Happy Father’s Day

Y’all. I know posts of late have been on the sappy side. You can blame the sleep deprivation, hormones or the vicious news cycle, whatever the reason, I need an outlet for some heartwarming, mushyness. I think we all do.

Last summer, after we found out baby # 2 was a boy, I spent a great deal of time pondering what that meant, how that challenged me as a mother and parent. I have always wanted a daughter. I feel confident about raising a girl. I know the sphere of femininity, for all its blessings and challenges well, because (duh) I’ve lived it.

But manhood? Masculinity? That sounds much harder. And very unfamiliar turf. How on earth do I instill kindness and integrity when modern-day manhood is so often toxic and violent? These are broad strokes of course, but the challenge is real.

 

I still carry these worries, but not without reassurance. Because of this guy.  He is loving, caring and attentive. Patient (mostly;), FUN and tender. He enjoys being with us and we all know it. For these things, and many more, I am grateful. And reassured knowing that both our children have such a wonderful example, not just of fatherhood, but of manhood too.

 

Raising babies ain’t easy, Somanna. But it sure looks good on you. ❤

 

 

 

 

Unexpected reminders

Recently, my beloved gifted me with Tracy Chapman’s greatest hits CD. Yes. A compact disc. I realize that shows my age and lack of technical prowess, but hey so does this blog and the artist selection.

As the youngsters say, whatevs.

I had been hankering for the album and he oh so thoughtfully ordered it for me so I could enjoy it on a recent road trip. I first heard Tracy Chapman in seventh grade. My older brother had her album and he would play it, along with other great music, on our morning drives to school.

In college, my roommate played this song for our brokenhearted suite mate (young love can be so sweet, and so sharp). Halfway into the song, our wounded friend burst into tears and said “How the hell is this song supposed to be helping?!”  An anthem for those swimming in fresh heartbreak, “The Promise” is not. I still chuckle whenever I hear the song.

I give you that background simply to show you my age that her music has been around my life for some time. And last Saturday, her music spoke to my most current life stage: motherhood.

It had been a rocky morning. Our five month old son refused to nap, our almost three-year old daughter didn’t feel well = cling to mommy like algae on a rock. And I was cranky. That wasn’t really anyone’s fault, but it happens.

So when hubs discovered we were out of a few essentials, I gladly volunteered to run to the store. I freely admit that any trip to a store sans little ones gets me giddy. Parents of small children everywhere understand this excitement and we’re not ashamed.

At the stoplight, a new-to-me song caught my attention and before the next stoplight, I was a blubbering mess.

Sweet and high at the break of dawn
Simple tune that you can hum along too
I remember there was a time
When I used to sing for you

The past tense of that last refrain….it caught my mama heart off guard. When I used to sing for you.  I love to sing to my babies. My mom sang to me and I sing to them.  To get them to sleep, to comfort their cries, to entertain them in the car and on long walks. I have songs specific to each child. Songs I played while pregnant that they recognized after birth. I sing those songs and others. I sing in the car and around the house.  It’s about my children knowing, intimately, the joy of music and singing; the individual offering and the communal affirmation.

It’s not about having a great voice. It’s about them knowing my voice. To remember me. To hear a lullaby or a song and feel a familiar warmth, a sense of peace, belonging, love. Isn’t that what lullabies are all about?

One day, they won’t need me to sing their songs at bedtime. One day they’ll ask me to stop or maybe tell me I’m doing it wrong. But right now? Right now, it’s delicious and wonderful.

Soft and low
When the evening comes
Holding you sleeping in my arms
I remember
There was a time
When I used to sing for you

I am grateful for this time and the music that fills up our life.  And for unexpected reminders.

Hello? Is this thing on?

Lately, I’ve felt like writing. And by lately, I mean the last 2.5 years. But life tends to get in the way. Though not nearly as much as my insecurities. However, one of my goals for 2017 – or life really – is to take more risks. Focus more on the TA DA list and not the to do list. I’m tired of going to bed feeling like I spent the day chasing the mundane and not making room for the meaningful.

So here I am, giving this another whirl. I’ll probably talk a lot about babies and motherhood because that’s my world these days. (And I love it, despite the relentless ass kicking that is parenthood 😉 I’m sure some other things will get tossed in as we go. I don’t know. There’s not really a plan.  I just know it feels good to be in this space, so I’ll start there. You are welcome to join me. I hope we inspire each other.

 

 

Well, hello. It’s been awhile.

Lot’s happened in the past 2 years.

Peaches and Curry have a sweet lil’ side dish.

How are we here already?

I’m not quite sure how we got here, but here we are at 32 weeks.

Friends, that is 5 weeks from full term. Baby could come anywhere from 5 to 9 weeks away.

Like whoa.

I don’t even know where to begin really. So many thoughts swirling in my head. So many items left unchecked on our to do list.

So far, my pregnancy has been relatively smooth and for that I am very, very thankful. I have especially enjoyed it since finding out what we’re having and feeling baby move. Love the movements! Sure, there are some not so glamorous parts and I know I’m headed into the home stretch where even the most glowing goddesses have declared themselves officially DONE with sharing their womb. But despite my very slow warm up to bodily cohabitation, I have come to really love it. It’s quite fascinating.

While physically things have been going well, the emotional front remains a bit more challenging. A large part of that centers on the ole to-do list, learning to make room for baby in our already busy lives and constantly reminding myself to be patient. Patient with ourselves. With slow answers. With this unorganized mess of a house and yard, which I hope will one day be transformed into a home.

There’s so much to sort out and so many decisions to make, from the mundane (cloth or disposable wipes? what shade of white to paint the nursery trim?) to the super important (navigating health insurance, childcare and car seats) And of course in our hyped up age of social media, It’s all too easy to feel overwhelmed and inadequate.

But luckily I’ve got Somanna to keep my head straight. The other night, fueled by pregnancy hormones and a lack of sleep, I declared rather dramatically that we didn’t know what we were doing. Without missing a beat, he looked at me and said with every ounce of confidence, “And who the eff does?! Any parent that tells you they know what they’re doing is full of it.” And then he snorted in a pusshhaww kind of way, as if I had said that our cats could bark and pigs could fly, and went back to what he was doing. 

His response both cracked me up and snapped me back to reality all at once. Yes, we have lots to learn. No, we don’t know what we’re doing and perhaps most disappointing to me, no we won’t get everything done on my dream to do list. But you keep trying. And you keep practicing patience. And always, you keep laughing.  Here’s hoping that formula applies to parenthood.

Finding Out – Part I

Forgive me while I indulge in all things baby over the next several blog posts. But I want to write (type?) this stuff down so that we have something to look back on when our memories fail us down the road. If that’s not your cup o’chai I understand. But these memories have already begun to fade and that makes me a little sad. So let’s start from the beginning …..finding out your uterus is inhabited.

Friday, August 30, 2013

Labor Day weekend. A glorious three-day stretch to commemorate the end of summer and beginnings of fall. Leaving work Friday night, I swung by K-Mart ( yes, those still exist) to pick up a pregnancy test with little expectations that the results on this one would be any different. After all, we weren’t um, the best students when it came to baby making. We definitely opted for the lazy a more organic approach.

Fast forward roughly 45 minutes and there is an unmistakable double line. This is met with a momentary sense of elation followed quickly (so, so quickly) by a resounding

“WHAT THE EFF HAVE WE DONE?!!!

All inside my head.

All alone in the bathroom.

And all 10 minutes before Baby Brother would be joining us for dinner.

So naturally, I did what any rational, modern woman who has suffered through a college statistics course does. I immediately dismissed this finding as statistically irrelevant and decided that the next course of action would be to conduct a full investigation, complete with extensive, scientific validation.

I would take another test in the morning.

Yes, yes. My scientist brother-in-law and sister-in-law would approve. What legitimate scientist blindly accepts initial test results? Psshhhawww.

In the meantime, we had dinner plans. Baby Brother had arrived. I hid the evidence. (No need to alarm the husband unnecessarily.) While waiting for Somanna to finish cat litter box duties, I invited Baby Brother to take a quick walk with me. I asked Baby Brother lots of questions, ignored his answers entirely and focused on making sure my head did not spin right off my neck.

And then we went to dinner.

I ordered shrimp.

Uh, Oops.

Saturday, August 31st, very early in the morning…:

Shit! This can’t be right. OMG do not tell me this actually freakin worked?!

A-HA!

Yes, of course….Second test, but SAME BRAND. Rookie mistake.

Must purchase variety of brands to eliminate testing bias. Will have to figure out how to squeeze in a Target trip when our Saturday is already jam-packed with bed shopping, Somanna’s company picnic and meeting up with Raleigh friends in the evening.

When can I start drawing a bell curve?

Saturday night, very late, after drinking copious amounts of water:

Hmm…different brand, but negative result. Is that disappointment? Must consult directions.

“Drinking excessive amounts of water can dilute test results.”

Rookie mistake # 2: failure to execute experiment properly.

Sunday, September 1st, in the early, early morning hours:

Still on brand # 2, test #4 …….annddd the double lines strike again! But I can never remember…is it one or two lines? WTF pee stick manufacturers? Can’t you make it more obvious? How about a flashing neon sign that says “Pregnant Bitch!” or “Congrats! You’re knocked up!” Oh wait…there is a brand that displays words …must purchase asap.

But how? I have a bridal shower to attend today, which will be tricky given the whole drinking thing.

And oh yea….gotta figure out how to tell Somanna about this little scientific hypothesis. It will require some creativity though. After all, he did specify some requirements way back when.

To be continued…..

He’s A Keeper

Nothing brings out the humor in life like big events: funerals, weddings….BABIES.

Well friends, pregnancy has brought out some great lines from my sweet Baby Daddy.

Here’s a sampling for your enjoyment.

——

Somanna: So people at work are really excited for us.

Me: Aww that’s sweet.

Somanna: Yea….especially when I tell them it’s your first.

—–
Two weeks after learning about the proverbial bun in the oven, we’re out and about running errands in town….

Somanna: Hey! You wanna grab a drink somewhere?!

—–
Also in the early weeks of shock pregnancy….while discussing a myriad plans for 2014…
Me: Well, it’ll depend. We ‘ll just have to see how it goes. You’ll need to save some PTO (paid time off) for May.
Somanna:  What do I need to save my PTO for?

—-
Somanna, very emphatically: You are carrying my CHILD!

(Pauses)

Yea, I’m glad it’s you. I mean, that’s cool.

—–

Me:  What do you want the baby to call you? Daddy? Papa? Pop?

Somanna, deadpan in a deep Indian head bobble accent: Father.

—–

Upon walking into Babies R ‘Us for the first time last weekend:

Somanna: Wow. Shit just got real, son!

—–

Me: Perhaps we should take baby CPR. You know, so we don’t kill the baby.

Somanna: Nah, we can just Google it.

It’s Been Awhile…

So. Happy New Year. As in…Happy 2014!

2013 was a record setting year for the ole blog.

As in….we wrote one post. One really is the loneliest number.

What can I say? Ambition overwhelms underwhelms us. Pathetic it may be, I take comfort in knowing that we were out living our lives and not just writing about it from behind a computer screen. Like all years, 2013 has been full and busy, with highs and lows.

But what you really need to know about 2013 is that life pleasantly took a different turn.

We’re going to have a baby.

Yup, Peaches & Curry finally decided to join the procreation bandwagon.

It should be interesting.

And extremely humorous.

I would stay tuned if I were you. There’s no way I’m not documenting these antics.

The Deed is Done

It’s official. WE SOLD OUR RALEIGH HOUSE.

Sing it from the mountain tops y’all: HALLELUJAH, PRAISE JESUS AND PASS THE CORNBREAD!!!!!!!!!!

Ever since we decided to take this crazy plunge and move back to Asheville, it has been one wild (and costly) ride.

I’m trying not to dwell on the money lost. (OMG – nauseating.) But sometimes that’s hard to abide by. It’s also hard to ignore the doubts.

Was this the right decision? Should we have held out? Why did we buy the house to begin with? Etc.

In those delightfully enchanting moments of self-doubt, it requires tremendous discipline to make the voice of calm compassion reassure the voice of hysterics. We made the best decisions we could at the time. Perfect decisions? Maybe not. But they were not poor decisions. And really, who could have predicted a national housing market crash way back in early 2008? Certainly not these two young kids:

Aww..young love.

But now it is done. The decision has been made. The deed has been signed and the keys handed over.

I hope the new owners enjoy the home. We did during our time there and for that I’m thankful. We have some great memories, despite the struggles since moving. And I am incredibly, incredibly grateful to our fabulous neighbors who looked out for us from day one.

So you live and you learn. And while that money could have done a lot (A LOT) of other fun things….at the end of the day, it’s just money. And that is no substitute for good health or lots of love. My bank account balance is significantly lower…but my cup runneth over in the other departments.

I’ll take it.

2013: Let’s Do This

I love New Year’s. Love, love, love it. A clean slate. A fresh start. An “insert your cliché of choice” here.

And really, what’s not to love? Goals AND list making?

SIGN ME UP SISTER!

You could say I’m a little excited.

In the past, I may have been known to make the usual 10,20, err 30 New Year’s resolutions. Ambitious, much?

I struggle with narrowing my scope. Just ask Somanna when I plan out our weekends.

SOO this year, I am limiting myself to five goals / intentions. “Intentions,” by the way, is really a hippie speak for goals. Ssshhh!! Don’t tell the hippies!

So here are my 2013 Resolutions…in all of their shiny, New Year glory:

1.) Eat locally sourced meat. That is of course, organic, hormone free, free range and all of that other good stuff. We plan to phase into this goal. First, eat all of the meat in our fridge and freezer…replacements must adhere to the new rule. Then after mastering the home front, we move on to eating out. Hmmm….that will be the hard part. Not even going to lie. We could very well end up like this. Should be interesting.

2.) Read Three Classic Pieces of Literature. I feel like my brain is rotting. And this is my feeble attempt to revive it with some life, art and intelligence. Want to hear a sad fact? I’ve never read an Ernest Hemingway book. Or Tolstoy. Or Jane Austen. I’m not sure what this goal says about me. My education failed me? I’m a total dork? I’m reverting back to high school?

3.) Do a race. I know that sounds vague, but I’m currently feeling this one out. Not sure if I want to do another half marathon, a 10K or a mini-tri….as in triathlon. Mini-tri or sprint tri sounds significantly less scary than “TRIATHLON.” (dun, dun, dunnhhh.)

I’m looking into races now, evaluating training plans, time commitments (biggest factor), costs and race timing (i.e. when in the year is the big event.) The point is to really get me back into running. And in shape. Because I, along with half of my closet, miss both of those things.

4.) Blog More.

Cliche? Check.

Trendy? Check.

Annoyingly Redundant? Check.  BUT! This is my list and my blog, so I’m afraid I get to exercise unchecked power on this one. You understand of course 😉

5.) Quit living in fear of scarcity by practicing more Gratitude and Joy.

This principle is brought to you courtesy of Brene Brown. For more explanation, you can read this . That’s just a beginning. I highly recommend her books if you want to know more. It’s really good stuff. Very inspiring.

So that’s the plan for 2-0-1-3!

What’s on your resolutions list or do you scoff at New Year’s resolution makers? Happy New Year Y’all!