Happy Birthday Tiny!

Enjoying summer and s'mores

Two years ago today Tiny was born! He has brought so much joy into our lives every day since. He is such a sweet, mellow, happy boy. He loves his brother, loves his dog, and he just loves to play.

I love everything about him. His bright yellow hair, his blue inquisitive eyes, the way he scrunches up his nose when he's mad. I love his soft toddler legs, and the way that he sleeps all twisted up. I love how he likes to play "mama sad" where I pretend that I'm sad and then he kisses me and I'm happy again. I love how he makes up his own language, and how until recently he called water "awah" and would say "doh" instead of yes. I love that he calls Lightening McQueen "Bob." I love that he is such a ball player, that he already is learning how to dribble a basketball, do a layup, put spin on a football when he throws it, and hit a golf ball with some form. I love that he asks me to do criss cross applesauce on his back.

Tiny and his big brother meeting for the first time.

He got the name Tiny because he came into this world very big, weighing in at 10 pounds 9 ounces, and he has been a big boy ever since. When he was first born I didn't like that everyone made such a big deal about how big he is. There is so much more to him: he's beautiful and has such a peaceful soul. Even at birth I could see that, and I didn't want the fact that he was big to be his whole story. But I have grown to love that this is part of his story. I love that he is our big teddy bear, our gentle giant.

One week old and beautiful.

His arrival was also very healing for us. I delivered his older brother with a cesarean because we discovered he was breech when I was very far along in labor. We were rushed by ambulance from the warm, peaceful tub at our birth center to the hospital operating room, and the experience was traumatic. It left an emotional wound that was difficult to heal.

Having a natural birth after a c-section is very hard to do in this country anymore, sadly. Even though it is much safer in most cases to have a VBAC (vaginal birth after cesarean) than a repeat c-section, it is very difficult to find caregivers and hospitals who will support mothers looking to have a VBAC.

One week old smile.

So when I delivered Tiny naturally, and completely unmedicated, it was very healing. It gave me closure and removed all my doubts about whether I could ever experience childbirth the way I wanted to. A natural birth was something I have always wanted, a gift that I wanted to give to my babies, and it was such an empowering experience. Delivering a 10 pound 9 ounce baby also felt like a major accomplishment. It is something I will always be so proud of.

This boy knows how to enjoy life.

Tiny has healed and transformed us as parents as well, by way of mellowing us out. Perhaps his mellow attitude has rubbed off on us. It also has been just a side-effect of having two children. The amount of time and attention we have is limited more than when we had one child, so we cannot obsess about making all the right parenting decisions like we could when we just had our oldest to focus on. We've also come to realize that it is better to have more relaxed and present parents, even if that means we don't have a super green vegetable on the menu every single day (and the children's vitamins sometimes go missing for three days at a time because someone puts them away in the toy kitchen).

The second time around, we now see that the details matter less than the big picture. I guess you could say that Tiny has taught us not to sweat the small stuff.

the amazing erupting volcano cake

Look at that face! I think he liked it.


So for sweet boy's birthday, we made him a volcano cake with dragons climbing up the side (his idea). As an added touch, we made it actually smoke and erupt some delicious lava. It was really, really cool. Thanks to my super crafty friend Andrea for the instructions, which you can find here. It's so much easier than it looks. If you have a child in your life, find a reason to make one of these!



Check out those dragons.

Here's a video of the eruption. It is out of focus, but you still get the picture.




Since it was also a birthday party for Tiny, we made him some cupcakes that look like all different kinds of balls. He LOVES sports, especially basketball. Whenever we do art projects, he asks us to draw a basketball going into the hoop and a picture of him carrying a football. Oh, and hot air balloons, but that didn't really fit with the theme.





Ross and I had fun decorating the cakes into the wee hours of the night before the party. The volcano cake was my vision, and Ross decorated it amazingly well, don't you think? We were pretending like we were on Ace of Cakes. It's only a matter of time before Duff and his gang make an erupting volcano cake. Remember, you saw it here first! (unless they have already made one, in which case nevermind:)

Five years old...

Five years ago today you entered this world and changed everything for me. I became a mother, we became a family, and everything else in the world suddenly became so distant and less important than being with you. Holding you in my arms for the first time seems like yesterday, how can it be that you are no longer a baby?

You are sweet, brilliant, sensitive, and strong-willed, and you have challenged me in ways I never dreamed possible. I love you exactly as you are. Happy birthday to my sweet boy. I wish for you a day full of volcanoes, dragons, Lightening McQueen, bike-riding, knock-knock jokes, and all of your favorite things. I can't believe you are five years old!

collecting stones

Last weekend we visited my in-laws house on Lake Michigan. It was Saturday and I was feeling worn out after a long and busy week. I took a walk by myself on the beach and started collecting some of the wet stones that I found just where the waves wash onto the beach. There were brilliant orange stones, transparent white and pink quartz stones, pale green stones, and every so often the illustrious Petoskey stone. Collecting them became almost meditative, I was feeling more grounded and my mind started to clear. I began to focus on all that I was grateful for: the beautiful day, the immense lake, my sweet children, our health, being alive. Before I knew it my pockets were full of stones, my mind was clear, and I had an idea for a business that could spread that feeling of gratitude and cultivate my own creativity. I have been wanting a creative endeavor like this and waiting for this inspiration to strike. I'm so excited to start working towards this idea and hopefully unveil it soon.

U2

Last weekend Ross and I saw U2 in concert, and it was nothing short of electrifying. We were on the floor close enough to see the band's faces, dancing and singing along with thousands of intimate strangers outside on a gorgeous summer night. When the band walked out on stage to start the show, I felt so happy and so alive. It was still daylight, just turning to dusk, and these men who make this moving music felt like old friends.

It made me remember how important and inspiring music can be when you really love it. I've decided to overcome the little technical hurdles I have right now (e.g. get that old ipod to work and get a player in the kitchen) to make sure I can listen to and explore new music in the places I spend most of my time. It also reminded me how important social action is to me, and how, despite my work for an environmental group, I have pushed that to the back burner as I started raising children. I miss it.

Being at the concert also reminded me how following a passion is so key to having a fulfilling life. These moments are what make life rich and exciting and beautiful. Sometimes it seems too inconvenient, or like a lesser priority when there are so many things to do to run a household and raise a family. We could have so easily not traveled the four hours to the concert. In fact, when we woke up in the morning exhausted from a long week and busy weekend, it occurred to us that maybe we shouldn't go. I'm SO glad we went. Doing something that knocks your socks off every once in a while is worth the effort.

It was also such a bonding experience for me and Ross. It was the first concert we have been to together in a long time, and it is something we both love doing. We felt like kids again, drinking our Jaeger and Red Bull in the car before the show (after all, we had a long drive back later and needed to be awake); walking around the college town where we lived during law school and driving by the apartment where we brought home our first child; and then experiencing together a moving concert of music we have loved for twenty years. As caregivers to two young and precocious boys, often our time alone together is spent collapsed on the couch, reading or watching a movie. It was invigorating to do something so exciting together, and reminiscent of our early years. In fact, early in our relationship we sat in line overnight to get tickets to a Phish show, which was Ross’ favorite band at the time. I was not that into Phish, but I was very into a certain boy who became my husband. The experience was one we will always remember.

The concert also spun me into some deep thinking about life and growing older. The first concert I went to was in 1992. I was 17 years old at the time, and my friend Brian and I snuck onto the floor of the concert from our balcony seats using the ticket stubs of our friends with better seats. He recently reminded me that I said at the time, "We're so close I can see the beads of sweat on Bono's face." Something a 17-year-old would say. Life was in front of me, possibilities were endless, and U2 were still young men. It seemed like being young was the peak of life.

This time was different in many ways. Almost twenty years have passed. I have a husband and two children, an established career, a house, and lots of things tying me down. I still have plenty of life in front of me, but I have plenty of life behind me too.

I had one of those moments at the concert where I greeted myself in the bathroom mirror and it was like saying hello to the 17-year-old version of myself. I never thought I would get to 36 so quickly. I also didn't know that 36 would feel good, and that in many ways I would feel the same (especially when I let the responsibilities leave my mind for a while). When U2 walked on stage, I felt the same. I was jumping up and down, so full of life, so happy. It may be more socially acceptable for a 17-year-old to do that, but it felt good. I probably thought at 17 that the age of 36 was past my prime in some way. Oh contrare. Life is getting more interesting, in many ways I'm getting braver, and I understand the big picture so much better.

It also helped that the band themselves just turned the corner into their 50s, and they don't seem bothered by it in the least. And contrary to other bands I've seen who have been touring for a long time, they still were on fire with a passion for their music, and so energized by the crowd. Bono looked reluctant to leave the stage even after two encores.

I think I can speak for most of the 65,000 people in the audience and say that we too were reluctant for them to leave the stage. Their music is poetry. It inspires us to be better people, like the heroes Martin Luther King Jr. and Aung San Suu Kyi that the band plays tributes to in their concerts. They make us want to be kinder, more compassionate, and to work for justice and peace in the world and in our communities.

At one point in the concert, two women started pushing their way through the crowd to get closer to the stage. They were breaking the unspoken code of concert-goers, moving us from our established spots and pushing us back ever so slightly so they could get a closer view. I realized that while I may have pushed my own way to the front when I was 17, it was not really an option for me anymore. It wasn’t the thing of integrity to do, and that was more important than a closer view of the band. And since the song “In the Name of Love” was playing, it was easy to push anger from my mind and focus on more important things, including the joy of just being there.