Doubt Digit Joy

Our little girl woke up this morning with a wide grin, ready to embrace her double-digit birthday with open arms. She proudly flashed the crisp $20.00 bill left under her pillow by the tooth fairy, informing me with unrestrained glee, that “she usually gets $5.00” and “she must have left me extra because she knew it was my birthday!”   She then proceeded to get dressed in her school uniform, humming loudly all the while and taking frequent breaks to gush over Lola who watched her with equally unrestrained adoration. 

Her mood might have been elated but mine felt far more subdued. This birthday feels different. I do not feel ready to embrace the double digits, the doorway to all thing’s “tween”.  I am not ready for her to begin a new journey that may have her leaving behind the childish trappings of her youth. I ache with the bittersweet notions of those coming losses, those casualties of her growing up…not far off now it seems to me as she marks this milestone.  After depositing her, and her birthday donuts, at the classroom door this morning, I found myself fighting back tears on the way back to my car. As much as I want to share in her enthusiasm, I feel so much like a mother on the brink of something I am not prepared for and it has left me feeling uncharacteristically unmoored. 

These days I am struck by all the small things that mark her changing.  While she still prefers to clamber into our bed at night, she has begun going to sleep in her own room. She has taken to wearing a sleep mask she got for Christmas. It has a wild, purple zebra pattern that looks at odds with her little girl sleep smile.  I check on her to find that, even in sleep, she has begun to straddle some invisible line between the child and the young girl.  One of her arms is wrapped tightly around her stuffed horse Roo and the other is draped loosely around her dog Lola and that flashy eye mask is firmly in place. 

This week she asked me to paint her nails. She has managed to grow them at last, in spite of barn chores and piano lessons. The nail polish I had at hand was a perhaps a shade too dark for her, but she still brandished them proudly. As far as I can tell, they are her only real vanity in the otherwise athletic and unadorned style that she’s adopted as her own.  

Last night at the barn she went about her chores as usual, taking a break when a song came on she liked to “dance with Roo”. I had to laugh at her antics, her silly made-up moves that garnered only the most casual glances from her munching horse. Roo is growing used to his child, the one who covers his soft nose with constant kisses and prattles about his stall, talking about her day even though he is far more interested in his hay. Still, I see him turn to watch her with his large brown eyes, his curiosity as clearly evident as his affection for her. At times he seems to have this expression that says, “yup, that’s my kid…that weird, wonderful, chatty little being right there”, and I find myself in a complete and kindred agreement with our gentle gelding. 

Watching her this morning, I found myself thinking, “Yup, that’s my child…that’s my silly, kind, smart, crazy, loveable, “on the verge of something wonderful” …little being right there.”

I don’t know how much longer she will believe in the tooth fairy.  I don’t know when she will retire her stuffed animals or when I will stop finding her wrapped around me like a koala in the night.  I do not know how much longer she will break into those random fits of wild dancing.  For now, I celebrate those things and I feverishly document them…leave my testimonies in electronic ink so I will have them always.  While I might not be 100% ready for double digits, I know I am more than grateful, more than blessed for the opportunity to be part of it all.

Age 9 - A Whirling Dervish Delight

This month my daughter turns nine. In keeping with tradition, and in my ongoing effort to temper the bittersweet forward march of time, I like to author at least one blog wholly devoted to marking the milestone of her birthday. If I am to leave her anything of real value when I am gone, it will be this ongoing testimony of an immensely proud mamma who was fully invested in her journey and loved her in every second and with every fiber of my being.

This past year has been filled with trials..from the sheer physicality of moving twice this summer, to our ever increasing battles over her hair and clothes, to combating her near obsession with online games and YouTube. We have started most of the mornings in this fresh New Year with an argument about one thing or another. I have lost my mind over her stomping feet, exaggerated eye rolls and disgruntled faces. It seems we endlessly debate why leggings are not appropriate winter attire. We battle. Sometimes it gets loud and the dogs, sensing an epic throw down is looming, take off to hide upstairs until the storm passes.

Still, before our turn comes up in the drop-off line, we manage to sort it out. Regardless of how angry she may be, she still shoulders her backpack and leans in for a kiss before throwing open the door. These days I find it is more about finding victories in the delightful surprises then consistently winning arguments with her. Eventually she listens to me…and besides, there are so many delightful surprises…

She is becoming her own person and that person is most definitely not a mini version of me. She is entirely something new and improved, a hybrid of both her parents with a balance of our features and various traits blending together in this beautiful new way – along with things that seem unique to her.

She is athletic and competitive in a way neither one of us ever were. She is drawn to things that challenge both her body and her mind at once, like obstacle courses and horse-back riding. I can see her mind working as she puts her body through the physical paces, concentration is as evident on her face as enjoyment is. She has become more fearless in this environment, trepidation giving way to a growing confidence. I can see pride blooming there as well, in that telling Mona Lisa smile when her instructor cries out, “Yes, Good Girl!”, the moment she achieves the perfect posture or executes the perfect transition or canter.

Music continues to be something she is drawn too. She pushes back on practicing piano but once she sits down and begins to coach the notes from her instrument, I can see her lose herself. She started ukulele lessons in school recently, and she has really taken to it. She talks a blue streak about chords and likes to play me the YouTube tutorials they use in class. She has asked for her own ukulele for her birthday this year and I look forward to hearing her strumming away on those chords.

Like mine, her taste in music is highly varied. She has a wide scope of what she likes. For now, she gets by on my playlist but makes the occasional request for me supplement it with a new song she has discovered. For the most part, I enjoy her selections. They reflect someone who listens with a critical ear and harbors a true appreciation for musical composition, regardless of the genre. The other day on one of our drives, “Under Pressure” came on the radio. I immediately turned it up and began singing along, as one simply has to do in appreciation for genius collaboration of David Bowie and Freddy Mercury. I glanced at my daughter in the rear view and was simultaneously shocked and elated to find she was also singing along in the back of the car. She caught my eyes, and smiled back at me. It was a moment of kindred connection, one of those delightful surprises.

At her core, she is still that child that loves to snuggle. She still prefers to fall asleep between us. Even when she goes to bed in her own room, we find her wrapped about us come morning, one leg or arm draped over us and her hair falling in sheets across our faces. The “I love you’s” still come unsolicited, though not as frequently as they once did. She will still take my hand in a parking lot or store. Randomly, during a movie or in the throngs of deep sleep, I will sometimes suddenly feel the slip of her hand – her long fingers lacing up with mine. These are the moments I treasure most.

She is magical in so many ways these days. Even in her stubborn fury, her green eyes flash and pierce with a mysterious loveliness. Her heart-shaped face has changed so much, it is hard to find a trace of my own features there anymore. I see a version of her teenage father in her lanky silhouette but she has a grace to her movements and a flavor to her beauty that must hail from more distant ancestors.

As she turns nine, our girl is still more reserved and quiet than most girls her age. She still holds herself back, but less so. Her confidence is growing and she engages more freely with those people she feels most comfortable with. She readily chimes in on phone calls with my sister or responds with unchecked giggles at her new uncle’s antics and teasing. She tells stories and jokes. She asks for things she wants and responds to questions from adults without my prompting her to answer. She will occasionally surprise me by breaking into nutty dancing in the aisle of home depot or quoting “Napoleon Dynamite” with a deadpan accuracy. She still likes slime, unfortunately, but has showed a renewed interest in things like painting and her pottery wheel. She is creative but draws more pleasure from exploring the mediums than by finishing the final pieces. Our daughter has an explorer’s heart.

At nine, she is our whirling dervish, our musical student, our budding equestrian. She is warm and loving. She is intelligent and she is kind. She will not back down from an argument but she won’t hold a grudge. You may wait half a lifetime for an apology but when one finally comes it will arrive accompanied by a fierce hug and kiss and a throaty, heart-melting, “I’m sorry Mamma.” And it is absolutely no surprise that life with her is simply delightful.

For My Daughter, Age 8

My daughter celebrated her 8th birthday over two months ago and this one felt just a bit harder for me than the one before. At age 7, she still had seemed that shy, quiet child who wanted me to walk her to her classroom each morning and follow behind me like a shadow everywhere else. The transformation between age 7 and age 8 was something I had not fully been prepared for. It seems that overnight she has discovered the joyous fun in reading graphic novels, the scientific discoveries of slime and geodes and the finer points of picking just the right outfit and tinted lip balm. She is still shy with adults, but she is loud everywhere else. She sings and dances with abandon and often performs with a silly, wanton joy.  Yet, she becomes embarrassed to the point of tears if she hears me telling anyone, anything about her. It's as if she is our secret firefly, you can catch her sparking brightly but briefly, if you know where to look.

Age 8 has brought eye rolling and a new streak of defiance to our negotiations. She argues, I believe, just for the sport of it. She pans refusal for almost everything I suggest she try. She doesn't like what I pick for her to wear and hotly contests any adjustments I insist she make to outfits she assembles. She can be aggressively stubborn. At age 8, she has tapped into a new sense of drama. A recent visit to the doctor for her annual flu shot treated her father and I to an almost Oscar-worthy performance where we might have assumed she was about to have her arm amputated without anesthesia. Each injury, no matter how slight, now seems to be accompanied by copious tears and irrational claims that, "you don't care when I get hurt."

Despite the challenges, age 8 has given us the opportunity to see her reach out and seize opportunities to do things she really enjoys. She has found her voice, found new levels of confidence. Without much prodding, she will play piano now for friends and family. She is clearly proud of her burgeoning skills and I'm happy to see that music is still so much part of what she loves about her world. She is one of the few girls in her ninja warrior class, a fact that does not seem to make her self-conscious in anyway. I can see sparks of a competitive nature in her. She likes to be the last one to release her plank during warm up, likes to know her time is that much faster each run at the obstacle course. She makes it up the warped wall in one take, but still freezes at the top. She says its the drop that scares her. She describes the feeling of gravity acting on her limbs as an unwelcome and uncomfortable intrusion, something she feels she can not control. We watch her, perched on the edge of the wall, her small frame tense with the desire to jump, only to back herself down. I ache for her and for myself, not knowing how much to push her past her block.

My daughter has always managed to forge wonderful friendships. One of the best things about this age is discovering that she has continued to grow into a loving and loyal friend. She has never forgotten those special friends from preschool and she reserves a portion of each party invite list for those friends she may not see every day, but still counts as part of her little circle. Her delight at seeing their faces, at sharing experiences with them, warms my heart beyond measure. She astounds me with her kindness, her limitless expressions of love toward her besties at school. She adores her friends and her book bag bleeds a regular stream of crayola-stained testimonials that prove they adore her back. Age 8 brought the very first friend sleep over, a play date that picked up Friday after school with her very best friend and ran straight through the next mid-morning. They stayed up far too late and got up way to early but the house was filled with their playful giggles and running feet. After they had finally dropped off to sleep I crept into her room to check on them and found them, heads pressed together, faces soft and serene in sleep. Physically they are polar opposites and they looked  like a sweet composition in cinnamon and sugar. It made me think of my first sleepover with my bestie, whom I still treasure to this day and I felt happy for these two the special bond they have forged.

Age 8 has given me such bittersweet moments. I have been so proud of her, surprised by her sudden fierceness, delighted by her antics and frustrated to tears by some of her habits. I have discovered pools of her slime in the rugs, her hair and on the dogs. I have lost hours of my life collecting discarded clothes from her floor and rehanging them in her closet. I have caught a glimpse of her applying lip gloss in her room, her face a mask of concentration. I saw the little lady in her suddenly gaining on the child - and it wrecked me for hours. I am not ready for so much that I see coming but I am so excited to see her becoming her own beautiful all the same.

One day this past month, I had a rare day off with her. We went to the mall to do some shopping together. At some point, she surprisingly slipped her hand in mine and we walked through the mall hand in hand. I was very conscious of that moment, it felt crystalline and rare. I had to fight down the lump in my throat. I was filled with gratitude that at least at age 8, my daughter still wanted to hold my hand in public. Before that moment, I don't think I had been so sure. As I listened to her happy chatter, I felt blessed in the knowledge that at that moment, there wasn't anyone else she wanted to be with more than me.
At age 8, she is my fierce little firefly, my bright spark of light in my wide night sky.

Image Courtesy of Firefly Bookstore

Mona Lisa Smiles and the Climb

The summer here in the Northeast is winding down, a fact that seems to be registering in my daughter as she welcomes her last few days of sunlit freedom. We scramble to provide the last play date, day trip and summer-flavored adventure we can fit in as the first day of school approaches. I was looking at her this morning, tan and leggy in her favorite shorts, and I had to marvel at how beautiful she wears the summer. She is natural and comfortable in soft shirts and flip flops. Her hair is a shade lighter and her skin has toasted to a rich mocha which brings out her vibrant sea green eyes. She has matured this summer and its much more obvious when those little girl loose teeth are hidden by her shy, Mona Lisa smile. She looks older, less childlike. The hints of the young woman she will be are there in her candid postures and her quiet moments. I see those delicate lines of grace and poise and I find myself transfixed by her sudden and exotic beauty. My daughter is lovely and graceful in all the ways I failed to be at her age. I had been, and still very much am, a pale and ordinary child of Winter. This Summer has been good to her. It has wrapped her in its warmest embrace and made her golden.

"Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise"
Day 899 August 24, 2016
Prompt: "The Young and the Restless" has just celebrated it's 11,000th episode. With that in mind, what are some of your favorite episodes of your life? You can talk about your bad ones as well. I look forward to reading your entry.

I have had my share of bad episodes for certain but they are far outweighed by the good ones. A highlight reel of those good episodes would look a lot like your typical trip down memory lane with all the requisite milestones; high school graduation, first day of college, first day meeting my soul sister, a first date with the future husband, our wedding, the birth of our daughter...all those same really big "good ones" that anyone with a blessed life can claim. There has been so much more light than darkness, even if at times it seemed as if darkness was all I was due.


"Blogging Circle of Friends "
DAY 1379 August 24, 2016
Prompt: "But why did you go there in the first place?"

The end of the light came with surprisingly little drama. Like the final flicker of a dying match, the space around her winked into darkness. Mallory shifted her body in the narrow space, resting her back against the ledge. She slowly stretched one leg out, the tendons protesting, until her boot hung loosely out over a precipice that was darker still. Night was here and with its arrival, the knowledge that she had spent five hours alone trying to navigate the face of the evil Bodner's cliff washed over her.

Stuck. Five hours into her climb, Mallory had to admit to herself that she was stuck. Now having lost the light, she would be forced to wait out the night from her perch, facing long hours in which she would ask herself over and over how she had made such a deplorable decision to attempt this climb alone. She would think about her cell phone, mocking her from were it sat in her jeep's cup holder and her water bottle at the bottom of a ravine. Mallory had dropped it when she landed on the ledge, had listened to it clack and crack against rock the whole way down. She had cursed then, a stream of the worse obscenities she could muster.

Mallory had billed this climb as an empowering rise above a bad divorce. She was going to tackle the toughest cliff she could find in the fifty miles radius around the apartment she'd been forced to vacate and she was going to "climb the hell out of that bitch!". The arduous ordeal would be a catharsis. It would help her heal. The few friends she had managed to keep in the divorce had cheered her on. Her parents had upgraded her best climbing gear. Mallory had felt ready. She had not been. The cliff had bested her in the end.

Jaden Laughs

My daughter has been in summer camp now for nearly two weeks. She has grown into it, day by day. I get few details about her day when I ask her. She's often worn out at pickup, preferring to climb into the air-conditioned car and sit quietly listening to the radio. When she decides she wants to talk it is usually much later, right before bedtime or when I'm trying to get her into the shower. She suddenly has lots of stories to tell me, like about her going underwater during swim lessons, getting pinched by a baby crab or a new friend she made that day. She chatters on, animated, her green eyes wide and her tan arms and legs in constant motion. My daughter at six is a whirlwind. I can barely keep up with the new lingo, expressions and interests she seems compelled to pick up on a daily basis. I find myself just looking at her, watching her playing with the neighbors or riding her razor around the yard, marveling at her beautiful, strong little body and her boundless energy. I wonder, had I been so full of promise and wonder at her age? So full of sass and spice? My favorite thing about this stage of her journey is the laughter. She has developed several distinct laughs and I hear them at regular intervals. There is the shy giggle, her old standby. She's got a mischievous snicker, reserved for times when she pushing the buttons and almost certainly bound for trouble. There is that slightly less than sincere chuckle for the times she knows the polite thing to do is laugh but she's not really feeling it. My favorite is the completely natural and hearty guffaw that rolls from her in unbridled waves, unhindered by self-consciousness. It is a sound rich with joy. It comes from the center of her budding sense of humor, from the untapped reservoir of fun and childhood mirth inside her. I love to hear her laugh like that. It is heartwarming and infectious.


"Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise"
Day 858 July 14, 2016
Prompt: Collect moments, not things. Do you agree?

It is easy to lose the value in material things, to become trapped by the representation of success. Moments are fleeting cross-sections of time and space that can bring far more lasting joy than more tangible things can. I try to remember that its not the vacation photos that matter but the moments captured in those frames, the experiences and the feelings shared and exchanged. I know people who are consumed by the things they have or can obtain but their lives have a vapid quality, something seems lacking despite their obvious success. I think that is sad.


"Blogging Circle of Friends "
Day 1338 July 14, 2014
Do you see podcasting as a means of getting your writing out there? Pros and cons?

I am new to all things "podcasting". It seems very "brave new world" to me and I think overall its great exposure for writers who understand how to use it. I am not one of those writers yet though. I have to garner my audiences in the "old ways" and that seems like enough of a challenge for me most days.

Escaping Octopi and Sweet Moments of Motherhood

"Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise"
Day 829 June 15, 2016
Prompt: What was your worst summer job? What was your best summer job?

The best summer job I ever had, was oddly enough, also the worst. I'm not sure it would even qualify as a "job" in that I didn't even get paid. It was a volunteer stint, meant to garner my resume and expand on my experience, as a Sea Urchin at my local aquarium. The job lasted approximately three months and provided many rich experiences for an aspiring marine scientist.

Not all those experiences were wonderful however. The work was tough some days. Messy. I spent lots of hours pressing meds into the gills of freshly gutted mackerel or blending the odious mixture of "fish chum" that comprised a major part of our exhibit's diets. I also cleaned tanks, scrubbing stubborn deposit stains off the glass until my fingers ached. One time, while cleaning a bi-level exhibit featuring a trout stream, I slid down the artificial hill and into the "stream". The thigh high waders I was wearing quickly filled with the cold water and the trout. I struggled to find my footing and my dignity while an excited family laughed and took pictures on the other side of the glass.

The worst day of that summer job however came at the hands of our aquarium's residence Pacific octopus. I loathed cleaning that dark tank and had to lean way over the edge to scoop out the strands of feces at the bottom, my eyes constantly darting back to the blurry pink blob pressed into the far corner. This one particular day, as my luck would have it, the octopus made his move. He grabbed my pole and used it to lever most of his body up and over the edge of the tank. I'll never forget the cold, fleshy feel of his tentacles sliding over my arms or how quickly it moved. My heart racketed with alarm and I fought to drive him back into the depths. I've never quite gotten past the experience and I never cleaned that tank again, begging off each time it appeared on my roster.

"Blogging Circle of Friends "
DAY 1309: June 15, 2016
Open Prompt

My daughter open her sleep tired eyes this morning and told me, with a furrowed brow, that she had a bad dream. It was only 6am and since school is out for the summer, it was very early for her to be awake. I pulled her close and felt her little arms encircle my neck, felt her slide one leg over my hip, drawing our bodies even closer. In a few minutes, she drifted off to sleep again, feeling secure and safe from whatever had chased her in her dreams. I gave myself an extra thirty minutes on my alarm and settled in with her, feeling secure and safe myself. At 6, my daughter is more than capable to sleep in her own bed, on her own. She does, on occasion, spend entire nights there. More often then not, I wake up to her presence in our bed, waking to find she's wriggled between our sleeping bodies in wee hours of morning. The truth is, I don't mind. These moments of comfort and cuddling will be sweet but brief. She won't always want to sleep in our bed. She won't always need my reassurance after a bad dream. I won't wake up with her arms or legs wrapped possessively around me, or open my eyes to find her and her father entangled, face to face and snoring happily. Fleeting are the sweetest moments of motherhood. I cherish these little moments - treasure our sun-filled Sunday mornings, our family walks, our lazy afternoons....

Jaden, My Crazy Love

Sometimes I have a moment when I understand why I've always been driven to write...why it has been always been such a huge part of how I define myself. This morning my husband sent me a link to a blog entry I had made years ago when my daughter was just about 17 months old. The date/time stamp reads May 20th, 2011 12:42pm. I took a moment to read over my words from that time and I was instantly transported back there, to that shining and wonderful moment when I was still a new mother.  It makes me realize and remember that I write first and foremost for me, because having this testimony feels like the best gift I can give myself on this journey of life. My words give me the vehicle to look back, and experience those moments again in living color.  I love this entry so much because I see myself as that new mother just taking in all the joy and wonder of raising a daughter.  It is such a bright and sweet snapshot of our amazing journey as a family. 

Jaden, My Crazy Love...                                                      May 20th, 2011 12:42pm
Jaden is feeling better. There is still a slight rumbling sound when she breathes but her eyes are bright and her laughter and smiles are again effortless and joyful. She bounced around the house this morning leaving a narrow swath of destruction in her wake. She kicked over the dog's food bowl, scattering pieces across the floor, tossed my neatly folded laundry all around the living room, crushed a graham cracker under her shoe in the kitchen and left a trail of cherry puffs down the walkway. I followed after her, amazed by her energy and enchanted by her gleeful giggle. There was a moment this morning, when I was so captivated by the beauty in her little face, that the world stopped for me. There was only the morning light and the perfection of her tiny profile, still so much her father's yet still so exceptionally unique at the same time. If she would let me, I'd love to cup her little face in my hands and just study her, every inch, so I could memorize her features before they change again, before she grows up - growing ever closer to the girl, the teenager, the woman she will one day become.

When Fatih and I got married, we played Van Morrison's "Crazy Love" for our dance with our wedding party. I always loved the song. I always wanted to be loved like that, have a love that was that powerful, consuming, unconditional. Dancing with my new husband, I had felt like I had found it at last.

This morning, that song came on the radio and as I listened, I found a whole new meaning in it, a new connection in my life. That feeling I get with Jaden, the desire to hold time still and just watch her, take her all in until my heart aches with the impossible fullness of it...that's my Crazy Love. She is the thing that "brightens up my day", "takes away my troubles, takes away my grief" The heavens really do seem to "open up every time she smiles" and I feel as if I could, without any effort at all, "hear her heartbeat for a thousand miles", that same sweet sound that pulsed inside me for nine months. But nothing is more true about this Crazy Love, than the fact that her very existence makes me complete in a way I never imagined was possible...

"Yes it makes me righteous, yes it makes me whole, yes it makes me mellow down into my soul.."

A Daughter, A Gift

Tomorrow my daughter turns six. In the quiet corners of the day I have found myself marveling over how rapidly we have both reached this milestone, my baby girl and I.

The last year has brought a host of new adventures and challenges and each one Jaden has embraced with a fearlessness that has both surprised and delighted me. She has blazed through kindergarten so far, adapting to life in her sprawling, bustling urban school better than we could have hoped. She has begun making friends, all the right kinds, and has set herself apart in the eyes of her teachers as a kind and contentious student who works hard and has the desire to participate and always do her best. Her father and I are very proud of how she is learning and maturing.

She is not always sunshine and smiles however, for with her independence, there has come defiance and rebellion. Jaden is coming to understand that as an only child she wields a fair amount of control over our daily routine, something she is learning to exploit for her own advantage at times. Challenges come, and we all do our best to navigate the lessons that life gives us with minimal frustration and fewer screaming fits.

So, on the eve of her 6th birthday, what can I preserve about my daughter at this stage in her life? What testimony can I leave in this electronic ink for her one day?

Jaden, at nearly six, is still our cuddle bug. She loves to park herself between us on the couch or lever herself in between us in bed. She prefers to fall asleep next to us, wrapped protectively around one parent or another. She is a fitful sleeper and I often wake with one of her legs thrown casually over one of mine or her elbows pressing into my ribs. She loves to sleep in when she can, snuggling up against us or inviting the dog to burrow under the blanket with her. I have to drag her from the bed on school days, often carrying her into the bathroom, still groggy and grouchy. She's discovered the joy of slipping on her toasty uniform after its sat warming on the bedroom radiator. She would eat Nutella and toast for breakfast every day if we let her. By the time I get her to the school, she's rushing from the car too soon, shrugging her backpack on and heading toward the doors. She never looks back anymore. She's making new friends but still prefers the company of her preschool crew, eager to reconnect when she can. The affection she shows them is testament for me of how sincerely she forms bonds and treasures friendships even at this young age.

Jaden loves art and music, constants from when she was very young. She is serene when she's working, connected to the creative part inside her. I watch her with my grandmother, the artistic force in our family, and I know they are kindred spirits and nothing makes me happier. She also loves science and math. She is interested in experimentation and I can see she responds to the rules and form of mathematics. Her favorite new show is Project MC2...a show about tween girl science geeks and inventors who's motto is #smartisthenewcool. This also makes me very happy, as I continue to shamelessly promote and plug the STEM agenda in our household. She is also reading, falling in love with the library as I did myself at her age. We read each night and I love listening to her sounding the words out under her breath.

Jaden loves being outside with her Dad. In the wave of unseasonably warm winter weather, she has spent long days kicking around in the yard and walking in the woods with him. She misses the boating and the ocean as much as he does even though she's eagerly awaiting snow angels and building snowmen in the yard. She is a child of the seasons, finding reasons to delight them all.

Jaden, at nearly six, loves her family most of all...her grandparents, her aunts and uncles, her cousins, her parents. She loves with abandon, drawing pictures and giving colorful, vibrant life to the stick figure representations of all the people she loves. She is affectionate and caring. She has an amazing sense of her place in our family. She's her cousin Kyra's biggest fan, the little sister to her beloved Desi, she is Tyler's devoted audience, never failing to deliver laughter at his antics...she is something unique to each of her cousins, older and younger, learning with them and from them at every opportunity.

Tomorrow we will celebrate another birthday with our growing girl. Despite all the changes and challenges to come, I hope all the things that are true about her nearly-six self are always part of her personal landscape because they are lovely and wonderful. She is lovely and wonderful.

"A daughter is the happy memories of the past, the joyful moments of the present, and the hope and promise of the future." ~Author Unknown

All the Difference in the World

I am not always good at juggling life. Some days I do better than others. Some days, not so much. For whatever reason, this morning I had a breakdown.

Jaden and I were running behind schedule. I was struggling to get her into tights, the same tights she wears every day, and she was fighting me. Her squirming gave way to outright protests and she broke away, running off after she banshee wailed, directly in my face. The epic headache bloomed behind my eye sockets.

I'm trying to yell less, trying to be more patient. I started to race after her. I tried, for a moment, to find the parental humor in her dashing around the house with her little butt hanging out and her navy tights pooled around her ankles like elephant skin. Rather than laughing, I surprised myself by starting to sob.

I think I was worn out from worry, from frustration, from not being enough - having enough time to be enough. I think my reserves had been driven too low from dealing with chronic pain over the last few weeks and the constant concern about what those aches and pains might mean. Whatever the reasons, I just snapped. I heard myself crying, and they were ugly, raw sobs, the kind that hurt when they finally break free. I left my daughter, hiding half-dressed, in the bedroom closet and ran downstairs.

I sat myself down in the kitchen. I tried taking deep breaths, tried to calm myself down. Breathe, the voice in my head commanded.

I looked up through tears to see Jaden standing in the kitchen in her stocking feet. She walked over and put her arms around me.

"Sorry Mom," she said, and hugged me as tight as her little limbs could manage.

And I hugged her back.

After a few minutes, we wordlessly went back upstairs, hand in hand. We finished getting dressed without any further trauma and even made it to school on time.

Maybe its not a bad thing to show a little weakness now and then. The people who love us best know how to best bring us out of the darkness. Sometimes all it takes is a heartfelt hug from the right person or a kind word of encouragement to spell away a bad moment. A little love in the right places in life makes all the difference in the world sometimes.