YMM Grows Up

As of Sunday, I’ve been blogging for three years. Three years!

 

The past couple weeks I’ve started to really feel like an adult, and the passage of time that’s elapsed on this site speaks to that. Part of it is that we’re preparing for our ever-impending big move this summer (back to New Jersey and John’s family!). We’re joining the “sandwich” generation, in that we’ll be the middle generation in the house. John’s parents don’t need us to take care of them, but it’s certainly a change for all involved. We’re excited for our boys to have more time with grandparents, aunts, and uncles. I think the feeling is mutual.

 

With the move comes conversation about roof estimates and decking and paint colors in our spare (ha!) time. We also just bought our first car, a minivan, which makes me feel like we’ve skipped another phase of adulthood altogether. (The car’s name is Odysseus, Frankie for short.)

 

What’s most making me feel like an adult though, are not these material things, but the joys, sorrows, and hard work that life is about these days.

 

Having two little guys to care for is very different from one, and I feel more legit as a mom somehow. The boys bring me great joy and I offer thanksgiving for them every day. Jacob is a hoot and such a helper (he eases my mood when I spend an hour looking for a parking spot in Brooklyn; he paces with me while I’m walking Henry to sleep). Henry’s smile lights up the whole world—and it’s a world that seems to need that light more and more every day.

 
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The last year and a half especially have meant challenges in relationships—loss in more ways than one, as well as situations that have forced me to face myself and see what I’m really all about. What do I stand for and do I live it? I know the answers to these questions a little bit better now, and I think the humility that comes with that might be the beginnings of wisdom.

 

Two babies, a car, a move, a giant test, a growing business and a manuscript always in progress can steal the time it takes to make a marriage work—if you let them. When we’re bouncing back and forth between states and trying to get a decent amount of sleep each night, it’s taking a conscious effort to make time for our marriage recently. Thankfully, all the rest that life has thrown at us has given us ample opportunity to grow closer, and we’re taking advantage as much as we can.

 

If I had to define “being an adult,” at this point in my life, I’d have to say it’s giving myself to others. When I think about dating John and how I hoped and hoped it would lead to this, it wasn’t romance that I was interested in, but sharing my life, growing a family. When I think about the challenges we’ve faced, I know that I can’t keep myself to myself—that’s not why I’m here.

 

The journey isn’t over, but today’s as good a day as any to have a check-in with myself and see where I’ve been, where I am, and where I’m going. I’m really glad you’re all here for the ride.

 

Thanks for reading for three wonderful years!

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Losing Control . . . As If I Ever Had It

This week I thought my life as a mother was spiraling out of control—out of my control, that is. With a mild stomach bug-ish thing and a twenty-poundish baby who’d decided to push back bedtime, get picky about naps, and be held, standing up, for the time it took him to fall asleep, I was just about losing it. The time John and I had gotten used to spending with each other in the evenings seemed a thing of the past.

 

I know that life with a little, little one means a whole lot of phases, and that they change when the baby needs them to, not when I think it would be convenient. Still, it is tough to find comfort in that when you’re in the middle of a phase you haven’t figured out how to deal with yet.

 

And that’s the harder part, I think—the figuring out. Every family needs to make sacrifices for one another, and once I know what that sacrifice is and understand why it’s important, I’ll do it (I might complain some, but I’ll do it). The time it takes to see the situation for what it is, before I can adjust expectations and routines to satisfy it, that’s the part that drives me nuts.

 

Thankfully, today at least, we seem to be on the other side of our most recent speed bump. Last night, John suggested we get the mobiles out for Henry. So far, they’re a hit—plus Jacob can crank one of them on his own, so I’m off the hook for that tedious task. This morning, I woke Henry up to go to Mass. Afterward, we took a long enough walk with him in the carrier—where he fit better than he ever has before—to have him sleep soundly for another hour once we got home. Now the boys are both in bed for naps at the same time, and I don’t feel like I’ll have to claw my way through the afternoon again. Dramatic? That’s what it feels like sometimes.

 
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There are ups and there are downs in this motherhood thing. Sometimes it seems like there are more downs than ups. That’s probably not the case in reality, just what it seems like in the moment.

 

With every phase comes a challenge or six, but every phase also means our boys are becoming more and more of who they are meant to be. Henry is entering a new stage of babyhood this week. It means I need to adjust and be a mom, in the harder sense of the word. It also means I get to see him reach out for toys to play with, listen to him coo and screech at us with a big gummy smile, and watch him get a little stronger, a little more like a little boy each day.

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The fact that I thought I was losing control this week is just downright silly. When did I have control to begin with? When do I think I’ll ever really have control? Never and never.

 

But when can I choose to make the best of the moment? To give myself permission to take the time to figure out what my kids need, even if it means I mess up a few times? Now and now.

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Spring Is a Season of Firsts

It’s finally spring in Brooklyn, and all things are new! Today we took our first real trip to the playground for the season.

 

Jacob can ride the tire swing like a big guy now. He still loves the sandbox, but doesn’t need me in there to help him find toys or build.

 

Henry is learning what it’s like to be outside without a coat. I’m so glad to use our baby carrier without the extra bulk, and it’s good to introduce him to vitamin D that doesn’t come from a bottle.

 

Change can do you good, but it isn’t always super exciting right off the bat. . . .

 
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Pointing to the vase holding the flowers he and John brought me after grocery shopping this weekend, Jacob asked, “Mommy, why are the flowers in there?” I couldn’t answer for a minute, because I was processing the fact that the “why” questions had just started about six months earlier than I expected.

 

Henry’s eight p.m. bedtime is now more like ten. Or eleven. I’m not sure I can accept this.

 

Change can happen to you or you can make it happen yourself.  Spring is in the air of its own accord, but I have some ideas of my own as well, i.e. potty training and learning to sleep when Mama tells you to.

 

This is going to be a very eventful spring.

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