A Birthday Gift

Today has been a really mixed bag for me. Today is Elise's 1st Birthday.  Obviously it is a major day of joy. I wish everyone could see the way she lights up when someone says "Happy Birthday", she claps and kicks and loves it.   She even smiles and claps along when we sing Happy Birthday to her.  No shame there, she loves getting older and the attention!

I can't believe how quickly things pass when it is a second child.  I find myself struggling to grasp on to her babydom.  Yet at the same time I love this older more independent  stage she is coming into.  

In this last year she has taught me so much.  I watch in awe the sheer determination she has when she knows she wants something. Sure it can be frustrating, but I also feel like it's a glimpse into a future of a young woman who will succeed at anything she decides to pursue.  She also loves equally. She doesn't have favourites.  She just loves ya good when she decides she is ready to love ya good, ha. She can be fickle with it all at the same time. She has a smile that lights up her whole face, it just takes her over. When I look in her big blue eyes i worry I may never find my way out. 

My biggest ache today, is my own hurt. I've kind of tried to ignore it and been quite successful for the most part.  I find myself trying to not regret the first months of her life. I regret that I was so torn up that now I worry that what if she didn't feel the same kind of love that Aubrey got as a baby?  Did she always feel as loved as I felt I loved her?  Did I give her absolutely everything I could?  I kind of feel a little angry at the same time that I couldn't just enjoy every last second of being a Mom all over again.  I feel cheated. Just thinking back to that time my heart hurts, it gets a little tougher to swallow while at the same time trying to stop the tears. 

Then I try and talk some sense into myself realizing that at the same time I also grew so much through Elise becoming a part of my life. I grew in a way I don't think I ever would have without her.  She gave me a gift. She gave me a new start. I will forever be thankful no matter how painful it can be to look back at.

50 Years

First, last week there was a lot of sadness and tragedy in our world.  If you really let yourself look in depth it can feel like our entire world is nothing but tragedy.  It's true there is so much that needs to change. So much that if you allow yourself to think about it it might just consume you whole. 

Last week one comment that really stuck with me was "It makes me sick to think of the world my children and their children will have to grow up in…"  There were many different variations of this statement.  This comment kind of stopped me in my tracks. 

First I was a bit embarrassed by myself because I have thought this exact same thing. Even had a bit of anxiety over it. Why was I embarrassed?

Well, the way I see it is (god willing) I have at least a good solid 50-70 years left on my life.  To be conservative let's go with 50.   Am I really going to sit back for the next 50 years and say "too bad this world my kids are growing up in sucks so much!"?   Am I going to passively sit around and hope someone else picks up the pieces of our community, school, world etc.   Or just already give up?! 

Honestly this thought never occurred to me until this week.   

Then it made me realize I am really not OK with sitting around for another 50 years feeling sick about our world and my poor children. Instead I want to make a difference. I want to work the next 50 years trying to leave our world in a better space.  I also don't want to raise my kids as a victim of our environment. Poor them. Pfftt. I want them to get their hands dirty. Be apart of transforming this world into something amazing. 

Maybe, just maybe if they are a part of it they will take pride in it. They will nurture it, tend to it with a gentle hands, embrace it with a loving heart, look at it with compassionate eyes.  I like to try and imagine a world like that.  Try it. It's a pretty cool looking place. 

Stripes

I have to be really careful around Aubs. She is really intuitive. She quickly senses any
shift in the energy of a room, around a person you name it. Today was an off day for
me. The girls had a brutal night and Elise is in high teething mode making for one
heck of a needy babe through out the day.

As the day went on Aubrey was really good. She played with a friend through the
morning while I was in a meeting, then she played happily on her own through
a good chunk of the afternoon. I layed down on the floor at one point with both
girls circling around me playing. Only to have Aubrey stop and start up a …touchy
subject.

When I got on the floor my shirt had slipped up just slightly, but I never noticed.
Aubrey stopped in her tracks knelt down beside me and gently touched my stomach.
You see mine looks different then hers, mine has marks. Right now I am mentally
hitting my head on a wall, like I really want to think about friggin stretch marks.

As she did this she said “Momma it’s ok you just have stripes” she stopped kissed my
stomach then said “You’re gonna be ok!” then sat and waited for my response.

You know I have read all the different posts on blogs and pinterest, facebook you
name it, all about how we should accept our stretch marks from childbearing,
embrace them even. I’ve tried, like really hard. But I hate them.

I love that I was able to carry my children into this world and that they are two
healthy little girls. I love that I got to feel what it’s like to have a little foot kick you
from the inside. I feel incredibly blessed to have had all the experiences that come
with being pregnant and the end result of my amazing children.

But, nope, still don’t like the stretch marks.

Although I will say I have come to terms with them. I accept that they are there and
just a part of my body now. So in response to Aubrey’s kind words I went on to
explain to her how I got them. I told her a story all about how her and Elise got to
spend some intimate time inside my belly and that it needed to grow to make room
for them, which then left me with some stripes.

She lifted her shirt looked from her belly to mine then said “WELL…we both have
belly buttons Mom!” That we do Aubs, that we do!

Brick Wall

I've been finding myself at this wall. It's a sort of brick wall, kind of pretty in the way brick can be. It has these cracks in it.  They are old cracks. You can tell they are old from the way the dust and dirt is settled into the broken parts.  At a first glance the cracks make me almost want to look away.  Some days I guess I do.  They just seem too…at home.  

But then I look closer, the closer I look at the cracks and broken pieces I notice that in the time I focused on the cracks I almost missed the best part. I completely missed seeing the way the cracks brought the wall to life. Without them to create shadows, and depth, and character, well it would just be a wall, a brick wall. 

I have the feeling if I can let go of the worry and angst of the imperfections on this brick wall something magical would happen.  That maybe vines of  beautiful flowers could grow through the space left in the cracks and create a mass of beauty.  Or maybe, maybe even more cracks would appear and one day just finally take the damn wall down and expose the hidden life behind it.  

*Please go give the smiley lady in the corner a click to keep my votes up on the Top Mommy Blogs site.  She likes the attention.