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...