Mommy-kind's Struggle for Intrinsic Value

When I first had E I was very much alone in the world of new Mommies. My friends were all unmarried and seasoned bar enthusiasts (the classy kind, I assure you ;) ), my cousins all either had no children or children closer in age to me than E. The village that you hope will be there to help you raise your child alongside theirs just wasn't there for me. Thank God for the internet! Through my online mommy groups I've come across wonderful ladies, some of which I'm privileged to say I have met and am now friends with in the real world. I have fabulous real life mom friends who I am so lucky to have. I've built my own little community of mothering and advice and support on my connections with all of these women. But then sometimes there are weeks like these past few that I want to turn away from Mommy World entirely. I want to turn away because I'm tired of the notion that what I am is not enough or too much. I'm tired of how I see myself as a mother being effected by other women as frustrated by the lack of defined value assigned by society to motherhood.

In recent weeks, while sidelined on my couch by either my being sick or E clinging to me like a sweaty, ginger starfish, I noticed a trend in a lot of conversations raised in my online mommy groups that bothers me. The newest harping point is not routine infant circumcision or vaccination or carseat safety (all the online equivalent of the H-bomb under the right circumstances), its on mothers "letting themselves go" and "losing themselves to mothering.". Moms criticizing other women in trenches of parenting for not being mom enough.

 

I should preface what I'm about to say with the admission that I am likely biased toward one side of this argument. I have two crazy, busy girls who I want to be able to do and see everything with every day. I want my time with them to matter. Because of that I am always tired and usually look like crap. While I'm always clean, makeup has become a rarity akin to tap-dancing unicorns. And that's fine with me because looking like a contestant on America's Next Top Model (is that even a show anymore?) is not my priority- my children are.

That is not to say that those mystical women who have both children and a full face of MAC don't have their kids in their forefronts of their minds, just that they prioritize life differently. Neither one of us is right or wrong. And when I see you in public I don't judge you for looking so good, I'm happy that you are happy. I am glad that you are able to strike compromises in your life that allow you to have the things you deem important in your life. All I ever hope for you is that you see the forest for the trees and don't judge women who struggle as much or more than you do every single day. So often we like to reflect on how, "Kids can be so cruel.". What we neglect to remember is that their mothers have the same capability to cut others down and reinforce the wrong lessons in their children without meaning to.

Because I forever hold out that hope seeing declarations of how miserable my husband must be to be married to someone who has "given up" hardens me a little more each time. Being preached to a la 1950's finishing schools about how you have to hyper-value your appearance to be a "good mom" is what bothers me the most however. A recent post read to the effect of, "I realized I don't value myself because I don't have my hair done, makeup done, etc. Now I'm doing it and YOU should be too because if you aren't you obviously don't value yourself either.". While I was happy for the original poster that she felt better about herself, why did her own feelings and circumstances have to be transferred onto other moms? Why does having a child make us experts on how other people should live their lives? When does being a friend turn into being a mom friend and a mom friend into just another one of those women who will judge you?

 

The Trouble with the Transience of "Mommy Friends"

I am luckier than most in that I have a strong core group of mommy friends: I am fortunate enough to have two B's (one in town, one in the city) who are both amazing, gentle moms to little boys (and city B's brand new baby girl!). I am blessed to have a sister-in-law that I love dearly. I have the sweetest American friend ever in J! I have my life-long not-yet-mama friends C and C that I treasure beyond words. I have online friends I want to meet so badly it pains me ;) . But I think one of the largest roadblocks I've encountered in the world of parenting and my own struggle for a sense of value is the transience of the "mommy friend".

As I write that last bit I feel like I'm titling a mystery novel even though its a phenomenon I've seen, been a victim of and have likely inflicted on other moms (dear those moms, I'm so sorry). The transient mommy friend is a woman you become so close to after bonding over your parenting battle wounds, your successes, your great fears and failings- and then one day she's no longer there. Maybe you drift apart and then one day realize you haven't talked in forever. Maybe you've had a new baby and she seems to effectively cut you out. Maybe you find yourself illogically angry with her because she seems to have an easier life as a mom than you. Maybe you struggle with the fact that outside of being moms you have nothing in common. Regardless of the reason it hurts.

It hurts because one of the great struggles of being a parent is in finding connection with anyone whose hands are not perpetually sticky, who can speak in full sentences and who understands the social etiquette of not running into the bathroom unannounced. You crave that human contact to both build your own "village" and to validate that your thoughts and feelings on anything and everything still have merit in the world...that you still have merit in the world.

Who Determines the Value of a Mother?

I for one would really like to know so I can just pick up my report card already (haha). But speaking frankly, what does a mom have to do to be enough? If you work, you should be home. If you're home, dear God you need to head back to work already! If you have it together, moms will hate you. If you don't have it together, moms will talk about you. What exactly is the standard for being the World's Okayest Mom? And is it okay to just be okay? Will your inability to forge the right connections in your village fail your child down the line? Has having birthed a little person made you inferior? Are you even valid anymore?

Sadly, as a young mom in the trenches, I have no answers as to how we should determine a mother's value. Am I enough? I don't know. I do however think on Layton's last statement to Canada (as I often do) when I think on mommy-kind's struggle for intrinsic value,

"My friends, love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic. And we’ll change the world."

So until the day we come together and change the world of parenting I'll be waiting to find out if I am mom enough...from the only people whose judgement will matter to us as mothers in the end.

Raising a Tiny Girl in a "Bigger is Better" World

              "Though she be but little, she is fierce."

I've struggled with whether or not to write this post for a few days now because we are so fortunate. We are so fortunate that E's doctor has finally decided to agree with us that there is nothing amiss with her. We are so lucky because there are people who have walked the same path as us and ended up in a different place. We are blessed that she is healthy and happy and smart and is still too young to understand the hurtful things people have said about her. I am trying to be grateful rather than feeling vindicated and angry even though I do feel both those things.

You see we have lived the last two years as the parents of "that girl". That tiny slip of a baby and then a toddler. The one half the size of your younger child. The one you've whispered to your co-workers about in the Best Buy, or other moms at the park or the library, the one you've seen running and playing and chattering away and asked in hushed tones, "What is wrong with her?"

In the Beginning...

When I was pregnant with E I was told she was going to be huge, 10+ pounds kind of huge, and it wasn't surprising to me because me and my sister were both massive babies. I was ready for baby with big, juicy rolls that would go straight into 0-3 month clothing. But on the day E was born the first thing I heard out of my nurse's mouth was, "God, she's such a little peanut! Your dates must've been wrong.". For several reasons we knew my dates weren't wrong and we chalked it up to the unreliability of ultrasound technology. We embraced our 7lb7oz string bean of a newborn girl and assumed she would grow, as babies do.




Brand new E!

As time went on E seemed tinier than her counterparts but not alarmingly so (in our minds anyway). She spent over two months in newborn size clothes, and I remember solely because I remember going to the Carters to buy her Christmas dress and the clerk asking me how old she was when I asked them to check for a cardigan in NB. I remember the shock on her face when I told her she was almost two months old. I remember her telling me that her nephew was the same age but was in six month clothing already. I smiled and said, "She's just tiny I guess!" and went about my shopping. But I couldn't help but feel a little slighted. Was it a bad thing to have a small baby?

E in her Christmas dress with her beautiful Aunt M

Our Experiences with "Smallness" in the Medical Community

It wasn't until E's four month shots that I realized that people would often see my beautiful baby for what wasn't "the same" about her. It was the beginning of my current reality as a mom the moment a nurse scolded and shamed me because E was in the 20th percentile but was born in the 50th. Everything about my parenting was questioned. We were told to pursue calorie dense formulas. We were made to feel like having a smaller baby was bad.

It was the first time I felt like I had failed as a mother.

E was so smart, speaking her first word at 6 months, mastering hide and seek and all variety of shenanigans well before other kids her age and yet it never mattered. It didn't matter that she was happy and funny. It didn't matter that she loved puppies or tuna sandwiches. All anyone ever cared about was that she was so small. That her percentile kept dropping- 20th, 15th, 10th, 5th, 1st...no percentile. They actually went so far as to tell me  when E was 18 months that in a group of 100 children her age she did not get a percentile because in that group compared to her peers she did not count because she was so small. In the eyes of the professionals, this girl did not count:

Every appointment and well-check after that was worse and worse. I started to dread E's upcoming appointments and any contact with doctors and nurses. I have spent many an evening crying over those appointments and the things the doctors and nurses have said to me about my precious girl. More than anything though I have pored over everything I have done with E since birth that could've "caused" her smallness. Was it that she was largely formula fed? Was it because we practiced baby-led weaning? Did we pass down inferior genes? In my mind we had to have done something wrong because everyone in the know was telling us we must be.

The Social Stigma of Having a Small Child

Between appointments I try not to think about the fact that E is tiny. Clothes are always a battle (she was in 3-6 month clothing until she was 1!) because obviously they are generally cut for the average body type of a North American toddler and E just doesn't have it. She's all little chicken arms and legs and a booty so teeny we have to cinch her jean elastics in all the way and double stuff her cloth diapers to keep her pants up. Lets just say BabyGap has taken in a substantial amount of our income in the last two years of fighting to keep pants on our ginger ninja. But that's okay because I figure when she's older she can enjoy the bevvy on clothes in the smaller sizes that I currently give the side eye while looking for a single item in my current size (its like a quest for the lost ark trying to find a women's large in our Walmart).

A recent picture of E on her way to preschool!

Most people make harmless comments when we go to the park or the drop-in playgroup about how small she is (usually in comparison to their kids) and I just roll with it. I feel like sometimes people think the size of one's offspring is a suitable topic for awkward small talk with other mom-quaintances and in our size obsessed culture that isn't necessarily their fault, so I let it go. I don't want to look for reasons to be hurt and angry when there are so many reasons to celebrate our wonderful life as a family.

But then there are the times when people's comments are not harmless, when they know full well what they're saying is offensive, and I have to catch myself. Let me start by saying, to every mother who has ever asked me or one of the other moms that know my baby girl with an expression of abject horror (and sadly there have been multiple), "What is wrong with her?", there is nothing wrong with my daughter. She is a remarkable child who is precisely who and what God intended her to be. She does not have to be like your children to be valid. Weighing less than them does not make her less than anyone. Sadly the person who clearly suffers from having something wrong with them is you. You have failed to see the innocent, wonderful child in front of you for what she is and have taken some different about her and tried to make it ugly. What is wrong within you to seek to find something horrible in something as glorious as a little girl like E?

(This is a photo from a day where I was asked "What's wrong with her?" by a fellow mom. It has totally colored how I see the photos from that day)

Aftermath

After having spent much of the last two years absorbed in issues of size and how size in North America relates to worth we are blessed to be finally turning a corner. E's doctor is satisfied that there is nothing "wrong" with her as of her 2 year check earlier this week and they will no longer be monitoring her size. She is small statured, clever, silly toddler full of tantrums and kisses and declarations of being a doctor (for puppies too!). She is just like your children were or are or will be.

E with sister K. They're 15 months apart but nearly the same size :)

Much of this post is just catharsis for me because I have needed to air all of this for so long, but I also hope that it might reach one or two people in its travels on cyberspace who this will impact. If you are a mom or a dad of a small baby and you are struggling with the societally engrained concept that "bigger is better" and how your child fits amongst their peers, my heart goes out to you. It is a hard road that not a lot of people understand and so many people judge without knowing. I am so sorry this is your journey. If you are one of those people who is forever insisting something is wrong with smaller babies and toddlers, please consider going forward; is what you're saying kind? Is it necessary? Is it helpful? If it is none of these please pull back. Curiosity gets the better of all of us I know, but mommy culture is already cruel enough- be the change we need in the world and see other people's struggle. And to everyone who made it through this lengthy blog post which saw a lot of sweat and tears (mostly tears) on my part I want to say thank you. Thank you for reading through a rambling novel of a post to, hopefully, glean my message to my E (and to all fun-size children, everywhere):

 Being small will never stop you from doing big things!

Gift Giving and the Modern Toddler

 

As E's second birthday approaches (be still my heart!) we have so much on the horizon. Planning E's waterpark birthday party, getting her excited to see all her family and friends, writing her the special letters I will be writing for all of her birthdays as long as I live- there is so much to do. And in all this doing it is so easy for me to forget that E's birthday involves so, so many people that love her and celebrated the day she entered the world. I am forever snapped back to this reality however when asked the parent-bone chilling question, "What should we get E for her birthday?"



Photo Credit to Jenna Crystal Photography

For less detail hyper-focused people this is probably not actually a mind-bender but my thought process following it always goes a little like this:

"NO MORE TOYS FOR THE LOVE OF GOD!!!"
"...But I can't say it like that because it sounds like we weren't grateful for the toys she got last year."
"Books and clothes, you always need more of those!"
"Uggggh but no one ever wants to get the "boring" gifts, they'll just buy toys anyway."
"Should I suggest the least annoying toys possible?"
"My living room already looks like Toys R Us threw up all over. Where will I cram anymore of it?"
"What if we just say she doesn't need any gifts?"
"Then they'll definitely buy toys because I'm such a mean mother."
"Can we devise some sort of prepper-esque toy cellar?"
"Eff it, I'm telling them no toys..."

Now obviously I know she's going to get toys anyway, but I am praying it doesn't end up being such a plethora of rainbow colored plastic, eleventy billion battery powered shenanigans that I'll be on the news for my home being viewable from space. And if it is...well the drop-in play centre in town is going to be getting a lot of their old toys very, very soon if you know what I'm saying.

Unlike some of my recent blog entries I'd like this one to be more proactive than rambling so I've provided my own tips as a toddler mama who often buys gifts for the little ones' of fellow toddler mamas!

Photo credit to Jenna Crystal Photography

1. I find it helps to always ask the mother first when possible. Dad is obviously a big important guy in baby's life but is often not overly concerned with details like the centimeters of spare floor space you barely have at present, nor does he necessarily know what size/color/etc. the birthday baby wants or needs.
2. If she tells you not to get something, don't do it. She won't think its funny or cute that you're a rebel without a cause- she will crap talk you to me later about how you don't respect what she tells you (especially when YOU asked!).
3. If Mom has no ideas and you want to get a less conventional gift give the gift of an experience (zoo passes, etc.) or go to the dollar store or the craft store and load art supplies in a little tub- that Barbie will likely go unplayed with and forgotten fast, play-dough and window crayons are messy and therefore forever fabulous.
4. Whatever you end up buying try to be the person who gets the gift receipt. Yes its annoying to leave the store with a bajillion teeny tiny receipts, but for whatever reason every birthday party I've attended since my own childhood has featured at least one double gift. Sometimes that's awesome! Other times...let's just say one family only needs so many copies of the movie Frozen. We all need the ability to "let it go" to a hiding place for a few days ;) .

A further caveat to this blog post is if you can't afford a gift when attending a toddler's birthday don't sweat it. That sweet and slightly insane person wants to see you regardless. One of the most important things we can teach our children is that people matter far more than objects ever will. One of my favorite gifts to give little people are letters to them imparting age appropriate "wisdom". For example, there is nary a two year old boy who does not need to know that, "Broccoli is only for big boys, not for babies- eat at your own peril.  Dogs are pretty much always cool. In case of emergency, mustard is a suitable finger paint." 
 


On Appreciating what I have...

Its been a while since I've written anything because life has been madness for nearly a month. B has worked constant overtime, E is in the throes of the terrible two's (I have joked with some friends that if the three's truly are worse as the mothers of all three year olds say, I'm running away to Cabo), K is working on her first tooth and crawling simultaneously, I'm trying to get out and enjoy more photography and the house is forever getting more and more bogged down in the mess of everyday living. I'm exhausted just typing that out. But in being so exhausted I find myself (far too often) losing sight of the things in my life I ought to appreciate.

I find myself getting annoyed with E and her constant toddlerisms- the "why's", the "no's" and the "mine's" alone are enough to grate on my nerves, but in conjunction with her sudden picky eating and whining about everything and anything I sometimes sit at the dinner table thinking, How long until bedtime?. In these moments I forget all the funny, wonderful things about this age. That she loves all dogs indiscriminately, that she declares "I a doctor" and applies bandaids asking "It hurt?" with such compassion, that books hold so much wonder for her she'll gladly go to bed to read them. I'm forgetting that E won't be this small and sweet and all over me forever.

Often I envy my husband because he gets to leave the house everyday and talk to adults. He gets to still be seen as something other than "E and K's Daddy". He has much more freedom even in the house because the girls aren't constantly starfished to him. And when I think these things I am forgetting that he is giving up so much so I can stay home and raise our girls. I lose sight of the fact that he's tired from working around the clock and that he carries demands on his from within and outside of our family. I'm forgetting that B is the man that I love and that he is walking an equally hard line every single day without complaint.

There are days that my sweet, innocent little K almost drives me to drink with her level of neediness. Her constant mommy preference is exhausting and her pre-crawling frustration makes her miserable to be around by the end of the day. But I need to remember that her neediness is largely courtesy of our hard-won nursing relationship that I yearned for with E.  I need to see that the second she can crawl she won't want as many mommy snuggles or to be carried everywhere. I'm forgetting that K is a genuinely wonderful baby who is far too quickly losing her babyhood.

I struggle to enjoy photography as much lately because I want to be as good as people who've been doing it much longer. I pale at the thought of anyone entering my home because of the state of it. I am desperate to get out from under the weight of my OCD. There's so much negativity in me right now that everything is just so hard. And that's why I have to remind myself that I am very blessed...

Every single day.

Parenting with OCD

Last week I didn't have time to blog. I didn't have time for much Momtography (and am embarrassed to report it took me all week to edit photos for the sweet lady I took pictures for on Monday). Much of the housework laid half-done and my girls were running around without pants on the majority of the time. Last week I was lost in the mire that is parenting with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.

While only recently diagnosed I have been unknowingly struggling with OCD my entire life; the all-night long racing thoughts, the anxiety, the thoughts I couldn't consciously stop despite my desperate desire to end them and the inability to sleep. These things have made up much of my memory since I was nine or ten years old and have only increased sharply in intensity since having E and K. The objects of my obsession have gone from random things that caught my attention throughout the day to things that could happen to my children, to the ways another mother would be doing better or be doing more in that moment with E and K, about everything I do for my family that still isn't enough. About the fact that I am not enough.

This past week I was especially lost in all of these thoughts and in my desire for perfection I accomplished almost nothing. That's the problem with being an OCD mom in the age of the Pinterest parent- other moms can see perfectly decorated, clean homes of their counterparts and roll their eyes, can enjoy photos of crafts and activities without feeling as thought they should be doing them with their children, can see a friends child excel and not be stricken with fear that their personal failings are suffering their own children. Everyone seems to be able to slough these things off but you (and that in and of itself becomes another way in which you are defective). So I worried about E developing regressive autism for hours this week. I worried K is going to be speech delayed because she wasn't attempting monosyllabic babbling by her six month appointment. I obsessed about a photographic concept that I want to do for E's second birthday (but only if I can do it right, or what's the point?) without actually getting anywhere with it. I've been frustrated with every picture I've taken since Kate's "Purple" session because they aren't as perfect. I agonized for hours over where to buy E's fall long sleeve tops to get the best longevity out of them. All these trivial things kept dishes in my sink, laundry in the hampers and fun crafts undone by me and E.

Today I'm struggling a little less, though the fact that I haven't vacuumed the living room yet today is making my eye twitch, and trying to remember that nothing is truly perfect anywhere. Going forward I'm trying to minimize my extensive to-do lists to one manageable task a day. I am trying to see the beauty in the everyday things that make me angry with their imperfection and trying to see the forest for the trees when it comes to what actually is perfect.

I am an OCD mom, and while I'll never stop wanting to be better, to be more, I think that's okay. Keeping it in perspective is the new name of the game for me...because E and K deserve a mom who is perfectly invested in giving them as much as possible, always.

Faith and the Modern Mom

"Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling." Philippians 2:12-13

"K", Photo credit to Jessica McBride

When I was in my first year of university, a self-proclaimed atheist enrolled in a Catholic institution, I remember making the argument to my introductory theology professor that the world was divided into people of faith and people of facts. To my black-and-white mind I was very much a woman of facts. And then life launched me into my journey to find faith.

My First Trial of Faith

At that point in my life I'd already been with my husband (then boyfriend) for a year. B was charismatic and kind and so much more fun than I ever would be, and I loved that about him. I remember how simple things like music or joking around with his brother would make him come alive. He was an apprentice plumber working on his third year of school, I was transferring colleges, we were living in our own apartment, and in the thick of all this living God didn't once cross my mind. Then one day my mother-in-law called tearfully trying to explain something had happened at my brother-in-law's apartment. Unbeknownst to us our lives were forever changed.

In their grief they couldn't get out what had happened though we had known for some time he was depressed. I recall so clearly sitting in our Lancer at a stop light and begging God, if he existed, for B's brother to be okay. I promised to be a better person if he was okay. Fear left me open to all possibilities.

But my desperation went unanswered and my brother-in-law was gone, and so too was a part of the man I love. It changed him terribly and I decided with finality there couldn't possibly be a God- nothing truly benevolent would have crippled so good a man with such agonizing pain. My heart turned cold to the idea of faith for what seemed like a long time.

And then I found it again...

Eventually B healed enough for us to start pushing forward with our life, it was hard-won but we had fought for each other. December 2011 we got married and shortly thereafter we found out we were pregnant with E. Almost immediately we realized my pregnancy was going to be complicated when I had multiple episodes of sudden, heavy bleeding. We went to the hospital, desperate for answers, and were told by a rather unsympathetic OB/GYN resident that they believed my pregnancy to be ectopic despite having no evidence. "A lack of evidence is evidence." I remember her saying before she told me I needed to take methotrexate to end my pregnancy. Perfectly rational, completely sensible given the circumstance. The first thing out of my mouth after talking to my husband about it was, "No."

This was the first time in my life I had ever actually experienced faith. I knew, beyond all reason and rationality being presented to me, that this wasn't an ectopic pregnancy. A woman of fact would've calculated the odds, factored in the potential loss of a fallopian tube and taken the medication. But before even meeting her I had blind faith in my daughter. The doctors went on to treat me badly, condescend to me, keep me in the day surgery ward to attempt to scare me into taking it before they relented and got me in for a follow-up ultrasound. I laid on that ultrasound table, and sobbed, and begged God again to hear me.

Obviously since E is here with us today (and is nearly two years old!), I know God did hear me. What I remember most about the long test of faith that was my first pregnancy however, is when I was lying in bed nights, or in the hospital hooked up to fluids because my HG was out of control, or on ultrasound table after ultrasound table promising to have a more open heart and to be a better person if my sweet girl could just live.

And all I could say when E was born and first handed to me was, "You're safe. Thank you, thank you.". I didn't have the heart to tell my doula, the nurses or my doctor who all politely smiled their, "you're welcome" 's that my thanks wasn't for them.

Faith as a Mom

Now as a mom of two busy girls under two I have time for almost nothing. The vacuuming is forever half-done, the dishwasher that I don't have the time to gut keeps spitting out dishes rife with water spots, E's curly red hair is often wild and sometimes I even forget to brush their teeth/K's gums. But at night, when the three loves of my life are sleeping, I am always sure to give thanks for having had them another day. I try (because faith still doesn't come easily to me) to have faith that things will work out the way they are meant to. I have faith often more for my children than for myself. I want them to exist in a sphere where God exists, I want them to be able to take comfort in the idea that everything is part of a bigger picture. Whether they find that in a monotheistic deity, a philosophical concept or within themselves, I hope they find faith. And some days its hard to enforce that ideal in myself because I'm tired or because terrible things are happening in the world and I wonder where God is...

"K", Photo credit to Jessica McBride

And then I remember.

Fostering Childhood Literacy: A Quest Like No Other

So you want to Raise a Reader...

 

Growing up I was always the kind of kid who was reading. I read when other kids were out playing in the streets. I read when I was supposed to be doing my homework. I read in secret under the covers until 3 AM, jumping at every noise convinced my mom was going to bust me. Reading for me has always been the stuff of life.

When I found out we were pregnant with E I bought books, upon books, upon books. What to Expect When You're Expecting, The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding, and Belly Laughs made up my pregnancy. I felt ready to charge into motherhood head first with my considerable book knowledge. Of course, as all babies do, E arrived and I received an education of arguably greater depth and breadth from the school of hard knocks. Still, books had helped prepared me for her in a small way. Then the first two months of E's life she barely slept, I gave up on sleeping too and caught up on nine books on my e-reader. Even in delirium, books were at the epicenter of my world.

At about five months old the fog finally started to clear from our lives as E was starting to sleep in her own crib and was gaining minor independence. One day I received a questionnaire from Alberta Health Services about Emma's development and an enclosed flyer about reading from birth to promote lifelong literacy. To this point I'd just been trying to survive a colicky baby and a move to a town six hours from the city we had lived in, so teaching her fundamental skills for lifelong literacy hadn't even occurred to me. Hell half the time a shower hadn't even occurred to me (and I NEEDED one). But I knew I wanted my baby girl to be privileged enough to love literature as much as her Mama. I knew from my psychology classes in university that laying the foundation for life skills such as reading needed to be laid in infancy. What the hell had I been doing for five months?! All my anxious mind could do was obsess over the thought that a better mother would be doing better. All the fight in me could think was 'Where do I start?'.

E and Daddy at the library

Talk 'til you Drop

My most important discovery about literacy and overall early language development is that you cannot ever talk enough to your kids. Thank God, its also the easiest thing you can do every single day (you're such a killer mom you're probably doing it already)! While reading wasn't a focus for us until that fated AHS flyer came to my door, I narrated everything to E from the time she was born and it was one of the greatest pieces of parenting advice my mom has given me (so far anyway ;) ) to talk 'til I dropped. When we go out we talk about what she sees, where we're going, things we have to do. When I cook we count measurements or list ingredients. We sing silly songs to her sister and teach K games like "Pat-a-Cake".

Talking about seemingly banal things has, to my mind, made a huge difference in E's language development. She spoke her first word (that she clearly understood the meaning of anyway!) at 6 months in true to E fashion:

 

She hasn't stopped talking since. Now at 21 months she speaks in two to three words sentences (sometimes more!) and is never at a loss for words. Our doctor and the public health nurse have both declared her "brilliant" and "extremely verbally advanced", but I think her development has a lot to do with what she's been exposed to. Sure, E is a smart kid (doesn't everyone believe that about their kid though?) but even the smartest children can't flourish without the right stimulus and experience. Exposing your child to literature on whatever basis you can is improving their stead in life no matter how much more you wish you were doing for them. Now I'm not saying that reading to your child everyday and talking to them until you are blue in the face will insure they are like E and talking at 6 months (in fact most children won't and K at almost 6 months isn't even close), but in the long run you are raising a reader, a thinker, a doer. The work you're doing now will shape the way they see the world. Be proud of whatever it is you do!

Books for Bedtime

While bedtime reading seems like the most pedestrian of literacy building activities I think its also one of the most important. E has always been a ghastly sleeper (to put it mildly) but the introduction of the bedtime read made bedtime less of a fight because she enjoys going to bed to have "Mo book!". While the activity itself is self-explanatory I've always stressed (even to my not-so-book-crazy husband) that no matter what we will read her books before bed. Making reading a constant in her life has made her love books and reading so much. So often these days we check on her before we turn in and find some variation on this:

Family Literacy Bag Program

The first trip E and I took on our quest to "find" literacy was to our local library. In our town its a rather small institution so I wasn't holding out much hope of finding the resources we needed to get started- but we did! Our library had put together a family literacy program to encourage parents to read to their pre-school aged children. In each themed bag they enclosed about four books, coloring sheets, a flash card matching game and a craft.

On our first visit E and I took home a bag about spring. I was completely overwhelmed by the activities at first so we started off by just reading the books together (I let her turn pages to help develop her fine motor skills, so this was a lengthy process). Then the next day we read them again and integrated the flash cards by naming the pictures instead of matching them. Afterall, what good is learning an object relationship if you can't identify the objects right? The coloring sheets and craft laid in the bag untouched because I wasn't even going there with a five month old, I just wasn't that brave, but that first bag changed our little world. We had found our first shared point of interest.

Since that first bag we've since taken every bag at the library out more than once, made a plethora of crafts that litter our computer desk, made up our own crafts (like construction paper shoes! FYI not great for walking in) when the bag had none, we've even had a few of our own themed days around our literacy bags. Princess Day for example, was a big hit.

The beauty of this program is that it has all the materials you need to begin to enrich your child's world with the written word. If your library doesn't have such a program, you are OCD mama and I hear you roar! Setting up your own bag is easy. Grab a few books surrounding a similar subject (animals is an easy one to start with- what children's book doesn't have an animal of some sort in it?), print some coloring sheets off for older babes and toddlers, draw your own animals together, make paw-print cookies! You can do as little or as much as you want and still enhance your child's love of books. Or you can inquire with your library about potentially starting a program with them yourself. Live Ghandi's vision and be the change you wish to see in the world!

Discovering our Inner-Seussians

In the midst of our love affair with the Family Literacy Bags I happened to hear from a friend of mine (who happens to be a bit of a literary academic) that there had been some recent research that suggested reading Seuss to young children would help them to develop better language skills as they grew. That was all it took for me to launch into buying E some of my favorite childhood reads: One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish, The Cat in the Hat, The Lorax, Oh the Places You'll Go! and Oh The Thinks You Can Think!. At first she was too wiggly to get through a full read of One Fish but loved to look at the pictures. That was okay I figured, I wasn't going to push through and keep reading it if she wasn't interested. I didn't want to make her hate it. Still, every night we ended our bedtime stories with one Seuss or another to varying degrees of completeness, and every night we did a little better.

Now at 21 months E's favorite book is Oh the Thinks You Can Think!. In fact I have the whole book memorized to the point where I often wonder why Kitty O'Sullivan Krauss has a big balloon swimming pool over her house and how high her house insurance payments must be ;) . What's better still is the deluge of words that came from our Seuss-tastic evening reading routine. She loves to point to Sam and chatter about his "geen eggs and 'ams", or answer Oh The Places You'll Go!'s ultimate question, "And will you succeed?" with a sweet and sleepy "Yes."

Emma rocking her Cindy Lou Who hair style!

Teach My Toddler Kit

Our newest adventure into the world of reading and literacy is the Teach My Toddler Kit we received recently. While E, K and I are still new to the lessons contained in our big suitcase full of the alphabet, numbers, colors, shapes, continents and animals we are enjoying it. Each lesson contains a board book, a puzzle that relates to the concepts in the book and a matching card game to relate back to the concepts in the puzzle. You however do not need this kit (or any other supplemental program for that matter) to promote literacy in your household- its a fabulous addition to break up our reading routine and E loves the puzzles but you could easily gather up similar materials on your own. If you're looking for something pre-assembled however it is a great buy!

Recently, while watching an episode of Dragon's Den, a group of young presenters said a very apt thing that I feel really applies to teaching our children just about anything:

"When you change the things you look at, the things you look at change."

So stop looking at all the things you aren't doing "right"! So you aren't feeding your child vegan, gluten-free meals, that sweet kid doesn't own a stitch of organic cotton clothing and you let them play with your IPad so you can have five minutes of peace- it happens to all of us whether we admit it or not. But when we focus on the amazing things we can foster in our children, those things materialize and fluorish in the little people who are our masterpieces. You've got this Mom, whether you've got a brand new baby and are starting early (way to go!) or starting to tackle literacy with an older toddler or pre-schooler (awesome, they'll be so ahead once school starts!), in the words of E's favorite author, "...You're off to great places, you're off and away. Your mountain is waiting, so get on your way!"

The Art of Mom-tography (otherwise known as, "How to get Great Memorabilia: Cheapskate Mommy Edition")

Mom-tography: a term of my own imagining that encompasses all things home photography while trying to look closer to professional photography. Also see, fauxtography.

Photo credit to Jessica McBride

If you've found this blog entry maybe you're pregnant and gaping at the monumental price of newborn photos and wondering how your great grandparents ever afforded the eleventy billion children they had. Maybe you have a baby of whom you want to take special photos like your friends' professional photographers do of their children but don't have the money (or the desire to spend it perhaps) to get it done. Maybe you're a super awesome Grandma or Auntie or BFF that wants to help a frazzled mom in your life capture the moments that might be passing her by. Whoever you are welcome to fellowship of the fauxtographer.

Let me preface all the advice I've pieced together with the fact that I am in no way a photographer. By trade I'm a paralegal, so not even a little photographic ;) . I happen to know many true photographers and they are so wonderful at what they do. Photography is a true skill that warrants the hefty price tag under the right circumstances. The professional photography of our wedding for example was a good buy:

Photo credit to Chris Siddall Photography

But then there are times you want great pictures for occasions that do not warrant the hundreds to thousands of dollars that a professional photographer would ask. Times like Easter or Valentine's Day when you want new photos for your spouse's desk or Grandma Grandpa's ever growing shrine to your sweet army of mini-yous- these are times that call for Mom-tography. You may be thinking, "I can't do that." or "I don't have the time." but you can! That neurotic broad deep down will probably have an eye-twitch that sends out SOS in morse code thinking about all the ways a real photographer would do it better. Tell her to settle down, trying it is better than not trying in every way- you CAN do it! Your kids might even have fun (my big turkey girls love to play "models") while you make your own new hobby ;) .

I started doing Mom-tography after K was born. There were so many photos of my girls together I wanted, but I wasn't willing to end up in debt to get them. So after having studied the professional photographers in three shoots E had had done in the months prior for her birthday cake smash and Christmas I was bound and determined. I was sure I could turn out something passable without shelling out all the money if I tried. I was always a good student! Now I'm sharing all the lessons I gleaned (mostly from Jenna Napier!) with you, feel loved my dear!

Photo Credit to Jenna Crystal Photography

For a Mom-tography shoot you will need:

• a camera. Whatever you have on hand is fine, I did the first six or so on a point and shoot digital camera and they still turned out awesome. I've since bought a lower grade DSLR because I love fauxtography so much!
• a backdrop. I've used blankets, flat sheets, yards of fabric I bought at Walmart and my wedding dress. The world is your backdrop oyster mama! I've found some good places to set up my backdrops are in rocking chairs (great for littler littles), against my oldest's easel, and suspended from the ceiling with hook and eye screws.
• good lighting. I tend to set my girls up about two feet from our front picture window in the mornings because we get wonderful sun exposure. Outdoor shoots are also great because you get full sun exposure!
• cute kids. Thank goodness you made some just for this occasion!
• patience. I'm told wine is a good substitute in the absence of it.

It's often nice to have:

• props. The introduction of a prop can break things up esthetically, add visual interest and entertain your kiddos. Hats, headbands, soft toys are all good examples of easy to find props.
• help from someone the kids find hilarious!

Once I've gathered all my supplies and set the backdrop up the way I want it I try to get the girls excited about the fun activity we're about to partake in. I let my big girl help me pick her outfit from some pre-selected choices (my brain would likely explode from what she would choose organically) and match K up as well as I can. Then I sit them on the backdrop/false flooring I've set up and shoot away (usually on continuous mode, you'll get a ton of pictures that you have to ditch and that's okay- you'll get some gems too!). Tips I would give you to make the most of your first shoot would include:

1.  Have a list of "Must Have" photos in your mind and make sure to shoot those FIRST. By the end of your session your kid(s) are going to be getting tired of playing model for you and will be less cooperative, so its better to get important pictures in first. If you can't get them at first don't worry about it- preserve your backdrop and come back to it after naptime or even another day. Unlike professional photographers you won't be billing yourself more money to re-do a shoot you're unhappy with, you can always come back to it!
2. Get down on your little one's level when you're shooting. It will eliminate the amount of non-backdrop background you need to crop out.
3. When using babies who aren't sitters yet as models you have multiple options for posing. If you want to lay them on their backs, simply drape the backdrop material under them and shoot overhead. If you want a tummy time pose I find it looks better to place baby on a nursing pillow that has been draped in a sheet or cloth similar to your backdrop. It elevates their heads more and just generally has a better esthetic to it. If you'd like to sit them up I might suggest you try the previously mentioned rocking chair technique and steady them in the corner of the chair or against an older sibling. Always be right in front of your baby if you choose to put them in the rocking chair!
4. When you go through your photos for the first time you'll be tempted to start deleting right away. Don't do it lady! Scroll through your whole reel first and then revisit what you want to remove pre-editing.
5. Consider creating a file on your SD card for each of your photo shoots for organizational purposes. I want to go cross-eyed thinking of the chaos that would be held  on my SD cards if I didn't have them organized.
6. Share your photos with me! I want to see your artistic triumph, your crazy outtakes, share them! 

I hope this blog post has found you well! I hope its given you ideas for fun home photography projects with your littles or fur-kids or friends and family. If you've read this and felt deflated and like you don't think you could do this or that it looks too hard, know that I'm saying this from a place of love- you're crazy. Managing your family everyday with all the craziness in your everyday life is tough, staying sane even tougher, but this is so doable and can be such a bright spot for you if you end up enjoying it. It doesn't have to be perfect even thought you'll probably make it that way! And maybe it won't be for you, but you'll still know you can do it. If you've got questions leave me a comment and I'll get back to you. I know you've got this OCD Mama, you're one tough broad!

Introductions and other Ramblings of a SAHM

There are times in life that you just can't say where your life is going. You can guess at it. You can hope and wonder with boundless optimism. But you're never quite sure how everything will pan out (or if it will pan out at all) and it is a uniquely terrifying and liberating experience all at once. Finding yourself with two children under the age of two is one of those experiences, and in our society today perhaps even something unique in life.

To give you some background I am and always have been someone who likes things just so- good enough has never been truly good enough. So when our big girl, the Ginger Ninja, E joined our family I was shattered by the adjustment. She is spirited and clever and wild and particular- she is every inch her mother. And being like me she is trying and difficult and stubborn as a mule so she made for a crazy baby phase. I took solace however, in putting together activities for my girl to work on to hone her developing skill sets, in putting together literacy programs, in developing all things E. Then I found out I was pregnant with K when E was 7 months old.

K has been our sweet, chubby, marginally less excitable baby since day one and I love her for it. She is still a baby and by virtue of that fact demands a great deal of my time as a stay-at-home mother. Balancing PPD/PPA, nursing, honing the development of both my sweet girls, keeping the house and cooking have all been struggles for me to this point because having moved to a small town away from our support base when E was 5 months old I have no help. It has driven me to a sort of productive neuroses that I think a lot of moms who are truly on their own much of the time share. You become frazzled by the thought of folding another load of laundry, while rocking another whiney baby, whilst singing "If You're Happy and You Know it" for the 318,765th time that day and planning an afternoon activity- and yet you do it all anyway. You come back fighting to do better because you ARE better for being this neurotic woman who at times fervently prays for naptime to come. She makes you better even when she's tearing you down.

It was the realization that I can't be the only person in the world who keeps getting back up and trying harder that inspired me to finally put this out there. Lord knows enough people over the years have told me I need to right a book (HA! How much time do you have?). I want to find that community of women, wherever you are and bring us all together. I want to share with you the sheer insanity of day long temper tantrums, the wonder of construction paper outfit crafts, the magic that is child literacy, the absolute laundry witchcraft that is my stain fighting regime (You know you want it ;) ), my love for "mom-tography" and the cooking adventures that nourish our families bodies and souls.

To quote a favorite book of mine as a teen, "[Sometimes] You have to lose your mind to find your heart." . So lose your mind with me (I'm ahead of the game, I lost mine months ago- catch up now my duck!), in all the madness and beauty that is the journey through motherhood- with a touch of OCD! We might just find something we're both looking for...