Photo Friday :: Being Brother

by flowers on July 30, 2010

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These two boys have come along way these past few months. They had to hang tight while we launched a new business this past spring and they bared with me while I had a mama meltdown. They really had to fend for themselves when I injured my hip and needed bed rest the last three weeks of my pregnancy and they’ve had to adjust to life with a new baby and all the changes that have come these past few weeks.

It hasn’t been particularly easy on them and yet I notice the ways it has built character for each of them individually and bonded them as brothers. As much as they drive each other crazy (and us in the process) they also play with each other more and keep themselves busy more often. I had to do a double take when Sol recently dressed himself, made himself a snack and brushed his teeth in preparation for a play date–all without help or prompting from me. Six months ago Koala was hesitant to leave my side and now he begs to take off for the park with friends when the opportunity arises.

And just the other morning I suggested we go take a walk and I found them dressing themselves and S buttoning K’s shirt for him. I had just a moment to grab the camera and catch the moment.

Boys, we have come a long way and I’m so proud of the way you’ve grown.

What about you? Do you notice your kids stepping up to plate in times of change or great challenges?

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Welcome to the Sisterhood

by flowers on July 28, 2010

I didn’t allow myself to want a girl until I had her. And now that I have her I have completely surrendered to all things girl.

Like ruffled sun hats.

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And super cute dresses.

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And there’s always super cute floral pajamas.

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I also like to sit and daydream about the knitted woolen jumpers, picky pants and bonnets I can knit for when the weather cools. (Note to self: less dreaming and more knitting!)

But amidst all the excitement of simply dressing a child differently according to their culturally defined gender, I am truly excited to have a daughter. One of my passions in life is empowering and supporting women around their fertility and childbirth experiences. To think this tiny little daughter of mine was born with hundreds of thousands of eggs in her tiny little uterus just melts me and furthers my obsession with empowered femininity. She holds the potential of live lived forward within her! Mind blowing!

The night she was born (4 weeks ago today) I was laying in my bed relaxing after all was said and done. My midwife, her assistant and my doula, who I’m lucky enough call friends, were all just lounging around me. Lauren: my doula, neighbor and friend said, “Welcome to the Sisterhood”.

I am proud to introduce Ninu into my sisterhood. I have two living grandmothers, my mom, her sister and her daughters. Then there’s Stone’s mother and sister who are powerful and positive allies. My girlfriends who, despite the distance (ladies you know who you are), will always be aunties to my clan and the amazing circle of women who I’ve built community with here in the last two and half years. And now, with this new little bright spirit, the sisterhood has grown that much more.

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Do you have a daughter(s)? What does your sisterhood look like? Any insight into the whole mother/daughter relationship?

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Radical Courage

by flowers on July 26, 2010

In celebration of our newest arrival I’ve invited some of my favorite bloggers to guest post. Today Tara from The Organic Sister is here to share some of her radical wisdom with us.

I’ve never seen myself as a particularly courageous person, but the more experience I have with life and the more strangers with whom we converse, the more I begin to realize just how the absence of fear (or sometimes the embracing of it) has shaped us and our life, and just how radical that can look to anyone who has yet to experience it.

I can’t say I’ve never experienced fear. Things often look absolutely terrifying from the outside. Before we convince ourselves to look under life’s bed we believe it can hold any number of scary monsters ready to tear our lives, our dreams and our families apart.

Oh, I’ve been there. I know the paralyzing effect fear plays in our common, ordinary lives. It’s a lot like those scary dreams in which something is coming for us and we just can’t move our legs to get away. We’re petrified into thinking the worst and remaining immobile in those feelings. But there’s one thing I’ve recognized in my experience: Just when I think the worst is about to happen, I wake up and realize my emotions and my perspectives were merely a dream.

In just the past four years, I’ve:

Overcome my fear of business failure. I sold a business for no other reason than it was making us miserable and made the choice to be with my family. I was terrified of the professional backlash and my image, but I learned that it just didn’t matter what others thought compared to the joy such a choice brought us.

Learned that I am exactly the person my child needs. I thought I couldn’t be human, couldn’t make mistakes, couldn’t be “wishy-washy”. I parented out of fear of myself and fear of “ruining” my child. But I’ve found making mistakes, learning the fine art of apologizing and taking back the stupid things I’ve done and insisted on is exactly what my child needs from me.

Come to understand that children can be trusted. I no longer think they need to be controlled to “behave” or told what to eat, when to sleep or how to learn, but instead have experienced that transformational results of embracing my child’s personality, guiding him with unconditional compassion and respecting him as a whole and unique individual. I wouldn’t trade our current relationship for what we had before for anything.

Challenged my fear of personal failure. In the past year we’ve lost a steady income, a home and will soon lose our health insurance. We’ve given away our possessions, our “stability” and our credit score. Now we travel the country in a vintage RV, exploring and seeking and loving what we find. It took dropping below the “poverty line” to realize just how rich we were. Rich in time and love, in creativity and adventure.

Allowed my beauty to be dictated by my personal definition of self-worth. My feminine appearance was so closely tied together with my perceived “value” that it was hard to accept the fact that some people will look at me differently because I don’t often wear makeup, don’t own a single pair of high heels and love my dreadlocked hair. But the spiritual lessons it’s imparted are profound and amazing for me.

Accepted that living is messy but life is still good. Serious back, joint and other health issues limit me every day and sometimes can leave me in bed for several. But even through the worst of my pain and the scary prognosis for my future, I can still laugh wholeheartedly, love passionately and live bravely.

Lost a father and realized I can still breath. Nothing shakes me to my core like the thought of losing a person I love. But through the most difficult time in my life, I learned that death can be a means of waking us up to the fact that life is not just for living…but preferably for living out loud.

We’ve gotten a lot of negative responses to our choices: A lot of honest concerns, plenty of harsh judgment, many frustrating assumptions and even a few negative predictions. We’ve received nasty words, shocking insults and rude looks all for doing something radically outside the norm.

We’ve also heard plenty of “I’m so jealous!” and “I really wish I could that but I just can’t”. To many it seems that what we do is some elusive lifestyle only available to a lucky few.

That’s just not true. Our life is not radically different than anyone we’ve met but for one particular choice: We consistently choose trust. We embrace what comes our way, we allow our fears without accepting our immobilization, and we keep just keeping flying on trust.

“The reason birds can fly and we can’t is simply that they have perfect faith, for to have faith is to have wings.” – James Matthew Barrie

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Photo Friday :: The Mask

by flowers on July 22, 2010

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I’m participating in Shakti Mama’s self-portrait series and our first assignment was to explore the mask.

This could go a million ways. I’ll highlight some thoughts I’ve had through the process of choosing the mask, taking the picture, uploading and posting it.

*I feel comfortable behind a mask. Life feels exciting and adventurous. I feel stripped of society’s expectations and a certain freedom comes from that: I can say what I really feel. I can do what I really feel called to do. Maybe the real mask I’m wearing is invisible–in my every day life.

*This blog can act as a mask. I choose the lens, the feel and what I want to present. I share certain aspect of my family and myself. I want to live authentically and this blog is a tool that constantly explores where what authenticity means and feels like to me–how it plays out in my experience.

*Solshine does not like me wearing this mask or any mask. It frightens him because he feels like I am no longer his mother. It’s taught me about how he sees the world and the kind of possibilities he accepts as reality and glimpses into the things he fears. Koala loves it in a thrilling, dangerous way. He looks at me mischievously begging to know if it’s me or what new world we’ve entered. He giggles and I see his whole body relax as I pull it off and say, “It’s just me.” He begs me to put it back on.

The mask feels like a lesson in self in relation to the outside world. It acts as a go between. I am I. I am also who I am perceived to be. Somewhere in the middle there are a million shades of gray.

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Rekindling my Affair with Books

by flowers on July 21, 2010

There was a time when I was a voracious reader. In fact, that was how you could describe me most of my life until my second son was born. Then my world changed into reading magazines and blogs because they were something I could pick up quick, read an article or post, and then go back to taking care of the kids.

Shortly after Ninu was born I picked up The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley. It is one of my all time favorites and since I had so much help with the house and family I had time to nurse and lounge and read. And fall in love all over again.

Something has as awakened in me–an old flame: my love for reading words on paper that I hold in my hands. It was soothing and calming and created great balance in my life. I read a lot online and on the computer, but hence is the manner of modern media, it is subject to bouncing around erratically from blog to facebook to twitter and email. Reading a book feels centering and grounding.

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I’ve decided that instead of working and reading on my computer until bedtime I will close things down and head into bed, ending my night with books. It’s a past time I’ve loved so dearly and it feels really good to bring this habit back into my life.

Two questions for you:

When do you find time to read?
What is your favorite all time book or genre?

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Embracing an Unconventional Life

by flowers on July 19, 2010

As we celebrate the newest addition to our family and transition into this new phase of mindful family living I have opened …infinitely learning… to guest posters every Monday. I’m having so much fun hearing from you all I am going to continue to accept submissions. Today I am thrilled to introduce and share a piece from Amber of Strocel.com. She’s one of my favorite bloggers so be sure to check her out.

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I have lived a very conventional life. I have never set off a firecracker or smoked a cigarette. In fact, I haven’t smoked anything at all – my grade 4 teacher told me not to. I graduated first in my class from high school, earned an engineering degree and got a Real Job. I married my high school sweetheart, bought a house in the suburbs and had babies. We have a cat and a lovely lawn.

There are advantages to being conventional. When you follow the rules you receive certain rewards. Things like comfortable salaries deposited every other week into your bank account and business cards with a snappy title under your name. The world understands who you are and your way is smoothed. I liked that part of it.

In spite of the advantages, though, I occasionally questioned my conventional life. Why was I doing this, anyway? What if instead of 3 weeks vacation I wanted to take 5 weeks? Why did I spend most of my waking hours in a gray cubicle? Few locales are less inspiring than gray cubicles.

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Me and my husband Jon, in our conventional suburban living / dining room

I ignored my doubts. I had a mortgage and small children, and being conventional promised safety. Except that it didn’t. It turned out the safety was an illusion. Your job can be eliminated based on a decision from someone who’s never even met you. Your comfortable existence can vanish in the blink of an eye in an effort to maximize corporate efficiency. And it all has nothing to do with how well you followed the rules.

This is how I found myself, towards the end of my second maternity leave, trying desperately not to cry. My infant son was sleeping on my lap. My boss and an HR rep were on the phone. They were very apologetic, and I’m pretty sure the whole thing was almost as bad for them as it was for me. I was hardly alone – my company was slashed. So were countless other companies all over the world, as the global economy tanked. My conventional world was turned on its side.

Because I had been such a good rule follower, I was fortunate to receive a pretty good severance package. I could live on it for a while, if I was careful. Looking at my friends who were struggling to find work, I decided to do that. I would spend some time with my kids and wade back in when things had settled down a little. In the meantime, I would take some time to plan my next move.

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Me and my children on a very conventional family vacation

I asked myself a simple question – what do I want to do with my life? I was at a loss to answer. This is not the sort of question that conventionality encourages. The answers to this question are risky, you see. Wanting makes you vulnerable. Dreaming leaves your heart open. It compels you to action and you could fail. Failure sucks.

After I spent some time wallowing, though, I finally realized that not dreaming is no guarantee. I had always done the Responsible Thing. I had pleased every teacher and aced every test. I had been courteous and not rocked the boat. And yet, here I was, losing my job. There is no escaping the possibility of failure. I might as well follow my passions.

My lay-off was over a year ago, now. I still haven’t decided what to do with my life. But the more freedom I give myself, the more answers I find. I know that my life will involve simplifying so that I don’t have to work as much. It will involve doing things myself, living lightly on the earth, and baking bread from scratch. It will involve homemade ice cream and handmade clothes and a whole lot of writing. I will start a business or three. I will show my children that some rules are meant to be broken. And I will know that however my life turns out, it will be something that I created with my family. That’s worth being a little unconventional for, don’t you think?

You can follow along with Amber’s adventures every Thursday through her Crafting my Life series on her blog at Strocel.com.

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Photo Friday :: A Baby

July 16, 2010

“A baby will make love stronger, days shorter, nights longer, bankroll smaller, home happier, clothes shabbier, the past forgotten, and the future worth living for” ~Anonymous

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Daily Rituals

July 13, 2010

We are a pretty go with the flow kind of family, but it has become apparent that in order for me to survive these times with my sanity we are going to need some conscious daily flow to keep everyone centered. The challenges: Koala is two and a half. He’s having a hard time with [...]

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Expanding Hopes, Horizons, & Home

July 12, 2010

I’m having a baby and some amazing bloggers are here to share their …infinitely learning… moments with us while I nest, birth and babymoon. This post is from Melodie of Breastfeeding Moms Unite! ************************* Life has been hectic lately. We’re getting ready to move, and while I’ve moved before and understand that moving is stressful, [...]

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This Moment

July 9, 2010

{this moment} A Friday ritual. A single photo – no words – capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. If you’re inspired to do the same, join in over at SouleMama. **********

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