The Tassel + Trim team is growing!

If you follow Tassel + Trim on Instagram you may have seen a little announcement—my husband and I are expecting a baby!!!

CHANGES FOR T+T

I’ll be sharing our journey with you as we prep and prepare for the babe. I love organizing and decorating just as much as I love to throw a good party, so you’ll start to see some decor and organization posts on here as we get the house and nursery ready. I’ve also been dreaming of some gifting ideas for little ones—so our product line will be expanding to include more of these gifts and nursery decor items soon! You know you are a small business owner when you use your pregnancy as a test kitchen for new products, haha!

OUR STORY

…I’ve been struggling a bit on how to tell our story. Every time I have tried to type it up I’ve stumbled on what words to use so this is my best attempt (mind you, lettering is my forte— but writing…not so much). Mitch and I have been together for ten years and married for six. We both dreamed of the day we would be parents and always knew that having children was ‘meant for us.’ Only a few years after our relationship began, we already had a baby name list started—and we occasionally added to it throughout the years. We discussed parenting styles, values, number of kids, things we liked/disliked about our own upbringings, and hopes for our little ones’ futures. Our sibling’s families grew and we became the proud aunt and uncle (x8!)—our nieces and nephews filled our lives with so much joy and laughter and confirmed this idea of having children one day.

We both work a lot…I have had a full time job as an Experience Designer and launched Tassel + Trim as my passion project shortly after we married, which then became its own full time job (thanks to all of you amazing humans!) Mitch began his own small business while he was finishing his degree and fully launched upon his graduation, which took off immediately! Work unintentionally became LIFE. We have opposite schedules and get one real quality day together a week. Our priorities quickly shifted to ensuring our marriage and working/responsibility were number one. Family was put on the back burner, and we became really okay with it. We were asked shortly after the vows were exchanged, ‘When are you having kids?!’ we laughed because we knew there was not time for that. We kept telling friends and family ‘next year!’ to ward them off a bit longer—one year turned into 3 and turned into 5…and so on. We actually began secretly trying during all of this and it didn’t quite happen as easily as we thought.

We continued to try for over a year and it just wasn’t happening. At first I was disappointed and saddened and started going down the rabbit hole of what if we can’t get pregnant (I have an auto immune disease which makes this a real possibility). But at the same time, I was also okay with it— I just thought how could I possibly have a baby, launch my career, save for our future, and be a good wife and friend? It felt impossible and the thought of having a baby seemed less dreamy and more overwhelming.

I didn’t even want to share these thoughts with Mitch at first because I thought he may be dissappointed, he is MEANT to be a dad—you can just tell the moment you meet him! Our relationship has always been open and honest, we don’t hold back. So despite my hesitation to share, I opened up to him. He surprisingly shared in my feelings and we both for the first time felt okay with the possibility of not having children—which terrified us as well as helped us remain calm at the thought of infertility all at the same time.

How do you express to people that you are ok with being in the middle? I didn’t know how to explain that even though we yearned for children, we were also perfectly content without them.

We talked about what life would look like if I couldn’t get pregnant—and came to the conclusion of ‘if its meant to be it will be’ and if not we were going to live a life of travel and continue to grow our businesses (adoption also came into the conversation for later down the road in life) We continued to try to conceive and after 3 years, we thought—let’s just see what a fertility doctor has to say (we finally caved into my GYN’s recommendation of making that appointment). If they say we can’t have children—at least we will know and we can carve out what our life looks like with this answer.

Our baby name list still continued to grow and so did our travel bucket list. I started to realize I really did want to become a mom—and that I also wanted to have a successful work life, and remain my husband’s best friend. My heart genuinely burst with happiness for friends announcing their pregnancies and also became a little bit heavier at our potential reality. Just a week after talking about making that fertility appointment, I was watching reality TV (my guilty mindless pleasure) and I found myself ugly crying over two little boys hugging on the show—mid-cry, I paused because I knew in that moment I was pregnant! I rushed to take a test and within minutes a positive popped up. After countless failed tests and a mental-tug-of-war, we were going to be parents. The second Mitch got home from work that night, I told him the news (well, I flung the pregnancy test in his face because I could barely think of a word to say, I was so overwhelmed with emotion!)—we both stared at each other laughing and crying and hugging all at the same time—it was pure bliss as we tried to comprehend what was next to come for us.

I honestly believe that this was the time for us. If we had actually gotten pregnant when we first tried, I don’t think it would have been right—we just couldn’t see that when we were going through it. Now we are in the perfect place for this new little babe to join us. We still are going to travel the heck out of the world while we are still on it. We are both going to still run small businesses. We are going to be parents. And we are welcoming the crazy, messy, chaotic and beautiful life that is to come with open arms.

YOU DO YOU

To all of the women out there: the mama working full time in an office, the mom working from home or with a side hustle, the woman that knows kids are not for her, the woman that wants a child but it just isn’t happening, the stay at home mom, the woman who just feels lost, the woman who just isn’t sure what she wants but is taking it day by day, the woman who is just rocking life right where she is etc. You are right where you should be. There will unfortunately always be ‘Well, when are you having children? When are you getting married? Why aren’t you engaged? Are you going to work after the baby?’ and a million other unnecessary comments and questions in your life—guess what—its your life and no one else’s. There is no blueprint or right way to live it. It’s ok to want more at the exact same time that you are content with where you are at. Ditch what you think society is telling you to do, look, feel…and just be. When you let go of others preconceived notions of how you should live your life, it all just seems to fall into place. And wherever that place is, it’s a beautiful place to be.