Mothering :: Lessons

Last night I did the unthinkable. I withheld my love from my children. They had completely dismantled a handmade necklace, scattering it in every direction. When I found them it was too late to salvage the piece, bedtime was minutes away and my head was going to explode. Fuming, I yelled for them to get to their room! and then went into my office to try to settle myself. It was Tim’s turn for bedtime and I decided that I was just going to get my yoga things together and leave the house early, give myself a few extra minutes to calm down.

One thing led to another and the early start to class did not happen. But I saw one of the boys run by the window on the outside patio and started to see red again, knowing they were drawing out the already arduous process of bedtime yet again. I yelled, telling them to get back! to their room and get in that bed!. I turned off the light, shut the door and went back to find the ever elusive pieces of yoga that I need for classes. And then I heard it … from their room.

I could hear him crying. Racking sobs, so loud. I knew Tim was in there, that they were not crying out of fear. But even more, I knew exactly what I had done. In my anger I had diliberately ignored our bedtime ritual, the kiss-hug-high five and repeat that happens every night unless we are too far to touch. I had ignored them racing past the window which was the two of them looking for me to say sorry and get that hug-kiss-high five. I had let my anger get the best of me and was hearing the result of it.

I opened the door. Mason was there, devastating tears and deep sobs, Owen just staring at me, closed face and shut down. Both looked at me and I opened my arms and they came into them. I felt their still small bodies burrow into me, I apologized for being so angry and also for being so mean. I apologized for letting my hurt hurt them and then we cuddled and laughed a little and said a proper good night.

Yoga last night was like a purge and a prayer. I have been at the end of my tether in so many ways lately. There are times when being stretched so thin in so many directions feels like it will never end. Sometimes the hardest tether to take is the one of Mother. There is no rest from it, it is a ceaseless demand and a challenging position. Sometimes the tether feels like a noose as they refuse to eat this or cooperate with that or take 10 minutes to usher from car to house or house to car. It is no matter that I have to work or launder or cook or clean, always the Mother part comes first now because it should, because it has to, because they are and so that it how it is.



It struck me as I thought of writing this post that so much of it has to do with what I am mothering. They are children now, unmalleable in many ways. They are assertive and have desires and wants and wishes and ways of giving and holding back now too. They challenge us daily to think of new ways to entice or engage or just get away. They make me worry in a different way as school and reading and learning and Life starts coming in. I am feeling a new fear, unacknowledged until this moment, that I cannot do this. That I don’t know the right way to do this. That I am hurting more than helping, that I am fucking them up.

That feeling has not gone away as I write this, my fears still sit at the back of my throat as we contemplate huge life changes, knowing they will have to go along with any ride we choose. But I know one thing. I am not going to with hold my love from them, no matter what anger sparks from whatever is happening. Because that was a scary thing and it left me feeling empty and them feeling so sad, so sad. Chalk it up to another lesson in the land of Mothering. A good one, an important one, an essential one.

Going to go hug one of my boys now. Lesson learned.

To Run or Not to Run ...

Last week I decided that it was time to start running. Because here I am, 35, watching friends and friends of friends on Twitter do the Couch to 5K and I suddenly thought that this is something I could do. Me, the girl that loves yoga and having her feet firmly planted on the ground unless they are firmly fitted to bike pedals. Me, the girl with a generous ass and thighs that go right along with it. Me, that gasps for breath after a sprint to catch the boys before they do something really bad. Yes, me. I decided I too can run.

The C25K program is a good one, a gentle one that lets you transition from never ever running to possibly completing a 5K. Last week was week 1 and I felt great; three runs with Tim, each one a little easier than the last. But then Sunday I woke up and my knees were aching something awful so I skipped yoga and decided to try a day of rest. Then came Monday afternoon and we headed out for the 30 minute session with plans to repeat the first week because I am not sure I am ready to move on yet. And oh my god, my knees, a fire-like piercing pain in the right one which gradually started in on the left by the end of the ‘run’. It was hellacious. But I stretched and did my yoga class and figured I would take it from there.



Yesterday was the second session for the week and it did not happen.. At all. I barely limped home and collapsed on the floor and resigned myself to being that girl that cannot run. It was quite disappointing and really painful.

This morning I was doing paperwork and a light bulb hit. I am a PT. I am the person that people go to when they cannot run because they are in pain. Well, I am not that PT, my specialty has never been orthopedic injuries. I am the brain injury/CVA wunderkind but never been one for the old ‘it hurts when I run’ treatment routine.

I spent 20 minutes in self diagnosis this morning, zeroing in on the problem. Now, I know my body well, yoga keeps one fairly linked in, I would like to think. But apparently not as well as I thought. I started at the patella (knee cap in laymen speak) to measure my tracking and Q angle. First thought on my R knee was “Holy sh*t!!! When did my knee start to look like that?” Because my Q angle is not looking so good. The greater your Q angle, the worse your tracking, the more you risk scraping your poor little patella out of the femoral groove leading to even more pain. So I did a little squashing and pushing and pulling and taping and it began to track a bit better and I began to feel a whole lot better.

Why am I telling you all of this? Because this morning I was reminded of something. Well, a few things. That I am a PT for real and I know a lot of things about the human body, its failings and its healing and something I can do about both. It also reminded me of the fact that I am getting older. My knees are getting older and tracking in ways that I never thought I would see on me. My heart is getting older which I why I wanted it to pump more so it can be trained like my knees. My bones, my flesh are starting to change, not fall into some deep spiraling decent but just age. Moving towards that inevitable place we all end up.

It was also a reminder that I may never be a runner despite my will/wish/want. I can still do yoga and hike five miles a week with my feet touching the ground the whole time (I might have to hike a little faster and harder to get that cardio effect though). So, I may just fail at this Couch to 5K thing. Which I think is okay despite the fact that I hate to fail.

Ah, to be a person that is aging. I am not sure I feel comfortable wearing that role quite yet. But I know from my work that it happens to us all. And I know that staying on the move is the best way to welcome it, this aging thing. Now off to something I know I can do …

Sometimes....

Sometimes I just can't.
I can't find the time to blog, much less breathe.
I can't finish anything correctly, not my paperwork or my cooking of dinner or even a conversation.
I can't figure out if my boss has some secret agenda, whether my kids are going to be okay or where the line between work me and home me falls.
I can't see the end of it, the solution, the fun in a situation and it all starts to feel like obligation.
I can't get away from the fact that my responsibilities are bigger than they have ever been, that I am leaving it for a week and I am not even sure how I feel about that.
I can't even play.

At least I feel a little better acknowledging this somewhere.

Brought to you by a maelstrom of hormones, jitters and fatigue.

Lost at Sea

When I was a young child my father bought a boat. He taught himself to sail and then we began to take summer trips to Catalina Island. My parents would load us up and we would go out for a few days, anchor in the tiny harbor and take a small inflatable dinghy to the shore. It was not a short trip by sail and I was a terrible sailor. My mother would load up on those light plastic produce bags and I would load them up with barf. But I always loved the island, the long days in Avalon, the gentle waves, playing all day in the sand and eating peanut butter sandwiches.

My father liked to sail at night and there is a story I have told since I was old enough to be a story teller. It goes like this…one night my mother came down to the cabin and she woke me from sleep. She took me on deck in the dark. I remember wondering if it was so I could barf. But we were not moving, mired by a seasonal crop of floating seaweed. My dad was trying to free us up from the seaweed with oars. And in my story there was a pod of dolphins helping, chittering away as they aided my father in pulling the seaweed away from the boat. And then we were free and they swam at the helm, pacing our small sailboat.

I cherish this story dearly, but just went to corroborate with my father and he explained that there was seaweed and there were dolphins, but neither had anything to do with each other. Ah, the stories of childhood as they fall away into truth. I feel a little sad after hearing that today.

Lately I feel like that bad sailor again. I cannot find my sea legs. We have had so many changes happening and I have once again lost my sense of balance. It makes me think parenting is like sailing, constantly navigating a changing and challenging landscape. Foreign to me, exhausting and foreign.

It makes me realize that if my analogy holds true, I may never be very good at this. I am proving to be not very good at sailing the seas of parenting right now. I am worried about the boys and their adjustment to the changes; this is being compounded by tantrums and willfulness, by two boys deciding to drop their nap. For a few days we have had nothing but nutty behavior. And poor sleep for everyone, every day. I am short tempered and impatient. I am starting to feel like I need a barf bag. Ugh.

And I am starting to feel like sometimes this parenting gig is not terribly fair. Because I realize we are just at the start and I seem to have some issues with change and compromise and keeping my cool. And who knows what is over the next swell.

I hope there is a harbor, a small calm safe harbor with gentle waves lapping the protected beach and simple peanut butter sandwiches that everyone enjoys. Just a few days of respite.

Next weekend Tim and I are taking a solo trip, not to a beach, but a lake. I do better with lakes. Let us hope this trip provides the breather I am desperate to take, no barf bags included. Just a little quiet time, a little regrouping and a little practice on finding my sea legs. Because I really want to sail on this ship better than those early days.

*I have to give my parents props for taking four small children out to sea, feeling good and confidant about it, giving us the experience, barfy as it was for me.

*And I just went in and laid down with them for a bit to regroup…and their sleep breathing and sleep sounds and snuggles made me think I can find those legs after all.

*And damn, Owen can snore. Like a drunken sailor.

Summer's End :: School Begun

I don’t know what it is that I expected. But I tell you, I did not expect this. And yes, I am talking about school.

Tim and I decided in May to enroll in a local parent-run preschool. It is a well established school and came highly recommended by a friend and we loved it at the Open House. I immediately signed the boys up, delighted at the idea of being involved as a teacher assistant, at the close proximity to home, at the cost (200 hundred and change a month for both children to attend two days a week). Delighted in general. It remained mostly a concept over the summer, something we talked about with the boys to encourage a smooth transition.

And then the week comes and we are late to Back to School Night because I thought that it said 7:30 p.m. So we sheepishly sneak into the classroom and sit in short chairs. And we sign up to work the first few weeks to get our obligations out of the way and we receive our community jobs (I nabbed the garden spot) and we meet some of the other parents. And it starts to hit me that we are totally into this thing, this thing called school. And that we have opted to be a part of a community of largely unknown people and children.

First, I have to say this is not going in a bad direction, this post. Just a “still overwhelmed” direction. Because now we have fund raising to do and job to fulfill, just lots of things that I realize now I should have been prepping myself for. Not the least of which is my role as teacher assistant in a room full of two year olds. To think I was excited about this.

See, the first day of school was technically Thursday, so everyone came and left their little ones and Mrs. B was there with myself and another Dad from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. Mrs. B is their teacher and I think she is younger than me but I love her dearly already. Because she is cool and has tattoos and is totally level headed and practical and unflappable. And I pulled diaper duty as the policy is no Daddy changing diapers or assisting on the toilet because there are a handful of parents uncomfortable with that kind of thing. And then it was a rainy day schedule, due to the ash falling out of the sky, so no outdoor play. And did I mention that their room, though adorably arranged is only cooled by a few oscillating fans? And that it was 100 degrees or so? So, yeah, it was not the most auspicious of days. Not to mention the 11 2 year olds running around trapped in a room with which they are only slightly familiar with adults that they barely know and other kids they are just learning to like.

But at least we got it over with, the first day. I now know what it is we signed up for. And I think it is going to be alright. Not sure about the boys as I was there the whole time so to them it must have seemed like an extended play time. Not sure how Tim will fare when he is the only man in a room full of madness and a few women, but I am guessing it will be better than I as he will not be on ‘diaper and potty duty’. And how will I do? That is yet to be seen. Right now my back hurts and I feel tired and maybe a little disappointed and scared.



Worst 1st Day of school pictures ever. Point and shoot cannot capture two year old. And he was up from 2 until 6 a.m. the night before teething. Check out those under-eye bags. And no Mace cause then diaper duty struck. It gets better, right?


This would not be the first time that my imagination runs in congruent to reality. And I know it will not be the last. This week I felt stripped of a few things. My imaginary school scenario crashed down with the first words of "fund raising obligation" and the hour I spent scrubbing linoleum glue off the pre-school floor. First day pictures blurred by with a point and shoot as the Canon is fritzing on us again. My hope for more time seems dashed to bits on the rocks of reality.

And I sound so totally dramatic. But here is to a new week, a bluer sky as some of the fire smoke eases in our area, a different parent cleaning my kids bums on Tuesday and quite possibly a few other fresh starts coming soon. I think I just got excited.

Here is a video of getting ready for school that made me feel lighter.

And here is why we have to get the kids out of the house at this point. They know how to turn on the hose. Enough said.


I know it gets easier. And the fire will eventually be out. And the house will not be in total shambles due to keeping them inside for days at a time. And and and. Just let it be soon. Please.

So, my version of an existential navel gazing blog post coming up, just to warn you. (Smile from me).

I have been thinking about this blog lately, prompted by reading about some of the happenings at Blogher and then by some of the great bloggers found due to reading about Blogher. The conference has always been somewhat fascinating and scary to contemplate, the thought of all. those. women gathered in one spot. Whew. Awesome and scary all at once.

But back to blogging, me and a place in this world. It feels like lately my blog is an afterthought, skipping from craft to craft, a half look into what life really looks like around here. Sometimes when I read back I feel like the quality of my writing has suffered, not improved, as time has moved forward. The proverbial mama brain everyone claims in those infant months seems sharper and more realistic and in touch than my recent tepid efforts put to page.

I know in part what the 'problem' is, my return to the workforce has changed so much in my life, so very many places inside of me. The line up of posts of 'hand made' things march along, a bit of a disingenuous mask, seeming to say to me 'look at all of this time I have to do things'. In reality, lately, I have not been sleeping enough, not thinking enough, not stopping enough, not really meeting any of my duties well enough.

Working right now is essential but I attend to it like a reluctant teenager at times, avoiding paperwork and delaying appointments. I would like to say I am a good employee but marginally adequate is probably the best description. I can't say I hate working, can't say I love it, I do it because I have to and I am grateful that it is there. But I am finding it saps a lot of things, my creative energy, my time (of course) and my ability to focus. I dedicate time to making things because it enlivens the part of me that needs more than to just walk through days, but that too takes its time. And then I feel guilty, wasting a little bit more energy on that state, energy better used reading the boys a book rather than fretting that I did not.

I think what I am finding is that I have to decide how to make my precious Time work better for me. Managing it all is not getting easier, I find myself feeling more fractured and discombobulated than I did in the infant months. At least then there was a laser focus created by the demands of two infants, simple and easily defined tasks that I could meet. Now, I am all over the place and it is taking its toll. I want to feel more present and connected, less harried and dull.

Last week I got really really sick. Sicker than I have been in years. I think it was the Swine flu, for a few days I was literally bedridden, a little bit delusional and almost unable to care for myself, much less my family. I laid in bed at one point imagining my white blood cells eating the virus (told you I was delusional) and it struck me how very out of sync I am with my body, with my mind, with my Self. I used to meditate, I used to dream about things, I used to be a lot braver. And now I just float. And I am thinking that is not a terribly good thing.

So, I am taking this week to do a few things. I am re-evaluating what I can do to re-engage while balancing what I need to do with what I want to do.

I am deciding how I can fit dreaming and story telling and creating back into my daily life. And how I can use this space to chronicle not only the things I make, but the things I think and need to work on and want to share.

I know there are tools and places and ideas that foster the things I am craving. I am committing to finding and connecting with folks that share the desire to take a life that feels too ordinary and settled and shaking it up a little bit.

I do want change and growth and energy...and I am realizing this place can be more than what it is right now. Here is hoping that taking a fresh perspective on blogging will lead to a few more fresh perspectives in other places.

Stitching Again

I seem to be having a love affair with this book. Once my Alabama stitch skirt was completed, I started turning pages again, so many that the book has a frayed and broken binding. I love thumbing through this book and imagining all the wonderful projects in there coming to fruition under my busily stitching fingers. There was a bit of a lull after the skirt, mainly because I could not figure which project to try next.

I flipped to this page and had a feeling I should try it.

I was feeling the need for a little top, something on the sexy side. This seems to fit the bill. I have heard from a few that the neckline dips a bit low, so sexy it is.

This was one of those impulsive starts, where I grabbed a spare black tshirt and the thread I had on hand. The cutting took place in one nap time and the sewing during SYTYCD and a during the next nap.

It is really quite simple with five panels in front, three in back then joining with stitching up the sides. I will get to the end results in a minute, but I wanted to leave a few tips here if you decide to try some of the great projects.

The book is written with wonderful instructions on choosing knits, cutting etc. The first time around I used a traced paper pattern and a rotary cutter and struggled a bit to keep the pattern in place while I cut. This time, I cut the pattern pieces out of the grided pattern fabric you can find on the bolt at any JoAnns.

I love making pattern pieces out of this stuff as it is a little ‘sticky’ and clings to the fabric when you lay it out. I placed my cutting mat on the floor and used the rotary cutter again, making sure to keep the blade perpendicular to the fabric so it would not ‘push’ it out of place.

I really loved how quick this method made the cutting. I also came away with really precise points and curves which seems to be important in this project.


The fabric came from a plain black tshirt I thought about embellishing, but I really wanted to see how this would come together so I avoided anything fancy and got to stitching. Like I said, it stitches up fast and I had the end results to try on the next day. And I am quite glad I did not invest too much effort because I am not really loving the end result. I made a few mistakes that made me less than happy with the finished piece.


First, I used a cheapish tshirt. Not a good idea for a top. The cotton is that almost sticky knit that does not feel good on the skin and kinda’ smells. So now I know to splurge for the organic yardage over at the Alabama online store. This uses very little yardage and would be well worth the extra pennies.

Second, I am not loving my choice of cream thread. I should have gone with the grey thread, the cream makes it all a little too Black n’ White, it just feels a little trashy to me. I think the low top sexes it up enough.

Speaking on the front cut….I meant to readjust the low neck line but forgot when cutting out the pattern. This front is cut low, folks. I think I would be more comfortable if it were about 1.5 inches higher. That way it would not cover up the girls, but they would not be on such, um, display. Remember, the knit stretches as you wear, so it gets lower as the day goes along.


I am glad I made it, though. I plan on making another with modifications. I used the largest pattern size and it is a bit too generous once it stretches, so I will likely use the next size down, lift the neckline a bit and also shorten the back a bit. Overall, it is a great and flattering pattern and I look forward to trying it once more.

If you want a wonderful and inspiring book that focuses on hand sewing, the Alabama Stitch book is your friend. She sure is mine. And the next book is coming soon. So, happy sewing, folks.

Next up…reports from our lakeside vacation. I wish we never had to leave.