because i haven't mailed the card yet

Happy Rebirthdayment, Dad!

In spite of the blonde hair, all my life people have remarked how much I look like you. Usually the comments go something like this: Well I always thought you looked like your mom but now that I've seen your dad, you really look just like him!

Now I get to live that from a new perspective, since apparently Bella looks exactly like Dave. (Can a mother get a little credit please? I only carried her for 10 months!)









Hopefully Bella will appreciate it for all its worth. It didn't used to be my favorite compliment, but it definitely is today. Who wouldn't want to be as cool and handsome gorgeous as you? I can only assume that people mean your personality, too. (And apparently I'm as delicious as you, too.)

And now the legacy continues. Not only does Bella have my eyes, that means yet another little person has your eyes, too. And I couldn't be happier about it. Hopefully she'll get your personality, too. (Ahem, perhaps if you move closer she'll really get your personality movehereahemmoveherecoughcough.)

Happy Birthday, happy retirement, and happy everything!

love, shawna

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spring into action!

I did mention that it was a busy weekend, didn't I? On top of that, I've been working every day. Not always full shifts, but working every day means pumping and commuting and scheduling around work every day, and even a 5 hour shift adds up. I'm looking forward to Friday, my first day off in a week and a half.

But this weekend! This weekend was a blast! After work on Saturday I headed into Seattle so that I could photograph a friend's recording session in the basement of an art studio. Talk about fresh subjects for my bored camera lens and colorful eye candy all around. I had so much fun, although I've been suffering from doubtydoubts since then. I'm not really equipped to shoot in a dark studio, so I had to get creative and hopefully the results won't suck completely. I felt like I was in over my head in every aspect of a photo shoot, from gear to set up to subjects to post processing. Especially since they paid me. Just a little, but it's a vote of confidence in me, who has never done a shoot like that ever, and of course now I'm obligated to perform in return.

After that awesome fun and nerve wracking night, I got up the next day to climb the tallest sky scraper in Seattle for the Leukemia Lymphoma Society. It was a blast, and I got to register my marrow, which was something on my 101 things in 1001 days list. The 360 degree view from the 76th floor was absolutely gorgeous and I wished I'd had a camera or at least stayed longer to appreciate it. It was stuffy and I was huffing and puffing from the 20 minute climb. Did I mention I took an elevator back down?

The other thing on my mind lately? Square Foot Gardening. Anyone tried it? Since it's my first year gardening, I don't want to go in over my head in alien territory with no one supporting me. In true unschooling fashion I'm diving right in and I'll have all summer to teach me the lessons results of my decisions this spring. I've already planted a few rows of things, but there will be nine people eating out of this garden and I want to make the most of it! I don't know how open my uncle will be (since it IS his back yard, after all) to the SFG plan, and I don't think I have enough time to figure it all out on my own this year. I'm thinking about next year already, and we can put the SFG in a sunnier place since the apple trees shade the current garden placement.

Next year. Next year? That used to just be something to say. Next year was just some random time. Maybe I'd be in another grade or another school but I'd still be in school. Maybe I'd be in another home or another state, but I'd still be me, doing my job. Now when I say next year, the time line is there. It won't be My Current Life just in another time frame. It will be me, likely in the same state, hopefully in the same job, probably in the same (gardenless) apartment, but most importantly, a Two Year Old Bella will factor in. And perhaps we'll be thinking of cooking up another by then, so how can I even fathom what I should accomplish next year? Planning for that far away? Uh-uh. It's an awfully good excuse to make it happen this year.

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an okay anniversary

So today I was planning a post that I started writing well over a year ago. But, time runs fast these days and it's still not ready. Or perhaps it's me who's not ready. I have the need to share, but maybe not in this moment, when life is stressful but still sweet.

One year ago I was relieved to find Easter falling so early. A blessing, because I was so full of life and the anticipation of being 9 months pregnant and yet faced with the sad anniversary of my miscarriage the previous year. There was mingled happiness and sadness and the need to understand it all or push it away with a busy day of celebration.

This year the anniversary falls on a weekend so busy that I barely have time to think. But, it turns out I don't need the distraction. This year is so different, so distanced from what I experienced last year. A healthy pregnancy, a beautiful birth, a happy baby, writing and time have done so much healing. I doesn't hurt anymore, at least not in the way it used to.

The word miscarriage falls easily into my Story now and doesn't trip up my tongue and make my eyes burn. I've even transitioned past that time when it aches to stop hurting and just accept. Accept that the subsiding grief is only changing forms, and to let it mature is not the same as abandoning memories. Now it just is and I'm finding a new place in my heart for these feelings to live, slightly more distant from my daily life, and I'm okay with that.

Instead of bitterness in seeing those happy, seemingly unscathed pregnant couples, the times that the grief resurfaces are in moments of sympathy. Meeting another babylost mama, hearing of yet another tragedy no matter how long ago, no matter how it may differ from my own experience. It's always yesterday. My heart doesn't ache as much for my own lost baby, but keens for the loss of all the babies. One loss is everyone's loss. It's always like it happened yesterday.

The hardest part is finding a way to share, to grieve an invisible loss, to rejoice in a short life, to remember an existence in a society that is uninformed and afraid to recognize pregnancy and infant loss in the open. Grief is awkward and ugly, and as a society we are poorly equipped to comfort each other and lift one another up in times of true need. I hope by sharing, we'll slowly break this taboo, this lack of understanding. As I share mine, other mothers share theirs, and together we give our hearts openly and listen and receive one another. We hold fast to our memories and the lives we have known and validate each other.

So I will share my story. Not today as I thought I would, but sooner than later. It's just a small story, but it's mine and if it helps just one other person understand, acknowledge and support with a babylost mama, it's worth sharing.

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Not twelve

Dear Bella,

Eleven months sure snuck up on us, baby! I was starting to think that it's been an uneventful month, events barely worth mentioning, but in fact I've just been so busy it's hard to recollect all we've done. You've had an exponential increase in Daddy time, but it's been a whirlwind month (how do moms who work full time maintain their sanity?) and you're rolling with the punches like a champ. Minus sleep.

You're crawling -rather, gimping, since you never put your left knee down and instead use your foot- at lightning speed, begging us to chase you around. You say Daddy, and there's no doubt you know what it means. You're actually asking for food now, opening wide for peas, oatmeal, applesauce and carrots. It's like you've finally figured out what you were missing all this time. Now we just have to get into the habit of making food for you and taking time to sit you down to eat.

But the grouching, oh the grouching, and no new teeth to show for it yet. You're finally getting time with other babies, although we've got a long way to go with the word gently. You have hair envy, smack kids for no apparent reason, gouge out their eyeballs and eat their noses off. Hmmm time perhaps to evaluate how roughly we play at home.

I suppose I'm not surprised to find ourselves at eleven months already, but that doesn't take away the dumbfound feeling of being smacked in the face -yet again- by Time. Looking at other babies, I can gauge with ease, five months, seven months, one year, eighteen months. Each stage just has a look. But for some reason I can't possibly be objective when looking at you. You're my baby and always will be. In spite of all the milestones you've hit so far, you don't seem Almost One to me. I'm completely blind to your age. Every time I look down at you in my arms, I see the newborn girl who lived inside me for nearly ten months. I imagine I always will.

So with this realization that I just hadn't noticed you looking older comes the rising panic of The Birthday. I've always been an anticipation person. Christmas Eve is better than Christmas, the eve of vacation is better than the vacation, and apparently the month before your Birthday is more unbelievable than The Birthday itself. I keep replaying a scene from When Harry Met Sally over and over in my head. (What, darling, you don't have it memorized yet? You will.)

Sally says, crying: "And I'm going to be forty!"
To which Harry replies, concerned, "When?"
"Someday!"
"In eight years."

Sure, we have another month before you're one. Yes we have years before you grow up, perhaps even become a big sister. But it's Someday. And Someday sure comes fast when you have a kid around. Bella, Someday you'll understand.

Love,
mama

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sleep woes

I needs me my sleep and I have definitely NOT been getting it lately. I have lost the ability to settle my mind and nap with Bella like I used to, and I don't want to give up any of my daily excursions, lest I feel cut off from the non-mothering world. If this is the amount of sleep I get with one kid, I do not know how I can entertain the idea of more kids and still hope to maintain my quiet, sane, enjoyable lifestyle. I don't want to be that exhausted mom. Fatigue does not improve my parenting or social skills.

Bella has never "slept through the night", apart from the occasional 6 to 8 hour stretch that has me checking for signs of life. But lately she's reverted to a newborn waking schedule and I need tooth picks to prop my eyes open during the days. I was about to write a thread about it on a parenting forum, perhaps to ask for advice, perhaps just for some commiseration, but it occurred to me as I prepared my mental list of symptoms, that while things may not be desirable, they are predictable and on track.

Woe is me, why is my child night waking? Ah yes, let us start with the basics: bodily functions:

Teething. Oh, teeth, please just come in already. Or not. If we're already miserable, I suppose it's better to have it all at once than to ruin a potentially idyllic day in the future.

Solids. Really, this is the first week that Bella has eaten a solid every day (or "people food" as I call it). Perhaps just a spoonful, but that's a lot for such a little system to process. The night poo that we used akin to a turkey thermometer to predict bedtime (stick a for in her, she's done!) has gone out the window and she's a maybe-one-poo-a-day girl now. Who squirms all night.

Don't forget the developmental aspects:

Crawling: Almost 11 months and she only just figured out the crawling thing. Now she's got missions and errands and Very Important Things to attend to (nursing not included). I might as well hand her the car keys.

Talking: She's definitely said her first word, Daddy. Though I must write it Dah-dee to preserve the beautiful way she punctuates each syllable. She's craving words and eating them up right and left. Yes, baby, each one of those words has a meaning and you will learn them all.

And the rest can be fully ascribed to Working Mother Syndrome. Now that Dave's basically the stay at home parent, I'm picking up as many hours as possible at work. And because I don't often have a full shift, that means I'm working almost every day. A five hour shift with a one hour commute, all during social time and nursing time. I get home anywhere between 11pm and 2am and Bella is waiting for me, either asleep and ready to make up for the whole day by sleep nursing all night, or she is awake and ready to soak up some mommy, and save the nursing til that boring time of night when everyone is asleep.

In writing all this out, I realize that night wakings are bound to happen. And honestly, I don't think I have any plans to adjust them. She's not comfort nursing at night, waking up because she can't put herself to sleep. She knows how to fall asleep on her own. Sure, she needs one of us lying next to her, but she's completely capable if her belly's full and her eyes are droopy. She's waking because she's hungry. She sucks til let down and then chug chug chugs and pops off with a big sigh and flops over with her back to me. (You have served your purposes, woman. Goodnight.) Shushing her to sleep when she's actually hungry and Needs! Booba! Now! results in howling screams that make me feel bad for our neighbors. She then requires at least a half an hour more to assuage the towering temper, to see reason and decide to nurse at last (before she was too pissed) and comfort suck until the hiccuppy cries subside.

I'd rather have night nursing than night tantrums. Anyhow, this too shall pass, no? I'll just be brain dead at work and life for a while. (And the unfortunate casualty of this sleep torture today was a broken camera. Just my point ant shoot, but always in my pocket, and my only macro lens. Can I say bummed? Bummed and tired.)

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