Romance, Family, and Skis

They say variety is the spice of life - and we've certainly been following this maxim in February! After filling our January weekends with family adventures in the Big Apple, we opted for some different activities this month. 

We started February off with a bang by teaching Lana to ski at a local resort. I couldn't ski myself, but watching and teaching was super-rewarding. Seth also brought his little brother, another first-time skier. We certainly had our hands full teaching both kids the basics. 

The following day, my parents took us out for a belated Seth birthday brunch at The Whitlock in Katonah, which was soooo delicious. After the restaurant, we returned home to watch the Super Bowl. Seth had made a wonderful chili recipe, but we were all too stuffed to eat very much of it! 

The next weekend we took a short trip to the Berkshires, where the leadership team of the nonprofit I work for was having a long-overdue retreat. One of our members even flew in from Ukraine! We enjoyed delicious food and productive discussions. Meanwhile, Seth took Lana to explore a children's museum nearby and go ice skating. We stayed in a charming little New England-style house and enjoyed the storybook snowy surroundings. 

Then, before we knew it, it was Valentine's Day, which fell right at the start of Presidents' Day weekend this year. For us, Valentine's Day isn't just a cheesy Hallmark holiday - it's our anniversary :) 2020 marks 13 years together.

To avoid the weekend craziness, we went out on Wednesday night to Cafe Carlyle, a cabaret-style venue that serves dinner and hosts various performers in a super-intimate space. We saw Broadway actress Stephanie Block, who sang various love-themed songs and even brought her husband up on stage for a duet! For some reason, I always end up having bad luck / experiencing misadventures when going about my life, but this night was an exception. We had no issues driving there or back, we got the best table in the entire room, the food was delicious, and the experience was overall incredibly romantic and special.

On Valentine's Day itself, I brought Lana over to my parents' for the weekend and enjoyed a delicious lunch with my family. That evening, Seth and I did our traditional indoor picnic (yummy meats and cheeses, strawberries, and gourmet chocolates Seth got me from Houston). We watched The Dressmaker, which is not quite a romantic film, but certainly an excellent one. 

For the rest of the weekend, we tried to be responsible and take care of some household tasks, but we also found time for a quick trip to the city to do some museum hopping. We saw a couple of amazing fashion exhibits, had lunch (valiantly avoiding the temptations of dessert), and strolled across the park. 

It's funny to consider that, a couple of months ago, I was telling Seth about the many dreary winter weekends that would await us when the holidays ended. "However shall we fill the time?" I fretted. Well, it looks like we didn't have much trouble!

Alas, I do not envision the next couple of months to be as adventurous - I am officially in the 3rd trimester of pregnancy and I am definitely feeling it. Sundry aches and pains are foiling my adventurous plans, and energy levels are dropping. My bump is getting quite big, which makes me very glad I did a professional maternity photo shoot last week, when it was still relatively cute and compact! But, even if these last months of pregnancy are rather low-key, I do have some exciting things to look forward to, such as my baby shower (more details on that later!)

Grabbing January by the Horns

All in all, January can be kind of a letdown. The holiday fun has ended. The days are short and the weather miserable, with many dreary weeks to go before spring arrives. 

As a kid, I certainly subscribed to this uncharitable view of the year's inaugural month. When you're 12, there are few sounds less pleasant than the jarring ring of the 6:00AM weekday alarm clock after the bacchanalia of Christmas break. But more recently, Seth and I have recast January in a more positive light - as a rare opportunity to start the year off right, to begin writing a new story for a new year before life inevitably gets in the way of our vision. 

We've filled the last month with the kinds of experiences that we love most - the things that make our family uniquely ours. Here are some highlights:

(1) Family adventures! 

Over the past few years, we've perfected the Manoff formula for a day out, and this month we got to indulge in 3 different weekend trips to NYC. On the first, an unseasonably warm Saturday with temperatures in the 60s, we checked out a renovated playground in Central Park, had a picnic lunch, and introduced Lana to the Guggenheim (or "the spiral museum")

The next weekend, the weather was bitterly cold (as in, it hurt to be outside). But we were eager for adventure. Initially, we'd been slated to travel to DC to celebrate Seth's birthday, but had to cancel at the last minute due to threats of snow and Lana's iffy health. So, we made up for the disappointment by exploring new places closer to home. 

One day, we took Lana to The Jewish Museum for a children's exhibit tour, art activity, and concert, followed by lunch at the famed Russ & Daughters (located right inside the museum). It was a great way to combine food, culture, and play without having to leave the building! 

Then, we walked up the street to the Cooper Hewitt, where the exhibits focused on futuristic design and Lana enjoyed designing her own digital wallpaper, using motion sensors and AI emotion recoginition tools, and learning about a man who decided to spend several days living as a goat. 

The following day, we drove to Midtown West for another children's concert, this one focusing on various types of music made popular by African Americans (in honor of MLK day). Lana danced by the stage to Motown tunes, jazz, and zydeco. For Seth and me, this concert was particularly special because it was held at the Actor's Temple, a Jewish temple / performance space where we'd held our Jewish wedding ceremony nearly a decade ago. It was our first time back at the temple after the wedding, so we had fun reminiscing. I wondered how past Seth and past Katerina would have reacted had they'd been told that they would be returning to the temple many years later with their amazing kiddo :) 

After the show, we checked out a public art exhibit consisting of large functional seesaws. Finally, we made an unexpected detour to a Victorian cafe/pub/restaurant with the coolest decor when Lana fell asleep in her stroller. 

For our third adventure, we were back on the Upper East Side again, this time checking out the Museum of the City of New York, Mexican for lunch, and a short walk in the beautiful gardens of northern Central Park, which is still my favorite part of the park due to the lack of crowds. 

The museum had an interesting exhibit about NYC landmarks, which included many places we hadn't been yet and inspired me to plan future adventures in my mind. Lana's favorite part was the historic dollhouse. 

(2) Food 

Another thing our family loves is cooking and eating good food. We generally like to try several new recipes each week. This month, we challenged ourselves to stay extra-healthy with mostly plant-based recipes and a 100% sugar-free diet. It was very needed after the excesses of the holidays and the babymoon, but soooo hard. So I made a special effort to make delicious meals that would help us miss sugar less. Lots of hearty dishes for the cold days: farro-leek soup flavored with pancetta, butternut squash red lentil soup, cauliflower nachos, rosemary farro stew...but also colorful smoothies and salads.

Lana also joined our culinary tradition using her new picture-heavy cookbook that she got for Christmas. She made "pretend soup" (fruit and yogurt) and French toast (yes, it was sugar free!) and helped me with a frittata, even suggesting her own ingredients. 

One exception to the no-sugar rule: I made a pavlova for Seth's birthday, which was a first for me. I generally fear stiff peaks and avoid any recipe that involves beating egg whites to this elusive consistency. But I'd promised Seth to make any dessert he asked for, and he requested pavlova, so I decided to go for it. It was surprisingly easy and turned out delicious!

(3) Bonding with Lana

As Lana grows older, it's more and more fun to hang out with her. I can't honestly say I enjoyed most of the games she played as a toddler. But now, there are plenty of activities that we both truly like - her art-themed memory games, learning to read with her new letter blocks from Ukraine, YouTube drawing tutorials, crafts projects from her monthly Koala box, scavenger hunts, and more. It's also fun to sit back and watch her pretend play, from the shows she puts on for Seth and me to elaborate scenarios with her dolls and stuffed animals. 

So, this month featured many quiet hours at home playing with Lana.

(4) Couple Time! 

Seth and I had a rare treat this month - going out to a big party. A real party, with dancing! The occasion was Malanka, a Ukrainian new year celebration that happens toward the end of January (I am not sure why). A friend was organizing a table and invited us to join. As an introvert/nerd, I was hesitant, but also recognized how rarely we had a chance to go out and dance. So, we RSVPd yes and ended up having a really fun time eating, dancing, and chatting. (Obviously, my dancing was limited due to the pregnancy, but still awesome). It felt like a redemption after our disastrous attempt to go to a party in Florida on actual New Year's Eve (that's a story for another time). 

Seth and I also watched a few great movies together as we both got caught up in the Oscar buzz. It was fun discovering movies that I wouldn't normally watch, like Parasite and The Two Popes. And, we resurrected our tradition together with a philanthropy guidebook called Giving Done Right, which I got him for his birthday.

I should mention that we were all sick so much this past month. Lana got sick just before New Years, I returned from Miami not feeling well, Lana got sick shortly after I got better, then Seth was briefly sick and I got sick AGAIN, and so on. Preschool germs plus weak pregnant immune system are not a good combination, and we also spent a lot of time sleeping, drinking tea, and taking it easy. But I am grateful to report that the viruses didn't stop us from having an amazing month!

The Story of 2019

When a year ends, I like to send it off with a story. To take 365 days of successes and snafus and lessons learned, get-togethers and professional challenges, adventures near and far and quiet days at home...to take these disparate threads and weave them into a coherent whole.

Some years are easier than others. The year I got married. The year we moved to Cambridge for my Master's program. The year I became a mother.

2019 is harder to define. It was an incredibly full year. Stuffed to the brim with experiences but not defined by any dominant narrative arc. So, as we welcomed the new decade in sunny Florida, I felt confused.

2019 was the year of my first published pieces in major national outlets, the year I pushed myself to try totally new and challenging types of writing, from social commentary to investigative journalism.

2019 also opened the doors to my other professional passion - nonprofit work in Ukraine. I built a college counseling program that helped talented Ukrainian students beat overwhelming college admissions odds. Only a tiny fraction of colleges offer aid to international applicants; among those, acceptance rates for high-need students hover around 1%-3%. In comparison, 75% of my students were accepted in 2019

2019 marked the launch of the Metelyk Grant, my first direct philanthropic effort. I learned how to be a grantmaker from scratch and supported 7 youth-led social projects across Ukraine. Working on the grant was doubly rewarding because I launched it in partnership with Seth; learning to work together on a professional level offered its own unique set of challenges and payoffs. The high demand for the grant led us to turn it into a foundation, which will hopefully continue funding promising Ukrainian nonprofits every year.

The final big professional step I took last year was returning to grad school. I applied and was accepted to a master's program in Marriage and Family Therapy, a subject that has fascinated me for years. I've wanted to continue my education for a while, but it never seemed like a good time. Now, given that I will not be returning to the formal workforce for a few years, I finally decided to go for it.

Which brings me to the reason I don't foresee a full-time job in my near future: baby #2, currently known as Munchie! After a full year of trying, I finally got pregnant in 2019, and now Lana is eagerly awaiting her little sister.

Ahead of Munchie's arrival, we've been fully enjoying life as a family of three with adventures near and far. We've been planning family adventures whenever we have a free weekend - exploring culture, food, and the outdoors both in NYC and small suburban towns in our area. Over the past year, we've discovered independent bookstores, cool playgrounds, hidden gem museums, yummy desserts, and much more.

We've also ventured further afield, visiting family in CT, New Jersey, Philadelphia, and Baltimore for various holidays and milestones with our loved ones. Spending more time with family was a primary reason for moving back to the East Coast back in 2017 and we've certainly taken advantage of the proximity to so many relatives.

And, of course, it wouldn't be a year in the Manoff family without some travels. We started off the year with a couples getaway to Stratton - a throwback to our very first ski trip almost a decade ago. In February, we explored Charleston over a long weekend, this time with Lana in tow, and then Lana and I took a detour to Charlotte to visit our cousins.

Perhaps my favorite trip of the year was in May - Seth and I visited Copenhagen and Amsterdam, with a quick stopover in Hamburg. On this trip, we reached the pinnacle of food tourism, trying more many incredible meals than I thought possible. And of course, we took in plenty of European art and architecture - this time with a northern twist.

In June, I planned a 4-generation getaway to a beach house in Long Island, a rare opportunity to travel with my grandparents. My mom joined for part of the trip as well. Fortunately, our house was quite large - and all the extra travelers meant lots of help with Lana. It was a wonderfully relaxing week of wine tasting, al fresco dining, and relaxing on the beach.

In July, I drove to Canada by myself for a conference - my first solo trip in a while, and, to be frank, a really tough experience, mainly because I got really sick almost the minute I arrived. But I am so glad that I didn't shy away from the challenge. I used to be quite independent back in the day, and it was nice to recapture some of that solo strength and spirit, even though I still vastly prefer being with others.

Later in the summer, we tried yet another new kind of trip - sharing a house in Maine with another family. It was a bit more challenging than we expected, but we are really glad we tried traveling this way! Also, more beach time never hurt anyone and we made some more amazing culinary discoveries. (This was the last week before I discovered my pregnancy, so I enjoyed much wine and cocktails...enough to last me the end of the year, I guess!)

On the way back from Maine, we made a stopover in the Berkshires to visit a friend and check out the gorgeous scenery. We liked it so much that we immediately planned an adults-only return trip for the fall. Overcoming my morning sickness, we hiked, checked out historic homes, and enjoyed the wonderful hospitality of my friend and her husband.

And, of course, we rounded out the year with a super-indulgent holiday babymoon in Florida, splitting a week between St. Petersburg and Miami. It was a perfect vacation for a lazy pregnant person who wants to do some sightseeing but also relax on the beach.

Seth (gently) suggested that maybe we travel too much. He might be right, but I love it!

2019 was a big year for Lana as well. She learned to skate, which is now one of her biggest talents, started learning to read and write, and began attending full-day preschool (which meant that I had to adjust to nanny-less life for the first time in a while). She has also grown up so much, from a cute toddler to an incredibly mature little person, who continues to amaze us with her emotional intelligence, sweetness, creativity, hilarious 4-year-old logic, and a seemingly bottomless capacity for love. After seeing how wonderful Lana has turned out, I can't wait to discover what Manoff baby v2.0 will look like ;)

Finally, Seth made a huge decision this year that will have consequences for the whole family - he is leaving his job and taking a sabbatical. Since he has spent most of the past decade working extremely hard, I am so excited for him to get the break he deserves and spend some more time with Lana and me.

So, coming back to the main question - what was 2019 all about? I think it was a year of building - specifically, building our foundation for the decade ahead. 

Since Seth and I have been together, nearly every year has been defined by a major life change: graduating college and getting engaged (2009), getting married (2010), grad school/new job/new city (2011), graduating grad school/new jobs/back to old city (2012), new jobs yet again (2013), moving cross-country and new job for me (2014), becoming parents (2015), becoming a published writer/blogger/entrepreneur/Ukranian nonprofit advisor and buying a house (2016), moving back to the East Coast and reshuffling my professional life once again after the startup I worked for went bust (2017).

By 2018, we finally seemed to be settled. No moves; no major job changes; no new family members. I took a breath and then immediately decided to use my newfound free time and energy to pursue my love of travel before I got caught up in life's demands and changes once more.

So, 2018 was the year of glamorous trips - Italy, Iceland, Costa Rica, Montreal. And having traveled my fill (well, almost!) I got down to the business of thinking about bigger questions and making plans. What goals did we want to pursue, both personal and shared, in the coming years? What did we want this next phase to look like?

Seth and I came up with many answers. We wanted to make memories with Lana and teach her to take full advantage of every wonder of this world. We wanted to start giving back through grassroots philanthropic work. We wanted another baby. I wanted to grow as a writer and nonprofit leader; he wanted to transition out of his long-time role in finance and switch careers.

And so, we dreamed and planned and built, trying new directions and improving existing aspects of our lives. No doubt, we failed in some of our experiments; but overall, as we start 2020, I feel proud of the foundation we laid in 2019. Many of last year's big decisions will start bearing fruit this year - my first semester of grad school, Seth's sabbatical, Munchie's arrival, the official launch of our foundation and so much more. Of course, you never know what the future will look like. But I'm super excited about everything we did last year to move toward for the future we want <3 

Picking Up the Proverbial Quill

At the turn of the decade - or, in other words, a few weeks ago - I had an urge to write. As I scrolled through social media posts waving goodbye to 2019 and welcoming 2020, I was inspired by the insights my friends, classmates, and acquaintances had shared: highlights from the past decade, successes and failures, ambitious goals and lessons learned.

And naturally, after so much inspiration, my thoughts turned to my own life. What had the past year meant for me? What would the coming year hold? We'd done so much in 2019, and 2020 promised to be even fuller. And yet, I couldn't seem to weave together these disparate stories.

My year - my life, even - felt scattered and undefined. So I didn't write a New Year's post. But I did make a New Year's resolution: to find the elusive storyline that connected all that had happened the prior year and all we were looking forward to in the coming months.

So, in the first week of the new year, Seth and I spent a few evenings looking at old photos and flipping through our 2019 calendar, recalling hundreds of beautiful moments. We reminisced about travels near and far, filling weekends with family adventures, catching up with friends, achievements at work. And still, I struggled to come up with one coherent narrative.

At first, I was quite perplexed by my apparent inability to tell a story about myself. But then, I realized something - I was hopelessly out of practice.

In high school, I wrote all the time - handwritten journals dripping with emotions, poems in the margins of my notes, numerous creative writing assignments. A few years later, I launched my first blog. I was a newly-engaged college graduate and reluctant investment banker searching for a virtual escape from long hours at the office. The blog, which I'd named Girl With A Ring, was a lighthearted, simple chronicle of the yearlong wedding planning process.

Girl With A Ring wound down shortly after my wedding, and I went searching for the next phase of my life. When I started blogging again in 2013, I had left finance, gotten a Master's degree, and was working in the education field, cycling through several roles in a search for the elusive dream job. It was frightening to jump off the familiar finance career ladder and stumble around making mistakes. But it was also exhilarating - here was adult life, finally, with all its uncertainty and difficulty, and I was - mostly- figuring it out.

Eager to capture these first years of adulthood, I started writing 87% Grown Up. Unlike my wedding blog, which had attracted an audience of fellow brides, 87% Grown Up was small and personal. And in addition to chronicling highlights and lowlights of my daily life, I posted random musings and epiphanies I had along the way.

Though I didn't know it at the time, 87% Grown Up would bear witness to some of the of my biggest-ever life transitions: moving cross-country to Houston and giving birth to my first child. Looking back, I am so glad I took the time to write about my life in this period as it was happening, despite the competing pulls of work and family.

In 2016, I launched a new passion project: Houston New Moms, a website and blog for new parents in Houston. I shared a bit of my own parenting journey on HNM, but the site's primary purpose was sharing ideas and resources with other parents in my city.

Never one to leave new places unexplored, I criss-crossed the Houston metropolitan area with baby in tow, seeking out baby-friendly playgrounds, restaurants, and activities, taking lots of photos, and writing them up in my blog. I used the blog to power community projects as well: for instance, I organized annual drives for baby supplies to donate to children's charities. I even decided to go far beyond my comfort zone by reaching out to local businesses to pitch paid collaborations.

HNM's success encouraged me to think bigger, so I reached out to Mommy Nearest, a national website that was in the process of launching in Houston. I became a regular contributor to the site, writing mostly about things to do with kids in Houston, but also more personal stories about my parenting experience.

With all of these writing projects, my personal blog was relegated to the back burner. Finally, a couple of years ago, I shut it down. At this time in my life, I was balancing numerous freelance commitments - an edtech startup, Ukrainian nonprofits, editing academic manuscripts, tutoring, and, of course, writing parenting articles - and trying to keep my workload part-time so I could spend plenty of time with my 2-year-old. There simply wasn't enough time for an online journal on top of everything else.

When we moved back from Houston to NY, everything shifted again. My main job, the edtech startup, went bust. Thousands of miles from Houston, I had to let HNM go. While trying to figure out a new blueprint for my professional life, I also struggled to adapt to suburban living and set up all the practical necessities for our new life - furniture, preschool, doctors, childcare.

I didn't totally stop writing after moving to NY. I kept publishing occasional pieces on various parenting sites. Then, early in 2019, I decided to try to break out of the parenting niche. I loved writing about being a parent, but it was just one sliver of who I was and what I cared about. So, I started pitching various ideas, which led to opportunities to write for The Independent, Nonprofit Quarterly, The Hechinger Report, and, my crowning achievement, an investigative piece for The Atlantic.

But even as I stretched my boundaries as a writer, I neglected to take the time to write - or even think - about my life, to analyze the ups and downs and draw conclusions and connect each day's events with a bigger narrative. I was so busy doing that I forgot to reflect.

And that's how I ended up struggling to articulate my thoughts in a simple end-of-the-year Facebook post.

2020 seems like an opportune time to resurrect 87% Grown Up. Another wave of major changes is on the horizon - we're expecting our second kiddo, Seth is getting ready to leave his longtime job and take an extended sabbatical, and Lana is going to turn 5 and start school. Meanwhile, I'm transitioning out of the role I've held at Ukraine Global Scholars for the past two years, beginning a graduate program, and formally launching a foundation to pursue the nonprofit work Seth and I have been piloting for the past few months. And though I might be busier than ever, I want to capture this fascinating time - to start telling my story again.