Allison Cooper

Having a full schedule can be a wonderful thing, but also exhausting and a time suck — sucking time away from you! Take a look at your monthly calendar and plan what is most important to you and your family.

Finding yourself doing extra loads of laundry because your toddler’s favorite T-shirt is dirty and you know there will be the mother of all meltdowns tomorrow if it’s not clean?

Pregnancy changes more than just your body and your emotions: it changes the “stuff” that you need on a daily basis, too. I didn’t realize just how much I needed — or how the packing game had changed — until I needed to place it all neatly into my (now) overflowing suitcase.

So you have made it all the way up to the end of the finish line? Congratulations!

I so firmly believe that everyone should have the freedom to truly be who they are, without limits, and it’s important to me to raise kids who are open and accepting of that, too. Here are five ways I’m raising a gender equal child.

In theory, the concept of a new mom not being able to answer your phone calls and/or texts right away should be self-explanatory...

Yes, it’s a public place, but neither myself or any movie-going patron should have to worry that they might not be able to hear what’s being said on the big screen because a baby is crying. End of story.