She is One

Bronwen Eliza is one.  It happened when I wasn't looking, when I wasn't ready, in the middle of a busy week. It happened without fanfare, with little celebration, but with much, much sentimental reflection.

She is one. And my heart breaks a little knowing that I will never have a child under the age of one again. Measuring age in weeks and months is over. She is one.

She is one and full of beans.  Into everything.  Crawling and yammering and giggling and singing and cooing.  She says Mama and Papa and Yayayayayayaya!

She is one. My final baby is barely a baby anymore.  She stands on her own.  She cruises.  She walks with assistance. She commands a room.

She eats indiscriminately: all fruits, vegetables, protein sources, snacks, anything you put on her tray, as well as books, paper, toys, dolls, dog toys, shoes, keys, dirt, sand, rocks, dog hair, clothing, binkies, stuffed animals, playing cards, hair things, stickers, blocks.  She has six teeth.  Three on top, three on the bottom.

She claps her hands.  She points at things.  She bats her arms to say "hi" or to mean "gimme."  She may or may not have socked the rector in the nose.  She makes the sweetest, lightest singing noises you have ever heard.

She has a crazy, deep, chortling laugh, just like Jillson had. A real belly laugh.

She is fiercely independent already (Lord help us all), unless she wants to go somewhere on her feet or unless she is hungry.  Then she crawls over and climbs up my leg, patting my knee until I do her bidding. 

Do not stand in the way of this girl and her food.  She growls.

She is an amazing and self-assured member of this crazy clan.  She rolls with it all.

In spite of her independence, her choice is often to be wherever her sisters are.

Did I mention that she loves water?  She will play in the bath, the ocean, the pool, the sink, a puddle for hours.

She is trusting and laid back.  A good sleeper.  A snuggler when exhausted or ill.  She gives funny, lean-in, head-only snuggles at all other times, a sort of reassuring pressing of temple to temple, or cheek to cheek, letting the full weight of her head meld into mine.

She is adored by her biggies.

Sweet Bronwen Eliza, I love you beyond all measure, beyond reason, beyond explanation.  Like your sisters, you are a piece of my heart. I can't wait to see what you'll become.  

You are one.  And you are on your way.  

I love you tremendously.

xoxo Mommy

April Round-up

I'm not going to let myself go back (too far) to play catch up. It makes me sad for all the wonderful memories in March and February that I've neglected to report here, but I'm in need of embracing an "onward" sort of attitude these days. Note to Gutsy Self: just because you didn't blog about it doesn't mean that it didn't happen or wasn't meaningful.

So, scrolling through some April photos, here's what caught my eye today.

Easter Day.  Dinner & drinks. People in various states of casualness.  The Gutsy Dad almost always changes his clothes right after we get home from church.  I tend to slip on flip-flops and carry on in my church clothes: who has time to change? Things I love in this picture: the heron carving above my kitchen sink that I found years ago while visiting my sister-in-law (before she was my sister-in-law) and her family when the GD and I were still just dating.  My parents' dog Charlotte lounging on our kitchen floor. The glimpse of Tilly's favorite toy in the background in the playroom.  My birds from Lake Constance on the wall.

I am completely in love with my own children, and I am not ashamed to be proud of them.  Their hearts, their spirit, their creative minds, their quirks, their beauty. Here they are before our Easter service with flowers to decorate the children's cross. 

A favorite birthday present.  My mother asked, laughing at me a bit I think, "You really want a beach cart for your birthday?" HECK YES and thank you!  This thing is awesome. 

She still falls asleep everywhere and anywhere.  Here she is during story time, sleeping on the Gutsy Dad. Ali Edwards once wrote a beautiful blog post about her family dog, parts of whom appeared in almost every family picture. This is one thing I love about my own photos. Our two loyal and lovable fur kids always manage to get parts of themselves in the photos.  Here we feature Tilly's back under the GD's arm and Zephie's rump by Maddie's elbow. 

I've been meaning to write about the physical beauty of our church.  It is my style. Of course, it's not necessary for a church to be beautiful for me to love it, but it certainly makes church all the more enjoyable. This is the church's playground. I would have LOVED this swing set/arc as a kid.

 Perfect blue skies for Easter. The sanctuary was filled with lilies and blue hydrangeas. Perfection. They didn't need to tell me twice when they mentioned we could take the flowers home with us after the service. I currently have a GIANT hydrangea potted plant on my dining table.  It must have 15 blooms on it with more to come.  I need to get this thing in the ground.

I made a frozen key lime pie for Easter dinner.  (Ina Garten's recipe.)  Since it uses egg yolks but not the whites, I channeled my Nana and made meringues with the whites. 

I love that my parents were game to join in our weekly "Five of Us" photo on Easter Sunday.

Project Update: Five of Us

Remember how I said I wanted to take a full-family photo once a year for the whole year?  Well, so far so good. We're nine weeks in, and we've remembered nine times.

To keep this project doable, I'm keeping it quite simple. We take the photo every Sunday, and there is no primping allowed.  Whenever we remember to take it, we take it.  (Alarm reminders on the phone help.) Since we usually go to church on Sunday mornings, we've been taking the photos in the afternoons, and you'll see that we are in various states of post-church unravelling.

I'm also using this project as an opportunity to practice very basic Photoshop Elements skills by adding a few digital embellishments and a number directly onto the photos before printing.

Here are our first nine weeks:

Poor Gutsy Dad was still recovering from his nose surgery from a few days before.  The balloons are left over from Madelyn's birthday, and I'm pretty sure Bronwen was actively nursing when this shot was taken.

This photo was taken on my iPhone at our neighbor's Super Bowl party. Thank God for the phone, since I had forgotten about the photo until that moment! You can tell Jillson was enjoying her friend's dress-up box.

Forgot until late in the day, so we had to take the photo outside. The neighbors may or may not have thought we were weird setting up the tripod on the lawn to take this pic. These photos are revealing how regularly my girls enjoy dress-up clothes! 

This one was taken just yesterday at my neighbor's house.  Please note that I allowed the kids to pick their own outfits, with no constraints (a challenge for Control Freak Me). Madelyn then got her outfit all wet playing in the neighbors tub (I have no idea what she was thinking), so she is wearing borrowed clothing. Funny. I am unshowered. (We skipped church.) The Gutsy Dad is on a business trip, so he's not in the picture.  Boo hiss.  I contemplated whether we should take the photo one day early so he could be in it, but then I forgot to do that, so that answered that.  Then I wondered if I should have him take a picture of himself where he is, and find a way to incorporate it, but I forgot to do that, too. So I guess it's just the four of us this week.

The printed and assembled version of this project includes a 4x6 journaling card, which I am printing out at home and writing on.  (The digital elements on the photos and the printable journaling cards are from Project Life, found here.  I went with the Clementine version.)

I rounded the corners and slipped the photo and journaling card into a very simple and cheap album I found at Target a few years ago.  (You can imagine my delight when I found this album already waiting for me in my closet. Equally exciting was the discovery that it has exactly 52 pages in it... to last a year. Shopping from my own stash.  Love it.)

The inside of the album looks like this when it is all together. Not complicated.

And there you have it. I'm enjoying watching the pages of this little book fill up.

The Job Offer

Last week, I was offered a job.  

There I was, flitting back and forth between making dinner and setting the kids up with crayons and paper, doing dishes, feeding the dogs, and putting Christmas decorations away, when d-d-ding! a new email made itself known in my inbox. 

The email was the job offer.

I will not lie: I immediately felt awesome. Someone wants to make use of my skills and my brain and my talents and my time and they want to pay me for it! No longer shall I be a mere scullery maid/chauffeur/disciplinarian/butt-wiper! I almost told the kids right then and there (but they wouldn't get it), called my parents, emailed the friends & colleagues who acted as references and cheerleaders during the job application process. But I didn’t. Though I wanted to share the news right away, I just cracked a smile and returned to my maid, I mean, maternal duties. I decided to tell my husband first. (Which I did, once we finally got a moment to ourselves. He was appropriately psyched, delighted, congratulatory.)

While I was waiting for him to come home, I continued my everyday chores feeling slightly more awesome by the minute. It has been five and a half years since I have worked (for compensation), but apparently I'm still desirable. I've still "got it." Go me!

Nevertheless, that feeling of bad-assery (to borrow a phrase) lasted, at max, about fifteen minutes, after which Bronwen stirred from her nap. When I went to her, she stared at me--a concentrated stare--and grinned. My heart soared and then it melted.  It practically floated with happiness. And then, with little warning, my heart felt heavy, really heavy, as though it were soaked through with emotion beyond its saturation point and bearing many times its own weight. It was all I could do not to start bawling. (But the kids wouldn't get that either.)

Here’s why. In order to do this job, which (as you will see) is pretty much ideally suited for me at this point in my life and stage of motherhood, I will need to attend training for it. The training is in Texas and lasts four days. 

Bronwen won't be tagging along.

Listen. I know I will go to this training, and I know I will be fine. The kids will be fine. Whatever craziness I need to accomplish between now and then (warehousing the breastmilk) and whatever craziness I need to endure while I am there (pumping and dumping eight times a day), I know I can do it.

The rational, educated, feminist, gutsy part of me knows all this.

During story time last night, the Gutsy Dad read to the big girls, while I nursed and rocked Bronwen. This is often how it is in the evenings, and these full-family times at the closing of the day are precious to me always, but especially last night.  I admit that I stayed and rocked Bronwen long after her big sisters had gone to bed and long after Bronwen too had fallen asleep, not wanting to let go until absolutely necessary.

Each of us moms has to figure out the right balance between work and home, both in terms of what our ideal parenting plan is and in terms of what makes sense or is feasible for our families financially. I know plenty of parents who work part or full time only weeks after their kids are born and they all (parents and kids alike) turn out fine. I know this first hand.

I also know I am extremely fortunate that I have not had to go back to work sooner than this. And I know that getting back to a state of employment will be very, very good for me. 

Further, I have no problem arranging childcare for Bronwen and whomever else needs it when I am here in town and will be working. 

But I am dreading those four days away. Sounds silly I know, but I just cannot imagine being away from them at night, not coming home to them. The first time I spent a night away from Jillson was when Madelyn was born.  The first time I spent the night away from Madelyn was when Bronwen was born.  And that’s it, folks. This is part of the reason I must write this, I suppose--to work it all out--to talk myself into a place of acceptance regarding the mini business trip I will be taking.

Feel free to roll your eyes. 

Heck, maybe a few nights away from the kids would do me good.  Maybe a few nights away from me would do the kids good.  Maybe it would.  But sweet Bronwen?  Even her?

Oh, man.

Then there’s this. I've been thinking this, too:

How in the hell does my husband ever survive his RLBTs, when I cannot even fathom four days?

Ah, it is just that my heart hurts thinking about being away from the kids, mostly Bronwen, for that long a time. Not because I think I can't do it, but because I think it signifies--in my heart--a breaking away from my kids. A breaking away from this time of pure motherhood.

What’s a soon-to-be working part time mom to do? Figure it out and move on. 

Be gutsy. Feel the part in your heart that is breaking, and do it anyway.

Christmas Recap in Pictures

It has been a lovely, lovely few days. I feel so fortunate to report that our holiday together--as a couple, as parents, as a family, as an extended family--has been everything I hoped it would be. 

From soup to nuts.

But we can hardly declare the holidays over. With Madelyn's birthday, Mom's birthday, and New Year's Eve all coming up within the week, we are barely pausing. So in the midst of it all, I offer these pictorial highlights.

(Click any photo to see it larger.)