Grateful, Part 1

Amazement. Two mamas in my playgroup are going to be mothers again. Another friend called me from Oregon on Wednesday to tell me that she is filling out paperwork, attending classes and trying to become a mother herself. She and her husband are going to adopt.  When she told me, I burst into tears.

This friend is already a mothering spirit. She cares for her friends' children and she's listened compassionately during many conversations about my own journey into and in mothering. She's held my hand when I've shared secrets with her, she's loved and intervened on behalf of her adult step-daughter for twenty years. She cared for her ailing parents attentively and she's celebrated many births with many women. She takes in animals in and gives them a safe and happy existence on her farm.  Underneath her snappy sense of humor and disarming comebacks, she is a soft soul with a generous heart.  She puts so much love and energy into the universe, that bringing a child into her home will only confirm for the world what I already know as her friend: She is a wonderful mother.

Last spring, my friend and her husband hoisted Lil E on to a digger between the house and the shed where the other farm equipment lives. The video Bruce took shows a little boy, thrilled beyond words, and a farmer, also a kind spirit, beaming to give this city child a peek into this world.

I've thought of that moment a lot this week, of my friend laughing and taking pictures and her husband moving the gears and holding my son. It was a moment that swelled up inside me then and has this week, making me feel so grateful to have such good friends who love me, love my husband, love my child.

The process to adopt began a long time ago for my friend. When we first met years and years ago, she already had stories of halted possibilities and little heart breaks. This time, this process, takes about nine months, she told me. And that seems just about right.

On the same day I heard about the possibilities and promise one friend has in the adoption process, one of my pregnant playgroup friends asked me, "How do you feel being so surrounded by people having babies?"

I laughed when she asked me and admitted, "My ovaries are flipping."

I am sure that as the months go on, they will be dancing more and more. I am happy right now with the family we have, with what is ahead of us and for where I am with my job, my body, my marriage, my life. For today, I am grateful to know that these women are on this journey and that I know them already as strong, amazing spirits who have much more mothering to do.

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Baby, it's (almost really) cold outside

We've been wearing our winter coats off and on for weeks now, but the reality of the season is that we have 68-degree and sunny weather one day and flurries in the weather forecast the next. Just seeing that five-day outlook sent me to my laptop to seek out some in-between accessories to bundle up (without too much bundling up) Bruce, my boy and myself. Check out what I found:

The Oeuf Squeeze-Me Mitten - These adorable mittens pair up kiddo and parent so you only have to hunt down one set up hand-warmers before leaving the house. A little mitten for the shorty is sewn on the mama (or papa) pair at the perfect angle for hand-holding. They look oh-so cozy and seem just right for this time of year (that is, before the snow hits). Since we spend a lot of time walking through our neighborhood in search of construction crews and equipment (which are easy to find now that the tear-down revolution has sadly hit our little corner of the city), these will keep us connected and warm during the hours (yes, hours) we spend watching cement pouring and bulldozing.

Mama Poncho - Maneuvering a stroller through the snow and slush does not make for a nice winter walk. My solution is to put the boy into a sling or carrier, bumping up the body heat coziness and making the walk a lot easier and more enjoyable for us both. Since Lil E's been known to sack out on the walk home from co-op, I know he is warm and safe snoozing in the sling on my back or hip. The tricky part is getting the sling and the bundled-up child over my own winter coat. This gorgeous wool Mama Poncho will help styley, slinging mamas avoid the bulk when they wear their babies in the winter.  Mama Ponchos are sold in the US here, and many crafty mamas make similar designs  and sell them here.

Since we're all about crazy hats and other "classics," here are a few of our standards for those in-between seasons:

* Comfy headbands like this one from Columbia keep Bruce warm but not overheated on his weekend runs through the neighborhood. 

Faux (ahem...very faux) pashminas like this one from Target are must-haves for the mama. They feed my multi-tasking tendencies and add a little glam to the goose down. I use mine most often as a scarf (outdoors all fall and winter and indoors when the radiator hasn't kicked on yet), but also as a wrap, an extra layer over my coat, a blanket over Lil E's insistently bare toes in the car seat, and even as an easily-washable Kleenex when things get really runny and desperate during construction site viewings.

* Affordable and adorable hat and glove sets for the boy who likes to play in dirt (even on miserable, gray days) coupled with a quilted, down vest from BabyGap. It keeps my little pumpkin toasty and comfortable, and isn't so bulky that I end up muffling a string of curse words at the car seat while trying to buckle him in.

What are the keys to your coziness when it is sorta fall one day, sorta winter the next?

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Pause

My friend Mack is in town and, just as we have been since we first saw each other in our dorm room freshman year, the next few days together will be a flurry of reminiscing, catching up, analysis, inside jokes and lots and lots of giggles. Mack is very laid back and we often talk about how organized and tidy we wish we were. I wasn't necessarily worried about dusting before she arrived but I definitely cleaned up, put away, rearranged and then cleared the toy trucks and Little People out of a corner of our living room for her suitcase. That took time and more energy than I like to admit.

All that domestic engineering, added to unloading our goner of a refrigerator and organizing and reloading a new (new! new!) refrigerator (it did arrive yesterday and I did actually get that shit together as promised) and working and shuttling Lil E to and from co-op and fixing snacks and dinners and many, many frozen mini-waffles and...phew. When I came across these meditations mid-way through the giant precarious pile on my desk, it was no coincidence.

Thanks to my intuitive, incredible yoga teacher, I read these words in a frantic moment, just when I needed them most. 

Here's to your own mid-week, mid-way through frantic and precarious deep breaths.

Enough.  These few words are enough.
If not these words, this breath.
If not this breath, this sitting here.

This opening to the life
we have refused
again and again

Until now.

David Whyte

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Your hand opens and closes and opens and closes.
If it were always a fist or always stretched open,
you would be paralyzed.
Your deepest presence is in every small contracting and expanding
the two as beautifully balances and coordinated
as bird wings.

Rumi






Photo credit: Bruce Ferguson

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