Arise, mamas, arise.

"Arise all women who have hearts."
--Julia Ward Howe

Yesterday I woke up to pans banging, loud giggles, and several "sssshhhh's" as three little heads took turns peeping into my bedroom. And from the moment I pulled back the sheets, I was washed over with sweet hugs and words and pampering from my children and their daddy.

There was the traditional breakfast and morning cup made by the boys in the house. There were the marvelous handmade cards.


(yes, that really is us if we were a family rock band. My favorite part? Even as a lead singer in said rock band, I still carry a tote with an apple inside).
There was the quiet moments I got (instead of cleaning or changing diapers or making lunches) to sit and focus on my breath, my gratitude, my blessed life.

There was the time spent together, just playing and being. It was perfect, really. But I must confess: my Mothers Day was all weekend long, and perhaps the stuff that I will carry with me most happened away from my children, on Saturday morning in a yoga studio across the bay.

While the very fact that I was doing restorative yoga without my normal, um, helper

was glorious, the truth is, the morning's power came far more in the reason for the gathering.

For four years now, my good friend Copland and I have been part of the national organization Mothers Acting Up, a mama-led, mama-fed movement that inspires people to act up-- with joy-- on behalf of the world's women and children. Each year, we've put on a Mother's Day event focusing on international initiatives working for the betterment of those who so often do not have a voice of their own. We've opened a village bank in Haiti and put in a PlayPump in Tanzania. Our community of women in a town of 1,500 people has come together in ways we never imagined; a collective uprising rooted in love that is truly making a difference. This year, Copland organized a morning of restorative yoga, tea and conversation as a way to give back to these women, and as a way to kick off our part in the Stand for the World's Children campaign.

The campaign is aiming to reach one million people-- through postcard signings and online petitions-- to Stand for the World's Children by asking elected officials to prioritize so that the world's most vulnerable children are cared for in the following ways: 1) to see President Obama appoint a Children's Ambassador, a person who would report to Secretary of State Clinton and oversee programs and funding dedicated to caring for the children of the world. 2) To see congress fully fund programs benefitting orphans and other vulnerable children on this planet.

Sitting in a circle on the yoga studio floor with this diverse group of women-- conservative and liberal, young and old, mothers and others-- I was able to breathe in the incredible gift of the collective spirit. It gave me hope. It encouraged me to step forward and to open my heart with a compassion that requires action outside my own four walls.

Driving home Saturday morning, I spent my time thinking about these beautiful children:

Caroline, Isaac and Watuma-- sponsored family members-- who live in Kenya and Uganda. I know of the fear their own mother's face; I know they worry about having enough food, about violence and school fees and illnesses that run rampant in the slums of cities like Nairobi. I recognize the innocent and pride of these children, as they learn to draw pictures with English captions like "chicken" or "This is cow."

It is hard to not feel overwhelmed and yet, it is hard to ignore the fact that my blessed life can only truly be honored if I am doing what I can to ensure that all children are cared for, that all children can curl up in their beds at night and fall asleep feeling full and safe and warm.

Mothers Acting Up provides me with the fuel to stand up for these children. I can connect with other women, can share my frustrations and my dreams. Together, we are able to open space in our lives to dig deeper, to uncover the well that is at mothering's soul-- a universal web that binds together anyone who has loved a child as we do. This place within us, the place where the heart and art of mothering lies, shows us an undeniable truth: all the children of the world are our own. All the children of the world need nurturing and love and the protection of someone bigger. It is not our burden, but instead, our gift, to know that we can stand up in their honor.

I encourage you to spend a few moments by your child's bed tonight. Watch the peace of their sleep, the way the rhythm of their breathing becomes your own, the way your body feels like it radiates the most beautiful light as you look upon them. Soak in the gratitude, and then ask yourself, "how can I give this to someone else?"

The answer? It can be as simple as signing a petition.
http://www.standfortheworldschildren.org

Doing our own thing, together

If you have been a Blankie Chronicle subscriber in the past, please re-subscribe. Something nasty happened with feedburner, and you've all seemed to disappear from my list. So sorry. And thanks, in advance, for taking the time to re-submit emails or rejoin on your readers.

"It's froggy outside," Max said with a yawn. He was sitting on our couch, looking out toward the valley with his eyes scrunched up, as if he could cut through the gray mist simply by squinting. "Maybe we better stay inside for awhile."

Curtains of fog hung heavy in front of our house yesterday, contrasted only by a darkening sky. Rain was coming. The air smelled of it. My right knee, broken at age eight while jumping on a neighbor's bed, was aching as it does whenever a storm is brewing. With days of warm sun and hours upon hours of outdoor play and exploration behind us, I was content to let the sky open up and begin dumping the first warm showers of the season.

It was a morning of moving slowly. I sipped tea and fussed with my sewing machine. Max stayed on the couch, resting with books and filling his blankie in on any and all adventures "he" may have missed earlier in the week. There was the many bird hikes (and bikes), with swamp discoveries.

There was the noise Lizzie made when she tried out the swing. (A Terodactyl noise. A very loud Terodactyl).


There was the great army battle (more on this another day).


Meanwhile, Elizabeth found her way out the front door. She sat for a long time, waiting for the rain to stop. Or maybe, just soaking in the very sight of water hitting earth, of the damp smells and warm breeze.




And by afternoon, the sun returned, bringing with it new energy to go foraging for leeks,

to play tag,

to work the flower beds,


to curl up on the porch and read the last (sigh) Percy Jackson book.

Everyone found a rhythm to get lost in on their own, but together. The best kind of day.

Happy Weekend. And PS-- come on over to Cluck and Tweet, where we've gone all Typepad fancy. Lots of crafting and cooking and funny business going on there. Really.

Half Full

If you've been visiting this space for awhile, you'll notice the blog has had a bit of a makeover. A little lighter. A little more simple. And a little ditty on the side about how I'm trying to live my life. It's new, and I'm still getting used to it (the ditty, that is) because I'll be honest: I do not come by this whole "choosing joy in every moment" idea naturally. Truth is, I have a tendency to swing into darker places, to stew over little messes, to be stormy and passionate-- sometimes in the not-so-nice ways. My 30 years have been spent swinging in the extremes of emotion. Balance is not a word often used to describe my life.

And that's okay.

Because right now, I am typing while my daughter sleeps on my arm.



She's breathing in a rhythm that makes me realize we are moving toward summer; her inhales and exhales flowing slow and clear, the result of spending an entire day outdoors. It is this baby, along with the two boys breathing in similar candence in their beds a floor above us, that helps me understand the importance of choosing gratitude over anything else.

As a poet, I've always chalked bouts of dark and stormy (or weepy and aimlessness) on my craft. Occupational hazard of sorts. It almost seems attractive-- and certainly has its elements of romance-- to be a creative soul that bleeds emotions in words and sponges the essence of loss as much as love from the world all around. I know. It sounds pretty stupid when I actually type it.

The older I get, the more I realize how brief this time in life really is. I look at my children and find myself totally awed-- when I take the time to slow down and notice-- how quickly they grow and change.

The Noah who woke up this morning was not quite the same Noah whose hair, damp with sweat, I tucked behind freckled ears as he slept tonight. Experiences, moments, discoveries; these things happen to him all day. And he changes.

It is the same with Max and Elizabeth.

Each moment is part of their story. I think I got tired of being caught up in anything and everything that got in the way of the opportunity to watch these stories unfold. And so, I made a decision to choose joy in every moment. And I'm not looking back.

Don't get me wrong: there is very little joy in unclogging the toilet every other day, even when my four-year old is prancing around yelling "I'm the best toilet clogger in the universe!" It isn't easy to feel grateful when my daughter gets up a thousand times a night or when Noah is crying because some bully called him an "A-hole" and he feels like he is swearing by even saying A. Hole. I have plenty of melting moments around 6:45 p.m. (exactly) when the wear-and-tear of the day just feels like too much and I want to pee alone or curl up on the coach or sew or anything besides what I'm doing. My breath gets shorter. My back tenses up and I feel antsy and agitated and unable to settle. And that's okay too-- because it is my body's way of calling me back to the present. Maybe I need to step outside or slide out for a walk. Maybe I need to go grab a book and curl up on the couch and let the dishes wait in the sink. Learning to give myself a break-- this is a big part of living joyfully. In these moments, however, more than anything else, I need to stop and ask one question: am I, despite all the junk, still very blessed? I've never, ever been able to say no. And somehow, I swear, it changes everything.

One glance as photos like these, and I realize, my life is full.









So very full in all the best ways. What are some ways you remind yourself to choose gratitude?

I'm also so very grateful that I'm learning to sew, because now I can whip out fantastic little projects like this sandwhich/snack bag.


You can check out the tutorial on Cluck and Tweet.

In this moment

In this moment:

I am:: discovering spring again through my daughter's eyes


I am:: filled with gratitude for the little things




I am:: taking each step, one foot at a time.



I found this passage in the Parent's Tao Te Ching the other day and I'm letting the words sink in past my skin, past my mind, past the bones and muscles into that place where an inhale stops and an exhale begins.

"You do not have to make your children
into wonderful people.
You only have to remind them
that they are wonderful people.
If you do this consistently
from the day they are born
they will believe it easily.

You cannot force your will
upon other human beings.
You cannot hurry children
along the road to maturity.
And the only step necessary
on their long journey of life,
is the next small one."


Happy Sunday.

Come visit me here for fun (and funny, at least to us) domestic "stuff".

Noticing every minute

Walking through the woods behind our house the other day, this caught my eye:

It was everywhere. New growth springing from limbs and earth…and my children.

It’s funny how spending time in the natural world not only energizes and restores us, but also helps us remember. Being in that moment, air rich with wet underbrush and soon-to-burst buds, I was suddenly so aware of how the change in seasons is also a call to stop. And notice.

My Noah turned 10 a few weeks ago. 10. I think I’ve avoiding writing here since then because I knew I would have to say something about this milestone, and, well, I just wasn’t ready. Each year on my kids birthdays, I write them a letter. I have each letter for each year tucked away, a gift they will receive bundled on their 21st birthdays. I shared my first letter to Elizabeth here, and at the time, thought I would do the same with Noah’s letter.

Except I realized that at 10, his letters are no longer mine to share. Something significant happened when my first born hit double digits. As I wrote the words to accompany his entry into this new phase of childhood, I was struck by how much of my wirting was centered around the notion of watching Noah becoming the person he was meant to be. More than sweet sentiments of the passing year, more than hopes and dreams for his future or reminiscing his first nine years, I found myself writing about the joy I am experiencing simply seeing him explore who he is. And who he is, and how he decides to share that with the world, well, I think that is for him to decide. From each year forward, the letters I write him will be tucked away as always, but instead of feeling like they are mine to read, it feels more like I’m simply guarding these observations and words of love until they are turned over to their rightful owner.


And this left me in a quandary. How do I do justice to the 10th birthday of my baby boy, without simply reprinting that letter (which I always feel like sucks the best words out of me for each birthday). How?

I go back.

Locked in a bathroom with white tile and blue walls, I took the pregnancy test. It was late August, 1998. I was 19. The test was positive.

Flash forward eight months. I am in a hospital bed, crying and pushing and feeling exhausted. I told my mom I could. Not. Do. This. But I did.

I won’t say the moment Noah came out that everything changed. My love for him was instant and fierce, but my understanding of the depth of mothering came in pieces over the next five—or ten—years. I was 20 years-old when I brought him home. And we, in so many ways, raised each other.

There is no person on earth that I feel as tied to as Noah. It is as if a piece of my soul was placed into my womb when he was created. Not that my other two children feel less a part of me. They don’t. It’s just that there is something so familiar about Noah’s mind, about his heart, that makes me understand we are woven together in uncommon ways.

While I have long loved how his curious mind and abstract way of discovering the world brings me back to those moments of my own childhood, I also know they have served up a desire for me to guard every second of his growth. In doing so, I over-analyze, hyper-concern, and generally get caught in a trap of parenting doubts.

Like a mirror, he has reflected this too.

Recently, while walking down the hill that leads into our town, I took time to simply notice my surroundings. I listened to the few song birds that had already returned from their winter homes. I felt and heard the wind sweep across my fingers, the rustling of leaves still clinging to the now snow-free ground. I saw the clouds move east through the sky. In the distance, the ice was shifting in the bay. It was subtle, not something I could visibly recognize. No, it was more a feeling; one that I noticed only because I was paying attention.

And it hit me.

That is what parenting at this age is all about: noticing. So I’ve spent the last weeks doing just that. I listen to the words that flow so readily from Noah’s mouth. I watch his face, taking in old expressions and new ones. I laugh to myself as he tries out new fashion, new phrases, new ways to walk. He’s exploring his identity. He’s trying on different hats (which, apparently, must be worn sideways).

Freeing myself from the attachment to how my mothering will shape the being he is to grow into, I suddenly am able to sit back and just enjoy my boy. As he is. In this moment.

10. It’s a huge leap from babe in arms to eight years away from high school graduation. Soon will come the days when friends and activities will replace the desire to curl up beside me with a good book. But for now, for this moment, 10 is a beautiful age, one where the hard work of tantrums and diapers and sleepless nights are distant memories, and the awe of discovering who this person—this person who was born from my body—truly is. What a gift.


*You can find me going on (and on) about spring in the great north country right here.
** You can find me writing about everything from crafting (which often includes wine corks) and food to um, all that other mama-related stuff over at the newly hatched Cluck and Tweet, a website trying to be find the joy (and sometimes sarcastic laughter) in all things domestic.

On Justin, for a change

Most of the time I sit down at my computer to write here, I’m buzzing with words about what funny thing Max said or how Lizzie just looks at me and giggles for no reason, or how Noah seems so suddenly grown. Tonight, though, as I sit in front of what may be the last fire of the season, I realize the only person I want to talk about is Justin.

My husband turned 39 today. As we sat side-by-side and had lunch today, I took a rare moment to just watch him. He was staring out the window, sighing in that big thought kind of way.

“Birthdays,” he said with a frown, “only remind us we’re getting older.”

This is true. I nodded and hugged him and said something cheesy, some cliché about him being like fine wine. And I went back to lunch and laundry.

Parenting is a funny thing. It is, in so many ways, the most intimate act two people can entwine themselves together to perform. Intimate, but also exhausting. Exhausting and weighted and worrisome and wonderful—and simply busy enough to make even the best of us (and I am by no means in that category) forget to stop and just look at our partners. To sit and just breathe alongside them and take five minutes out of our day to say thank you or I appreciate you or anything else that validates what they do to make us, well, us.

Thinking about the father Justin is always brings a deep sense of gratitude for me. He’s the kind of guy that can spend hours building sand castles or playing Legos or pick up soccer in the backyard.

He’s the kind of guy who would rather start an out west ski tradition with his eldest son rather than with his buddies.

And on such a trip, he's also the guy who suggests his son take the camera and get a picture of this:

(and a year later, his son is still laughing about it).

He’s the kind of guy who takes one look at his daughter’s toothy grin and just melts.


It’s a gift my children don’t even realize they are getting, because he just IS present when he’s with them.


I love that about this man.


And I love this too:


It is so true, that at some point, birthdays just remind us we are getting older. But maybe that’s okay, when we’re living and creating and being part such a central part of something as simple and profound as a family.

Happy, happy birthday J.



And speaking of birthdays, I am so very excited to announce the hatch of the new weblog Cluck and Tweet. It is a great one-stop gaggle of fun where you'll find everything from crafting and traveling with the kidlets to recipes and talk about, well, the breeding grounds of life. Please, please come over and check us out-- and say hello-- because my friend Alison is offering up the coolest necklace giveaway, and I just want one of my peeps to win it!

Lots to celebrate-- over on mynorth.com, I'm celebrating the return of spring-- and because of www.cluckandtweet.com, I'm celebrating the fact that I can write off my lattes. So basically, I'm trying to be all over the web, and all up to no good. Hope you are having sunshine and above zero temperatures too...