My Dearest Boy,

Sunday, you turn nine. You’re almost two full hands, can you believe it? It seems like just yesterday you changed my life forever.  You came into the world, just as you have lived in it these last nine year, wild and full of passion.  Determined to do things your way.  Ready to be doted upon by the large crowd anxiously awaiting you.  From the moment I laid eyes on you, the world was yours to have, and it was our very first secret.  

And I?  I was just the 19 year old girl playing fiddle in your background.  And I loved it.  Even then, I didn’t understand how deeply and profoundly you would change me.  Laying in the recovery room, I knew at first sight that I would forever be yours and you would be mine.   The bond between us was different than I imagined it would be…you were my first true love and my new best friend. 

Son, those words have never been more true than they are today.  That bond has gone un-touched.  Words like proud and honored and humbled do not do justice to the way I feel about being your mom.  In fact, there are no words on this earth that embody what you mean to me.   Someday, when you’re a parent, you’ll know what I mean.

You are so very smart, son.  I can’t tell you how many teachers tell me how worldly you already are.  Wise beyond your years.  You understand the world and how and why it works the way it does.  It seems you came into the world with that knowledge, you’ve always grasped things just outside others reach.  You are passionate, child.  You do everything with such joy and desire and intensity that it’s easy to see why you have so many friends. Your excitement is contagious.  You are fierce.  Especially when it comes to love.  You know you are loved and you return that same love with the most wild and fierce emotions available to a nine year old boy.  And above all, you care. Just last year, your teacher told me that you were the most compassionate and caring kid in her class.  She told me how concerned you always are for other people and their feelings. I cried right then and there, at the parent-teacher conference.  She could not have said anything to make me more proud to be your momma. Or your friend.

You are going to do wonderful things with your passionate, fierce, and caring life. I don’t worry about that.   I know you will make magic happen wherever this one life takes you.  My only worry is that you don’t leave your momma too far behind and that you never forget our path. 

I love you son.  I love you more. I love you most. I love you more than most.  Past the Earth. Through the sky. To the heavens.

You are my love.

I’ve been thinking (a lot) about my house.  It’s cute and all.  It just…needs some work. Bless its heart.

To be honest, it mostly needs people with expendable income…but, it’s not going to get that until we sell it.  So, in the meantime, I feel like it needs some work in the HOME department.

Ya feel me?

I mean, I know it’s a home – home. Like, it has walls and all that jazz. We sleep there, so there’s that.  But, it just doesn’t necessarily feel like ah-we’re home. (If that even remotely makes sense to anyone living on this planet.) I mean…it doesn’t feel like it represents the people that dwell within it.  Even if home is where the heart is and all that good stuff, your home still has to feel homey.

Homey. (I just had to say it again.)

To be honest, I think my home still feels like two kids who graduated college, had zero cash and threw together some handmedowns their parents had in the basement to make it look full.  At least some of the rooms look like that.  The other ones look like two kids who bought a home, got a credit card, went bat-shit-crazy in Pottery Barn and will pay for it (PLUS INTEREST) for the rest of their freaking life.

So, the house, that needs to be a home, doesn’t even match. (It’s more lovely than it sounds, I promise.)  

It has some things that require cash that we just don’t have the cash (minor detail) to really do right now.  Like…redo all three bathrooms,  new hardwood in entryway and half bath, new carpet upstairs, new countertops in kitchen, a chair and ottoman that need to be re-upholstered, a new kitchen table (WHICH WE MAY BE GETTING FROM MY PARENTS! It hasn’t been sitting in their basement. Promise.)

But, those things are way too big picture for me.  We need big mullah. I have little mullah.  So, they take a back seat. 

What I’m working on?  Projects.  I’ve decided to take all homey (and again) matters into my own  hands.  Therefore, the husband (see how quickly that “my own hands” thing changed? I’ve got that down.) will be purchasing chalk board paint to do something with the back of my island the requires framing and oodles of two year old scribble.  I will be purchasing frames for a art/photo wall in the entry hall. I already purchased a sign for the kitchen that defines my homey-ness.  And it is about to get CRAZY.

Like, I’ll be re-pinning the hell out of some shit for the entirety of 2012.  I have big plans for the entire house (well, except the boys room, his room is just plain adorable) in 2012.  No hallway will go untouched.  Things may get painted if I can convince someone to do it for me. (I don’t paint.)

I’m one tiny craft away from Martha Stewart, let me tell  ya.

I’m going to blog this out.  Don’t you worry.  I’ve got this.

I have spent a great deal of time over the last few days thinking about my spirituality.  I feel like it just isn’t being fed, if you know what I mean.  I reflect back on when I really felt in touch with my faith and I am reminded of a time not that long ago when yoga was part of my weekly routine.  

The meditations that yoga led me to were feeding my desire to sit with my Lord and really listen to how He was speaking to me.  In those meditations I was able to be present and truly open my heart to all the things the Lord and I were working on.  I could free of my mind of the struggles that life include and let my inner eye focus on the face of my Lord.  I was present with Him. We were together.  And, I was ready to face anything.

Even if it was just for 20 or 30 minutes a day, it felt good and Holy and right.  And it directed my life in a way that felt like we (He and I) were doing things together, in unisom.  I was finally allowing Him to direct my life.

But, life got busy and schedules got challenging – and yoga got dropped.  And then my daily meditations at home stopped.  And then I began to notice that I was leaving church feeling less than full.  This weekend, when I chose to skip mass for the first time in quite some time, I caught myself saying, it’s not like I even get anything out of church, all I do is chase a toddler, feed a toddler and entertain a toddler.  Even if the statement is true, it’s a hard pill to swallow.

Is it possible that my toddler is cramping my spiritual growth?

We sit in the back of church, in the “cry room” as it’s often referred, behind a glass screen, where toddlers can’t disrupt the other families during mass.  We sit and try our best to focus as one feisty toddler asks to go for walks and get drinks.  We pretend to be listening when she’s asking for food and shows us her dolls.  We bow our heads to pray as she whispers songs in our ears. 

So, are we getting anything out of mass?

Now, I know we could take her to the church nursery.  But in order to that, you have to volunteer to work in the nursery twice a month.  And let’s be clear on one thing – time is a luxury in my life.  And, quite frankly, I don’t want to be spending my time with anyone else’s kid.  I don’t see my own enough as it is.  And, I’m not a big fan of nursery’s anyway.  Call me paranoid, but they make me nervous.  And they guaranteed my son was soon to be sick – and like time, sickness is also a luxury we can’t afford. There is too much to be done.

So, then we’re left deciding if we should split up for mass? Does the husband goes alone or with the boy and I stay home and then I go when they get back and they stay home with the toddler?

But, then I’m left wondering  if it’s right to split us up for mass, which feels like it should be celebrated as a family?  And, is it right to not take the toddler to church? It feels like she should be there. 

We still don’t know what to do. 

But, you can bet that I’ll be bringing it to the table tonight with the Lord when I begin my nightly meditations again. 

Do you take your toddler to church with you?  Do you feel inspired by the time you spend with your faith?

…and our family of four is officially done growing. 

Honestly, it feels a little bittersweet. 

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When I re-started this Medifast journey, I honestly wasn’t sure if it would work for me, again.  Or, if I deserved for it to work again.  There is a lot of shame in losing weight and regaining even some of it…and I gained back nearly half.   I have been carrying that shame around for about 6 months and the thought of starting again seemed so daunting, at first. 

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Like many Americans, I have an unhealthy relationship with food.  And for months (and months and months and month) I’ve been trying to pinpoint what exactly that even means.  I’ve been casually journaling what it going on emotionally when I feel those great desires to eat.  But, at this point I see no real pattern – and that’s what I am searching for. 

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