Prefacing for Posterity: I'm almost fully recovered from the Cheerio fisaco, and we're back home where the floors aren't hotel-floors, so that's good. But the fact that I am standing at the weekend's door of Kai Patrick's first birthday party (a safari of historic proportions) is not only supremely bittersweet, but also ridiculously, pathetically, freakishly, extraordinarily and extremely chaotic. More on that later. For now: #2 of Part I continued  and concluded ... yippee for us all.

So now that it has been written and broadcast into blogland, it must be true -- I am no longer banishing the concept of Baby #2's conception completely, though if this prospective progeny wants a ticket into this world, it's going to have to be a last-minute, Priceline-stylie flight deal, because if we were to sit here and really premeditate on what it means to exercise complete -- if not despotic -- control over TWO ENTIRE human beings in one lifetime, Gage would already be en route to Dr. Vasily Vasectomy right now. Or there's always:

 
While there are a shazillion reasons people might throw at you for not letting a child suffer through this life sad and siblingless, I say to them: I was an only child, and I am happily well-adjusted on occasion. 

And now for the vacillation:

Parenthood is something for which I studied up good and hard, damnit, and if Kai would be to serve as my sole receptacle for the inordinate amount of information I have amassed on the topic, I'm afraid he'll gurgling over with complexes by way of over-analysis and, basically, because the poor child has been my precious little guinea pig since his conception.

 
I really didn't intend to transform into a:

• babywearing
• no vax-ing
• extending breastfeeding
• Searsian ... Karpian?
  

mom, but now that I am one, am so excited for the opportunity to share with anyone who's receptive to the concept of progressive parenting all that I have learned since I started baking this baby bun in my ovulation oven o' fun.

Now that I find myself quite possibly craving to cradle another newborn, I really do hope there will be an unbiased third party out there who might either reassure me that the second one is half as hard as the first, or, give it to me like it probably is: A second kid is more than twice as hard.

As a good friend once conveyed: Being a parent is easy. Being a good parent is the hardest thing you'll ever do. 

So, let's use this amazing blog tool as a means to connect and be the best parents we can be together, because, as I have found, a strong support system really is the key to not self-immolating.

There you have it -- a MicroCosmic Mama's Manifesto. Seriously, you must be like, "finally ... the end."

See you on the other side of Sunday's safari, assuming I survive.