Happy Mother's Day

Pure love, and a lot of laundry. That's what being a mom is all about. 

Happy Mother's Day to all you mothers and babes, of all shapes and sizes. 

Gratitude

It doesn't have to be about Thanksgiving, although these pictures are. It isn't exclusive to autumn, or to sharing a meal or exchanging kind words, though sitting down to a table spread with harvest colours and savoury flavours does inspire a grateful appetite. Am I making your mouth water for sage stuffing or pumpkin pie? Only five months to go, my friends. Soon enough. 

She is grateful for the food she shares, on a daily basis,  and for the family with whom she shares it; yes it might well go without saying. She is grateful for the healthy faces, hearts and bodies of her children. She is grateful when they clean their plates without complaining. She is grateful when they climb into their bed without tears. She is never more grateful for the swelling silence that accompanies her away from their softly sleeping bodies, toward her own bed and its willingness to receive her.

All poetry aside, she is grateful she is not doing this alone. Any of this. The meals, the care of the boys, the bedtime routines, the building of this home, this life. She is grateful that what happened last fall did not undo her, that there was a recovery. She is grateful that she made the choice to put them above herself, to believe in the relationship that holds it all together as something requiring as much faith, love, nurturing and support as any of the individuals beneath its boughs. For all of this, the second, third, fourth and fifteenth chances, she is grateful. 

Since September

This was only just barely and not quite a year ago. 

The tail end of summer dragged its weary path into fall, and that saw the start of a new year for E. Still chubby-cheeked and baby-toothed, still wearing the bamboo boxer shorts his mama bought for him when he was two -- and won't she be in trouble for telling -- he traded his preschool pack for a big-kid's back-pack, a new haircut, and a whole new school. 

He carried the sign that was shipped from New York and penned by his daddy's mommy, in likely the same rounded-letters she used for his sign so long ago now it would seem -- and posed for this photo on his First Big Day:

At home, he was the guest of honour at the Kindergarten-is-going-to-be-a-piece-of-cake party. And there was cake, and in many different pieces, but the one requested by E was the fire-breathing scorpion cake, which his mama was happy to make -- probably because it reminded her that he was still such a little guy, still just her own bug-loving boy. 

But not for long, or so they say. One baby step for E is a big step for his mama, and he keeps going, keeps climbing and reaching and before any of us can say look out he'll be all grown. But she's heard this one before: it goes by so fast. And maybe that's true. But for this breath, and the next, he will be just as he is. Just right.