, that has not happened. On more than one occasion, I’ve been in charge of “doing stories” with my 4-year-old, only to startle myself awake at 11:30p.m. in his bed. Pre-kids, I laughed incredulously at my friends who used to crash as soon as their children went to sleep and now I’m one of those parents.

The past nearly six months have been a blur. Of maternity leave, of COVID-19, of social distancing, of baby giggles, of masks, of exhaustion, of joy, of uncertainty, of doubt, of laughter, of neighborhood walks, of stress, of fear, of kisses, of tears, of meltdowns, of blowouts and milkshakes. And the neverending sense that we’re living in Bill Murray’s movie “Groundhog Day.”

I am slowly starting to come out of the fog of being a parent with a newborn, and I’m back in the game. Let’s do this. No regrets. Moni Makai vibes are coming in hot. Stay tuned to our Instagram page for more details on the Shopify site and when we go live.

Friday, the 13th. An ominous day to most, but a really lucky day for me.

Tales from the nursing pillow

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The mise-en-scene: I’m sitting in the chair we’ve designated for my son so I can be close to him while he watches TV. He’s sitting on the baby’s Dock-a-Tot on the floor. It’s upside down and he’s wearing a rash guard and underwear, the remnants of the outfit he wore after an earlier standup paddleboard session. Disney’s “Lion Guard” is on. It is a welcome break from some intense pillow fighting/wrestling in his bedroom. Our newest addition, 2.5-month-old Skylar, is snoozing in our bedroom in the carseat. She rarely stays asleep when we lug her in the house after an outing, but she did this time and, well, today I’m letting her sleep because I’m tired.

We only got about four hours of sleep last night, though not for the reason you may think. We’ve had some evening critter invaders and last night we were up until 2 a.m. trying to rid the house perimeter from a band of raccoons. They can be loud and they often scare our son to tears in the middle of the night. He wakes up crying in fear from the noises they make outside his window so we’re determined to piss them off enough that they find another home to terrorize. My husband purchased a super soaker and two nights ago he was on watch with the hopes he would zap them on sight. He only saw a cat. Last night I heard them crawling on the fence behind our bedroom and when I opened our bedroom curtain three of them were inches away from my face staring at me from the staircase railing leading down to the backyard. MainMan ran out with water and nailed them, but we still heard them a few more times after that. In addition, we have rats eating from our birdfeeders on our back porch. LG says he hears scratching in the walls/ceiling and the jury’s out whether it’s these guys or the raccoons. Ugh. Any tips on pest control are welcome.

Our daughter Skylar is 12 weeks this week. Which means I’m just over halfway finished with my maternity leave. As it goes with this precious time home with a newborn, it’s flying by. I’m surprised that even in quarantine, where most days are the same, that it’s going by so quickly.

If you don’t follow us on social media, we are masked crusaders and still largely sheltering in place and practicing social distancing. Luckily we live in an area where we can find some outdoor places that don’t feel overcrowded where we can comfortably play and enjoy the sun (though we have pulled into some parking lots and turned around at the first chance).

So what’s it like being a second-time mom during a pandemic?

Minus the fact that LG is home whereas he would have been in school five days a week, I can’t say a non-coronavirus maternity leave would have looked much different. I probably would have actively pursued some new mommy group in the area, but other than that I would have been hunkering down at home for the most part anyway. I think I am definitely more adventurous/brave when it comes to leaving the house with Skylar than I was with H. Though this is half because we need to get out with H or we’d all go insane and half because he was just a tougher baby in general. We could barely put him down for a moment of reprieve whereas Sky is pretty much content all the time no matter what. A friend told me she heard that the tougher the pregnancy the easier the kid, and vice versa, and this holds true with my kids for sure! And while I voice child comparisons to family and friends who ask, I keep this from H.

Skylar is recognizing us with smiles and dimples (where did she get these dimples?!). Starting the week of her two-month birthday, she was talking to me. She aah-ed and I aah-ed back and we have daily convos keeping a consistent E-note. What really blows our minds is she’s been sleeping through the night for the past week or so. She will have a last feeding between 9 to 11 p.m. and we are not hearing from her again until 5 or 6ish. We don’t know where her blue eyes came from. I mean, we do, but they certainly skipped a generation. My mom hears from her best pals that Skylar looks like her and she’s tickled by this.

I chuckle that LG slept in our room for all of one night after he came home from the hospital. I was such a nervous nelly sleeping next to him — every noise he made startled me into a panic — that on his second night we put him in his nursery. Meanwhile, Skylar is sleeping swaddled in the Dock-a-Tot on our bed and we have no plans to move her to her bedroom until maybe sleep training. At this rate she may not even need it (we did this for H at around four months).

H has been a truly loving and doting big brother. There have been a couple of brief moments in the car when he’s covered his ears because Sky has been fussy for a hot minute, but that’s the only visible frustration we’ve seen. I think there is definitely some subconscious stuff going on, however. We’ve had a couple of rough mornings and I attributed it to daddy feeding the baby, mommy pumping and nobody giving LG 100% of their attention. Now we’re trying to structure the mornings so one of us can be on LG patrol while the other is taking care of the baby and other stuff (dishes, wrangling our pets, day food prep, etc.) We also know a day at home can be a recipe for disaster so we’re trying to get LG out of the house as often as we can.

Car rides with the whole family now involve a level of planning and gear I never imagined. It’s rare that we can leave the house before 10 or 11 to go anywhere. Then when we do we barely fit in our vehicles. MainMan just got a “hand-me-down” pickup that’s in great shape and the whole bed fills up in minutes with our loot. We spent a day with my family this past weekend and my SUV was stuffed to the gills. Heaven help us when we pack today and tomorrow for a week-long adventure in Tahoe.

We had a brief hour at the beach in Carmel to let H blow off some steam post-car ride and when I got back to the car I said, “How could taking two kids and a dog to the beach for an hour be this stressful?” The only one who was remotely cooperating was Skylar, which is typically the case, even Agnes was whining and out of sorts. I often make the mistake of going into such outings with expectations of ease and fun and I leave feeling like I went through a car wash with the windows down.

Speaking of stress, two days ago we decided we weren’t going to send H back to school on Aug. 19. His school reopens then, but since we’re both home, he’ll stay with us until I return to work on/near September 30. His school was doing all the right things, we just felt we weren’t in a rush to send him back as California continues to be a hotspot for COVID-19. We are at peace with our decision, but coming to that conclusion involved lots of discussion and soul-searching. I feel for parents of kids who are old enough to really feel like they’re missing out on the school experience. Distance learning is TOUGH. H still prefers to be home anyway so we’ll be fine. My mom reminded me a few days ago that I didn’t go to school until kindergarten! Who knew?

Then there’s my business. Moni Makai is almost set to launch. For real this time. I’m finalizing some things on the website before I hit the “LIVE” button. I envisioned a launch party and friends and family coming in to celebrate the event, but that will certainly not be happening. Instead, I think I’ll order a cake and some balloons, and maybe have a picnic where we snap a few pictures of us in the shirts.

I go back to work on September 30 and while I miss my team, I am prepared for it to be an emotional rollercoaster. I am extremely grateful for this time — 20 weeks back in April/May when we were gearing up for this ride sounded really generous. And now at the tail end I realize be it 20 weeks, 30 weeks or 40 weeks, no time is enough.

Things I Want to Remember

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Has there been a more strange, intense time in our lives?

I didn’t want to return to work in Manhattan for several days after 9/11, but I did, eventually, only to move to Aspen, Colorado, two months later. This weird limbo of waiting out a deadly disease is unprecedented and throw a recent move, new jobs, my husband’s layoff and a pregnancy on top of it and I feel like I’m on the fringe daily.

LG snapped this photo of me in his playroom.

Thank goodness I work for a company that encouraged us to work from home since the very beginning of the pandemic (I naively thought I’d be back in the office by now). I feel very privileged and I know many are not so lucky. And while my husband losing his job was a major blow, I’m not sure how we’d be coping with child care if he was still employed. We hadn’t found a sitter in the Bay Area and we were hardly going to have some stranger coming in and out of our house during this.

With baby no. 2 coming on May 13, I often think of how I wanted to spend LG’s last couple of months as an “only child.” I wanted to create a “LG only” bucket list of sorts and well, here we are. On day 1,239 of quarantine and we’ve probably left the house three times. What’s funny is our son is a total homebody and he’s been in heaven not going to school and not going for drives and not going to the beach. I still would have dragged him all over the Bay for adventures, but alas, that was not meant to be.

While we’ve all had our freakout moments during this sheltering in place, I admit I will forever cherish this additional time I got to spend with LG before his sister’s arrival. He’s been going to daycare/school since he was 2 and I’ve always struggled with this decision and the amount of time he’s been away from us. As two working parents, we had no choice. Calling this time a gift feels insensitive, given the amount of lives that have been lost and the pandemic’s impact on the global economy, but it didn’t take me long to realize we had to make the most of this and more shared time together was, and continues to be, my silver lining.

LG turns 4 in August and the last time I reflected on what he was up to was when he was 18-months-old. I wanted to have another record before my mind goes haywire with two kids. The following are some of my favorite things about the here, the now and our final days being a family of three.

***

Getting greeted by our son in the mornings in my office. “You get the first hug,” he always says when he opens the door and falls into my arms.

Hearing, “Mommy, you done with work?” every time I sneak out of the office for a stretch, snack or potty break.

The words “delicate,” “actually” and “carnivore” somehow made it into his daily vocabulary. And phrases like, “I sure do…” Sadly, “coronavirus” is now part of his lexicon, as well.

The “I’m OK!” exclamation after we witness a fall or a crash. LG’s pop-up is legendary.

LG’s undying love for Nutella sandwiches. He would eat them for every meal if we let him. Hot dogs are a close second (and the smell of that and the ketchup combo makes prego mama want to heave).

Paw Patrol and Peppa Pig have been replaced with Dino Dan and Dino Dana.

LG is a homebody and never wants to go anywhere. My side of the family is familiar with this as my brother once famously whined on a vacation in Hawaii, “I just wanna go home.” He was probably similar in age to LG now.

Legos have become a huge hit.

The mommy, daddy, LG sandwich.

Mommy is always the top pick for bedtime stories. “Mommy, you doing stories?” Even though he knows we alternate nights. For now…

LG wants to name his baby sister Harrison.

LG loves tubby time with his snorkel and mask, but NO bubbles. He’d stay in the tub for hours if the water stayed warm.

We recently started doing family “night walks,” per LG’s request.

Falling asleep together in LG’s big boy bed. And how hard it is for prego mama to get up (his mattress is on the floor which makes it safe for jumping).

“Twinkle, twinkle” is the lullaby of choice these days.

“You’ve just got to see this!”

We did a recent comparison of MainMan and LG’s statistics from this age. LG is already pacing 3″ taller than daddy. Daddy stands at 6’3″. Yoikes.

Our dining room table has become the crafting table (colored paper, crayons and Play-Doh everywhere) and the dining room turns into a daily dance party venue. We go around the circular table dancing and running around to “Lion Sleeps Tonight” and “Thank You!” from “Moana.”

LG is really into rocks right now. We dig around the front and back garden and we look for them on our walks. “For my collection section.”

LG loves to say hi to passersby when we’re out walking (though it typically takes some bribery to get him to want to get into the stroller). Folks can be 25 yards away looking in the opposite direction and if we’ve just come out of the gate he’ll yell, “HI!”

Hide and seek is a favorite game around the house. We either hide ourselves or stuffed animals.

Costumes. Give him all the costumes. Batman. Superman. Astronaut. Doctor.

Cardboard box creations have started to take over the house. We have a mommy-height space ship, a castle with a drawbridge and a fire truck at the moment, not to mention three countertop skate parks. Moments ago I asked if I could discard them and sadly, LG said not yet (even though he hasn’t been in them in weeks).

Daddy/LG go “wrestling” on LG’s bed.

Just today LG told Nonnie (my mom) he really missed going to the pool. And that he couldn’t wait to go back “when people aren’t sick anymore.”

Facetime has become a constant with grandparents. He loves showing them around the house like they’ve never seen it before.

“Daddy’s not listening…” is a new fave go-to when mommy’s working and he’s upset about something.

***

With school canceled through the end of the year, along with the summer program we signed up for, my maternity leave will be more crowded than I expected. LG seems very excited about his little sister, and I’m hoping his enthusiasm continues when I’m glued to my nursing pillow, an infant, the changing table and struggling to be present on little to no sleep.

On a recent afternoon, the three of us were splayed out on LG’s bed and I started to cry as I was hit by the nearness of the life-altering change we’re all about to experience.

“I’m going to miss this,” I said, through the tears.

MainMan reached out and grabbed my hand.

“We’ll still have this,” he said.

“I know, it’s just going to be so different.”

For almost four years, LG has been my little everything. And I’m terrified of losing our special bond. Is that backwards? Most parents having a second probably worry about how their first-born is going to respond. I’m worried about how I’m going to respond. I love the dynamic of our small, but mighty, trio and I don’t want LG to feel like he’s losing me. Like it did when we had LG, I hope our hearts instantly burst with new love for our fourth family member. We worked so hard for this, but it’s still hard to believe she’s almost here.

Ode to Southern California

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Today marks three weeks since movers packed us up and out of our two-bedroom apartment in Rancho Palos Verdes. Sunday will be three weeks for me in our new house (yes, a real standalone, single-family house!) in Marin County. To say we’ve been supremely busy the past two months would be the understatement of the century. I haven’t done anything non-moving or non-unpacking/settling-in related since the first week in January. OK, I lied, I finally got a much-needed haircut two days ago.

Moving oneself is a lot of work. Moving the husband, the child and two pets is exponentially more challenging. I knew we’d collected stuff for LG, between monthly boxes of toys and clothes from two sets of grandparents, and the stuff we buy him regularly. I didn’t realize each of our pets would need their own giant Rubbermaids for beds, collars, jackets, toys and meds. Or that the contents of our dresser would take up six boxes.

I made countless trips to Goodwill, sent bags and boxes to ThredUp, and still we seemed to have endless amounts of stuff. The last 10-15 boxes were the hardest to pack. At that point, if an item hadn’t already found a home in one of the boxes in the medieval cardboard tower in the corner of our apartment, I was compelled to throw it away and never see it again.

On top of the packing, there were so many logistics to figure out. Of course, finding a house was the most pressing and challenging. Finding a good school for LG — with space mid-year for him — was an added stressor. This was the first move where that was a serious consideration. Between MainMan and I, we took three trips to the Bay Area to find “the one,” or the house that checked off all of our criteria. We came close to applying to a couple of places, but yours truly stuck to her Goldilocks ways and found reasons why they weren’t quite right.

I emailed friends in the area. I chatted neighborhoods with future coworkers. About the East Bay. The city. Marin. San Mateo County. I was Googling all kinds of “best places” lists, until we landed in San Rafael. A family friend lives here with his wife and two kids, and he detailed the S.F. commute to me (he takes the ferry daily), and while at first Google-maps-glance it looked too far away from my office, after looking at a lot of other homes in neighboring towns, we found a sweet little cottage house in a cute, residential neighborhood. I decided the commute was worth dealing with for LG to have a yard (front and back), a playroom and for us all to enjoy the luxury of a small garage for storage items. We could not be happier. And we hope if you’re reading this, you’ll come visit. Did I mention we’re 30 minutes away from wine country?

Before I start documenting our adventures from our new town, I wanted to reflect on this past decade, and where I’ve/we’ve been. Surreal to imagine I uprooted myself at the beginning of the previous decade, leaving New York City for Los Angeles to be with MainMan (we met at a wedding in Sept. ’09 and after a few months of long-distance dating, I decided to move there in May ’10 to give us a real shot). And now, here we are in a new decade, having just completed another life-altering transition. We survived a few moves in the ’10s, but none feel quite as momentous as this one.

After living in New York for six years, and in my roaring 20s no less, I considered myself a diehard New Yorker. I relished the sunshine and coastline of southern California, but I accepted that Los Angeles and its environs could never be my Manhattan. This changed. After seven-plus years of living in several neighborhoods throughout Southern California, it became that and more. Here are some of the great memories I’ll cherish and take with me for the rest of our lifetimes.

Oh, Southern California, to me you’ll always be…

The first place I went camping. And subsequently where I got the lifelong camping bug. We’ll miss you Leo Carillo, Sycamore Canyon and Joshua Tree, to name a few of our favorite spots.

best camping california malibu

Where I got SCUBA-certified. While life in the parenting lane has prevented us from doing any SCUBA of late, I will never forget my first dives off Casino Point on Catalina. And the follow-up Buffalo Milk cocktails at various bars after to celebrate.

My first home with the love of my life. From “three’s company” nights at the Palazzo in West L.A. to our red barnyard apartment in Culver City. The hidden treasure that was El Segundo. A brief hiccup to South Carolina. Then back to California again. To Mission Valley in San Diego and our last home in Rancho Palos Verdes.

The land of endless palm trees and sunshine. I actually missed the rain and clouds a bit living in SoCal. MainMan would tease me I was the only person in L.A. who complained about it always being sunny.

Beaches, beaches, beaches. Some wide open and endless, others small patches of sand. We hit them all from Ventura County to Mission Beach in San Diego. RAT beach, Hermosa Beach, Manhattan Beach, Venice Beach, Mother’s Beach, Tourmaline, Rosie’s Dog Beach, Topanga, Zuma Beach, La Jolla Cove, Coronado Beach. Whether it was for a quick surfing session, a shore dive, an open-water swim practice or a playdate with dolphins and whale spouts, the beaches of Southern California are some of the prettiest in the world.

My preferred destination for margaritas and burritos. I bit into my first California burrito at Don Bravo’s in San Diego. None have compared since. We became regulars at our local Mexican spot in PV where the mole and margaritas were part of my weekly diet. I will look, in vain likely, for a replacement in our new town…

Fun at Baby Beach, Dana Point , Festival of Whales
Where are your pants, LG?

Harrison’s first almost everything: First dip in the ocean, first steps, first words, first (and second) apartments, first golf tournament, first camping trip, first crawl, first school, first (and only) nanny, baptism, first Disney trip, first boat ride, first skate park, first train ride, first pumpkin patch, first Santa’s lap, first Halloween, Thanksgiving, first flight from LAX to Hawaii, first night in a hotel, first school concert, I’m sure I’m missing something.

The home of Agnes B. I volunteered for a dog rescue in L.A., which is where and how I fell in love with our furst baby. You can take the pup out of Southern California, but you can’t take the Southern California out of the pup. Our bulldog mix, who’s nearing 10, hates the rain. Like even when she’s in her fancy raincoat. And she loves a good sunbathing spot. I hope she survives the northern California climate. There’s never been a sweeter, more loyal, devoted and loving fur friend on the planet. And I will forever be indebted to the colleague who introduced me to the dog rescue where we found her.

Designing Moni Makai --
Posing with the samples of the boy’s shirt and the girl’s dress

The birthplace of Moni Makai. I’m sure many of you are wondering, “Oh yeah, that!?” The factory has completed the first run of our clothing line (literally our last day in SoCal is when I got the call “We’re finished!” Fancy that.) Now I just need to get the clothes in my hands, and figure out where we’re doing our first photo shoot. So much for a Palm Springs weekend! I’ll need to find somewhere up in the Bay Area now. My factory works with people remotely so we’ll give that a go for a while. The move and my new job have curtailed progress on the clothing line front, but I’m committed to seeing it through and getting fun coordinated mother/child outfits out there for the world to enjoy.

Sunset picnics with PPLQ. Surprise birthday dinners with JF and SM. Kiddo birthday parties and shenanigans with DM and co. Long Beach dinners with KG. Mexican dinners and SP brewery dates with CW and KS.

Where we completed the “SoCal board sport triple.” There are few places in the world where you can hit the slopes and surf in the same day. We committed to doing this with a few friends and it was a blast. After skiing/snowboarding at Mountain High (86 miles from L.A.), we hit Santa Monica for a surf session. Someone brought a skateboard so we could all hop on one in the parking lot to complete the triple. To celebrate our feat, we grabbed some pints at Ye Old King’s Head in SM.

Home of the most frightening Halloween shenanigans From the Queen Mary’s Dark Harbor, to the Haunted Hayride in Griffith Park and a night sponsored by “American Horror Story” at an abandoned psych hospital. It will be hard to top L.A.’s Halloween.

Home of Terranea. We discovered the amazing Hawaii-esque resort less than 10 minutes from our home in PV and we made a point to visit often. When we weren’t sipping on pricy cocktails at picnic tables overlooking the Pacific at their “sports bar” Nelson’s, we were walking the coastal loop with Agnes that was open to the public. Or diving from the rocky shoreline below the resort. It was a trek with all of our equipment, but the dive there on a “good viz” day was one of my all-time favorite shore dives.

Where I launched a successful dog-walking business. After two years and change I greatly missed human interaction, but the decision helped me overcome a not-so-great work situation, got me in pre-wedding shape and got me outside and working with animals. If you’re ever in a rut, I highly recommend this as a viable option.

Where MainMan got down on one knee in July 2012. And I was too busy watching a family of ducks float by on Big Bear Lake to hear him or understand what was happening.

Where we were able to conceive our second child, with the help of Dr. Baek at California Fertility Partners in Santa Monica. And where our three embryos will continue to live in their frozen home until/if we ever decide to have another child.

Meeting Tigger at Critter Country

The home of my happy place. Disney movies were a huge part of my childhood, and from the moment I stepped foot in EuroDisney in middle school, I became a fan of the parks, as well. (My parents took me to Disneyland when I was really little, but I have no recollection of it, other than I had to go on Haunted House twice because I lost a shoe.) Being an hour’s drive away from Disneyland was one of the biggest perks of living in Southern California. When I was single I would often play hooky and just go to the park by myself (MainMan does not share the same passion I have for it). Experiencing the parks with LG was a whole new experience, that only got better every time we visited. The week we moved we made sure to sneak in one final trip with YiYi, our former nanny. It was a blast. We’ll miss you, Tigger and friends!

****

“What are you going to miss most about your home?” My mom asked.

“The view,” I said. Without hesitation.

Discovering the Palos Verdes Peninsula was a game-changer. I don’t think I could live anywhere else in L.A. County. It was a hidden pocket of coastal yumminess not known by many.

“My Aggie coastal walks. And LG’s school,” I added.

I sobbed on the last day picking LG up from the PV Montessori Academy. We will miss the teachers and administrators there. And while I know we will discover new walks with Aggie, none will be quite as easily accessible and beautiful as Point Vicente with its lighthouse backdrop.

One thing is certain. I often focused on loving what was outside our apartments in Southern California. Here, in our new home, I can finally focus on loving what’s inside. And that is a welcome change.

My 3 Words for 2020

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My “life is good” pose. Park City, Utah, Christmas 2019

Last year, thanks to some inspiration from a friend, I chose three words that would steer me on my 365-day trip around the sun.

They were discernment, cultivate and persistence. Discernment, to remind me to remember what was important in the grand scheme of life and what to shake off. Cultivate, as in relationships, mainly. And persistence. It barely needs explaining, but on our continued, difficult road to conceiving (finally had luck at the end of 2019), persistence was 1,000% integral.

As my family launches into a new exciting year/decade — more on that TK — I can say my 2019 words definitely contributed to where we’re headed in 2020.

Have you tried picking three words for the year? Here’s a little bit on where it started.

Without further ado, here are my 3 words:

Open. To new possibilities, experiences, people and adventures. I feel like I’ve been living like a bit of a hermit in our Rancho Palos Verdes bubble. I’m looking to get out of my comfort zone more in 2020.

Move. Both physically and figuratively, on various projects (some in my head, some already in motion). I’ve been pretty sedentary these past few years since having LG. Even with a baby in the belly, I’m trying to focus more energy on physical activity. And I want to be focusing on forward progress on my business idea and its evolution.

Absorb. I want learning to be a focus of 2020. With this comes more reading. Send me all your favorite book suggestions, both non-fiction and fiction, please.

Do any of these resonate with you? Are you a resolution(s) person? Share with us in the comments how you embrace the new year and new beginnings!

40 Thanksgivings, 40 Reasons to Be Thankful

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I’ve been thinking about what I could possibly write that hasn’t been said before about Thanksgiving, being grateful and giving thanks for blessings upon blessings upon blessings. So many blessings.

Before I turned 40, I’d hoped to write a little “top 40” listicle of things I’d learned in my four decades on this planet, but since I never got around to it, I decided to do a little belated birthday/Thanksgiving hybrid post.

I’m keeping it simple and sharing 40 things I’m thankful for.

We follow several blogs, Instagram accounts and Facebook pages devoted to the infertility community and we’ve read a few posts of the theme, “It’s OK to not be thankful.” And with a history of many years of feeling alone in our suffering during the holidays (whether it was at this time of year or for numerous Mother’s/Father’s Days, even), we just want to remind you to try and be sensitive and keep those in mind who may be experiencing pain or loss during this season.

And with that… here is my 40/40 list. I look forward to revisiting this in subsequent years.

The weekend I met MainMan … Here we are on a chairlift in Aspen heading to a friend’s wedding.

1. MainMan. If you’re a new reader, this is my husband. When we first met at a friend’s wedding in 2009, he’d just moved to Los Angeles from Maine, where he’d gotten his masters degree. He was MaineMan on my first blog Mona’s Apple for a while, then I renamed him MainMan when we got hitched. I knew he was one in a million when I first met him, but he’s now one in a trillion as a dad. I could not survive the day-to-day without him. His father-ing puts my mother-ing to shame on a daily basis. And we are so lucky he is ours.

2. Friendly, courteous drivers.

3. Our LG. What can you say about a firecracker? He lights up the world wherever he goes. The apartment, the car, the grocery store, the sidewalk, the playground, school… Just the other day he made me put the window down so he could wave and yell “HI!” to the construction workers on the way home from school. He had these big, burly dudes in stitches waving hi. He is our everything.

4. Ellen, Jim Gaffigan, Robin Williams, Steve Martin, Conan, Kings of Comedy, Ali Wong, the Blue Collar Comedy Tour and other comedians I’m forgetting who make me laugh.

5. Agnes. Our “furst” baby. She’s about 9 (when we adopted her in 2011 the Ace of Hearts dog rescue estimated she was 1 to 2-years-old). Before we had LG, I often wondered how I could love anything more than I loved her. My mom would tease me and say, “You are in so much trouble… the way you fawn over that dog. What’s going to happen when you have a human?” I think we all know what happened…

6. Grey days and a good rainstorm (currently experiencing this in SoCal, and while I feel bad it’s during my in-laws’ visit, I love it).

7. Bode. Our 3-year-old tabby is our irresistible terror. He doubles as a super-reliable alarm clock. Nobody needs to set their phone alarms because Bode starts his witching hour somewhere between 4 and 5 a.m. I’ve been known to curse him in the morning darkness after he’s flown off a dresser and knocked picture frames over, but home wouldn’t be the same without him.

8. Fall. And spooky movies.

9. Mamacita. When my parents lived abroad in Tokyo, my mom’s friends nicknamed her “Tsunami Sue.” In high school, my teammates called her “Big Sue.” These monikers sum up my mom. She goes big or she goes home. She loves big, she gives big and she lives big. Similar to her grandson, she brightens up any room she walks into and she treats everyone like they’re in the House of Windsor.

10. Dog-owners who pick up after their pups.

11. Big Kahuna. My dad was always the more serious of my two parents growing up, and I don’t think I really appreciated him fully until I was in high school. My dad worked his butt off so our family (four of us, including my mom and brother) would never want for anything. Because of him we moved to Paris, I grew to love (and attend) UVA, New York sports teams (Yankees and Giants), classical music, Italian bread, and history. He also taught me everything I know about hard work, determination and patience.

12. People like Greta Thunberg who are out there fighting for the future of our planet.

13. Tedward. I’m grateful for my not-so-little brother. We’re two years apart. And we didn’t exactly get along when we were little, but having a sibling is one of the great joys of my life and while we have had our share of ups and downs, I can always count on him for a laugh and a deep thought. He’s recently started baking bread and after receiving a delicious seigle in the mail the other week, I’m grateful for his new skill.

14. My various swim coaches throughout the years. For instilling the attitude that nothing is possible without determination and putting in the work, and that failure can ultimately teach us success. The lessons of sport never leave you.

15. The Wilton Wahoos and UVA S’women. I swam in high school for the Wilton YMCA and at the University of Virginia (CLAS ’01), and it was during my time on these two teams that I met some of the most amazing women on the planet. Many of whom continue to be my lifelines today. My friendships with these circles of extraordinary women have shaped who I am, and for them I will always be eternally grateful.

16. Antiques. Wandering through antique stores and malls is one of my favorite pastimes. I dream someday of owning my own store.

17. My eyes. I can’t imagine living a day without seeing my family, their smiles, our pets, the colors of the ocean outside our windows, a sunset, the flowers, or being able to read, write, drive, type, etc.

18. Grandma and Grandpa. My husband’s parents are two of the kindest, gentlest souls on the planet and we are forever grateful for their thoughtfulness and generosity. I love witnessing them interact with their grandson and boy does he love them.

19. My ears. Yup, most definitely thankful for my big ears. The bigger to hear my son’s voice and his random “Mommy, I love yous” throughout the day, my husband’s laugh, music in my car, a podcast on a walk, Christmas carols, Hawaiian slack guitar, owls hooting at me on my morning walk and the ocean break.

20. Our local Mexican restaurant Salsa Verdes. We ate there last night, the food and service is always lovely, and it’s just really nice to go somewhere laidback and casual where you are welcomed by your name and a smile.

21. My nose. As a pregnant mom there are a lot of smells I could do without (ketchup is at the top of the list and my kid loves it so I literally have to leave the dinner table if he’s eating it), but life wouldn’t be as sweet if I couldn’t smell my scented Christmas candles (or any candles, really), jasmine, lilies, plumeria, pine, vanilla, rose or a burning fire (in the fireplace, of course).

22. My hands. I am grateful for the ability to touch… this keyboard, a pen, to hold my husband and son’s hand, to pet Agnes and Bode, to eat with utensils, to pick up and play my violin or strum the ukelele with LG, to text a friend or family member.

23. Taste. What if you lived in a world where you couldn’t taste cookie dough, macaroni and cheese, pizza, a glass of Pinot, a salt-rimmed margarita, freshly-baked bread, a flat-white (or a sweet cream cold brew), a birthday cake, french fries, an everything bagel, a perfect caesar salad, mmm. Is it lunchtime?

24. Dr. Schnorr and the Coastal Fertility nurses in Lexington, S.C. Dr. Schnorr’s team introduced us to the wild world of infertility care back in 2015. With their help we came away with four embryos, and despite three embryos/transfers that didn’t work, we got our one miracle rainbow baby, LG. While I wish infertility on nobody, I’m grateful for doctors like Schnorr and his associates who have devoted their lives to helping people pursue their dreams of becoming parents.

25. Dr. Baek. I was referred to our most recent (and third) fertility doctor by two people who went through IVF, and I will be indebted to her (them) for the rest of my life. We are expecting our second child in May 2020 and it’s all because of her infinite knowledge, expertise and diligent monitoring. I went into her office on countless weekends and I was never put in anyone else’s hands. She did every single exam that was needed. I put her name here in case anyone reads this and they’re in Los Angeles and looking for fertility doctors. SHE. IS. IT.

26. My job. I get paid to work from a desk in my home and while we are always trying to improve our budgeting skills, it does afford us many privileges, the one I love most is where we live. I am grateful for a smart and kind manager and a team of people who I respect immensely.

27. RVRNT. My newly-opened local coffee shop and where I began typing this post. I would drive to other towns to support small coffee shops and now we finally have one of our own. It’s laid-back, they know my name (this is becoming a theme) and it’s way more pleasant than tripping over wires and bags at our cramped local Starbucks.

28. Disney. I know it seems strange/funny, but it’s hard to picture a childhood (mine or my son’s) nearly as fun without Mickey, Minnie, Woody and Buzz, and (more recently) Olaf. My son is obsessed and I love it.

29. Electricity. I have to give my man Thomas Edison a shoutout. Where would we be without the lights? It’d be really dark out there.

30. Technology. What can I say, I’m grateful for my phone! Not necessarily all the apps on it, that I admit, can be time-suckers. But for being able to call or text anyone anywhere in the world instantly. And to snap adorable images/videos of my family that will give us joy for many years to come. And for Netflix. Which has helped me get through many a slow work-from-home day these past five-plus years. I’m also grateful for our Amazon Prime account 😀

31. Music. Starting from when I began “following” music and making mix tapes with my friends and when you hoped for “that slow song” at school dances… U2, Madonna, UB40, the Cranberries, Poison, Guns & Roses, Whitney Houston, Nirvana, Green Day, the Samples, Jewel, Dave Matthews Band… moving onto college where I remember my roommate blasting Martina McBride, Reba and Shania Twain… and more recently Taylor Swift, Blake Shelton, Lady Gaga, Adele, Rihanna, Katy Perry, Beyonce… to some classical/musical/movie composer faves Tchaikovsky, Beethoven, Mozart, Barbra Streisand, Sarah Brightman, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Hans Zimmer, John Williams, James Horner and Dario Marianelli.

32. Books for kids, books for me, travel guides, biographies, autobiographies, historical fiction and self-help books. I’m also grateful for libraries and mom-and-pop bookstores bringing us the best books. I tried going digital, but I just didn’t enjoy it like I enjoy opening a physical book.

33. My memory. I recently watched a documentary on Netflix where one of the subjects got in a horrible accident that left him with amnesia. I just couldn’t imagine. While I do suffer from mom brain/brain farts a bit more than I’d like to admit these days, I still have marvelous, juicy memories of my past. And thank goodness. They make me who I am today.

34. Mrs. Smith. She was the bane of my existence in high school, but I attribute a lot of my writing/passion for storytelling to her ruthless hand in English class.

35. Vehicles. They get us to where we need to go, not always on time, but I’ve done countless road trips/moves with our cars and I’m grateful I not only have a car to drive us various places, but that I know how to drive.

36. The Graham Norton show.

37. Our mailman Omar, our garbagemen and the maintenance guys at our apartment complex. Even the UPS/FedEx guys who are always dropping off goodies at our doorstep.

38. Health. My health, my husband’s health, our son’s health. My parents’ health and my in-laws’ health. My brother’s health. I have somehow been lucky/blessed with good health and I know this won’t last forever, so I am trying to not take it for granted.

39. Airplanes, though not necessarily the act of dealing with airports or getting on the plane. How else could I have enjoyed Tahiti, Hawaii, Paris, Tokyo, Ireland, etc.

40. These lyrics from “Olaf’s Frozen Adventure” (song is “When We’re Together):

“Sure, it’s nice to open a gift
That’s tied up with a perfect bow
But the greatest present of all
Was given to me long ago
It’s something I would never trade
It’s the family that we’ve made…
‘Cause when we’re together
I have everything on my list…”

We saw “Frozen 2” over the holiday weekend and I didn’t like any of the songs nearly as much as the one above. It’s a beautiful representation of the true holiday spirit and even though my kid is probably a couple of years away from “getting it,” we’ll sing it loud from the rooftops until he does.

My work day is finished and it’s time for me to get back to the family. I know as soon as I hit publish I will think of other things I’m grateful for. It was easy to think of the big things, but a little bit more challenging/fun to come up with the every day things. A good exercise, too. While they say “don’t sweat the small things,” I’ll say “be grateful for the small things.” They can add up in a big way.

Happy Thanksgiving, all.