Mothers

I have always found such beauty in motherhood. Now that I am a mother, and have felt what mothers feel, the depth of emotion I see in motherhood is so much bigger than I imagined. Stunning. There is nothing more fantastic, more pure than a mother with her child.

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Happenings....

Leave it to me to do some really fun projects, and completely neglect to photograph them. Here is what I have been up to. My mom spied this beauty while I was scrolling through my Pinterest board for projects to do that I could pretend were completely original ideas of mine. I'm pretty sure had she not seen it it would have been one of the many projects that sat undone. Thankfully she jumped right in, found some old canvas we had lying around, and gathered the supplies and now Hazel has her very own swing hanging in our entry, and it even has springs that can be attached to make it a jumpy swing. She loves it.

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 A friend of mine and I have a craft night every Thursday, except it never actually happens on Thursday. plans have changed all three times and we have ended up doing it on a Friday the first week, not at all the second week, and Saturday the third week. Oh well, at least we are doing it. Today we created this lovely little knitting needle case. Tutorial via Design Sponge. I changed it up a little with olive green bias tape for the trim, and I used a decorative stitch for the edges instead of a straight stitch, just for fun. I gifted it to my Mom who has turned into a professional knitter practically overnight.

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Gathering supplies to build this fun little playscape for some kids I know. It costs hardly anything, and it was fun to gather the supplies today. I literally walked down my driveway, and pointed out an aspen that mike could cut down, and gathered the rest of the wood from the woodpile. Easy Peasy.

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cool kid

Right?

Eight

Eight months ago
I was not quite a mother.

When looking through photos of this day, this one grabbed me. Not sure why. When compared with the hundreds of similar ones, there isn't anything of noticeable significance, but all the same it caught my eye. It took me back.
 

So tiny. So dreamy and sleepy and new.


And now. So big. So aware, and strong and demanding. So stubborn. So beautiful and chubby and giggly and toothy. My Dear Hazel. She still sleeps with me every night. I curl my body around her, and she fits right where she always has, and I know that she will not always fit there, sleep there.
Now I wonder every day whether what I am doing for her is the right thing. I think and think, and rethink.
And now I treasure my moments with her........and I treasure my moments alone, few and far between.
And I wonder every day about her hair, what color it will be and when will I be able to braid it, will she even let me?
And her face, what will it look like? And every day it changes but it's still just the same.
And the firsts are coming and going. In fact just now, as I was writing, she turned over in her sleep for the very first time from her back to her belly. We've raced past the first smile, the first giggle, the first time she sat up, her first foods, her first tooth, her first big fall, the first time she really reached for me, and even the first time she pulled herself up to stand.  I'm not sure how we got to this place, already past half way to a year.
The last eight months have certainly not been the easiest of my life. I have had to admit a lot of things about myself that I didn't want to. I have had to work on my patience and understanding a great deal. I have had to make hard choices. I have had to make big changes. Despite all of those hard things though, these last eight months have certainly been the most perfect, the most fulfilling, and the most rewarding of my life.

On being photogenic....

can't I get ONE photo where we both look good? ONE?