10.09.2011
10.04.2011
run. ran. running.
I bought a pair of ridiculous looking shoes and began to run. It took a long time to get over it all. The "it" being the healthy husband, the marathoning friends, the serious lack of lung health, the absolute distrust of my ability to find success in any sport-related activity, and not being able to ever find my sports bra.
The runners I know and love run for miles and miles and eat gels and train and race and track and time. I love them and their running love; it's why, after 5 years of supporting their gatoradey ways, I began -- and think I can actually follow through this time. I am not training for a race. I am not monitoring my speed/distance/calories. I am not ever having the expectation of doing this for more than 30-40 minutes at a time. My only goals are weight related. And it feels different. Maybe the endorphins? Maybe the opportunity to be in the wild by myself for a while? Maybe I am just in that expanding place and want to run in the trees alongside of Jesus and sometimes joey and sometimes siah and feel the physical free that my heart has returned to.
Yes, that sounds right.
The runners I know and love run for miles and miles and eat gels and train and race and track and time. I love them and their running love; it's why, after 5 years of supporting their gatoradey ways, I began -- and think I can actually follow through this time. I am not training for a race. I am not monitoring my speed/distance/calories. I am not ever having the expectation of doing this for more than 30-40 minutes at a time. My only goals are weight related. And it feels different. Maybe the endorphins? Maybe the opportunity to be in the wild by myself for a while? Maybe I am just in that expanding place and want to run in the trees alongside of Jesus and sometimes joey and sometimes siah and feel the physical free that my heart has returned to.
Yes, that sounds right.
10.01.2011
from many thousands of feet above the desert
Mostly I feel like looking out the window at the stream of broken lights and weeping. She is a shattered girl, collected in a tall glass with a lid that doesn't fit quite right. I am a shattered girl who is familiar to this feeling of having been spilled upon the kitchen floor, my important bits lost beneath the lip of the cupboard. I will be collected in the dustpan again, and reglued into the next manifestation of self. I will be whole and new again again again. So will she. Again again again. 
9.29.2011
flying back from utah
home to the small boy
how i missed you so
my wee boy who
tumbles
and laughs
and
reads about whales
digging to a face of dust
tucked beneath
my chin
kicking kicking
kicking
my knees
home is so much more
of
you
3.31.2011
minor toddler tragedies
I just retraced our afternoon trip, scanning the curbs for a lost Leonardo. Drove obnoxiously slow, peering into the grass for a lime green, fuzzy monster. He went to bed a little bummed, but I am incapable of understanding loved creatures as anything less that secretly sentient. I blame the Velveteen Rabbit and an over-active imagination. I'm having Toy Story flashbacks. Thank the Lord for Amazon.
1.30.2011
1.06.2011
no sleep for brooklyn
I have a love/hate relationship with sleep. Always have. I've never slept well, even as a little girl. I have these sleep paralysis nightmares sometimes, more often if I'm stressed or really tired. I used to sleep on my back every night, but doing so increases your chances of having one, so I don't anymore. I miss it. Anyway, I've had insanely vivid dreams of aliens outside my window, of joey being murdered, of the house being robbed, etc with this sleep paralysis thing. Not fun.
Siah seems to have unfortunately inherited my propensity for messy sleep. It it isn't often he ever truly sleeps through the night (not that 5-hour baloney, LEGITIMATELY sleeping through and not having to be snuggled back to sleep at some point during the middle), which kills me, however sweet it can be. He seems to be getting a bit more on that trolley now (at 18 months), but we're still at a 60/40 sort of chance.
Naps used to be hell. there were always a few weeks during the 3 naps a day/2 naps a day season where he would sleep for a full 45 minute cycle (or even an hour and a half!!) for each one and we could have good, balanced days. But most days we would spend completely unable to find success with his daytime sleeping. Joey would call from school and my voice would be dead and flat. Trying to teach someone to sleep has been one of the most defeating experiences I've ever known. I had bought Healthy Sleep Habits, Healthy Child out of desperation when he was around 10 months old (I think -- honestly all I remember is exhaustion) and read it in 2 days. I'm not keen on many of his more severe implementations in the book, but the ideal schedule and needed sleep times were SO freeing for me. I was able to establish more of his routine, etc, etc, it changed our every days.
But then.
There is always a "but then."
I try not to live in mortal fear of them.
Morning naps were amazing, but afternoon naps were turning into the bloodiest of celebrity death matches. Misery all around! And because I am wonderfully brainless, I FORGOT TO REVISIT THE BOOK. It went on for months. MONTHS. Screaming, crying, fighting, holding for hours and hours and hours; the absolute destruction of our motivation and momentum of EVERY SINGLE DAY.
Here, I will interject: being a stay at home mom is awesome. I love it. Favorite job, Full, challenging, rewarding, hilarious and exhausting at every step. However, in order to keep finding success with pre-verbal children, you have to work your ass off at helping them find out how to be the best version of themselves in every situation. And they can't have a reasoning conversation with you, let alone a non-reasoning one where you just win Because You're The Mom. You have to capitalize on the momentum of the small successes you find in the morning to carry you through the afternoon. Momentum is key. At least for me.
So. When we'd have these "naps" of destruction, it would literally demolish our days. Walls reduced to rubble, blackened patch of smoking carpet where the crib used to be. Tiny tragedies of the every day. Finally, I remembered the book. I reread the appropriate section. I shifted a few things. I anticipated a 3 week process (my dear, wise mom friend always advises 2-4 weeks for life changes). It only took a week and a half. Afternoon naps only. Between 2 to 3 hours each day! GLORIOUS CELEBRATION ALL AROUND! THE HEAVENS REJOICED!
And it has lasted. It's amazing. Our world has shifted and there is great relief and success. Deep sighs of joy and gratitude for the eternal hope that the joy of the Lord can be found even within the dark recesses of a tired toddler's routine. The season is looking up.
*Also, the other night I thought I heard him climb out of his crib and pad down the hallway, come next to my side of the bed, giggle, and TRY TO YANK ME DOWN INTO THE DEPTHS OF HELL. I promptly woke up from a sleep paralysis episode FREAKED OUT OF MY MIND, praying that he never, never learns to hoist himself over those weak wooden bars.
Siah seems to have unfortunately inherited my propensity for messy sleep. It it isn't often he ever truly sleeps through the night (not that 5-hour baloney, LEGITIMATELY sleeping through and not having to be snuggled back to sleep at some point during the middle), which kills me, however sweet it can be. He seems to be getting a bit more on that trolley now (at 18 months), but we're still at a 60/40 sort of chance.
Naps used to be hell. there were always a few weeks during the 3 naps a day/2 naps a day season where he would sleep for a full 45 minute cycle (or even an hour and a half!!) for each one and we could have good, balanced days. But most days we would spend completely unable to find success with his daytime sleeping. Joey would call from school and my voice would be dead and flat. Trying to teach someone to sleep has been one of the most defeating experiences I've ever known. I had bought Healthy Sleep Habits, Healthy Child out of desperation when he was around 10 months old (I think -- honestly all I remember is exhaustion) and read it in 2 days. I'm not keen on many of his more severe implementations in the book, but the ideal schedule and needed sleep times were SO freeing for me. I was able to establish more of his routine, etc, etc, it changed our every days.
But then.
There is always a "but then."
I try not to live in mortal fear of them.
Morning naps were amazing, but afternoon naps were turning into the bloodiest of celebrity death matches. Misery all around! And because I am wonderfully brainless, I FORGOT TO REVISIT THE BOOK. It went on for months. MONTHS. Screaming, crying, fighting, holding for hours and hours and hours; the absolute destruction of our motivation and momentum of EVERY SINGLE DAY.
Here, I will interject: being a stay at home mom is awesome. I love it. Favorite job, Full, challenging, rewarding, hilarious and exhausting at every step. However, in order to keep finding success with pre-verbal children, you have to work your ass off at helping them find out how to be the best version of themselves in every situation. And they can't have a reasoning conversation with you, let alone a non-reasoning one where you just win Because You're The Mom. You have to capitalize on the momentum of the small successes you find in the morning to carry you through the afternoon. Momentum is key. At least for me.
So. When we'd have these "naps" of destruction, it would literally demolish our days. Walls reduced to rubble, blackened patch of smoking carpet where the crib used to be. Tiny tragedies of the every day. Finally, I remembered the book. I reread the appropriate section. I shifted a few things. I anticipated a 3 week process (my dear, wise mom friend always advises 2-4 weeks for life changes). It only took a week and a half. Afternoon naps only. Between 2 to 3 hours each day! GLORIOUS CELEBRATION ALL AROUND! THE HEAVENS REJOICED!
And it has lasted. It's amazing. Our world has shifted and there is great relief and success. Deep sighs of joy and gratitude for the eternal hope that the joy of the Lord can be found even within the dark recesses of a tired toddler's routine. The season is looking up.
*Also, the other night I thought I heard him climb out of his crib and pad down the hallway, come next to my side of the bed, giggle, and TRY TO YANK ME DOWN INTO THE DEPTHS OF HELL. I promptly woke up from a sleep paralysis episode FREAKED OUT OF MY MIND, praying that he never, never learns to hoist himself over those weak wooden bars.
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