I probably shouldn’t admit this to the Internet, but our family has a new addiction. To a game. A game I’ve tried really hard for the last few months to avoid because I just knew this would happen.

You see, when I was in 7th grade my parents rewarded my brother and I with a Nintendo system after we moved towns and had patiently endured weeks of packing and unpacking and now, in retrospect, I suspect to ease their own parental guilt about uprooting their family (even though we wanted to be uprooted and we loved our new place). The Nintendo system was just as amazing as I had always known it would be.

But I couldn’t. Stop. Playing. Tetris.

I would fall asleep seeing line patterns emerge from behind my closed eyelids.

And I started to notice that I wasn’t the only one with this problem. I remember one night my dad climbing the basement stairs late into the evening, emerging from his tetris-induced stupor to finally head to bed. And then there’s my mom. She still has a classic, screenless, old-school gameboy hanging around the house to get her Tertris fix. That was, by far, the best birthday (or Christmas, I can’t remember) present my brother and I ever got her.

So Candy Crush? I tried to avoid it.

But, this weekend, those stupid candies emerged on the screen of my Mother-in-Law’s iPad and Nora flipped them left and right up and down and I watched from the side of the couch.

And then it was all over.

Soon I was playing that stupid game on my iPad and my phone. One told me I had to wait 30 minutes for more lives? I just played on the other one.

And when we got home from school? Nora got out the iPad she uses and she played. And so, of course, I had to play right next to her.

Yesterday I had one of those out of body parenting moments when you see how things really look.

Miles grabbed my phone. He somehow found Candy Crush, or “andy ursh” as he calls it. He tapped those candies until they jiggled and moved on the screen. Every time he moved one he screamed at the top of his lungs, “I DID IT!” And Nora would look over, from her screen to his, unbelieving.

Until she looked and (sorry to lose all of you non-candy crush players here – if I haven’t lost you already) she saw that Miles had a striped candy.

And then the scene went something like this:

Nora: “MOM! HE HAS A STRIPED CANDY!”

Miles: “STIPE ANDY!”

Nora: “Miles, how’d you do that? How’d you get a striped candy?”

Miles: “STIPE ANDY!”

Nora: “Mom. Really. He has a stripe candy.”

Me: ” I see that. He must have gotten four in a row.”

Miles: ” ONE TWO THREE FOUR!”

Nora: “I only have one more move left.”

Miles: “I DID IT!”

Nora: “Good job.”

Miles: “Andy ursh. I DID IT!”

Nora: “Do you want me to show you how it works, buddy?”

Miles: “I Did IT!”

Nora: “No you didn’t. Look here’s a blue one to move.”

Miles: “Miles do it.”

Nora: “Fine.”

Me: “Let’s quit Candy Crush.”

So we quit.

Or at least I quit until the kids went to bed. And then I only played on one device (small steps, right?)

And we didn’t play after school today.

I thought maybe our family had beaten this game addiction.

But then tonight, after I came out from putting Miles to bed? I found Ken playing.

The family that crushes together…

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When asked to write a story in six words, Ernest Hemingway responded: “For sale: Baby shoes. Never worn.” The idea of telling your story in six words is powerful to me, so I’ve started this series of six word blogs. What are your six words?

What are your six words this week? I’d love to hear them in the comments or have you link up your blog below.

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“I just want to find something where nothing ever changes,” she said to me a few months back when there was a substitute teacher at dance class. She was nuzzling herself further and further into me, holding on as I pushed her toward the doorway, assuring her I’d watch (as usual) from the window, telling her that the next hour would be just as fun as all the hours of dance classes past.

She walked reluctantly toward the circle of tutu-clad friends, took her spot, stood and pointed her toes when it was her turn. I took a deep breath and felt the weight of my own anxiety dissipate as I watched her shoulders relax and noticed a smile beginning to peek out of the corners of her mouth.

It was different. And she was ok.

This past week, our mornings have been filled with tears. With small fingers reaching into the skin around my waist as they hold on for one more kiss or one more hug and one more whispered, “Don’t leave. I don’t want you to go.”

She says she misses me. She says that she doesn’t want me to go.

I hear, “I just want to find something where nothing ever changes.”

I shouldn’t have told her last week that the I was committing her to a last day, that she only has three weeks left before she leaves the familiar walls of her daycare for the great unknown. I read the message aloud and filled in a date and as soon as I looked at her, eyes welling up, shoulders stiff, I knew I should have kept this a secret.

Change is not her friend.

And it’s not really mine either.

 Linking up with Heather at The Extraordinary Ordinary for JustWrite.

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When asked to write a story in six words, Ernest Hemingway responded: “For sale: Baby shoes. Never worn.” The idea of telling your story in six words is powerful to me, so I’ve started this series of six word blogs. What are your six words?

I am so honored to have won Teacher of the Year for Austin ISD. Having my parents, brother, husband, colleagues and students there to support me has made celebrating this achievement an almost surreal experience. It is hard to summarize my pride and excitement in six words.

What are your six words this week? Leave them in the comments or link up your blog below.

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Last night Nora graduated from pre-school, walking down the aisle in her cap and gown and celebrating five years of learning and growing and sharing with wonderful teachers who have loved her so well. How do you thank the women who have done so much for you? I wrote this in an attempt to show them just how thankful I am for them.

When she was a baby, you fed her her first cheerios, made her first Mother’s Day gift, helped her eat her first Thanksgiving Feast. You might have even witnessed her first unassisted sitting, her first crawl toward a toy, her first steps, but you kept those things secret, let me think that I was seeing all the firsts I had been so afraid to miss. But mostly, in that first year that Nora spent in your classroom, you taught me that despite all my worrying, despite all the guilt of returning to work, despite all the hours I missed her, she would be ok.

When she was one, you helped her celebrate her first holiday “parties” with sweets and friends and plastic tablecloths. You drew a smiley face on her pointer finger each afternoon before you left, a ritual she still remembers well. You complimented her growing vocabulary. One day I dropped her off and you commented on how she used the word “favorite” so well. Your compliments meant the world to me, your noticing the little changes in her the same way I did. Her words were gifts to me and you noticing them meant so much.

When she was two you helped her start to navigate the world of friendships, sharing toys, taking turns. You led her in her first class Christmas Carols and helped her give her first Valentines. You
helped her learn to use the bathroom on her own, one of the biggest gifts you give to us working parents. And you never said anything when she showed up each day after clearly having dressed herself – sometimes all in denim, mostly all in tutus, never really matching perfectly but always wearing some sparkle.

When she was three you nurtured her. You accepted all of her emotions, her uncontrollable crying fits and her outpouring of sweet words. You read her countless books, helped her draw and paint countless pictures. You taught her to explore, to love and capture bugs, watch seeds sprout into plants. You taught her how to pump herself on the swing, something I’m grateful for every time I see her reach her legs higher and higher towards our backyard tree. And you helped her transition into being a big sister, showering her with love and attention each day during a time when she was learning that she’d now have to share those same things at home.

When she was four and now five, you taught her to speak out, helped her break out of her quiet shell. You taught her to write her name, her whole name, which she now proudly scribes on almost everything she owns. You taught her to read her first words by sight, bringing tears to my
eyes that afternoon when I first sat down with my baby and heard her read a whole book to me instead of the other way around. You taught her to explore nature, to draw hopscotch on the sidewalk. You taught her to be a helper and supported her in growing out of some bad habits. You’ve let her be your shadow, understood her need to be quiet, cuddled her on the days when leaving was a bit harder. You’ve let her love you and you’ve always loved her back well.

I will always remember dropping her off for her first day in the two year-old class and finding a gift in her cubby. It was her “brown baby” – the one Nora had loved so much in the previous class. You moved that baby doll up with her because you took the time to notice her love for it, you took the time to think about making her (and probably me) comfortable with change. I had known already for a year and a half that she was loved in the moments each day that I had to be away. But that day, with the brown baby in the cubby? That day and that moment symbolize still for me all that you’ve done to truly know and care for my baby.

Next year as she heads to kindergarten, there won’t be any brown baby waiting in her cubby to soften the blow of change. Instead she will have five years of lessons lovingly taught, five years of extraordinary women showing her that she will always be loved for who she is. After all you’ve taught her, after all you’ve given her, I know she’ll continue to thrive.

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Five years ago I handed my six month old baby over to complete strangers. On that morning in August, I brought her bag full of sheets and blankets that smelled like home, pacifiers she’d never use, clothes for when she needed changing, bibs for mealtime and enough diapers and wipes for weeks at a time. I stuffed it all in a cubby, wrote down her schedule on a sheet of paper, kissed her goodbye and, very reluctantly, left her in the arms of a teacher I hardly knew.

The weeks anticipating Nora’s start at daycare and the first few weeks when leaving her each day felt like a knife in my heart were the most difficult weeks of my life. I’ve never had to do anything harder than entrusting the care of my daughter, my heart walking outside of my body, to women who I didn’t know.

On Monday Nora will “graduate” from preschool. She will sing songs and wear a blue graduation robe and cap. She will hug her friends and profess her love for her teachers. We will watch a slide show documenting her travels through the classes of these loving women who felt like strangers five years ago but who now feel like such an important extension of my family.

If I could travel back in time to August 2008, if I could talk to my former self, the one who was sure leaving my baby each day would split my heart in two, I would tell her a few things.

I would tell her to trust herself. Trust the warmth of the classroom. Trust the loving smiles of the teachers. Trust the words of friends who have traveled this working mom road before.

I would tell her that teary drop-offs don’t ever go away, but they do get easier. I would tell her that the days when the love is just too much come around and around and despite feeling the pain of the tears and the guilt of leaving, at the end of the day, everyone is usually pretty happy.

I would tell her that watching friendships grow, seeing the joy each morning as friends are reunited takes much of the pain and guilt and sadness away.

I would tell her that she’d learn a lot. About herself and her strength. About mothering. About taking time for herself. About the truth that working makes her happy, keeps her feeling whole despite the many pushes and pulls of motherhood.

I would tell her that it will all be ok. That the routine of daycare would eventually seem normal. That some mornings Nora would cry when she wasn’t going to school. That as much as she learns and loves and grows at school, she will learn and love and grow even more at home. That she will be a mother even in the hours that she is away.

I would tell her that sometimes she will feel powerless, that sometimes she’ll ache all day for the soft hands and giddy smiles, that some days she too would still cry at drop-off, that there would sometimes be problems that aren’t so easy to solve. But despite all of that, despite all that makes working and mothering and balancing it all a constant challenge, she would grow stronger and surviving through it all would make her a better mother.

And I would tell her that Nora? She’s fine. She’s better than fine. She knows how to share. How to be a friend. How to be a helpful member of a group. She has loved and been loved by each of those teachers, teachers she has learned so much from, has grown so much because of.

I am beyond grateful for the day five years ago when I stumbled into the church daycare carrying my then two week old baby. I am beyond grateful for all of the art projects they’ve helped create, all of the books they’ve read, all of the seeds they’ve planted, all of the songs they’ve sung, all of the hugs they’ve given, all of the stories they’ve told me, all of the naps they’ve watched, all of the lessons they’ve taught, all of the smiles they’ve shared.

The irony of all of this, the irony of sitting here five years later and knowing that it all turned out well, that the initial overwhelming fear and sadness I felt at returning to work wouldn’t last, is that I feel it all creeping in again.

I registered Nora for kindergarten this week. She’ll have to meet a whole new set of faces, go into new and unfamiliar territory. And , though it is nothing compared to those first days ending my maternity leave, I can’t yet wrap my head around this next phase. There is still so much unknown – where exactly she’ll go to school, who her teacher will be, what the other kids in her class will be like, how tired kindergarten will make her, how she’ll feel about school. And this week I’ve let all those unknowns overwhelm me. I’ve let them bring me to tears. I feel that familiar fear of the unknown, the yearning to control the uncontrollable, the reticence to change and I sit in my car and cry.

So I’m going to try to follow the advice I’d give to my former self. I’m going to try to trust myself, look forward to happy endings, imagine new friendships growing, think about all she (and I) will learn.

I’m going to try to trust that this next scary unknown will be just as full of struggle and strength and love and growth as the last.

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When asked to write a story in six words, Ernest Hemingway responded: “For sale: Baby shoes. Never worn.” The idea of telling your story in six words is powerful to me, so I’ve started this series of six word blogs. What are your six words?

What are your six words this week? I’d love you to leave them in the comments or link up your blog below.

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There is a tiny dot on my calendar every day from now until May 21. And there were four dots on the seven days that already passed by this month. One dot equals one appointment or outing with friends. One dot equals one preschool graduation or one Teacher of The Year celebration. One dot equals a night out for Ken or a night out with Ken. One dot equals a baby shower or an engagement party. Or a birthday.

I’m busy. Too busy. Happy busy. Busy because of successes and milestones and friends and family and life.

I sit down after getting the kids to bed and I want to write. But I can’t. Some nights lately I don’t know how to settle the words spinning in my head. But mostly I’m just tired. Tired from all that happened in April. And tired anticipating the whirlwind of May.

So I’m giving myself permission. Permission to not write. Permission to ignore this space when I need to ignore it. And permission to write when I feel the energy and words coming together.

So if you don’t hear from me in the next couple of weeks aside from six words on a Wednesday or a post on a weekend when I may meet up with the gift of time, you’ll know where I am.

I am celebrating and reconnecting and trying to keep my head above water while life swirls all around me at a terrifying and exhilarating pace.

And I’m sure, soon enough, life will return to its normal pace and I’ll have time to write about how I survived the month of May.

Linking up with Heather of The Extraordinary Ordinary for JustWrite

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As I wrote last week, for the next few Sundays I will be taking pieces of what I wrote in Nora and my reading journal and turning them into longer essays. This is the second one.

If you’ve ever been on a walk with a toddler, you know that moving fast is just about impossible; every step along the way brings something new to bend down and examine.

If you’ve ever been outside with a toddler, you know that no toys are necessary; each blade of grass, each newly stumbled upon stick, every bug that fills a yard is enough to occupy hours of toddler curiosity.

If you’re a parent, you know that through the eyes of our children, everything old becomes new again.

E.B. White knew what toddlers know; that if you look closely enough at almost anything, you can find life. You can find magic that you didn’t know existed before you looked around you as if you were young again.

Today Miles spent his afternoon digging in a small patch of dirt right outside our back door. It looked like just a brown patch to me. But to him, it seemed like hours of dirty fun. In that brown patch he found buried roots, roly polies, ants, leaves, halves of seeds that fall from our tree. That dirt was a treasure trove of life.

This re-imagining the world, re-looking at everything from a patch of dirt to a book you thought you knew so well, this seems to be the recent unavoidable theme of parenting for me.

But despite my ability to see all that is possible out in the world – or maybe because of all of those possibilities – I can’t help but sometimes hold on a bit too tight. I can’t help but sometimes tell Miles to be a bit more careful not to get too dirty as he digs. I can’t help but tell him to be gentle with the roly polies he finds (his touch is not as careful as his sister’s). I can’t help but run after him as he climbs the ladder toward the treetops – toward new possibility. I can’t help but hover.

E.B. White had something to say about that too. I read and reread and reread again: “Children almost always hold onto things tighter than their parents think they will.” That sentence, not essential at all to the story, must have been meant for mothers like me. If only I could trust that he is right. If only I could convince myself as I watch Miles climb higher and higher, as I watch Nora swing toward the treetops, as I hand them both balloons and already feel wary of the tears that will come when they let go and watch the tiny green speck floating higher and higher toward the clouds.

We walked to the store today and came home with two balloons – a blue one for Miles and a green one for Nora. I wanted to tie it around Nora’s wrist to assure that she would have it still when we walked into the house. But unlike Miles, who doesn’t know to protest, she didn’t want it tied onto her. A free balloon is not worth fighting over, so I let her have her way. I let her hold onto it tighter than I thought she would. I let her try to prove me wrong and E.B. White right.

And she did.

I used to think that Charlotte’s Web was a book about friendship. A book about death. A book about a pig and a spider and the power of a few well-chosen words.

But now? I’m pretty sure Charlotte’s Web is the best parenting book I’ve read.

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Today I’m honored to be on BlogHer as part of their “Motherhood Made Me” series for Mother’s day. As I sat down to write, I thought of many things that motherhood has made me, done for me, brought me to realize. And after starting and stopping many drafts of a post, this is how I finally started:

It’s the moment before my finger hits his skin that he laughs the most. The moment where he anticipates the tickling, anticipates his own laughter. I haven’t yet reached him, but he knows it’s coming. He stares into my eyes and his whole body smiles, tenses, releases.
 
I finally reach down to tickle and he laughs harder, barely breathes as he squirms away only to look right up and say, “More!”
 
“More,” he says over and over again until finally he says, “Stop it.”
 
I didn’t know this before I was a mother. I didn’t know that the split second before the tickle is the best part, the moment when it is all still just a possibility, a thought hanging there in front of you.
 
I didn’t really believe it when people used to tell me that anything is possible. 
 

I’d love it if you’d head over to BlogHer to read the rest.

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