Our first set of wheels

I never would have predicted that I would be a city kind of girl. But, here I am, a veteran of New York City for 6 1/2 years, living with my husband of 4 years and expecting our first child. Residing in an amazing city like New York has been its own journey, filled with all sorts of adventures. I can only imagine what raising a child in the city is going to be like.

But first, let me introduce myself. Hi! My name is Z and I’m so excited to share that I’m 17 weeks pregnant. My husband and I are freelance puppeteers in New York City, with our own company WonderSpark Puppets. When I’m not performing and building puppets, I’m also the Foundation Manager for The Jim Henson Foundation. Through my involvement in puppetry I have gotten a chance to see how many parents live in small spaces and have gotten to interact with many little ones of various ages.

My husband and I began trying to start a family in early 2012, and got the great news of a positive test in July. Officially my due date is March 7, 2013. It seems far away, and yet, not far at all.

Over the last few months I have found myself fascinated with strollers, carriers and the like. Both my husband and myself grew up in Western NY where there is very little public transit. Here, having a way to carry and/or wheel around your little one on and off the subway is imperative. The first thing that I noticed is that mothers in the city are STRONG. They constantly have to carry a stroller with a small child nestled inside up and down multiple flights of stairs. Sure there are elevators in some subway stations, but most definitely not in all of them. So, that means that we needed to find something lightweight. Also, space is always an issue for us. We live in a cozy two-bedroom apartment in Astoria, Queens—and whatever we bring in to the apartment can’t take up too much of a footprint. After doing some research and a lot of observation, I finally decided on one. And then I watched the video. Well, that was it, I was done. I knew it was the stroller for us.

But… YIPES! Why did I have to like such an expensive stroller? We are definitely having a baby on a budget, and a new, fancy stroller was NOT in the budget. What to do…

Luckily the New York City CraigsList postings are very active. With so many people having kids in the city all the time, I figured I could definitely find what I wanted if I was persistent enough. And so, I began a routine of checking out the local listings daily under baby & kids to try to find a nice looking, used one. We wanted a 2010 or later model, due to some upgrades that had been made that make this stroller even more awesome—such as the ease of switching the seat from front facing to rear facing, as well as being able to adjust seat height through a lever in the back instead of having to move the seat straps through slots in the back.

Through persistence, patience and some quick follow through, we found our stroller for an incredible price! The only catch was that it was in Jersey. Not awesome. While we do have a car, driving to Jersey—especially the Rutgers University campus where we would do our pick up, is not convenient for us. Luckily, we actually had a puppet show scheduled in New Jersey for the next day. At that point I was giddy with feeling that this was “meant to be.” We made the arrangements and stopped by to pick it up on our way to our gig. It was red, the color I had been hoping for, and was in great condition. We did a test drive and practiced folding and unfolding it. The gentleman we bought it from said his wife had recently had a second child, and they needed to upgrade to a double stroller. Perfect! We were more than happy to take it off his hands! We sealed the deal, put the stroller and a few extras that came with it in our car and were off to perform our puppet show in the next town over. “WE HAVE A STROLLER!!!!” I squealed! Chad laughed. “Yes, we are definitely on our way.”

I look forward to sharing more stories and adventures as our journey progresses.