An unexpected leap

I thought the wonder weeks had stopped. For some reason, when he turned one, I naively thought the developmental leaps would some how be less severe, at least until we hit the "terrible twos". How wrong was I.

I am tired, again. And I am impatient and easy irritable. And instead of realizing that we might be in one of those "wonder weeks" as the book by the same name so nicely explains, I lament and roll my eyes and snap at the two men I live with, constantly. One is an adult and sort of just takes it, the other is under 2 feet tall and just looks up at me with big round blue eyes, in utter confusion.

I am back to getting nothing done, back to hearing the high-pitched dolphin squeaks any time he is not sleeping and back to feeling utterly doubtful about my parenting skills. None of my old solutions work, he seems devastatingly unsatisfied all the time and everything is taking 4x as long as it used to. And the only thing that I can do, is really GET that everything changes all the time - and the nugget is here to make sure that I remember that. And if I have to stop what I am doing and show him how the dishwasher works and let him touch all the knobs, than that is what I have to do. But my lord that is frustrating.

I think the hardest part about the self-reflection that comes out of parenting is that I am realizing that I am not that patient of a person, that I am easily bored with monotonous details and tasks and how easily I can feel resentment - when I am not able to do something for me. Not for the house, not for my marriage, not for the baby - but for me. And all of that is fueling an internal rage that I don't know how to deal with.

And then last night, when we got home from Monday night meditation at Spirit Rock, I let myself read a few blogs and there it was: the gem of wisdom that perhaps I was seeking at tonight's sitting but did not find. It's from Stacy at Mama-Om. I read each word. And at the end I realized why....because she asked herself the same question that I need to be asking myself now:

What would it be like to have an open heart right now?

And right at that moment, I could feel a crack in the armor around my heart. Clearly, the nugget, my marriage and I need this question. Everyday, every moment, until this wonder week subsides. And then maybe for the next 35 years as well.


For more on the book The Wonder Weeks click here

Eat breakfast

ceramics by Dinosaur Designs

I love this. I love how it looks. I love how I think it tastes. I love the simplicity. Now if only my breakfast table could look like this every morning?

Since I have to start somewhere with my meal planning strategy, I am starting at the beginning: how we start our day.

And when I really looked at what we eat for breakfast and how we eat it, I realized that its not really the way I want it to be. So, breakfast planning it is.

Do you eat breakfast? Do you eat it in the car in between stop lights? Do you drink it as a Double Tall Half something or rather?

If you do eat breakfast at home, in a somewhat calm manner, do you like where you eat breakfast? Is it calm and beautiful?

This week, think about how you start every day. Perhaps there is a way to infuse just a bit of calmness and beauty early in the morning, that might just carry you all the way through. Well, at least until lunch time. I'll be doing the same.

Starting from scratch

There are about a million other things that I would rather do than sit here and figure out how I am supposed to feed my family healthy meals. The issue is that I don't like to cook, and no matter what I do to try and convince myself that it brings me joy, it doesn't. It never has.

And besides it not bringing me joy, my feelings about it are complicated because:

1. I grew up in a family with a dad who loved to cook. Its what he did and that's what I saw. Learning about food as nourishment and enjoyment came from my dad, not my mom.

2. I married a man who doesn't like to cook, at all. He makes a mean set of German pfannekuchen on Sunday mornings and his grilled ribs (as per his mom's recipe) are out of this world, but that happens almost never.

3. I am a mom who is at home, raising a toddler. At some point "stay-at-homeness" meant being responsible for food shopping and cooking. Makes sense, I suppose. And I suppose it could be redefined, but in our case, it simply comes with the job description.

4. I have a Masters Degree in Holistic Health Education. I know about Ayurveda and Celiac Disease and wheat allergies and the healing properties of food and food as medicine and sustainability and GMO's and so on. So I can't just buy Kraft MacNCheese in a box and feel good about it.

3. Cooking doesn't come naturally, so I don't feel confident and I get easily frustrated. And I am a perfectionist and if I can't do it perfectly the first time, I don't want to do it at all. I know, place for growth - only that its been a year+ of personal growth and it would be really grand to do something that comes easily to me and makes me feel outrageously successful.

4. Cooking is work for me, every time. And duty. And that makes it something I have to do instead of get to do. And that is never very inspiring.

5. I would rather be on kitchen clean-up duty, anyday. At least there the results of my work last longer than 20 minutes.

So there they are - the 5 big fat reasons why I feel overwhelmed and stuck when I stand in my kitchen. And the biggest irony of all, is that I love food. Good food. And I know what tastes good and what doesn't. But I don't know how to get from lady fingers and mascarpone to Tiramisu because I don't want to know - I want someone to make it for me.

However, there is no someone else, there is just me. In an effort to figure this out and feed myself and my family in a way that supports energy and vitality, instead of reading some blogs or a book on this damp and dreary Sunday morning, I have surrounded myself with a few cookbooks, a pen and paper and several weekly meal planner options from a quick google search. I am hoping with a bit of mental force, I will get through what feels like drudgery now.

My problem is not lack of tools or resources - I live in the middle of one of the most food conscious places in the world and have every possible organic everything at my fingertips. But I am missing the will. And if there is anything that is stopping me from feeding my family well, its that.

Nothing else.

On being 35

"For three years straight, I've been burning the candle at both ends, and as of last December, I just didn't have anything left. I've been so aggressive about living life to the fullest and being plugged into everything, but now I've ripped the plug out of the wall and put it on the floor for a while. I am thinking about the same things as when I was 15, about spirituality and who I am, who I want to be.
It's cocoon, pupa, larva, and, &*%$, I'm reborn!"

-Drew Barrymore in ELLE magazine, August 2010

Yup, me too.

I stopped buying magazines two months before our wedding back in 2006. I realized that reading them brought more internal strife than joy - they just made me think about what I didn't have or how I didn't look or what I couldn't afford. I realized that fashion and home magazines made me feel the same way, so I stopped buying them all together. Devoted still to Domino at the time, I let that be my one and only.

Until last week. I was at in the check-out line at the grocery store and I saw this picture of Drew Barrymore. And I have this thing for Drew Barrymore, because she's not perfect and never pretends to be. And we're the same age. And I just think she is cool.

So the magazine laid around for days, until this morning. The nugget went down for his morning nap, his papa was still enjoying a Saturday morning sleep-in and I was about to start on any number of household tasks when I just stopped. I picked up the magazine, sat down in the comfy chair and read the whole thing, cover to cover.

And I realized that I don't allow myself to do that very often. And I realized that I should.
Because it gave me something to think about. The article about Drew ended like this:

"The best thing about being 35 is that if I was lucky enough, with my health and life span, I might be able to do it all over again. 35 plus 35 equals 70, and that would be a long life. The next 35 years are a second chance at life...I wonder how it will go. It's fascinating."

I couldn't have said it better myself, I thought to myself with a smile.

First official "school" lunch

I dropped him off and I cried. Well, I didn't cry until I was in the car driving back to our house but I cried none the less.

Maybe it was because I packed a lunch for him this morning. Or maybe it was because I was not going to see again until 4pm. Or maybe it was because I had no idea what he would be doing all day when usually I see every smile and smirk and furrowed brow. Or maybe it was because I knew this was just the beginning of days just like this one.

So I let myself cry for 2 minutes. And then I went to the gym. And then I showered at home without wondering if he was already awake from his nap. And then I worked, really worked, like I haven't in an extremely long time. And it felt really good.

Here's to looking forward to next Wednesday and the nugget's 2nd day at daycare.

My new favorite thing: The Learning Tower from Little Partners. While we were away and I got to catch up on my blog reading, I stumbled upon some post somewhere that raved about this clever contraption. And I knew right away that this would be perfect for my oh so curious little man.

So I posted a "Wish to Buy" post onto my local mom's network and sure enough I found a mom willing to part with her well loved tower. With one string: that in 2-3 years she could potentially buy it back from me when her 3 month old is ready to use it. I of course agreed - because this is really what we should be doing with all of our baby and kid stuff. All of it.

And immediately, it was a hit. And indeed, it took him less than 24 hours to figure out how to climb up onto it. He is still working on the dismount though. But as you can see, he mixed his first bread batter today. And I made dinner, without the tugging at my pant legs.

One used learning tower, one baby who can now see what is going on and one calm and un-frazzled mama. Priceless.

Spiritual shopping

image from HSN.com Eat, Pray, Love collection

It's official, its been bastardized. I know, strong word. Probably at the end of writing this post, I will feel more open and embracing.

Months ago when I first heard that Eat, Pray, Love was being made into a movie, a part of me scowled and cringed. No, I thought, I don't want anyone else's images of this story in my head but my own. I read this book in 2005, before it was on any best seller list or Oprah and it is no exaggeration to say that it saved me during a dark and utterly lost place in my life. This book was my life raft and I hold it in extremely high regard.

I passed it on to every woman that I know and even used it as my inspiration for the project I had to create for my interview at Anthropologie. I started to re-read it during the first hazy months of motherhood when I started to experience those tiny drops of darkness, disconnect and sadness than can appear in the post-partum period. I didn't get through it all the second time, distracted by my lack of sleep and the taxing new duties of motherhood, but I didn't need to. I just needed to be reminded of what it had done for me before. I needed to remember my own time in Bali, my own strength in getting up of the floor and my own tools for finding the light again. And I did.

So, back to 2010 and Hollywood. I got over my initial "don't want this book to be made into a movie" attitude when I learned that Julia Roberts and Javier Bardem would be lending their talent to its story. And at the end of the day, I realized this was simply a natural progression of information sharing in this age of technology and film making. I sent out an email to my dearest lady friends and we have a matinee with dinner to follow scheduled for opening weekend.

And then today, on an unusual solo trip to Trader Joes, I let myself meander into Cost Plus to test my No Spend Month policy. And there, right at the entrance was America's answer to spiritual enlightenment: consumerism. Introducing the Eat, Pray, Love collection, just in time for the release of the movie. Mala beads from China, Indian inspired tunics and mass produced teak coasters from Bali. Arghhhh.

I get why this works. And I get marketing. And I get retail therapy. And I get wanting to feel good. And I get beautiful things. And I get that this is just all part of the process, but I don't have to like it.

So if you haven't read Eat, Pray, Love, go get it before you see the movie. Because my guess is that some part of Ms. Gilbert's journey will be like some part of your own. And that will remind you that we are never alone, in the darkness and the light.

A penny saved...

piggy bank available here on etsy

How does the saying go again..."A penny earned is a penny saved?"

As CFO of this new family of three, I have decided that August is going to be a No Spend Month. This is not an original idea but in the past year when I have been inspired by other bloggers who were committing to the same, it always felt like there was something that we "needed" to buy that kept me from jumping on the bandwagon.

Well, we are jumping on it this month. The move is over, the vacation has come and gone and before the circus of the holidays begins it felt like August was the perfect time to sit back, think, and make a plan.

So the no spending plan goes like this: no personal purchases of any kind that are not necessities. No extra craft projects, no deals on sale, no toys or clothes for the nugget, no Etsy purchases, nada. Groceries, gas, diapers, babysitting, exercise classes and date nights are allowed. Business expenses are also exempt to this rule (as my husband owns his own business and works often from home), though they are under strict scrutiny. Scrutiny by me.

So there you have it. This is going to be hard. But in a commitment to organize our finances and work on creating our version of financial serenity, this is a good test.

I will keep you posted...

Let's just go

{laotian baby on our boat trip down the mekong river, february 2008}

I did it. I said the words. And without having to say it, he knew that they would be followed by Bali or Bolivia or Guatemala, but he stopped me with just one look. The don't go there look. But that was a few days ago.

Today, I got the "I was thinking..." and when those words come out of my husband's mouth, I have learned to stop what I am doing and pay attention. This morning he stopped me in my tracks and I made myself comfortable on the steps leading downstairs. I have learned that the thoughts after those simple words often require me to sit down.

A bit of back story...

In 2008, I became pregnant just a few short weeks after we had returned from 10 months of traveling around the Pacific Ocean. In a decision that most called "adventurous" and only one or two called "foolish", we changed the course of our relationship, our careers and how we experience the world we live in. It is an experience that we reference at least once a day and it continues to be a source of inspiration, encouragement, joy and light when life feels a bit bleak. The decision to quit our jobs, rent out our apartment and travel together for 10 months changed our relationship, ourselves and our life outlook. Free to be where we wanted, when we wanted, we chose to travel when we did, because we knew children would be "next" and this type of travel would not happen with them.

Until we realized that it does. Or it can. Along the way, we met a family traveling with a 2yr old and a 5 yr old in the Galapagos, a family on a boat with a 7 yr old and many others along the way. They did not arrive in Lima for just one night without a hotel reservation or stay out until the morning hours in Singapore, but they traveled. And they experienced. And they were together.

While in Germany a few weeks ago I read the inspiring story of a family and their young boy, living temporarily in Africa - and the images of him in the wild have been etched into my mind. To read the story click here. And though the nugget and I only braved a short trip from San Francisco to Frankfurt, he proved quite adaptable and willing to play along with train rides and Spaetzle and all the new things we threw in his path. So Germany or Africa or Panama?

So today, as we gazed into the future a bit and saw a dog and a second child and maybe a house, we realized we have that need to experience again. To experience life outside our bubble and then find our way back home.

Today's conversation on the step was just that: about travel on the brain. Travel with the nugget on the brain. But that is as far as we got. For now.

If you are interested in our stories from afar, we kept an extensive weblog of our travels. You can see all of the Circle the Pacific Tour right here.

It may have been the last time...

{posted first at maus + nugget, june 2009}

Somehow it seemed appropriate to re:post this image as some of you may not have been reading my early chronicles of new motherhood. I love this image and I have no idea where I found it. But it was perfect for how I was feeling about 8 weeks into breastfeeding for the first time.

It may actually be that today was the last time - the last morning visit to mama's milk bar. And I post this for my own benefit - so that I can remember.

For like so many things one experiences as a new parent, it is bittersweet.

Already addicted

Yes, I see the absolute hypocrisy in what I am about to type. And yes, I realize that my post from yesterday was about simplifying by not getting distracted by things that are not important. And today that is still true.

But today I also joined the 21st century.

I now have an iphone.

I may be one of the last people in the Bay Area - I mean my mom even has one, but I surely never felt like I needed one and I absolutely do not want to be the mom at the playground who is updating her Facebook page (I apologize if this is you and offends you).

But now that I have it and its been in my hot little hands for about an hour, I love it.

Home again

{25 July}

Simplifying our lives does not mean sinking into idleness, but on the contrary, getting rid of the subtle aspect of laziness: the one which makes us take on thousands of less important activities.

Matthieu Ricard

We are home. It has been a week of getting re-acquainted with forgotten toys, sleeping at unusual times of the day and night, washing an immense amount of laundry and embracing the tasks of everyday living. The suitcases are unpacked, the photos are almost all downloaded and the refrigerator is full.

Yes, indeed we are home.

And today as my two men napped, instead of napping myself, I cultivated a little altar for this very precious book, that has been without a "home" since we moved. It is called Offerings: Buddhist wisdom for every day. Full of 365 days of reminders for mindfulness and stunningly alive photographs, it is our way of starting the day with right thought, right speech and right livelihood. And when throughout the day, we veer away from these, it lays there, like a reminder to pause, breathe and pay attention. And I have missed it.

Now it has a place of its own. And of course, as I opened it to today's date and read today's quote, I was again reminded that when we are ready to hear, the words arrive. For this is exactly what I needed to read, at exactly the right moment.