I know what you’re thinking. I think he is too. The cutest kid ever, right? Right.

Not only is he strikingly handsome, he’s quite agreeable as well.

It also really helps that he’s a Mama’s boy through and through. I don’t mind this one little bit.

But I gotta be honest with you.

Teething? It’s about to put me over the edge.

My sweet, laid back, angelic baby boy has been replaced by a non-napping, whiny, fussy alien child. I know, I know, he’s in pain. I should be more sensitive. And I was, I really was, about 3 teeth ago. Now that we’re working on tooth #5, I’m ready for a break from this teething nonsense.

You see Bitzy cut her bottom 2 teeth around 6 months and didn’t cut any more until she was 13 months old. Then she got 6 teeth in one month. But really it wasn’t so bad. She handled it like a champ. And then the incisors came…OUCH. And we’re still waiting on those dreaded 2 year molars, but the great news is that Bitzy’s teething journey is coming to a welcomed close while Brother’s has just begun.

Do they really need teeth anyway? Why must it be so painful?

Also? I’m not so great at the whole whiny baby thing. It makes me nuts, like literally a little crazy. Perhaps you are one of those parents who don’t mind crying/whining and can carry on normally while your baby melts down. Me? I can’t handle it. And it’s not even that I’m so caring and sensitive and all of that, it’s more that it drives me bananas. So needless to say, over the past month of Brother cutting these teeth and being subsequently miserable, this Mama is ready for my happy boy to return. I miss him.

But there have been some smiles through the painful cries of my wee one.

Take a look:

Even through the tears, the endless amounts of Tylenol and tired eyes, he remains the sweetest little thing ever. I’m smitten indeed.

Happy Monday everyone!

Have you ever read something that really struck a cord with you, whether good or bad, and weeks later it would randomly pop into your mind and force you to reconsider it once again?

This has happened to me many times, but this time, I feel like what is brewing in my heart must pour out. Like the words are bubbling up whether I want them to or not.

Because friends, what is brewing isn’t very popular. In fact, it’s convicting my heart to the core and I hope/fear that it will do the same to yours.

But ya know what? I started this blog to tell my little stories so that’s what I’m gonna do.

You see a few weeks ago, I read this blog by a stranger whom I will probably never meet. It made the rounds on Facebook and Twitter with mommies everywhere cheering and shouting “Hooray!”

It was a chant for mommies everywhere to join in, to admit that each day isn’t filled with sunshine, love and happiness. To admit that maybe, just maybe, motherhood is tough.

She mentions being in a store and older women encouraging her to “enjoy every minute because it goes by too fast.” (Which has happened to me many times as well). She admits the panic in living that way, suggesting that having a Carpe Diem approach to life is too frantic and too exhausting to execute everyday.

She reasons that parenthood is like climbing Mt. Everest, that you don’t truly appreciate the journey until you reach the summit. Only then can you look back and see all that you’ve accomplished.

And ya what? I get it. I really do.

I get why the Huffington Post picked it up and thousands of people read it and elbowed each other with a twinkle in their eye.

And to be honest, the reaction from so many people to the blog really bothers me more than the writing itself.

It seems everyone wants to feel justified in their frustrations with having children who are wild and crazy and don’t listen and who God forbid, act like children.

I know that I do. There are nights that I recount all the ways to Zach that Bitzy challenged me and how Brother refused to nap and how I am just so tired. I just want someone, anyone to feel sorry for me and my tiredness. But then, there are nights where I am practically dancing around the house with joy that I get to live this life and I am devastated that my babies had to go to sleep because I’ll miss them so.

It’s like the valley verses the summit. Every day can’t be the valley and every day can’t be the summit. I totally get that.

But this blog was almost a permission slip to settle for “good enough” and I have a real problem with that.

My intense reaction to this kind of thinking also stems from seeing mommies out with their littles at the indoor playgrounds and parks. I am continuously baffled at how parents ignore their children in public. The first time I experienced this was when Bitzy was around 12 months old. She was newly toddling along and we went to a local park where there are two playgrounds. One is for small children (1 and 2 year olds) and one is for older kids. As Bitzy was walking on the tiny bridge of the jungle gym I followed her and helped her up the steps, down the slide, etc. I mean, the child was barely a year old for goodness sake, she couldn’t do it by herself. As I was helping her up the steps there was a little boy. He was around 18 months. Bigger than Bitzy, but still a tiny guy. He bravely climbed up the steps and flashed me a smile. I innocently said, “Good job buddy!” as I helped Bitzy go across the bridge. As I scanned the area for his caregiver I didn’t see anyone, but that didn’t concern me too much because I was certain they were watching. After 15 minutes of playing and helping him maneuver the playground, his mommy finally appeared with her phone in hand texting. He ran up to her and hugged her and she non-chanlantly patted his back and then resumed texting. She didn’t even look at him, or me for that matter. I hadn’t seen her the entire time we were there, she just appeared out of thin air.

This was my first interaction with mommies who act like their children are a burden.

And truth be told, this situation is rare. Mostly, it’s much more subtle. Like a mommy looking at Facebook instead of playing with her kid at the playground. Or who barely looks up when her child yells, “Mommy watch this!” Or in this case, a mommy who settles in the knowledge that when the summit comes someday far away from today, then she will enjoy. Then, she will relish in her children, rather than enjoying the climb- today.

I always wonder how I would behave, parent, love, speak and spend my time if this were my last day on earth, because well, it could be. You just never know, ya know?

I don’t want to settle friends. I want the BEST. The very, very, very best. I want to lay down on my pillow every night knowing that I loved hard and spoke encouragement into the hearts of those around me. And on days I fail, I want to regret it and ask forgiveness rather than sighing and saying, “Oh well, it was good enough.”

I’m better than that, and so are you.

I don’t just want a few fleeting moments of amazingness throughout the day, I want a full day of amazingness. I want to cultivate a home where there is so much love and fun and encouragement and JOY that is springs forth in our speech and our dances and our hearts.

And when older women stop me and tell me to enjoy my babies I want to sincerely say, “I do and I will, every single minute of the day, even on the hard days.”

Because I’ll say it again, “How you spend your days is how you spend your life.” I don’t want to spend MY life complaining about the hardness, I want to relish the miracle of this life, even if I have to say it with gritted teeth as a manta over and over again to convince myself that it’s true on the hard days. I want to appreciate the opportunity to love without limits and to enjoy the moments.

But the reality is that this kind of intentional living with joy is tough stuff. It’s much easier to lazily skate throughout the day begging for bedtime. I know that, I’ve been there.

That’s why I’m so challenged/convicted/invigorated by this thought that although life/parenthood/friendship/whatever is a climb to the summit of a mountain, the climb is where we learn to take one step at a time and enjoy ourselves. We have to consciously take one step at a time and choose joy. It’s not easy, never is, but our attitudes determine the joy of the climb.

I want to love my time up the mountain, don’t you?

She keeps me on my toes.

It’s early on Monday morning and the house is at rest.

All is quiet as my precious babies sleep soundly.

Before I had this amazing family and I was footloose and fancy free, silence made me uncomfortable. Like I needed to fill the space somehow. With music, talking, movies, friends, whatever. I never just sat still and enjoyed the quiet.

Now that our house is, how you say? Bustling, to say the least, silence is so fleeting that I must enjoy it while it lasts.

Now don’t get me wrong, the “MAMA PWAY TEA PARTY WIT ME?” from the sweetest little Bitziest voice ever, is truly one of the most precious sounds in the world. And Brothers new found “MMMMMMMAAAAAAAAAAMMMMMMMMAAAAAAAAA” is magic to my ears. And I love playing, enjoying and loving my babies (I think we’ve well established that), but when all is quiet and everyone is tucked safety in bed I relish the silence.

Everything Bitzy does is hilarious to Brother. He is her biggest fan.

In fact, sometimes after both my babies are asleep and I walk down the stairs I literally collaspe on the couch. Motherhood is not for the weak friends. It’s exhausting work…but I can say with confidence that it’s the most fun job in the whole wide world. I have never been so deliriously happy to play all day and yet so thrilled to sit and soak in the silence after bedtime.

Tonight when I was rocking Brother to sleep (actually it was 5:30pm because he has decided that one nap a day will do, so he’s been sleeping 14 hours at night- is that odd?), I thought about how nursing is such a great opportunity to sit still. There is really nothing else to do but to sit still and nurse your sweetheart. Especially my little Curious George. The stiller I am, the better. So I pray mainly. I pray for my babies, for Zach, for peace, help, love, joy. You know, the usual. But tonight, I tried to not do anyting at all. Just to sit with not a thought in my head. Just to enjoy the silence as I gazed at my baby boy.

It took a few minutes, but finally it worked.

And I loved it.

How, how, how have I missed this phenomenon of silence? Oh glorious silence, I’ll never try to mute you out again.

God says to “Be still and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10) for a reason. I’m really going to work on this, because, silence? It’s good friends, real good.

Mother Teresa so eloquently said what my heart feels, “In the silence of the heart God speaks. If you face God in prayer and silence, God will speak to you. Then you will know that you are nothing. It is only when you realize your nothingness, your emptiness, that God can fill you with Himself. Souls of prayer are souls of great silence.”

May you all experience the joy of silence today as well.

This picture has absolutely nothing to do with this little story. Just thought I’d share some eye candy.

Ha! You thought I was going to say that I just started running again didn’t you?

Now THAT would be very sad story.

Because friends, that means that I would have died.

I think I’m too old to run.

That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

Anyway, my sweet little precious ones have given me a run for the money this week.

Between Brother teething and Bitzy struggling with being very off schedule since Christmas and trying to get back on schedule, it’s been a doozy of a week.

This Mama is very excited for Daddy to be home with us this weekend.

But then, in the midst of the exhaustion, as I nursed and rocked sweet Brother bear to sleep, as his eyes got heavier and heavier he unlatched, locked eyes with me and smiled the most beautiful smile. Almost as if to say, “I love you Mama, goodnight.”

What a gift.

And then, as I tucked Bitzy into her crib with her blankies after rocking and reading, she sleepily whispered, “Goodnight Kanga, I love you.” And I smiled and said, “Goodnight Sweet Roo. I love you.”

And that my friends, is what it’s all about.

Have a great weekend friends!

The culprit

My very first post about poop was many moons ago. Read it here.

It’s sweet that I thought I was a Poopologist then. Ha, aha, ahahahahaha. Since then, I have earned several doctorates in the subject. In fact, almost every single day I wake up with a nice stew of pee and poop all over me.

Nice, eh?

You see, my sweet Brother bear has gone from being the best little sleeper ever, to, well, NOT the best little sleeper ever. Sure, he’s no Bitzy. He doesn’t hate sleep with the sincere hatred that she did as a baby, but still, I feel like we’re on a slippery slope.

{more to come on that later}.

All that said, he normally wakes up ready to eat, snuggle, cuddle around 6:00am. If I just feed him and lay him down in the crib he’ll scream his brains out, however, if I bring him into bed with me (Zach is long gone at this point) then he’ll eat and go back to sleep for another hour or two.

And clearly I don’t mind the snuggles, not one bit.

What I do mind? Him waking up every 3 hours during the night. You got that right. The child is 7 months old and he goes to bed at 7:00pm and wakes to eat every 3 hours until 6:00am.

What I mind more? The fact that his tiny little size 3 diapers simple cannot hold the massive amounts of excrement coming from his sweet little booty. I’ve tried double diapering, bigger sizes, changing him during the night…nothing works.

No matter what, ever single morning as I breathe him in and try to memorize the way his chest rises and falls, I also smell the sweet smell of baby poop as it oozes all over me.

Yummy, no?

Ah, motherhood.

Someday when I’m old and grey I will miss many things about my babies being tiny…but I have a feeling I will not miss being pooped on every.single.day.

I was around 24 weeks in this pic. Now at 28 weeks I’m at least 899% bigger. It’s a real situation.

Remind me never to get pregnant again in the winter okay?

No really.

When I was preggers with Bitzy we found out in February and by the time I was actually showing and starting to feel the effects of growing a tiny human, it was spring. I totally missed the plagues of winter.

Granted I had a whole lot of other annoying pregnancy issues, but at least I wasn’t sick all the time.

On the other hand, with this new little baby boy growing inside of me we found out in September, which puts me smack dab in the middle of pregnancy misery in the dead of winter.

So far, I have had two terrible bouts of bronchitis coupled with the special treat of a sinus infection, and most recently, a stomach flu which put me inches away from having to get fluids at labor and delivery.

Again, remind me that pregnancy is winter is a really bad idea. Sure, there is no swelling from the hellish heat, but standing at deaths door from the plagues of winter and apparently nonexistent immunity, make for a tough few months.

(Maybe this has something to do with the fact that I am, in fact, growing a tiny human as well as nursing a toddler…hmmm..something to consider).

Anyway, the moral of the story is that I hate being sick. Hate it. And I have become quite familiar with sickness this winter, which is a drag in general.

However, I will pledge to be sick forever rather than to watch my sweet little angel be sick ever again. My goodness that sweetie is so pitiful when she’s a sicko.

There is generally a 1-2 day window between when I contract the disease and when Bitzy gets it.

For example, on Friday night around 8:00pm I began feeling terrible, and by 3:00am I was on the phone with my OB begging him to call me in medicine to help me stop vomiting in order to not have to go to labor and delivery due to dehydration. I was in a bad place.

Fast forward 48 hours to Sunday night and around 9:00pm I hear my sweetheart crying on the monitor, which despite our sleep wars of the past, nowadays if she wakes up in the middle of the night it is very strange indeed.

After obsessing and pacing with my handy dandy video monitor I finally ventured upstairs to check on her.

I was not prepared for what I found .

She was covered from head to toe in vomit. The sheets, her lovely, even her sleep sheep were covered.

Needless to say, she was completely confused and pathetic.

I practically broke my neck to run to her and cuddle her despite her unfortunate stench. She whimpered and snuggled close to me.

She was so completely covered that we had to give her a bath, which was confusing to her and apparently devastating. The entire bath she wailed and screamed, it was pitiful.

Unfortunately this particular virus wasn’t a one vomit wonder. There were lots. Like lots and lots. Finally, after several rounds of changing her pajamas and changing my shirts we ended up back in the rocking chair skin to skin with a blanket wrapped around us.

There was something so simple and almost primitive about it. It was beautiful in fact. A mother and daughter clinging to each other, not only for heat but for reassurance. I needed to know that she was okay and that this would pass and she needed to know that her mama was there.

I probably whispered, “It’s okay baby, mama is here” at least 100 times in the wee hours of the morning as we clung to each other.

It was a rite of passage I suppose.

Motherhood isn’t just about reading the same book 20 times a day. Or giving baths and snuggles. Or even about begging God to protect the little person that has totally captured my heart in a short 15 months.

It’s about being there.

Being present.

Being the one person that she wants most in all the world when she feels that her little world is being shaken apart.

I don’t have to be the prettiest or the funniest mama ever. I don’t have to know all the right answers and always do everything right. But I do have to be there. To hold and rock and whisper that everything is going to be okay. To comfort, adjust and teach. To love.

To always love.

That’s what I learned about motherhood through the plague.

A hard fought lesson, but a necessary one nonetheless.