Motherhood

Abigail The Mini-Einstein

My Abigail is awesome. She is such a great girl. The last couple of times I have watched her playing soccer from the car while waiting for practice to be over I just can’t believe she is my daughter. She is so grown-up. When did she become a woman? She loves to taunt us about getting her drivers permit in six months. Nothing better then that to make a parent feel like they are coming of age.

I love Abigail just because she is her but lately I’ve started to stress about what it will be like when she flies the coop. How will I know what to wear or what jewelry to match with my outfit? Who will tell me which shoes look better? What will I do without her to help the younger girls with their math homework? Who is going to be throwing out the smart trivia that always brings me such joy. This girls smarts always amaze me. I just really love hanging out with my Abigail. She has boundless energy and always makes me laugh.

Two funny stories about Abigail have occurred in the past couple of weeks. First is just a silly little thing but it demonstrates her silly sense of humor. She was talking to her friend about coming over to our new place to watch a movie. This is her wording, “Hey Kaimi, do you want to come over to my half-of-a-house and watch a movie?” The only reason she could even invite her friend is because the rest of us wouldn’t be home to bug them all night. We are literally on top of each other in our half-of-a-house, but at least we can all laugh about it.

The next story happened yesterday. It is A-typical of Abigail’s ADHD. She is my little mini-Einstein. She is just like her dad (except for the sense of humor and boundless energy and fashion sense – I’m taking all credit for those traits). She is smart as a whip but struggles with organization and motivation because of her ADHD. Although she could have taken all honors classes this year as a Freshman, LG and I limited her to two because we knew she would get overwhelmed. She picked math and science for her honors because those are her favorite subjects and are of the most interest to her.

All year long she’s been getting straight A’s and she’s told us that she was on top of her homework. We trusted her. Well, this is a pattern with her. She outright lies because she doesn’t want to do her homework. So, yesterday she texts me from school and tells me she is going to just drop honors math because her homework packet is due and she didn’t finish it. (The way they do honors math is by giving additional work to do at home to the kids that want it) I was not happy and kind of confused because I didn’t even know if she was allowed to drop it. I ended up calling the school adviser and after a couple of tries I found myself on the phone with her math teacher. I explained the situation and told the teacher I was NOT o.k. with this and would come pull her out of school right now to get the packet done. Her teacher replied, “No way, she is way too smart not to do honors; don’t worry I will take care of this. I will get her in here right now.”

Her teacher ended up texting her from one of her friend’s phones and got her to come to her class where she told Abigail that she would give her til morning to get it done. Abigail – 0, Mom – 1.

Abigail and I laughed about it all afternoon. Then LG stayed up until 10 pm with Abigail getting it all done. Math is just not my department. We now will require Abigail to show us her work every day so we can help her manage her ADHD better, but our final goal is always to let her manage it herself. Obviously, she hasn’t arrived quite yet but lucky for us we’ve got a few more years til college.

If you want a better picture of what it is like to raise an Einstein daughter, check out this commercial. It is so my Abigail.

I Feel Like I’m Rich

This morning after getting Caroline dressed for preschool, like usual, I looked her over and told her how cute she looked. She is cute every day, even when I don’t brush her hair. (Yeah, I admit that there are days I don’t brush her hair – I usually at least just pull it back in a ponytail. Judge only after you have four children.)

Today Caroline was feeling really special as yesterday we got her haircut at the local hair-school for $3.50 and we bought her a new shirt from the Walmart clearance rack for $4. Also, the other day LG had insisted that I buy her a new pair of tennis shoes that were easier for her to put on and take off. We’ve been making do with a pair from the thrift store that weren’t working so well. After brushing her shorter hair and putting it in a headband and sporting her new digs when I told her she looked cute she really believed it. She looked at me with wide eyes and a huge smile and said, “Mom, I feel like I am rich or something.”

Her declaration took me by surprise. We are obviously emphasizing our financial status a little too much around here. I chuckled and thought to myself, “Um yeah kid, you are soooo rich. We spent a whole whopping $17.50 on you all year.” I then thought how much happier I would be if shopping from the clearance rack at Walmart would make me feel as rich as it did for Caroline.

Then as I posed her for a picture the real lesson came in the form of a still small voice. “You are rich Alice. You are so very rich.” Like always the voice was right. Look at this beautiful girl. She’s all mine. She makes me the richest woman in the world.

As I looked around our small apartment at our comfortable couches, artwork on the walls, books on the shelves, and felt the warmth of my very humble American home I felt ashamed for my worldliness. Compared to most of the world, we are rich. We are very rich. We are rich in worldly terms and too often I am too prideful to see it. If worldly stuff mattered I should be grateful for so much abundance, but truly this little girl is way more of a reason for my heart to be full of thanksgiving because she is one of my few eternal treasures that I will be grateful for beyond the confines of this earth.

Relationships

I got up at 7 am and tried all day to blog and between three non-working keys on the laptop (that have fixed themselves miraculously) and the million other interruptions/to-do items, I never even typed in the blog url to get started until ten o’clock tonight. How I’ve needed to write. It’s silly, this love affair I have with writing. It’s as if the blank page is my sanctuary. I fill it up and become the sanctuary for myself.

Firefly Lane is my latest read. My 4-star review can be found over on GoodReads. The book is about two best friends over a thirty year period of time. It was heart wrenching and touching in every single decade. It made me wish for a friendship like that of fictional Kate and Tully. I have great friends but none who know me as well as these two knew one another and none who have been around and close for 30 years. Well, maybe my sisters count. I’ve known them a long time and they are pretty intimate with my insanity.

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As I set down this book upon completion I was overcome with the idea that relationships are all that matter. The only thing I am taking with me when I die is my relationship with God, my relationship with myself, my relationship with my family, and my relationship with my fellow human beings. That’s it.

I can hope that I can take my relationship with paper and a pen but it ain’t gonna happen. Anything I write is stuck in mortality. Hmm. Maybe that’s not actually true. Maybe this explains my love with language. Like Kristin Hannah, I can write something that could inspire someone to have better relationships. If I do, they will take that inspiration with them….take my words with them. Even though that is a total tangent, it’s cool.

It lifted my spirits today to know that material stuff is petty. It’s not necessary for a happy fulfilled life. Sometimes its a hindrance.

So, life has been pretty crappy around here lately. Our landlord decided to sell the house we have been renting for the past two and a half years. We have a home here and love our neighborhood, but now we have been forced to move on. It’s been hard and emotional.

Not only is it hard to leave our beloved home, it’s also hard because LG and I made the decision to be financially responsible and make a significant downgrade. The downgrade is depressing yet necessary so that we can save money to not just get into our own home again but to be financially secure once we get there. We could have borrowed money to buy the house we are in and saved ourselves the hassle of moving, but if and when the furnace went out, we’d be in trouble. We have learned the hard way that we really don’t want to borrow money and we also don’t want to put ourselves in a position to need to be rescued.

So in the next few weeks we will be leaving our four bedroom 2,600 square foot home with a beautiful yard and a heaven-like neighborhood to reside in a 1,400 square foot 3 bedroom basement apartment with ONE bathroom!! It just sucks. There is no other way around it. There is nothing worse than knowing I am a parent who is failing my kids. They aren’t getting the stability we want them to have. They don’t get a lot of what we want them to have. What feels really crappy is knowing if we hadn’t taken our vacation last year to Disneyland, we may have had a different outcome now. If I would have known at the time that I was choosing future stability over one nice vacation for my kids before they fly from the nest, I don’t know what I would have done.

I do know one thing: I’m not taking my place of residence with me when I go, but we will all hopefully take with us the memories that were made. We will even take with us the memories we are going to make while fighting over the one toilet for the next few years. Somehow that makes this broken mom feel o.k. with it all. It also makes me feel better to know that the relationships I’ve forged in our current home are not just gone because I am moving, they will continue with me forever.

A song comes to mind.

Sunday Pin: My Treasure

Two beautiful works of art have touched me deeply this weekend. I hope I can do them justice as I piece them together to tell you of the profound inspired message they’ve etched on my soul.

The first was this painting that hangs in the LDS Church History Museum in Salt Lake City. It is entitled Lehi’s Dream by Steven L. Neal. This copy I found online doesn’t do the original justice. The piece is absolutely beautiful. When an artist can make light illuminate from his brush strokes it always leaves me in awe. This piece won first prize in the 1987 Fine Arts Competition and hangs right outside the bathrooms on the main floor of the museum. It’s a good thing we needed a pit stop or I might have missed it all together. I find it very curious that although we went to the museum to see some Norman Rockwell originals (I love Norman Rockwell) this piece touched me so much deeper.

For those of you unfamiliar with Lehi’s Vision, this piece references 1 Nephi 8 from The Book of Mormon. Lehi was a prophet who shared a vision about the tree of life. In the vision, those who cling to the rod (scripture) will be lead to the tree to gain eternal life. The great and spacious building is depicted on the right – it represents worldliness.

What struck me so powerfully in this masterpiece were the people who had reached the tree. They are at the bottom of the piece and they are all holding a portion of light in their hands. Directly above dreaming Lehi, the mother is holding the small child and is kneeling across from the father who is holding the child’s hand. Their circle of love brought tears to my eyes.

Could it possibly be that simple? Light and joy is found in the family? When you find it you have no need for the great and spacious building or anything limited to its realm? Those with the light in this painting don’t even seem to notice the grandiose structure which holds kings and queens and treasures galore much less the college degrees, prestigious titles, fame, and the slew of other stumbling blocks to real happiness. While looking into this painting, I received a message just for me. It was an answer to a conversation LG and I had just the evening before. I wondered what would make me really happy. What did I need to feel completely fulfilled in this life? Surely, the answer couldn’t just be motherhood. What would happen to me if my kids grew up to be total losers? Surely I can’t allow my happiness to be contingent on them.

A tear ran down my cheek. Besides my own salvation, the only other thing that matters to my eternal destiny is whether or not my family will be with me on the side of light or not. All the other things I have worried about and considered to give me the personal happiness I’ve been lacking are just me stabbing at the facets of that great and spacious building. I have everything I need within the walls of my own home, I’ve just been too prideful to see it.

The second form of art came to me this morning via the local radio station that plays church music on Sundays. I don’t even think I have to tell you how this song touched me if I just tell you the title. It’s sung by Mindy Gledhill and its called More than The World. Take a listen and join me on my second journey this weekend into the beauty we call family.

As I sat down to write this post a scripture came to mind. I made it into a pin with a picture of my view while hiking with Abigail early this summer. We were headed down a beautiful mountain trail and in the moment as I snapped this picture I felt such a love and admiration for my oldest daughter. In this moment, just as with the two pieces of art, I was able to capture my real treasure. I am so very blessed to be a mother and I am so grateful God has been patient with me as He repeatedly opens my eyes to the true happiness that I can only find here at home.

Moms Cutting Loose

Sometimes as a mom you just have to cut loose and have fun, even when your serious kids try to hold you back.

Here’s a funny video clip from a local show on a local network.
I’ve never seen the show, but I may have to check it out
and hope that the teenager in me that had a slip n slide dance routine to Eye of the Tiger won’t make a reappearance.

I ended my run on Ice Ice Baby the other day.
I am pretty sure I threw in a running man or two out on the highway.
It was a happy place, and let’s face it,
moms need as much of that as they can get.

Here are some more moms who dance on YouTube.

This mom dances with her kid on Ellen.

Have you ever noticed how much more tolerable it is to do dishes when you dance and sing?

These dancing moms are local celebrities.

This mom and son dance at his wedding.

And I saved the best for last. Jimmy Fallon with Michelle Obama.

Just dance moms.

Carry Me Home Tonight {vlog}

We interrupt this regular blog post to show you what Alice has been doing all summer.

Yes, Alice does rock out in the car at all times. Usually she is in the driver’s seat and there are at least 6 children accompanying her to and fro from swimming, soccer, softball, parking, shopping, librarying, and the occasional break to Sonic for happy hour.

Life is good. And it also happens to be exhausting so carry me home tonight because I always set the world on fire.

Lessons from the Trail: The Mother Bird

I try to spend as much time as possible on a trail directly east of my house.
It is a beautiful place where I love to bike and run.
You’ve probably seen some of the Instagram photos from the trail that I’ve taken on my sidebar.
Since it’s completion a few months ago, Murdock Trail has quickly become one of my Holy Places.

In the past two weeks, while on the trail, I’ve had three very significant experiences that I want to write about. I expect I will have many more, so today I will start this “lessons from the trail” mini-series on my blog as a place to record these simple moments in time that have such a profound impact. In fact, for me, the impact is so significant that I usually bawl my eyes out and thank God for the message. Well, at least that is what has happened the last three times and I expect my reaction won’t change over time. When the whisperings hit straight to my heart, I usually suspect that God has something to do with it.

So, as you all know, lately I have been heavily focusing on my role at home and learning to find happiness and joy in my motherhood. Well, the other day, my lesson was magnificently focused on this journey. It was a small moment. It probably only lasted 25 seconds.

On a chain-link fence off to the side of a trail, I noticed a bunch of little finch-like birds. I couldn’t tell if they were just a really teeny species or if they were babies. The looked a lot like the ones above that I snatched off the internet. (I really would like to learn more about birds) As I was riding my bike towards home and watching the birds (there were about 5 or 6) playfully perching and hovering around the fence, out of nowhere, came a bigger bird. It was instantly apparent that the big bird must be their mother. She looked exactly like them and seemed to be at the very least communicating in some way with the young-in’s or at the most she was somehow corralling them. I couldn’t quite tell.

I kept observing and my eyes were drawn towards the mother. She looked haggard. Maybe she was molting, I wondered. Or maybe she was just a new mom and her wings were haphazard from all the time she spent in the nest with her babies? I kept thinking about the reasons the mother’s beauty was significantly less than her babies’ beauty.

Out of nowhere my answer came: She gave her beauty to her babies. She didn’t care what she looked like. Her eye was on her prize: her babies on the fence. She was happily observing them, watching out for danger, keeping them close. In the very least she was talking to them, in the most she was corralling them. Someday she would die, yet she would live on through those babies. Without the pressures and complications I as a human mother face, she seemed to possess the joy for which I’ve been looking.

With my new insight I gained from pondering, that mother bird was instantly transformed into one of the most beautiful creatures I have ever seen. As tears welled up in my eyes I realized that God was up in heaven somewhere looking down on me having as significant an experience with me as I was with the bird. He smiled (as I did with the bird) in pride at this haggard momma who just wants to learn to be happy with all that is required of her. I heard his voice directly to my heart, “Alice, know this to be true…you are a beautiful mother and there is nothing, I mean NOTHING, better than that.”

Talking to the Girls about Motherhood {Vlog}

Just having a lazy summer morning with Sophia and Bella.

We interrupt Buffy The Vampire Slayer for the following message…

Contrary to popular belief giving birth is not the hardest part of motherhood, it’s the monotony of taking care of the children physically

forever and ever and ever and ever….

(Oh and I had food in my teeth not because I didn’t brush my teeth the night before but because I had gotten up two hours earlier to take Abigail to soccer conditioning – and yes those are pizelle cookies in my teeth because I love sneaking baked goods for breakfast.)

And for those of you who just can’t get enough, here are more videos of Sophia and Bella at their school’s annual end-of-the-year dance festival a few weeks ago.

When it says 4th grade it really means 5th grade and visa versa….good enough.

Soaking in the small moments {vlog}

I’ve discovered a really great blog called Momastery. Apparently I am the last one of the planet, as the author Glennon has a newly released book and 81,000 followers on facebook. I’ve added her book to my goodreads and her blog to my reader and have immensely enjoyed her honesty about motherhood and the hardships she has faced (alcoholism and bulemia).

I guess I am just kind of a lover of tragedy – the overcoming of it draws me in every time. I love rooting for the human spirit. Momastery is a place which encourages moms to be real about their every day lives – it’s a breathe of fresh air in an online mom world that seems to embrace elaboration, exaggeration, and the elusive thing we call mom perfection. Here are some of her interviews. She discusses her theory that we have to just soak in the small moments of motherhood. It was a relief for me to realize that I wasn’t the only mom on the planet that dreads much of motherhood and that I can just power through most of the hard stuff (when 3 kids are having a meltdown while you are trying to check out at Target) and focus on really soaking up the ever brief and sporadic small moments of peace and happiness in the family.

Back in the day, it was my hero Erma Bombeck who did the same thing for honesty in motherhood. I remember reading her book about motherhood years back and crying as I read of the mother imprisoned for killing her children. She had discovered Erma Bombeck’s writings in prison and loved her humor and honesty. She wrote Bombeck a letter to tell her thanks for her honest voice about motherhood. She lamented, “If all moms would have been honest, I would have realized I wasn’t crazy when the weight of mothering was too unbearable.”

So when the baby is teething for a second year in a row and the toddler wiped poop all over her crib and the kindergartner comes home with a naughty note for calling someone a loser and the mean man at the library tells you to shut your kids up and all of these things happen in the same day (or not) just know you are not alone in motherhood. It is this hard for everyone. If the only moment you can soak in is after the kids are asleep and you sit down with a glass of grape juice and a good book to read one page and conk out in exhaustion it’s completely normal. Don’t fret. Sometime in the next day you may get the gem when your kids are holding hands while picking dandelions while the FedEx guy delivers you a box of long-stem red roses. Soak it in. If I know one thing about motherhood it’s this: the worst moments won’t last. And this: the next moment will be even better (even if it doesn’t happen for another month or two.)

These are my jewels.

Yesterday at church I did enjoy the story about Cornelia Gracchuser – a famous mother from Rome. (Yes, I just erased the 3 paragraphs I wrote about what I don’t enjoy at church on Mother’s Day – you’ve been spared.)

I researched Cornelia a bit today and found that she gave birth to 12 children (uncommon of Roman times.) Only three of her children survived until adulthood. She was widowed at an early age and devoted herself to her children, refusing all offers of marriage. Her daughter married well, and her two sons (Tiberius and Gaius) ended up as very influential tribunes (like a US Senator) in Rome. They were known as “the Gracchi” – they both ended up dying for their unpopular political views which included the ideas that land monopolies should be limited, the price of corn controlled, and citizenship improved for Italians and Spaniards. Essentially they were pro-underdog and the rich people didn’t like it and had them killed for stirring up the people in popular support.

Cornelia is well remembered as a virtuous Roman woman. The city erected a marble statue in her honor after her death. She stood by her sons throughout their lives and remained poised after their deaths. Perhaps though she is most spoken of because of a very small incident that occurred. She was well-off being the daughter of a war hero and the widow of politician, but it seems that Cornelius didn’t let the wealth rob her of perspective as a mother.

When a wealthy lady visitor came and showed off her jewelry, instead of Cornelius showing off hers in return she brought forth her two sons and said, “These are my jewels.”

How much I want to remember that my children are my greatest jewels. Modern society (like ancient Rome) makes it easy to forget that our children are so much greater than any material wealth we can obtain. I, like so many others, get caught up in other women showing off their treasures and want to have my own to shove right back in their face.

Yesterday as I looked out the window and saw my girls lovingly chatting with each other on the old dilapidated trampoline and then later caught Abigail in the second-hand hammock rocking Caroline,

I wonder if you all heard me around the world as I shouted:

“These are my jewels.”

Hopefully God will help me remember them in all their glory the next time I look in my outdated closet, go on another free date night, and especially when I have to force myself to cook yet one more frugal meal.