Before I even knew I was pregnant with Isla I had it in my head that I wanted three kids. There was no particular rhyme or reason behind it; I just thought three was a solid number and went with it. Kyle didn’t disagree, but he’s kind of always said he’ll have however many kids I’ll have. (Within reason, I’m sure. If I had wanted a dozen he probably would’ve peaced out a while ago, ha.)

Skip ahead to after we had Isla. While her birth experience wasn’t a walk in the park, it wasn’t so bad that it shied me away from wanting another baby. Even as we entered the trials of toddlerhood, Kyle and I decided to go for it and have another baby.

Now, the thing is, so many people had assumed that we were having another baby so we could potentially have a boy. More than once I was asked if I hoped Baby #2 was going to be a boy and almost every time I answered that it didn’t matter to me. As it (obviously) turned out, Baby #2 was in fact a girl, and Norah graced us with her presence in June this year.

I don’t even think Norah was a week old when people started saying to Kyle and I, “We’ll, I guess you need to have another one so you can have a boy!” We generally laughed it off, but really, the funny thing is that having a boy doesn’t matter to us, and now I’m second guessing my original desire to have three kids.

Having two children is a challenge some days. Between toddler outbursts and nap strikes from the baby, I frequently switch back and forth between sending Kyle to the doctor to permanently keeping the goalie in net and pulling him one last time. There are days/mornings/nights where Isla will be driving my crazy, Norah won’t nap and I just want to throw in the towel and not have another kid. But then Isla will be an amazing kid another day and Norah will look at me and give me a big smile and adorable, squealy giggles and my uterus will yell at me and tell me it’s not ready to be done yet.

It’s not an easy decision to make and I know I’ll flop back and forth 100 times before I can really make the final call. And while Kyle says he’ll have as many kids as I want to have, he’s admitted that he’s happy with two and doesn’t necessarily “need” to have a son. I’m sure he’d love more testosterone in the house, but just because he has daughters doesn’t mean he can’t share his “manly” passions with them. Isla has cried more than once because she wasn’t old enough to go hunting with him, and she loves baseball as much as she loves ballet.

I also don’t understand why people just assume we potentially want a third child just to maybe have a son. I suppose it’s a bit of old world thinking; In many cultures, sons were more desired because they can carry on the family name, but today I don’t think that’s as important. We don’t have a family legacy, we’re not rich tycoons with some kind of legacy, so carrying on a name is rather irrelevant to us.

And of course, there’s the fact that there’s only a 50% chance of having a boy. Unless we go an design a baby in a test tube, there’s no guarantee that Baby Evans #3 will be a boy. Kyle and I joke that he’s destined to only have girls, just like his grandpa.

There are all kinds of arguments for and against having a third child, and I think Kyle and I have exhausted them all. It’s a big game changer – more so than only having one or two kids – in so many ways. For now, we’re happy with the two amazing little girls we have, and who knows what we’ll decide in the future. Whether it’s two girls, three girls, two girls and a boy – We’ll love them all the same.

Since Norah arrived in our lives, Kyle and I have heard our fair share of unsolicited advice and oddball comments. While some of them make sense and are actually helpful, a few comments have been said numerous times and really just leave us scratching our heads.

“You sure have your hands full!” Unless you’re willing to drop what you’re doing and lend her a hand, bite your tongue. In fact, advert your eyes and don’t even give her a sympathetic look unless you’re going to help pry the chocolate bar out of her toddler’s hands at the grocery store checkout and put the soother back in her newborn’s mouth so she can pay for her gallon of milk.

“When are you going to have another baby?” The last thing a parent wants to hear is when she plans on getting pregnant again, especially you’re asking this question within the first few months of her most recent child’s arrival. Her answer to the question most likely changes on a daily basis

“Well, you have two X, so I guess you’ll have another to try for a Y, right?” Wrong. Families can be just as “complete” with two girls or two boys as those with one of each gender. Sometimes, parents decide to have three children just because they want three children, not because they’re trying to fill some kind of gender void. That’s what pets are for. (I’m kidding. Kind of.)

“You know what you need to do …” Most people aren’t overly keen on taking advice from people they barely know to begin with. Believe me, the parents have probably tried every suggestion in the book and hearing the same advice over and over again doesn’t help fix the problem, especially if the issue at hand has anything to do with fussiness. And if you do suggest something and they say if didn’t work, don’t respond with, “Weird, it worked for little Timmy when he was fussy,” it’s like adding insult to injury.

“Was your pregnancy planned?” This is probably the most inappropriate question to ask a woman who’s either expecting or has a newborn, especially when you don’t know the woman. Does it matter? The answer is simple – No. Regardless of whether or not a pregnancy was planned, the baby will surely be loved just the same.

“Are you breastfeeding?” Does it matter? Yeah yeah, they say that “breast is best” but sometimes nursing is a challenge and a new mom is unable to breastfeed her baby. Unless you’re a health professional and you need to know, how a woman feeds her baby is none of your beeswax. If a baby is happy, healthy and growing, then that’s all that really matters.

Yes, I’ve actually been asked all of the above by either complete strangers or someone who doesn’t really know me well. While in my head I’m screaming, “WHY WOULD YOU ASK ME THAT? BACK OFF!” I usually just politely answer with a simple Yes/No/Maybe answer and leave it at that.

The one that makes me the most frustrated is the one regarding to try and have a boy, which I will probably elaborate more on in a post of its own.

Do you have kids? What are you sick of hearing from people you barely or don’t even know?