retreating

Ellie and I are in Arch Cape, Oregon for her first art retreat this weekend. It's just the two of us and it's pretty awesome to be here together teaching her the ways of retreating. We're painting and getting sea and salt in our hair and snacking and writing and laughing. And there's of course a heavy dose of remembering to be kind and learning how to take some space when we need it and creating a mess with our words and then hugging it out.

Our time here has me very excited to come back in June for the One Move Retreat (which has five spots left). And it has me thinking about writing a few posts with some thoughts about what I'm learning as we paint and talk and hug it out.

 

While watching her run on the beach with a new friend this morning, I started thinking about how parenting is so much about trying to stay rooted while the world feels like it spins faster. And I'm not talking about time. That's a given. I'm talking about how you go from knowing what to do in a moment and saying just the right thing to help her learn to hearing her laughter and see her joy literally bubble up around her like magic to watching her run too far from you until she can't see you, until you can't see her, while the tide is coming in and the moment suddenly tosses you over a cliff of worry and knowing you're going to have to pull out the serious voice while not totally losing your shit in front of wedding guests who are suddenly gathering on the beach where just 20 minutes before there was only you and her and adventure waiting. Somehow staying rooted, even if only by a fingertip, in moments like that. 

More soon...but I think it's time to nap while she naps...

here

I've been carrying my "big girl" camera with me again these days. Before Ellie was born, I used to carry it almost every single time I left the house. And then I carried a diaper bag. And then my iPhone came along. And I just brought it out when we went somewhere special or when I needed to photograph something for my blog or work. But just carrying it with me again and noticing the simple and gorgeous and silly and quiet moments of my everyday life makes me so happy.

It truly is a way to practice creative self-care and water my soul. 

Using one of my favorite prompts, "here," take a peek at what I've been finding.

Here, spring unfurls early and we just soak it up in awe.

Here, we practice going out in the world using our kind voices while still being ourselves with every step.

Here, a little girl finds her joy.

Here, we both grow each day. And it's so hard. And beautiful. And messy. And true.

Here, the blue sky surprises us when it appears and I stand outside and soak it up.

Here, I remember how finding myself through my lens brings me home.

Here, we catch her in these magic moments of singing to herself and another stitch sews up the cracks in my heart.

Here, I listen to the wisdom within me and make the choice to choose love again and again.

Yes.

*****

Water Your Mama Soul is ongoing class that invites you to use creative self-care to help you come home to yourself.

I've created this class because I believe 10 days of focused creative self-care for just 10-20 minutes a day will change your life. Mamas have little time for themselves and need to be able to turn to accessible practices to ground themselves in the midst of real life. I'm running this class again live because I believe in the power of a circle of women supporting one another and saying, "I hear you. Me too...me too."

In Water Your Mama Soul, you will use your camera, journaling prompts, and self-care practices to reconnect with yourself. This will be a 10-day journey into self-care, healing, and noticing what you need. You will come away with practices you can use again and again to fill up your own internal well so you can be more present to your loved ones and other things in your life. Learn more and sign up right here.

the beauty and the grit

Ten minutes before this moment we were both yelling and I was setting the boundary of giving us space by walking the five feet to the kitchen and unloading the dishwasher. She cried and got really mad and then listened to her choices of staying at the table with kindness or playing alone while I kept cleaning. She chose to stay. So here we are laughing and cutting and staying in it.

It can be so hard to stay in it sometimes, but gosh when you do, you create so much more space for love.

And I guess I have a thing about sharing the "real" moments at the table right now. It feels important to gather evidence of what life looks like over here and remind myself of the little wins in the midst of all of it...of the ways I can hold beauty in one hand and the grit in the other and see them both and nod and say, "Yes, this."

(And I've been reading Parenting with Love and Logic and the idea of giving two choices that are positive come from that. It is really helping us and I highly recommend it...even if Ellie does sometimes say, "I don't want the choices again Mama.")

take a quick mama break

As part of my collaboration with eBay, I'm sharing a few quick ideas for taking a short "mama break" in the midst of whatever might be happening in your day. These are all things you can do in just 1 to 5 minutes, and my hope is you can use them in the carpool line, when you're moving from being on the floor playing with Legos to the kitchen to make lunch, and even when you're on the bus on the way to work.

I'm having so much fun sharing different guides over on eBay, and I hope you'll take a moment to read this one along with the others over there. And a shout out to Vaness Simpson of Focus in Photography for taking so many of the photos in several of the guides I'm sharing over there.

And here's one quick way to take a mama break right now: close your eyes and take five deep breaths (or even just one) and focus on the space you create inside you each time your chest opens as you inhale.

*****

If you're a mom want to dive even deeper into ways to practice self-care, check out Water Your Mama Soul. It's a 10-day class that invites you to come home to yourself through photography, writing, and self-care prompts.

sometimes the day starts upside down.

Yesterday: There's a lot that did not go well in the last 35 minutes of getting them out the door for school. But because we were running late, we had this "LOOK! It's a beautiful pink sky Mama" moment standing under the trees in our front yard. 

Sometimes the day starts upside down. Sometimes you say "hurry up" about 25 times more than you wish you had. Sometimes you want to put the words back into your mouth. Sometimes you wonder if this is really your life.

But then beauty arrives and your little one stops to make sure you all notice and you are reminded: You're doing something right. 

You push yourself to remember that most days aren't this hard. Most mornings are have more ease and laughter than pushing and pulling. And you choose to open your heart to kindness and love. 

Toward yourself.

Toward those you love.

Toward the woman who will experience other upside down mornings in the days to come.

Because each day you choose.

Yes.

she's all her.

The questions about "who does she look like?" and "who is she like?" come up from time to time. Watching her at the fair last month, I just kept thinking about how she is such her own person. So brave. So ready for adventure. So ready to laugh as she spins and dances and twirls in this world. So ready to say how she feels and what she wants and what she doesn't like. So ready to just be herself.

Jon and I are more of the "let's sit down and read or just be quiet" kind of people. Well, I'm more of the "let's sit down and solve the world problems and laught a lot" kind. Neither one of us has ever been much for climbing and spinning and sliding down the tallest slides ever. Nope. And we both have histories of keeping our wants inside, not wanting to rock the boat.

And then there's Ellie. 

She is teaching us every day with her wild, stubborn, brave, light-filled ways. 

She is awesome.

(And I finally caught them both with their dimples. Yep. In that photo she looks like her daddy.)

they were dancing

On Saturday morning, the air was thick with the grumps. The "it took us 45 minutes to get out of the house just to go to the bakery" kind of grumps. The "nothing I said was the right thing" kind of grumps. You might know those kinds of grumps.

But we went to the bakery anyway.

And after a lot of questions like "why don't they have chocolate cupcakes today," they went to find us a table while I paid. As I waited for my chai tea latte, I looked up and saw this.

They were dancing.

Dancing.

And in that moment I thought to myself, "We're doing something right around here...even on the days it feels like things are upside down and we don't really know what we're doing."

Even on those days, there is dancing.

Yes.

rainbow dinner

We've hit that stage where Ellie is saying things like, "I don't like green guys" when she sees bit of basil in her pasta sauce or jumping to "I don't like {insert new food she's never had here.}" The good thing is that she already eats a wide variety of foods and loves several fruits and veggies that she eats daily. But as we dive into farmers' market season here, I really want her to at least try fresh foods that are new to her.

A few weeks ago, I had this sudden brainstorm: Rainbow Dinner.

I explained that we were going to go to the market near our home and buy two fruits we love + one we've never tried, two vegetables we love + one we've never tried, and two cheeses we love + one we've never tried. And we were going to look for all different colors as we were exploring.

Ellie was so excited! She even wanted to wear her rainbow skirt to match her dinner.

We walked through the store naming all the foods and deciding what to put in the cart. There was a lot of: Let's try PURPLE CARROTS! I want to try those yellow tomatoes. Oh yes yes Mommy we MUST get those avocados, I'll put them in the bottom of the cart for you.

It was awesome.

We then worked together to wash and gather everything into pretty bowls and plates and ate at the table on the backporch.

She tried a bite of everything. She didn't like everything, but she was really happy to try. This didn't happen the next time we did "rainbow dinner." She only wanted to try the things she liked. The next time she was more open. And now she loves eating strawberries off the stem even though it means being closer to the green guys.

We've also turned our rainbow dinner into a rainbow pizza the next night when she wanted to put the yellow tomatoes and even the prosciutto onto her pizza. And we've done rainbow pasta.

But here is the really important part: On one hand, yes, this is a story about a parenting win. And I really believe in recording the wins so you can look at them and remember that there are moments when what you are trying to do works...where there is more joy than arguing...where there is softness and laughter.

But this is really about me taking the time to imagine the life I really want to create over here. I want there to be more fresh food going into our bodies. But I don't cook every day and that isn't going to change overnight. I'm not someone who thinks ahead of time about dinner and find myself texting with Jon at the end of the day saying, "Just get takeout again." And we eat in front of the TV sometimes. A lot of times.

Even though takeout will still happen and we will still sit in front of the TV sometimes, I have a choice:

Beat myself up for not being the kind of mom who cooks every night.

OR

Make one move toward more dinners at the table + getting Ellie to try new foods by having some version of rainbow dinner a couple of nights a week.

I can make the choice to make one more move toward the life I want to create over here. Beating myself up for not making those moves gets me nowhere closer to that life today.

And those moves start to add up. Ellie is now saying, "Can we go to the market and get food for rainbow dinner after nap today?"

Yes, honey. Yes. We. Can.

*****

If the idea of unearthing the life you're imagining for yourself and then making one move each day toward it resonates with you, consider joining Hand to Heart, my free ongoing community of women. Each month I share different ideas to add to your current self-care practice and we explore ways to make simple moves toward living the life we really want for ourselves and our loved ones.

Learn more and request to join right here.