Инстаграм Эрин Лохнер

erinloechner We're still here. And you. It’s enough. What else? Turtle habitats on the dining room table, self portraits on the fridge. The coffee has gone cold. There’s a positive pregnancy test in the bathroom trash can. Phone calls, plans rejiggered, subsequent three months in a fog. But then: stick puppets this morning, banana bread for dinner. Soon, the sun. It's enough. What else?

erinloechner Parents of littles:⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ I know a lot of you are (a) stuck indoors with small children, (b) trying to keep your kids busy while schools are canceled, or (c) attempting to work from home with littles underfoot.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ And in a time where so many of us feel helpless, this is a small way I can help.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ To support all quarantined families, my homeschooling curriculum @othergoose is 100% free for the next 3 weeks. Just use the link below, create a profile for your kids' ages (2-7 yrs), and get started with super simple, no-fuss, easy to implement ideas or lessons for the kids to try each and every day.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ Use what you need, for as long as you need it. No pressure, no expectation. ⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ Here's your link:⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⁠⠀ https://othergoose.com/free/ ⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ Stay safe, friends.

erinloechner Want to hear something top-notch selfish?⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ I blog for myself. It’s not a sales funnel, or a secret mission, or one small sliver of my thirty-year-plan. It’s just that I do it every morning because I’ve always done it every morning, and it changes me for the better.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ I write daily, in a chilly room with big windows a scratchy wool blanket, space heater at my feet. It is quiet. There is coffee.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ And that’s it. I open a new post and I write whatever is on my mind, whatever I want to – or rather, whatever I need to. I write about bruised knees and bruised egos, and I write what I want to remember most about this very season of raising children and raising myself.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ I publish perhaps 1% of this, because the lines get blurry when my story edges into someone else’s, and because relevance is less important to me than reverence.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ And it’s a gift to publish it, truly. It’s a gift to send it all out into ether and have it returned to me a hundredfold. It’s a gift to read your sweet comments, your kind and encouraging words. It’s a gift, it’s a gift, it’s a gift.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ --⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ I know this is a time of year in which announcements are often made, changes often outlined. I know it’s proper to shake things up right about now, to start capitalizing on rich SEO terms – keto meal plans and coatigans. I know I should be rounding up the top wallpaper trends to look forward to, or 20 parenting books to add to your arsenal.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ I should be using this space for more, it is taught.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ And yet: this feels like just enough. You and me and stories, the backbone of our everydays unfettered by fluff. It feels right to assume you need no help from me in determining your daily outfits, or how to care for your fiddleleaf. It feels right to think you’re here for the same reasons I’m here – to shove the rest to the side and return to the basics, or at least to make a crack at it.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ And so, here, I suppose the state of this space is the same as it has always been: both mine and yours. I promise to write when I can, to publish what I can, to attempt to learn from the both of it.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ More in “State⁠ of the Blog, Sort Of” --> www.designformankind.com⁠⠀

erinloechner I'm not much of a #wordoftheyear gal. In truth, I'm simply far too wordy to narrow it down. 😉⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ But I do have a few marks to aim for these days, and one of them is this.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ I'd like to sit down to have the harder convo instead of running away from discomfort. To sit still and watercolor with the kids instead of peeking over their shoulder on my way to the laundry room. To sit in the waiting room with a crossword, not a phone.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ I'd like to sit with my bad mood for a second.⁠⠀ I'd like to sit with my kids' bad moods for a second. ⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ I'd like to sit with what I stand for. ⁠⠀ To sit below the salt, not in the catbird seat. ⁠⠀ To sit in for someone who needs it.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ I want to sit and enjoy lunch, not stand-and-shovel-leftovers.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ I want to sit down and pipe down.⁠⠀ I want to sit up and listen up.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ Mostly this: ⁠⠀ I want to sit next to, not across from.⁠⠀ By not above.⁠⠀ Close up, not closed off.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ ⁠⠀

erinloechner #thegoodlist | flour on the floor, wool on the feet. when your dentist helps with your crossword.

erinloechner Want to write with me in 2020?⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ You might’ve noticed I fell way, way silent last year. After the incredibly kind response of Chasing Slow, I wanted to see what it would mean to write for me again. Not for another book (yet), or a blog post, or an Insta caption. For my eyes only. No filtering, fluffing, or fixing allowed.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ And so began A Year of Reflection, where I sat down weekly with 1 simple passage to read (Keats! Sagan! Woolf!) and just 2 journaling prompts to reflect on. Achingly simple, astoundingly profound.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ What I hoped would happen: I'd learn to hear myself.⁠ I'd break patterns. I'd finally learn what I wanted, not⁠⠀ what I wanted to want.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ What actually happened: That - and everything⁠⠀ else.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ I didn't expect a byproduct of confidence, this complete and unwavering clarity. I didn't expect improved writing, or braver conversations around the dinner table. Heck, I didn't expect to quietly untether myself from social media - but alas, wild things happen when you put pen to paper.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ So, round two. I'm doing it again, my simple 20 min practice each week. But this time, I want you to join me.⁠⠀ ⁠⠀ Details are in my Stories, or you can head here: --> www.designformankind.com/journal/

erinloechner My best #topnine moments never made it to this grid, and I know yours didn’t either. A toddler’s lisp, backyard strawberries, the timeworn sweater draped on his hook. Let it always be this: a commitment to the sacred in front of us, uncropped, uncaged - tonight, tomorrow, beyond. ⁣ ⁣ In Colombia, it’s customary to walk around the block carrying an empty suitcase at midnight. In Greece, you might whack your kid with an onion. Here, we dance with guinea pigs and fall asleep by eleven.⁣ ⁣ However you’re celebrating tonight, may it be ever yours, for yours alone. Happy 2020 to you.💫

erinloechner #thegoodlist | dessert before breakfast, a 12-hour snooze. watercoloring the astronaut.

erinloechner #thegoodlist | canceling plans for cold meds and slippers. tetley in the kettle, toast on the way.

erinloechner #thegoodlist | polar bear dens, tinsel in the vacuum. saying yes to the juggling lessons.😉

erinloechner A New Year’s pep talk:⠀ ⠀ I pretty much think you’re fine just the way you are.⠀ ⠀ Sure, you might benefit from a crash course in assertiveness. It might do you some good to cut the sugar, to read the classics, to schedule yourself a detox bath twice a week.⠀ ⠀ But it might not.⠀ ⠀ It might just make you feel gloriously defeated when you fall into bed at the end of the night to find Catcher In The Rye gathering dust (again).⠀ ⠀ It might offer the false assumption that you are what you do, that you’re only as strong as your weakest habit, that you’re incapable of change.⠀ ⠀ I don’t believe this to be true.⠀ ⠀ I think there is inherent worth in change, and I think there is inherent worth in the decision NOT to change.⠀ ⠀ I think there is a certain beauty in taking stock of yourself, in peering into your own green eyes, in surveying the wrinkles and the grays and your innermost imperfections and saying to you and you alone: You know, NOT BAD.⠀ ⠀ Perhaps you’re still sensitive, still a thin skin. You still eat too much cheese. You still forget to exfoliate. You still need an Introvert Time Out at family functions. You still can’t multi-task, still haven’t mastered a yoga headstand, still haven’t learned all of the words to We Didn't Start the Fire.⠀ ⠀ Maybe you weren’t meant to yet. ⠀ Maybe you weren’t meant to at all. ⠀ ⠀ Maybe you were given your precise body, your very nose, that freckle on your left knee, as little more than a means to wander and watch and observe something larger than yourself – flawed eyes in a flawed world. Perhaps this isn’t about you, not really. (Perhaps it never was.)⠀ ⠀ In a month where we’re encouraged to pick apart bits of ourselves, may we step back and see the landscape we're given. May we resist the arrival checkpoint, plunge deep into a sea of grace.⠀ ⠀ For ourselves.⠀ And mostly, for each other.⠀ ⠀ ⠀ Happy New Year, friends. ⠀ ⠀ ⠀ ⠀ ⠀

erinloechner Listen: there are many voices whispering into the ears of new(ish) parents, particularly around Christmastime: "Make the memory! Seize the day! We have only seventeen Decembers left before they’re out the door forever!"⠀ ⠀ But if you've got little ones, can I offer something else? ⠀ ⠀ This is not the time for extravagant gingerbread houses, for downtown lighting ceremonies, for late night caroling. We’re still eating-leftovers-while-standing-by-the-sink, after all. Still stashing back-up pacifiers in our coat pocket, our glove compartment, the cup holders. Still attempting a finished sentence. Still finding avocado in our hair. We’re still waking all hours of the night, still teaching our babies that we will bend for them, that the weight of their cries will not end us. That we will still rise in the morning, a little tired, a little disheveled, eyes half mast.⠀ ⠀ (I believe this is a lesson far greater than sugar cookies.)⠀ ⠀ You might see other parents weaving through nativity scenes, nary a tantrum in sight. You might see bundled up kids sledding down hills. You might see mothers smiling at their dressed-up angel in the Christmas program.⠀ ⠀ You might want to wish this time away so the magic can begin. ⠀ ⠀ But I think the magic's already here. In the midst of a swirling, larger-than-life season, we’ve been offered small babies, small children. And although the world has a tendency to usher them into bigness, I think we’ve got it backwards. We need only to let them be small, and to let ourselves be small with them.⠀ ⠀ I see many of us burdened – parents and nonparents alike – weary, thickened with responsibility and grief, or sheer overwhelm. Many of us left feeling hopeless, by our own circumstances, by others.⠀ ⠀ At times, it seems there’s no room for much else – Christmas magic or otherwise.⠀ ⠀ But perhaps that’s the point.⠀ For when there was no more room, we were given a stable.⠀ ⠀ May we all offer space for a quiet blessing this year: a gentle word, a fresh promise, a kind deed (a long nap). May we know it when we see it, swaddled and sure.⠀ ⠀ ⠀ p.s. Tag a parent-of-littles for some weekend encouragement, would you?

erinloechner Here's the thing.👇🏻⠀ ⠀ We are not here on this vast green earth to get stuff done. We're not here to power through a to do list, to bask in our sense of accomplishment, to wield a perfectly-organized spice rack.⠀ ⠀ No. We are here for one thing, and one thing alone: each other.⠀ ⠀ For all the day planners and dream makers and goal setters, may we never fail to include margin for others. To answer the door at the most inconvenient of times. To cart our grandmother to and from the airport, to babysit the lizard (again), to bake the just-because bread, to deliver it to someone we don't understand. ⠀ ⠀ May we ask the waitress about her tattoo; listen to her answer. Hold the umbrella. Wipe down the sink. Mail the card.⠀ ⠀ May we resist the urge to spend days, months, years successfully whittling down our lives in the name of productivity. Instead, may we consider a few priorities: the element of surprise, sweat on our brow, a good old-fashioned inconvenience for the sake of another.⠀ ⠀ ⠀ (All others.)⠀ (Every single other.)⠀ ⠀ ⠀ That, indeed, will be a day well spent.

erinloechner "You put a rock climbing wall in the bedroom?"⠀⁣⁣⁣ ⠀⁣⁣⁣ We did. ⠀⁣⁣⁣ ⠀⁣⁣⁣ Like most good ideas in our family, this one was Ken’s, a total hit for 4 years strong. Every kid we know sneaks in here to climb all over the place, growing mini Tarzan calves left and right. For those of you who've asked, here's the (super simple) tutorial:⠀⁣⁣⁣ ⠀⁣⁣⁣⠀⁣⁣⁣ Materials⠀⁣⁣⁣ ⠀⁣⁣⁣ 2×4’s (either new or scrap)⠀⁣⁣⁣ 3 inch construction screws⠀⁣⁣⁣ Power drill with 1/8 inch bit⠀⁣⁣⁣ Screw gun⠀⁣⁣⁣ Stud finder⠀⁣⁣⁣ Saw⠀⁣⁣⁣ Sheet of 80 grit sand paper⠀⁣⁣⁣ Painter’s tape⠀⁣⁣⁣ ⠀⁣⁣⁣ Instructions⠀⁣⁣⁣ 1️⃣Cut the 2×4’s on a miter saw (or a hand saw if that's what you've got) no less than 4.5 inches in length. Cut into desired geometric shapes to create “rocks.” (A note from Ken: Keep the integrity of the wood in mind while planning your shapes to be sure you won’t split the piece while hanging or climbing.)⠀⁣⁣⁣ 2️⃣Sand all sharp edges down with 80 grit sand paper (using a palm sander will save a ton of time here, but you can just use your hands if you’d like.) NOTE: Do this outdoors or sneeze forever.⠀⁣⁣⁣ 3️⃣Find your wall’s studs and tape a dotted line with painter’s tape to easily mark the studs.⁣ 4️⃣Hold piece firmly against the wall to first pre-drill each “rock” down the center in two places, in line with your marked stud with both pre-drilled holes at 3/4 – 1 inch from each end. Then, use your drill to screw the construction screws through the pre-drilled holes of the wood and directly into the wall to secure each “rock.” Use caution when screwing to ensure wood does not split (if any piece seems to be splitting, do not keep this as a “rock” – start over with a new piece!). Make sure “rock” is completely flat against the wall.⠀⁣⁣⁣ 5️⃣Continue placing “rocks” in a desired pattern by choice; some of ours are close together for toddler feet, but feel free to challenge yourself!⠀⁣⁣⁣ ⠀⁣⁣⁣ Happy climbing, friends! Tag a handy friend or spouse to tackle this one with - it's totally worth it! 💪🏻

erinloechner Whenever I travel to speak to a group of women, I like to wear my grandmother's dress.⠀⁣ ⠀⁣ She'd always wanted to be a nurse, but was married by 17 and pregnant by 18, and a woman with a baby couldn't attend university like "the other girls." ⠀⁣ ⠀⁣ So she went to night school instead.⠀⁣ ⠀⁣ By day, she read The Little Prince. ⠀⁣ By night, she read Taber's Medical Dictionary.⠀⁣ ⠀⁣ By day, she changed diapers.⠀⁣ By night, she changed tourniquets.⠀⁣ ⠀⁣ Slowly but surely, she became a nurse.⠀⁣ ⠀⁣ In a generation that prided itself on following the rules, on fluffing the pillows, on women in curlers, I'm so glad she bent the rules a little. Chose rogue over rouge. Went her own way.⠀⁣ ⠀⁣ This week, I flew to Chattanooga to speak to a group of women about just that: going their own way.⠀⁣ ⠀⁣ I wore my grandmother's dress and I shared that I no longer think of integrity as what you do when no one is watching. I think of integrity as what you do when YOU are watching. When you're paying attention to your wholeness. When you are striving for integration, when you are living from an undivided place. When you are paying attention to the people around you, whether changing diapers or tourniquets.⠀⁣ ⠀⁣ Here's the truth:⠀⁣ Your life is not a distraction from your work.⠀⁣ Your work is not a distraction from your life.⠀⁣ ⠀⁣ Your life IS the work.⠀⁣ ⠀⁣ And I know this because I laid my grandmother to rest last week. And when all of her granddaughters offered a eulogy, each and every one of us spoke of how grateful we are that Mary Frances chased her dream.⠀⁣ ⠀⁣ And I feel like the natural thing to tell you here is that life is short so you should chase your dream, too. And yes, I believe that to be true.⠀⁣ ⠀⁣ But what I REALLY want to tell you here is that life is short, so pay attention to the people around you. ⠀⁣ ⠀⁣ Gift someone else your attention today. Listen to them. Learn from them. Be present for them. Be a part of their stories.⠀⁣ ⁣ That’s how we can transform our work. ⠀⁣ That’s how we can transform our lives. ⠀⁣ ⠀⁣ For however many years we’re given at either.⠀⁣ ⠀⁣ ⠀⁣ p.s. Tag a woman you’re learning from today, will you? May our legacies include one another.

erinloechner This is 36.⁣ ⁣ And also 24, and 11, and 5. My favorite Didion words: "I think we are well-advised to keep on nodding terms with the people we used to be, whether we find them attractive company or not."⁣ ⁣ Early this year, I kicked off a quiet experiment to revisit my own nodding terms. I sat down and made a list of things I once loved, treasured, honored. Ideals I'd believed in. Rituals to carry the young. Then: I celebrated them throughout the year in odd little bursts. ⁣ ⁣ I ate gummy worms for dinner in honor of 4-year-old me. Listened to Freebird with the windows down to comfort a grief-midst 16-year-old me. Went forest bathing, a hat tip to the 8-year-old me who couldn't bear to leave the backyard maple. Peeled glue from an Elmer's bottle cap, showed the kids how to Mod-Podge a Lisa Frank journal, dressed as Boy George for every age of me between. ;)⁣ ⁣ Today is 36. I'm working on some new collaborative curriculum for @othergoose. Later, I'll walk to the library to ask for the new Maggie O'Farrell. At some point, there will be goat cheese.⁣ ⁣ I know now that our years don't leave us, but we often leave them. We trick ourselves into growing up, assuming "up" is the only way forward. But it isn't.⁣ ⁣ Another way is through.

erinloechner I’m not the Vegas friend. Listen, I don’t think I’ll ever be the gal you call for a wild night out with martinis and stilettos. I’ve never once gone clubbing, am forever confusing DMX for Run-DMC. Fact: the only hand stamp I’ve ever sported was a star for good sportsmanship on an elementary school field day. I’m not fun, is what I’m saying. But I am the gal you can call when your world falls apart and you need a good couch cry under a soft blanket with some cinnamon tea. And when you left your passport at home and need it overnighted to the Mirage? On my way, girl. Just for fun: what kind of friend are you? I wanna hear! And while you’re at it, tag your gals and tell ‘em what you love about them! Ready, set, GO! 👇🏻

erinloechner I have a story for you. ⠀ ⠀ When my grandmother passed away last fall, my mother handed out copies of her journals to all three of us daughters. I read every page, some over eggs with Bee, others over tears in bed. When I finished, I met my grandmother - a woman I lived in the midst of for over 35 years - for the very first time.⠀ ⠀ The grandmother I knew was of the seen-not-heard generation. The "If you don't have anything nice to say..." crowd. She was tight-lipped and even-tempered and knew her way around the kitchen, her garden, the Elder Beerman department store.⠀ ⠀ I never once saw her lose her temper, not even when she slaved over a homemade stew for an entire afternoon and I - in all of my 8-year-old empowerment - had the audacity to declare Dinty Moore's version better. Not even when I knocked over my RC Cola onto her Racko deck. Not even when I stomped on her prize tulips in a rousing Julie Andrews interpretation of "The Hills Are Alive."⠀ ⠀ And so, you'd be as surprised as I was to find that she was a rebel in her mind. The Baptist-church-leavin', Adrienne-Rich-readin', night-school-goin’ rebel. ⠀ ⠀ I wish I would have known that part of her, too: the fears, the doubts. Disappointment. I wonder what I might have learned earlier had she proclaimed it beyond her journals.⠀ ⠀ There is much to be said for self control. For wisdom. For quiet strength. And there is also much to be said for letting ourselves be seen. All of us. The faults and furies, the terrific injustices. May we resist the narrative that deep breaths are a balm for heartache, that we must gasp into air masks alone, that self care and “me” time are the answer, that our pantries are deep enough to contain a multitude of emotion simmering just under our ribs.⠀ ⠀ We can yell over tulips, and we can ask forgiveness over Racko.⠀ The world will not end.⠀ (It might even, instead, begin.)⠀ ⠀ May our daughters learn that we are women, wholly unafraid of heartbreak and chaos. May we cut loose, show our cards, lose our grip. May we come to our wit’s end every now and again, show our daughters how to find a new beginning.⠀ ⠀ May our children be seen. ⠀ May they be heard.⠀ ⠀ And may we show them how.⠀

erinloechner In the grocery store, my second year of college. I’m standing in the checkout lane, a cart full of “necessities” – a new shower curtain liner, shaving cream, Special K. I scan the rack displaying magazines and gum, flip through the latest issue of Glamour.⁣ ⁣ A woman with my grandmother’s earrings waits in line behind me, tsk-tsking at the cover I’m holding.⁣ ⁣ “Smoother thighs? Better breasts? What are we, chickens?” ⁣ I laugh in solidarity, put the magazine back on the shelf.⁣ ⁣ —⁣ ⁣ Today, I realize I haven’t picked up another one since.

erinloechner "I used to be worried about black holes," Bee once told me. "What do you worry about?" she asks.⁣ ⁣ My answer is everything.⁣ ⁣ I am worried I’ll lose something trivial, like that one morning when the pacifier fell somewhere in the grocery and I desperately scanned the store for a full five minutes, the toddler offering tired shrieks in the pasta aisle, in the toilet paper aisle, in the deli section. When we found it, by the carts, after his shrieks had diminished to hiccups, I worried I didn’t have the wet wipes with me.⁣ ⁣ I am worried that I’ll lose the important things, too. Her trust, her faith. His sense of security, his lightness. I am worried that the harsh words I lobbed yesterday squelched the hundreds of kind ones I’ve offered for years.⁣ ⁣ There is a daily influx of the vainglorious worries, too, in which I am worried the toddler eats too much salami, that we don’t get enough fresh air, that I bend too much to his whims, that I don’t bend nearly enough to her whimsy. I worry I’m not doing enough science projects with her, not reading enough to him. If there’s an emergency, does she know our address? Did I order enough outlet covers? Is the trampoline safe?⁣ ⁣ Are we?⁣ ⁣ I worry for the inevitable and I worry over the already-happened. I worry that when they’re 25 and 29 they won’t come home for Christmas – or worse, that they will but won’t want to.⁣ ⁣ I worry over keeping them too close, holding them too tight. I worry, of course, over letting them go.⁣ ⁣ And while I no longer worry about black holes, I do worry on cloudier days that I – the whole I – might always be a shadow to them, fully unknowable, entirely a stranger. "Who is my mother?," they will wonder at the woman chopping strawberries in the kitchen, and I worry I will not know, either.⁣ ⁣ —⁣ ⁣ There is little antidote once the fears rush in. But when you’re in the presence of a wise 6-year-old, you give her toast with her egg and you ask her what she does when she starts to worry about black holes, and she will smash bits of avocado with a fork as she tells you this:⁣ ⁣ "There’s not really anything I do. I just feel it. Then I go play."