Bekah Martinez just became a mom of two in June, and while she's not in a rush to expand her family, she's not ruling it out — or putting limits on the ways it could happen!
The Bachelor alum, 25, opened up to PEOPLE in a recent chat surrounding her partnership with cloth-diapering brand Charlie Banana, joking that while she and boyfriend Grayston Leonard are "kinda crazy people who go in whatever direction life takes us," they're content with focusing on their two kids — 5-month-old son Franklin James and daughter Ruth Ray De La Luz, 22 months — for now.
"I get nauseous every time I think about having to have a car with a third row of seats if we were to have a third child, so that's currently what's keeping me from having a third!" Martinez says, laughing.
But in truth, before she got pregnant with Franklin, "We were talking seriously about fostering," she tells PEOPLE. "And that's something that we're really interested in."
"So I think before we add a third permanent addition, be that through us biologically or through adoption, we definitely want to take some time to make our home a home for other children, even if temporarily, if that is an option for us," Martinez explains.
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While the ongoing coronavirus pandemic "has been absolutely horrible" in many ways, Martinez says a silver lining is that it has given her a chance to bond with her new family of four in a "special" way that she and Leonard may not have been able to otherwise.
"It was nice to have the excuse to not go anywhere, to not see anyone, and really focus on time with my family," she says. "My boyfriend has a whole business, and so for him to be able to just stay home and spend time with our daughter, it really brought us closer as a family and was a really great way to welcome a new baby into our home. It felt like we were really centered as a family and very connected."
"But now it's been nothing but chaos," the former reality star quips with a laugh. "Now that there's an almost-2-year-old and a 5-month-old in the house, it is just craziness. But it's been pretty awesome."
She's also excited her kids have each other, explaining, "I'm like, 'Okay, I don't have to be, like, play partner all the time.' And then I also was a nanny for five years so I did have a little bit of experience going into it, of how it would feel with multiple children."
Touching on her experiences with mommy shamers and those offering unsolicited advice about what to show on her own social media, Martinez tells PEOPLE she aims to be "authentic" with what she posts and thinks "it's really funny when people say what you should and shouldn't post on your own platform."
"I think that [the criticism is] on a lot of things that are underrepresented in mainstream culture, like women with body hair [and] people having beautiful, confident birth experiences," she continues. "I think there's a lot of people, maybe in their community or in their life, who haven't been exposed to those types of things. So even if people are initially disgusted or thrown off, maybe it'll plant the seed so that one day they can feel comfortable in their body or comfortable viewing other people who are breastfeeding."
As for how she instills body acceptance and confidence in her daughter, even at such a young age, "I think the biggest thing for children is just to see it," Martinez shares. "And even though she is only almost 2, I mean, when I was a nanny, I remember I wouldn't shave my armpits and the little kids who were like 3 or 4 would be like, 'Ew, why don't you shave your armpits?' That was already ingrained in them as a really young child. So I think just seeing it will make [Ruth] so much more confident in her own body."
But that doesn't mean she will force her particular way of life onto her daughter. "People always ask, like, 'Are you going to let her shave her legs?' And I'm like, 'Yeah!' " Martinez says. "This isn't about the right thing to do [being] to not shave — it's just about evaluating what decision you're making for your body out of insecurity or out of self-hatred and maybe working to move past that and work through that."
She adds, "I hope I can just be a model to her in the way I live my life, and she can make whatever decisions she feels confident in making in her life."
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At home, Martinez and Leonard strive to instill the importance of being eco-conscious in their children, too — starting with the products they buy for their home and remembering not to neglect the first two parts of "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle."
"Everything that we go to purchase, we look at it like, '1. Do we need this?, 2. Can we buy it used?' And if we can't buy it used, 'How can we buy this in the most environmentally friendly way possible?' " she tells PEOPLE. "Every little step you as a family can take to be more green and more eco-friendly is a step toward a better future. It really is one of those things where every small step does count."
And that's part of the reason why Charlie Banana was such a perfect fit for the mother of two. "They just do so much," Martinez says. "When you're cloth diapering alone, you're already reducing your carbon footprint and your impact on the world. But them as a brand, they have a One Percent for the Planet pledge, where they donate 1 percent of their sales back to the World Wildlife Fund."
"They're also the first Climate Neutral Certified diaper brand sold globally. So they've got a lot of good things going for them, and we just love it and I'm so excited to be partnering with them," she adds. "It's a dream come true."
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