Growing Stuff
I have a garden. Sort of. I plant things, and they grow, but I don’t do much cultivating. It’s survival of the fittest in my yard. I have a lot of berries, because (1) I like them, and (2) they’re pretty easy to grow, and (3) they’re fun for my kid. Unfortunately, reason #3 can lead to problems. Like, when Hannah picks and takes a bite out of the very green strawberry she saw me admiring.
My strawberry patch isn’t large, and the first crop is just starting to grow. I recently planted a few more, but it will be a while before they yield any reward.
To fully appreciate the travesty, here is the half-eaten strawberry beside the next-biggest one in the patch.
Luckily, the raspberries are coming along nicely.
The blueberries are in full flower, and looking promising as well.
And, of course, I have a bumper crop of weeds. See how healthy and vigorous they are?
You can see more of our latest goings on here and here.
Parenting Books
I am a huge fan of parenting books. In fact, I would venture to say that most of my parenting choices are informed by what I read. I always have a pile to go through, because there’s always something or other that I want to learn more about. Another technique that I’d like to hone, or viewpoint that I’d like to hear about. Here are my favourites so far:
1. Kids Are Worth It! – This is my favourite book. I know that I’m going to re-read it many times. It really shifted my parenting focus away from constant praise to quiet encouragement. It focuses on gentle and respectful discipline, which teaches your kids to see problems as challenges to be solved, rather than catastrophes for which they will face punishment. I love this book!
2. Unconditional Parenting – This book is short on details, and long on philosophy. The underlying premise is that we must treat our children respectfully, and communicate our unconditional love and support. The first half of the book is a hard read, leaving you feeling more than a little guilty. Once you get through the whole thing it’s worth it, though. I am a convert, and I’m striving to practice Unconditional Parenting with Hannah.
3. Playful Parenting – I think this book is an excellent companion to Unconditional Parenting, because it provides a lot of details on how to connect with your child through play. There’s a chapter called ‘Learn to Love the Games You Hate’. How can that be anything but a great read? Fabulous book, and far more scholarly than the title suggests.
4. My Child Won’t Eat! – I have a small child. I worry about what she eats. This book put all of my fears to rest. The basic premise is that kids need much less food than adults generally think they do. Some kids (like some adults) are just small, and overfeeding them will not make them grow taller, only wider. This book made meal times much more relaxed and enjoyable for me, assuaging my mama guilt.
Up next? How to Talk So Kids Will Listen & Listen So Kids Will Talk. I’ve heard only good things. I also have a copy of Living Simply with Children that I’ve been dying to read. So, I’d best get cracking!
Sweeter than Honey
A little over 6 months ago I experienced a skin-care revolution. I tried washing my face with honey. I read someone else’s experience online. Like me, she had sensitive easily-irritated skin, and she was raving. I was somewhat skeptical, but thought I would give it a try.
I have to say, it is the best thing ever! I don’t use make-up, so I’m not sure how it would work if you did, but otherwise it’s brilliant. Almost immediately my skin became less blotchy. It is no longer oily or dry, even at the end of the day. It felt really weird at first, since it’s so totally different than the foamy face wash products I have been using for decades. But now, I can’t imagine using anything else. Here’s some great things about honey:
1. It’s cheap! You can buy a jumbo jug for $12.00 at Costco, which lasts you for months and months.
2. It’s completely natural. You’re not exposing yourself to perfumes, dyes, or chemicals.
3. It’s a natural humectant, which means that it attracts and retains moisture. But it isn’t oily or greasy at all.
4. It has antiseptic properties, so it kills nasty bacteria.
5. It works as an anti-irritant, calming your skin.
6. It tastes great, if you happen to get a little bit in your mouth. 
Containing the stickiness has been a bit of a challenge, but otherwise I just love this so much. 6 months later, it keeps getting better. I am a true convert, I don’t think I will ever use a commercial face wash again.
Online Shopping
I am an online shopper. I love it. Anything that I can buy online, I do. Groceries, books, clothes, yarn, baby stuff. I’ve bought them all, and more, from some website or other.
Back in my carefree youth, before I had the tyrannical toddler my precious daughter, I did most of my shopping in an actual store. It was a rare week when I didn’t wind up at the mall picking up something. As I sit here typing, post-child, I can’t remember the last time I set foot in a mall. I believe that it was 2 weeks ago when I paid a brief visit in Abbotsford, while Hannah was off with her grandparents. Before that, it was sometime in April.
Shopping with a toddler is a chore, no two ways about it. If I can acquire needed goods without having to pack my reluctant offspring into a carseat, and endure tears when I decline the repeated requests to buy cartoon-emblazoned tcotchkes, I am all over it. Shipping fees be damned. And I am not alone. I have seen the eyes of other mothers light up when I pass along great online shops. It seems that we have even less desire to see our unruly children out in public than sour-faced store owners. 
But the best part of online shopping? All of the packages that you get in the mail. It’s like Christmas all year long, without the crowds or parking hassles. Shop on!
Dreams
I’ve always remembered my dreams. Particularly that last, most vivid, dream that occurs as I’m waking up. In the past, when I put my head on the pillow at night I would have a flash of that morning dream. My mind’s way of re-connecting with sleep, I would remember things that I had forgotten during the day.
All of this changed when I had a baby. My sleep became interrupted, my cycles fragmented and broken. Sleep-deprivation has changed things as well. Although I fall asleep more easily (collapsing in exhaustion, rather than drifting off), I don’t remember my dreams nearly so often, or so well. Even when Hannah sleeps long and well, I don’t have the same experience of my dreams that I used to.
This makes me sad. Not all of my dreams were good, of course. I’ve had the dreams where I couldn’t find my clothes, or overslept and missed an important event. But I’ve also had dreams that were marvelous. Dreams that answered questions I had, dreams where I could fly or breathe underwater, dreams in which I was fabulously successful. There’s a marvelous richness and escape in dreaming, and when I can’t remember my dreams, it’s as if I’m not having them.
I hope that, over time, I will reclaim my dreams. I will not be the mother of a small child all of my life. These manifestations of my subconscious are one thing that I look forward to reclaiming, when I make it to the other side.
Feet!
I can no longer deny it – my feet are growing. Or grew. Or something like that. Here’s my tale of woe.
In my teenage years, I wore a size 6 1/2 or 7 shoe, depending on the fit. While I still attempt to squeeze into a size 7 out of habit, it just will not happen anymore. On my recent shoe excursion I didn’t even fit the 7 1/2 styles in most cases, and had to go up to the 8. I’m not sure if this happened during pregancy, or is a natural effect of aging. I don’t like it, though. I am short. My feet just cannot grow too much more before it starts to look weird.
I am willing to accept the body changes that come with childbearing. My stomach will simply never be the same. But my feet? Really now!
To see where my feet have been taking me lately, look here and here.
Holding Tight
I think a lot about being a mother, and the love I have for my child. I love Hannah with a passion and a desparation that would put any lovestruck 13-year-old to shame. The more that I think about it, there are a lot of parallels between the two situations.
Lovestruck 13-year-olds and mothers are all holding out for a perfect moment. For 13-year-olds it’s the moment when the object of your obsession confides that he’s always loved you, and presents you with a single red rose and a romantic poem written in your honour. For mothers, it’s the moment when your child tells you how much you are loved, how all of your sacrifices were noticed and appreciated, and presents you with a bouquet and a handmade card and a poem written in your honour. Neither of these moments ever come. No real-life declaration, no real-life poem, could attain the perfection of the fantasy. In both cases, though, it does not diminish the love or the desparation.
The comparison between 13-year-olds and mothers dissolves in the face of adversity. No matter what comes your way as a mother, you do not love your child any less. The pain that accompanies adversity is actually worse, because time doesn’t diminish it. Years later, those wounds are still fresh. I do not feel better about Hannah’s stay in the special care nursery simply because she’s a healthy 2-year-old. And, if she wasn’t a healthy 2-year-old, my love wouldn’t be less desparate, less profound.
In the past couple of weeks I’ve heard from acquaintances whose children are encountering adversity. One has a daughter who was diagnosed with a rare and progressive degenerative condition. The other has a son who broke both legs, was in traction, and now has a body cast. Both children are also 2 years old, just Hannah’s age. Even thinking about it exposes pain in my heart for these mothers. And I do what any mother would do – I hold on tight to my own daughter, offer up prayers and good thoughts and hope like hell that my daughter won’t encounter this kind of adversity. We have been fortunate, but good fortune can change in an instant, and so this love I feel brings me fear, along with great joy. Always, in the corners, the fear. Like the 13-year-old’s fear of rejection, but without the 13-year-old’s capacity to move on and start again.
Rant on Dogs
I am not currently a dog owner, but I did have several dogs while I was growing up. I loved them, they were great animals. There is nothing quite like the love of a dog.
Most dog owners are responsible and considerate. A few are not, and of course they spoil things for everyone else. I would also conjecture that many dog owners do not realize that they are behaving irresponsibly, because they believe their dogs are very good, or they are not aware of the discomfort of others. Much like parents, though, dog owners need to remember that the world does not revolve around them. For example:
1. If your dog poos and you pick it up and put it in a bag, that bag must be disposed of properly. You are not picking up after your pet if you throw little baggies filled with canine excrement on to your neighbour’s lawn. That’s just gross.
2. If a park is not specifically set aside as an off-leash area, your dog must be on a leash. It’s the law, at least in any community that I’ve ever lived in.
3. The on-leash rule goes double for a playground where children are playing. Playgrounds are never designated off-leash areas, with good reason.
4. If your dog barks at my toddler, it’s not funny or cute. I don’t care if, “He’s really good,” or, “He just likes to make noise.” Not. Cool. Especially when your dog is large, off-leash, and on a playground.
Thanks for listening, I feel much better now.
Mother’s Day
Yesterday was my third Mother’s Day since I became a mother myself. Now that I am an honouree, I have to say that I really dislike Mother’s Day.
I like the cards. I love the handmade gifts from my daughter. I don’t mind the chance to take a little time to myself while Jon plays with Hannah. But that’s about it. I completely detest the giant guilt trip, the insipid poetry, the impossible expectations. And I don’t think I’m alone.
There’s a very dark side to motherhood. There are days when I barely restrain myself from running away, or selling my child to the circus (she loves clowns, I’m sure it would be great for her). There are times when I am sleep deprived and on my last nerve, when I think that I have made a horrible mistake, that I am not cut out for this. There are moments when I want to be anywhere but where I am. I don’t think it does anyone a service to pretend that these moments do not exist. To pretend that only ‘bad’ mothers would feel this way. To pretend that the best mothers are angels straight from heaven who spend their days smiling beatifically at their clean and quiet children.
I vote that we re-make Mother’s Day in the image of Father’s Day. More burgers, less obligation. More frank acceptance of mothers as whole people, less insipid poetry. At the end of it all we can sit the kids in front of the TV so that we can get 20 minutes of peace, and have a glass of wine. Who’s with me?
