My Name is Mud

It's 8:30 in the morning and already we have engaged "Operation Do-Over."

A "Do-Over" morning is one in which the morning has started so terribly that we all freeze in our tracks and declare "Do over!" Sometimes the "do-overs" are humorous and we all go back to our rooms and pretend we just woke up. Some mornings it's just me quietly saying it to myself, re-centering my priorities.

This morning was the latter.

Yesterday we came back from a mini vacation in Alabama. Even though today is Wednesday, coming back from a vacation and starting the week always feels like three Mondays squished together, sent to the DMV and then audited by the IRS. It just does.

The morning was going pretty well, actually. The girls were dressed and ready for the day. Breakfast had been eaten.

Eve asked to play outside. I helped her take her teddy bear and stroller to the back yard and smiled at her joy of outdoors.

Minutes later Eve was banging on the sliding door. "I found the perfect worm!" she squealed.

She was covered in mud. Her shoes were caked beyond recognition. Her hands were covered. There were big muddy footprints all over the patio with little clumps of mud tattling on her voyage to the door.

She came inside and clumped her shoes on the floor, scraping mud on the chair and on the rugs. Her feet and hands were covered in mud. She was absolutely thrilled to find a one inch worm, unaware of her condition.

A little voice in my head said, "Now, Emily, what is more important? Eve or clean floors?" to which I responded, "Clean floors."

I looked at my daughter. She was half naked with messy hair, a runny nose and dirt under her nails. She was looking into my eyes and, without saying so, asking me to accept her the way she was.

She could tell I was mad. She could tell I didn't like her in that moment. She had a scowl mixed with hurt in her eyes.

So I did the best thing I could think of:

"Want to make cookies with Mommy?"

She prepared to say no. I saw her mouth form the words and her scowl turn deeper.

But she stopped. "Wets make cookies, Mom. C'mon."

I dressed my daughter, cleaned her up a bit and we trolloped downstairs. I'm still in my jammies and eyeglasses. My hair is pulled in a pony tail. I don't need to EAT more cookies, but I need to MAKE them with my Eve.

If there's one thing I learned today, it's this:
It might be muddy here, but it smells like cookies.

McDonalds Meditation

I was talking on the phone the other day to a friend about the difficulties I'm having lately with the great mystery of life: mothering my sweet 3 year old. In our conversation I told a story about something embarrassing I had experienced.

It involved me on all fours navigating a mega play tube at McDonalds as a cadre of children followed me around while my daughter laughed because I couldn't reach her. It also involved me sliding wicked fast down a tube slide and feeling the heels of 4 sets of children hit me in the back while I tried to retrieve my daughter.

It took two tries of going up the intestines of this wicked configuration before I figured out which section she was hiding in. By the time I had found her, I had a parade of youngins giggling with glee that an adult had joined them and one rule-follower who sternly warned me that I "wasn't allowed up here." They were all operating under the notion that I wanted to be there.

All I wanted was to stand respectably on my two feet without my bum hanging out for all to see. That's all I wanted.

In retrospect, the story sounds amusing; if I pretend the story isn't about me, it's a riot to think of some woman trying to use her best sign language skills (none whatsoever) to convey to her impish 3 year old in the sound-blocking clear tube that she-needs-to-come-down-right-now. It's even more amusing to see the 3 year old raise one eyebrow, smile and say with her eyes, "Come get me."

When I conveyed this story to friends, they didn't seem to think it was that funny or embarrassing and I began to think that maybe I self imposed some of it.

But parenthood is that way, isn't it? We all have those issues that touch us too close to our heart.

"My daughter is a tomboy," said the mother who was a ballerina and learned a proper English tea by age six.

"I have all girls," said the mother who lost her father to cancer and desperately wants to name a boy after him.

There's the child who learns to crawl in a funny way.

There's the child who is sweet and selfless yet can't manage to sit down or stop talking.

There's the "extra truthful" child who is the son of a pastor and likes to update people on the family's affairs.

It seems to be that God, in his wisdom, has challenged our love by expanding our view on what love can be. The father who was captain of the football team won't understand why his son wants to be a history major. The dad who is CEO of his own company doesn't realize why his daughter wants to wipe noses in a nursing home.

If we're not careful, we start to put up our defenses. My sweet bald baby Eve didn't grow a good head of hair for the first few years of her life. I cringed when well-meaning older men called her "Ike" in the grocery store; you'd be surprised how many men did this.

Several days ago my front doorbell rang. As I opened the door, a little dog and an energetic boy entered my house. "Whoa, there..." I said as I ushered them back outside. The little boy I had remembered from the pool. He's a sweet boy of about 6 years who has the mental capacity of someone much younger. And because he has some mental challenges, God saw fit to give him an extra big heart. This little man will come right up to you, violate anything considered "personal space", smile extra big and start playing with you. I love seeing him.

His mother came running a few seconds later looking relieved to find him (hey--he's a fast runner!) and we spoke ever so briefly. Exchanged names. I saw the pride (and the energy) she has for her son. When she left I stood at my kitchen sink for a while processing how much joy this mother had for her son. I want that joy, that delight for my children.

Perhaps my McDonalds play tube adventure wasn't so bad. Perhaps it was just a search for joy, all wrapped up in an impish smile.

Being a mother of an eight year old is amazing.
I love my eight year old daughter.
I love that she is eight.
It's the perfect age of "girl, yet not teenager."

Morgan is an avid accessorizer.
She wears belts as hair accessories.
She wears hair ties as bracelets.
She wears ribbons and scarves however she wants.
Sometimes she goes to school with a scarf around her waist and by the time she comes home the scarf is in her hair. She loves to make things pretty.

Although I love to decorate, I find myself asking Morgan to make things look nice. She decorated for our New Year's party at home.

She's immensely fun to talk with. The other day she asked, "Mom, when we say 'delicious', aren't we really saying that it's 'de-licious'? When we put 'de' in front of a word, it makes it the opposite, right? So shouldn't it be 'licious'?"

I was stunned. I laughed and told her, yes, it should be "licious".


Morgan does pretty well considering that her little sister wants to imitate her every move. We bought the girls guitars for Christmas and even though they don't know a lick of music, they look like the do. :) Eve loves to bang it and occasionally use it as a weapon.

Morgan wants a dog so desperately. Ugh. I find myself saying "no" repeatedly while she asks very sneaky questions like, "IF we got a dog, what kind would YOU get, Mom?" I tell her "a hot dog"... anything to deviate from the heart of her question. We have too much on our plates to get a dog right now.

This is a pic of Morgan with the very pretty barette that Aunt Becky sent her from Korea. Thanks, Aunt Bex!

If Eve is my challenge right now, Morgan is my prize for waiting out her 3-4 year old years. She's pure beauty, inside and out.

Thankful-

Bizarro World

What I want to say right now is that I am a very patient, happy and organized mother of a preschooler. Instead I'll say this:

Nurturing a three year old is like living in a suspended state of Bizarro world.

It's intense. It's mind cracking. It's hilarious.

When people speak of the "inner child", they're speaking of when they were 3-4 years old. Being a three year old means:

Learning to joke around.

Calling your spiral pasta a "tornado" and having it run around your plate.

Learning the real name of things and then choosing to call it something else. Currently I respond to the name "Mister Emily" because my daughter learned my first name.

Talking ad nauseam about bodily functions. Poops. Boogers. Eating the aforementioned. Singing about the aforementioned.

The need to share their negative feelings loudly. Particularly the word "no" followed by running.

The ability to make emotional transitions in a very speedy fashion. "I DO IT MYSELLLLLFFF" is often followed by a more demure and faint "love-you-mommy".

It's at this age where children have total memory recall on most of the bad things you do and two of the good things you do. My children have started a new game called "Time Out" in which one plays the mommy and the other pretends to be upset while she is placed in time out. I have mixed feelings about this game.

At this age, there isn't a whole lot of gender differentiation. Children are whirlwind of emotional and physical possibilities.
Climbing on bookcases.
Hanging from bookcases.
Using books to build a tower to climb in order to reach the bookcases.
If it weren't for gender specific clothing or hair ties, we wouldn't know which gender we were raising. We really wouldn't.

I don't dislike this age. I mostly find myself confused with the mind-dizzying life that is running around my feet like a puppy. I lose my train of thought a lot, particularly when my daughter screams for lollipops. Which she does. A lot.

Today something particularly wonderful happened and it was so amazing that it erased the chaos of this morning. Eve and I began baking cookies and my sweet Evey was able to correctly use the sifter. I showed her a little trick with the sifter... the kind that has the handle that twirls around... and my busy whirlwind of a daughter took the sifter deftly in her little hands and used it correctly.

Shortly after I brought out the vanilla extract and she said, "Waz that, Mom? Banilla?"
I nearly dropped the bottle.
She knows ingredients!
I mean, of course she does. We make cookies almost 2-3 times a week to keep her little hands busy and all this time I thought she was just making chaos but in that little noggin of hers electrical charges were firing off and causing her to remember "Banilla" and how to sift flour.

Sweet mercy, I'm happy.

Funny Gestations

When I want something, I want it right away.

Pronto. Capiche?

Me no likey waiting.

Gimme, gimme. Have, have, have.

I am one of the most impatient people I know.

Currently I am in need of a functioning office. My office is--how do you say it-- a hole of death. Makes me go loco. Due to a list of reasons that would bore you and irritate me, I cannot tell you why it is not functioning. All I can tell you is that I am waiting for my contractor to show up and put in the electrical.

That being said, I can think of a host of good reasons to wait for something. And I need to remind myself of these things.

Beef Stew in the slow cooker.
Can't you just smell it? It's a cold winter day and dinner is simmering all day long in your 6 quart Crock Pot. And shouldn't it have to simmer? When the flavors of a half dozen wonderful veggies and beef come together and marry their flavors--each gently yielding their juices--its worth the wait. A carrot caramelizing. A potato absorbing broth. A nutty celery flavor. Oh me, oh my.

A Baby.
God didn't just take the greater part of a year because he needed that time to weave a baby. I firmly believe that 40 weeks is his idea of mental preparation for the amount of selflessness a parent is going to need to allow this baby to meld into their heart and family. Can you imagine the chaos in the world if the gestation for a baby were one week? *Sweet mercy*

Understanding Grace.
I can't even say that I fully understand grace yet because my bound-in-sin world is not steeped in it... but if you can imagine for one instant a world in which someone stopped slinging sloppy, un-creative, evil words at another person and instead said, "I know you think I'm a pickle bum, but I really like you. I like how you embrace the world with such vigor. And, while I'm at it, I also like your blond curly hair. It's really bouncy." An audible thud would be heard as heavy, ill-meaning words dropped to the ground and people pondered the use of other vernacular.

Side note: One time when I was a young know-it-all designer I emailed a publisher that I didn't like how they printed my design and the publisher wrote back a very nice note signed "Shalom" at the bottom. It utterly unraveled me with its kindness. I have never forgotten it. Sometimes understanding grace takes time to sink in... the results are marvelous.

Home Decor.
Okay, this is a stretch, but I'm going to say it: I can tell when people have spent a decade of choosing special things to fill their home vs. the people who gave Pottery Barn $10,000 and said, "Have at it." I really can. There's something special about not rushing things.

Surgery.
Ugh. Definitely do not let anyone operate on you who looks rushed and impatient. Or who dresses like a space cowboy.

Flowers and Butterflies.
Have you ever tried to force open a flower before its bloom was ready? During the time that the bloom is still tightly curled, amazing creation magic is happening inside its belly. Stamens are reaching. Color is deepening. Fragrance is crescendoing. It's a very important time of growth. Same goes for butterflies. If you peel open their chrysalis too early, you'll get a wet, mad butterfly. Best leave him be.

Wow. I could continue this list for ages. But for now, I'll just use it to remind myself to be patient right now.

The office can wait. The place of peace and joy and creativity will have to be only present in my mind until it manifests itself within these four walls of this very messy office.

Shalom.


These are some of my new cabinets... Aren't they purdy?