Growing Family

Tick (At)Tack Toe

I am at my parents' idyllic  Tennessee home in the woods. Butterflies perform their swooping dances over fields waving their tasseled grasses at the sky. Garden beds overflowing the brilliant blossoms bring the bees, wasps, and all manner of winged majesties. At night the fireflies illuminate the woods with their blinking, magical messages. 

I am barricaded inside, watching this grandeur from the windows. After a few short days where I stayed out of the fields and woods, I am overwhelmed with tick bites, chigger bites, mosquito bites, and the like. At night I am a miserable mess, and in the morning I scratch myself red and puffy.

"You don't always get everything you hope for" Small Sun wisely tells me, as I moan in my bed.

"You kind of sound like a baby" Sprout tells me moments later. 

They are wise children. They speak truth. 

I am a baby, and wishing won't make my bites disappear.

The children are having two weeks of quintessential American summer.

Slip and Slide on generic plastic with a sprinkler and dish soap.

Summer Reading

Catching frogs and garter snakes and beetles

Passing time with lemon ice water on the porch swing

Small Sun's been busy working on the tree house with Dad. This morning I pulled my head out from under my pillow to see him getting clothes for himself and his brother. "We've got work to do" he explained, as I questioned why he was up so early. 

We've worked in Mom's garden, and found a clutch of snake eggs buried in the soil. Tonight we'll grill hamburgers on the fire that Small Sun has been tending all afternoon, with potatoes in foil in the embers, and s'mores to top us off.

Back home The Captain is living in a house where one side is filled with boxes and furniture and save our bed in the master bedroom, the other side is entirely, absolutely empty while painting and new floors are underway. He is working extra to fill the spaces that we normally take, and I think we have the richer part of this bargain.

 

Moved

Oh, mah goodness.

I can't believe the marathon we just completed. I am sitting on the couch, feet propped up, at the new house, marvelling at the last four days. Holland - Turkey - house close - move. I feel like I was in the washing machine on a spin cycle that wouldn't stop.

The only real hiccup in all of this is that our new street is undergoing construction. They built me a temporary driveway to get our moving truck in (aren't they sweet?), and then dug it out as soon as the truck pulled away. Unfortunately, I still needed to move my plants from the old house, but now they're pouring concrete so I still can't get in and out. My car is parked down the street filled with my yard tools and the pool toys. It is going to smell awesome tomorrow.

I am so thankful for our next door neighbors back at the old house. Today, with help from other great neighbors, I moved my many (why so many?) pots of plants to the next door neighbor's side to wait until I am blessed with a driveway again.

Guys, there were so many potted plants. Artichokes and hostas and salvias, and ropes of tomatoes... On about trip 28 next door, watching my neighbor sweat as he rolled the dolly down the sidewalk, I tried to vow never to garden so much in a rental house again. I tried to vow never to require so much help on such a hot day from my already generous neighbors. I tried to vow to restrain myself. Then I realized, "I can't help myself." Each plant is like a friend I am eager to see.

"Gardening is cheaper than therapy." My next door neighbor said, as I apologized for over running his property with my plants. He is a man after my own heart. We can hold long conversations about when to plant fall tomatoes in Houston to catch the perfect window for blooms to open and fruit to set before the weather turns. I will miss him and his dear wife, who both adored our kids and were willing to share their expertise as veterinarians, each time our children found a bird fallen from a nest.

I am the richest girl, to leave yet another place I loved, and already to be welcomed and greeted where I am now. A delightful 76 year old neighbor pushed her way past sweating mover men and mountains of boxes to come hug me and exclaim "I am SO GLAD you're here!" Later a woman in a minivan slowed to a crawl in front of the house, rolled down her window, and called out "it's not always like this (the construction), welcome to the neighborhood!" Today I met the neighbor across the way who had already heard about me from the lovely lady next door who came yesterday. It seems we have landed well. Again.

As I unpack boxes I wonder what will happen in this house? What children will come to live here? What child will stay? Will we know right from the first moment that she is the one who is ours, who our hearts are meant to love always? What milestones and memories will my children make here? How will The Captain and I deepen and forge this bond that we are making?Will this bleak backyard turn into bloom and blossom? Will I be able to sing something out of the soil?

So many moves. So many new starts. So many meaningful connections. Even when there is no driveway, I am thankful for it all. 

Throwing out the anchor

We've done these big moves a couple times. Nashville to Holland. Holland to Nashville. Nashville to Sydney. Sydney to Houston. I've come to recognize a certain pattern of disconnection that enters when I travel for a holiday and it's coming time to return home.

I feel a bit lost and disconnected, trying to remember "home" - where it is, what it looks like, and who my people are. 

This listlessness set in several days ago, when we were closer to the end of the holiday than the beginning. When my thoughts started to turn to home, they immediately flicked to Australia, and I had to stop and remind myself that now going home means going to Texas. My mind began to bring up images of the things I love - our sun room, the view of trees from our bedroom window...my garden and the pool. 

In reality, the house is all boxed up. Only minimal furnishings remain to make the house livable for the person looking after it while we are gone. The plants are dug out of the garden and waiting in an army of plastic pots. That life, in that house has already been wrapped up, it only needs moving. 

Over the years I have discovered a way to mitigate this lost feeling. Towards the end of a trip I think about my routine "back home". I think about my friends and what they are doing. I send some texts and emails, planning some play dates or some coffee meetups for as soon as the jet lag wears off. I've found that if I get back "home" and end up having a lonely week, it can lead to me feeling entirely disconnected and wondering "do I even belong here?" when I really do.

This week rather than coffee dates and play dates, I have moving plans, and am so thankful to have friends to call on for help.

"Can I leave my kids at your house for a couple hours while the movers are emptying the house?" I ask a friend. I marvel at the rapidity of her response, an unchecked "YES" to my three jet lagged offspring. 

The babysitter can't come the morning we need to sign our contracts, but her mother agrees to come instead. I am so thankful for our sweet babysitter and her family who have made our lives so much easier this year.

I am not doing this alone. I have people to go home to. I have things to do. I won't drift off into the stratosphere. I am so thankful.

 

The Strength of Me

I am 33. I have birthed two children. I have been eating a grand amount of cheese.

This morning I was finishing up my shower and my seven year old daughter came into the bathroom.

"You're beautiful" she sighed, looking at me with stars in her eyes.

"Yes, I am!" The wonder in my voice matches the wonder in hers.

"I've got this great body that is so strong, and can do so many things, and God made it really beautiful too. How great is that?"

I see all these women rallying in effort to not pass their body hatred onto their daughters. I see commercials and add campaigns encouraging us to change our negative view of the female gender to one of strength and intelligence.

I hear women say that they pretend to like themselves so that their daughters won't take on the same insecurities they carry throughout life. 

How about we just like ourselves?

"I'm the one who stretched your belly out, and made it wrinkly", Sprout says, shyly.

"Yes, you and Finch both took a turn, and that's okay. The skin is kind of stretched out but my body is strong and does a really good job doing what it needs to do."

"Did it hurt your belly to get stretched out? Did it hurt you when I kicked you?"

"My belly is fine. It can digest food just great, and that's its job. The uterus gets stretched out too, but mine is strong and healthy and the uterus' job is to take care of babies. No, it didn't hurt when you kicked, having a baby inside is one of the most exciting, amazing things that ever happened in my whole life."

My daughter sits beside me on the bed, watching me put on makeup. My face is beautiful without makeup, and makeup is fun dress up for grown-ups. That's what I say, and it's true. Today I dusted gold shimmer over her eyelids and let her spray perfume on the back of her neck and mine.

She runs her hand over my beautiful clothes, and admires most everything about me.

We stand side by side at the edge of the pool and dive together, strong, and confident.

I am not being strong for her. I am strong.

I am not being beautiful for her. I am lovely.

I am not clever for her, it's just that I've got this great brain.

Yet the wonder of me becomes a gift for my daughter, and my sons.