A Constructed Life, Page 5

Glitches and updates

By Liz October 15, 2013 About Me, Adeline, Crosby, Grandma's House 2 Comments

I’m back! Thank you for your patience while I was in Internet Siberia.

As some may have noticed, the blog was unavailable for a while due to behind-the-scenes-technical issues that I think I fixed. I think. It was like jumping into a deep abyss of Internet that’s swimming with menacing jargon that could eat me alive.

For now, I would like to show you this:

Super retro, right? It is. Circa 1950-something. It’s the one and only stove my Grandma ever used while living in this house, and it’s what I cook on these days. For the most part it’s been swell and a testament to how well things were made in “the good old days,” but it seems to only have the temperatures of scalding, burn-your-food hot or barley warm. Dinner is an adventure every night and typically charred.

And also this:

This crazy little man is almost 2, and that seems impossible cause I swear he looked like this just a few months ago:

And this little girl not only turned 4, but also started school, as in she goes there every day with her practically-as-big-as-her-body backpack.

Addy’s first day

She loves school, thank god, and I LOVE LOVE LOVE that her school time coincides with Crosby’s nap time cause then I get some me time. Addy’s found two good buddies with cool moms, which means I have two new buddies, too. The community we moved to is like Pleasantville, but with an urban vibe.

While our home is still boxes and chaos and a disorganized mess, I feel we have officially adjusted to our new ‘hood and digs. But, in the words of Carrie Underwood, this is our “Temporary Home,” and we’re itching to settle in somewhere and claim a space as ours. We just don’t know where we want that space to be, hence the holding pattern we’re in now. We’re hoping that by early summer we’ll be preparing for a second, more permanent move.

On moving into Grandma’s house

By Liz September 10, 2013 About Me, Grandma's House 9 Comments

Four weeks ago, we moved from this lovely yellow place…

…to this quaint little tan place, a place my grandmother called home for more than 60 years, a place where my father and uncle grew up, a place I visited often my entire life.

There’s a difference of about 600 square feet between the two homes, a difference that became glaringly obvious once we tried to stuff it with our belongings, along with dozens of my grandmother’s that I couldn’t part with. See?

That’s the basement, and it is literally overflowing with boxes and furniture. Here’s what it looked like when my grandma and grandpa lived here.

That’s probably the way it looked for the last 40 years, and then we came in and ripped it all out, tossing carpeting and mildewy cabinets, joining my family in efforts to sort through an entire house packed full – as in every square inch had a nook or cranny hiding something – of my grandparents accumulated belongings. And then selling a lot of it to strangers at an estate sale and giving the rest to various nonprofits.

That’s been the hardest part of this – degrandma-ing this house to make way for us, and whoever moves in after us. My grandparents built this house and raised their family here. My great-grandmother passed away here. This was the hub of Christmas celebrations, the constant in so many of our lives.

My grandmother is still alive. She is 94-years-old and has only been gracious to me and my family as we take over her home and as she was rushed to make final decisions about what belongings she would keep because the rest would be finding homes elsewhere. She will never admit it to me, but I know this has been hard for her, especially now as she hears how her home is being transformed from the place she created into a new place that holds little trace of her, aside from the items I held to.

If you can’t tell, I feel guilty about this, and sad. It’s hard to erase the details from a place I remember with such love, a place that reminds me so much of my family and the many, many memories we all have here.

As we work to update the house, I find I’m putting a lot of pressure on myself to get it right. I don’t want to make bad choices, simply because this is a place that’s so important to my family, and my family’s future. The main reason we’re renovating is to resell the house in a year or so, all the money going towards keeping my grandma in assisted living for as long as she needs. My grandmother’s grandmother lived to be 104. I’m hoping my grandma’s got at least that much left in her.

Living here and going through all of my grandparent’s things has been like a suburban archeaological dig, unearthing decades of memories, momentos and stuff. I feel closer to my grandma than ever before, like I’ve gotten a glimpse into parts of her life I otherwise would never have known. As I unpack my belongings into her cupboards and closets, I think of what she housed in each of them and her devotion to detail and organization and utilizing every inch of available space.

While living through a renovation with 2 small children is not easy, nor is transitioning from a home with plenty of space to one where my children have to share a room, I am starting to love our new community and enjoy our new home. However, I do miss the grandma-ness of how it used to be. I feel sadness now that every cabinet has been emptied and my grandma’s treasures (and junk) have all been revealed. In a way, I feel like we evicted her, even though she moved out well over a year ago. When it is all said and done, the interior of this home will look nothing like it used to. Every room will have been dewallpapered and decarpeted, freshly painted and refurnished. But for me, no matter how long I live here or how different it looks, it will forever be my grandmother’s house.

Before and after photos to come, but probably not for a few more weeks. Because in order for me to type this, I had to climb over furniture that’s been shoved to the center of one room and shimmy under a drop cloth that’s protecting it all while the living room gets painted.

Crosby goes to the ER: A Story of Blood and Popsicle Beatings

By Liz September 3, 2013 Crosby, motherhood, Uncategorized 10 Comments

While I have much to say about moving, where I live now, what it’s like to live here with 2 small kids while remodeling an entire home and so very much more, I would like to hold those thoughts and share with you our latest trauma, which is now no longer any of the above.

Before I get into it, let me first remind you of my daughter’s trip to the emergency room when she was 2. The one where she almost bit her tongue off. Crosby was just a baby then, and now, almost one year later, it was his turn to get doped up and stitched up.

About a week ago I was following my children down the steps of our new house. Steps that had recently been comfortably covered in plush carpeting, but now were exposed hard (really, really hard) wood. They were in a rambuncious mood, and as I watched them from one step back – traveling down together a little too close to each other for comfort – I felt a deep urgency to get in front of them. I took one step to get around them, but I was already too late. Crosby slipped and tumbled down 4 steps, cracking his face on the edge of one of them. Now you may recall that this is not his first spill down the stairs. The first happened almost a year ago, and I take the blame for letting him reach the stairs alone while I argued with Addy. But this time I was practically next to him when it happened.

He hit the ground with a thud and immediately started screaming. I ran to him, and as soon as I was over him I saw the blood starting to ooze from his head. I scooped him up to get a better look and that’s when the tsunami of red poured down his face and onto his chest, into my hair, onto my shirt, pooling on the floor. I could see a gash on his forehead. I looked at Addy, who was sitting on the stairs crying. A split second passed while a million thoughts flooded my mind as I held a towel to Crosby’s wound and tried to comfort Addy. Can I get them both to the hospital by myself in this condition? What if he doesn’t stop bleeding? What if he loses consciousness while I’m driving? I have no family nearby to help me anymore. So I called 911. Within minutes a firetruck stopped in front of our house, blocking off the street. Five large men entered the house, sending Crosby into hysterics and causing Addy to cower on the couch. “Don’t move him!” they ordered, but he wouldn’t stop squirming as they wiped the blood from his eyes, cheeks and ears. I answered a zillion questions, all the while clutching my screaming son and desperately trying to reach out to Addy, who was too scared to even come near me. An ambulance arrived and by this time, the bleeding had stopped and Crosby started crying louder because he couldn’t see the amazingly awesome trucks in his front yard and how dare I make him miss this?!!!

At this point my wonderful new neighbor appeared in the doorway with her little girl, saying she’d be happy to watch Addy so I could go with Crosby. She had a popsicle in hand to help lure Addy out the door. My brave girl. She went. By this time Joey was on his way home and my mom was on her way over.

Crosby stopped crying the second he got in the ambulance – this was the sweetest ride of his life.

Let me pause here to share the underlying story in all of this. Since moving on to our new, very residential, quaint street, we have had a dumpster parked in the driveway. Also, since we moved into my grandma’s old home, which had been sitting vacant since she went into assisted living over a year ago, the yard looks horrendous. Dead grass and weeds everywhere. There is also an old dishwasher sitting in the driveway that we have not yet carted off to the junk yard. So in other words, I look like I live in the neighborhood crack house. A feeling I’m accustomed to.

So, now the crack house has a firetruck and an ambulance in front of it, parked in the center of the street so no one else can get through. My kindly neighbor enters the house only to find that we have plywood floors in the living room cause that’s what was under the old carpeting we tore out. Then I emerge with my screaming child, both of us covered in blood. I do not think I’ll be hosting a play date anytime soon. We are the black sheep of this supremely adorable cul-du-sac.

Anyways…we get to the hospital and it’s pretty clear that Crosby just needs some stiches. They smear numbing jelly on his wound and, though he refuses to put on the hospital gown, he’s a happy camper.

So they send in a nurse with loads of toys before letting him suck down a little tube of infant narcotics to make him more “cooperative” while they suture his wound. Fifteen minutes later, my son was tripping out of his mind. He couldn’t hold his head up, kept saying “Whoa. Mommy.” and smiling like he knew all of humanities deepest secrets. As instructed, I layed down on the hospital bed with him while they stitched him up in my arms. The pediatric nurse kept him entertained the entire time. It was over and done in about 15 minutes.

But then we had to wait for the drugs to wear off. And much like I imagine it is for many users when their high is ending, Crosby got mighty, mighty pissed off and began screaming at the top of his lungs. The nurse had given him a popsicle after his stitches. He held it in his little hand and rather than take a lick of the sugary sweetness, he decided instead to beat me with it, a chunk of it flying across the room as it made contact with my nose, leaving me dripping in sugary red goo. We carried our little man out sans popsicle, and he continued screaming and hitting us, making passerbys stop in their tracks and move to the other side of the hallway. It was awesome, especially because my shirt and hair were still covered in blood. I looked like Mom of the Year. And of course, this scene continued as we pulled in our driveway and walked from the car to the house, Crosby shrieking loud enough for every last one of our neighbors to hear.

An hour later, he was his normal self, but completely exhausted and went to bed. He’s been fine ever since, thank god. In the end, the ambulance was probably not needed, but I didn’t know what else to do. We’ve chatted with Addy on a few different occasions, trying to talk her through how she was feeling and helping her understand what happened. It helps that she went through a similar experience.

As always, it’s awful when your child gets hurt. But in the end, all I feel is gratitude because this was minor, just like Addy’s. It leaves me feeling so thankful that my family is healthy, and that my neighbors will come to the rescue, even if they think I’m a drug dealer.

Just for comparisons sake, here’s a picture of the blood that spilled when Crosby got a fat lip the first time he fell down the stairs.

And here’s the latest, and hopefully the last. And yes, the backdrop of this photo is the lovely industrial-chic plywood floors in the living room.

And then it was time to go

By Liz August 16, 2013 About Me, Celebrations, Country Life 6 Comments

We move in two days, and the emotions are hitting me hard now. All I see is how beautiful my shit hole of a house has become, that its walls housed the 9 most challenging years of my life (rebuilding it, birthing and raising 2 little kids, surviving the death of my father-in-law) and that someone else gets to enjoy this place that has come to mean so much to me.

Our house was originally built in 1913 by Joseph and Elizabeth Menger. And it was rebuilt by this Joseph and Elizabeth, and who are selling it almost exactly 100 years after it was built. I feel like we saved this house, and because of that I feel we’re just as important to its story as it is to ours.

The new people, Frank and Stefanie, will never know what went into making this house what it is today. But they don’t need to. That’s the beauty of a new home – it’s a clean slate for every family that enters it. And while I feel very bitter towards them right now since we ended up taking a $6,000 hit to replace the boiler for them, I hope this home acts as their shelter to a lot of happy memories.

There is much I will miss about this place – its proximity to family, with my parents and mother-in-law being within 5 minutes and my sister about 20. It made babysitting so very easy.

I will miss our incredible neighbors, Katie and Wayne, and their adorable daughter, Lydia, who has become one of Addy’s best friends. Katie, who is a stay-at-home-mom, too, is the reason I stayed sane as I adjusted to the isolation of being a full-time mom. We joke that we’re sister wives, only because we developed a pattern of watching each others kids as needed and helping the other with various tasks around the house. Frank and Stefanie don’t even know yet how lucky they are to inheret them.

I will miss the easy access to the countryside, where the sidewalks abruptly ends and rolling hills take over as the landscape becomes dominated by farms.

While I often curse its loudness, I will miss the train wooshing by our house and watching my kids (and Lydia, of course) go running for the door with excitement just to witness it clacking passed. And for my son’s sake, I will miss the lumber yard down the street, because Crosby could sit and endlessly watch the forklifts and trucks.

I will miss playing chase in the upstairs hallway with my children, a pre-bedtime ritual that burned their last bits of energy. I will miss how easily a zillon happy memories are recalled as I move from room to room. I will miss this home that we did such a good job rebuilding and filling with love.

And as I cry and feel sad about leaving, I know all the memories will move with me and that no matter where I go, my family is what makes a place my home. And there will be another beautiful house in our future, one that I’m certain I will love just as much and will become the backdrop to the sorrows, challenges and joys of our lives.

The next couple of days will be hard and packed with goodbyes. But it helps me to feel better knowing I did right by this house, taking care of it and fixing it up for more families, like stupid Frank and Stefanie, to call home. And I feel happier every time I see cracks appearing in the plaster walls, hear the insanely creaky floor boards that wake our children up at night, feel the oppressive heat of no air conditioning in the summer and get woken up by a loud ass train at 6:00 am every day, because they are now Frank and Stefanie’s problems. And I cannot wait for Katie to tell them that a man dropped dead in the upstairs bathroom and currently haunts the house. Sure only the first part is true, but I really want to mess with them for getting such good deal on a house I worked so hard for.

So here’s to the first Joseph and Elizabeth, who built this place, the modern day Joe and Liz who improved upon their efforts and Frank and Stefanie, who better not fuck it all up.

We New Yorked it properly

By Liz August 7, 2013 About Me, Friends, Travel 3 Comments

Wonderful. Amazing. Awesome. Exhausting. That’s my summary of our time in New York. I still can’t believe how much there is to do in such a small space and that every time I emerged from a subway tunnel, it was like walking into a new world – the landscape seemed to change every couple of blocks as we wandered from SoHo to Little Italy to Chinatown. I get it now – why people fall hopeless in love with this city and feel they could live there forever and never see it all. I’m already itching to go back…though my bank account will need to wait awhile, cause holy crap! it’s expensive there.

We spent the weekend with our friend Dave, his girlfriend, and one of his best friends and his wife. Dave is the reason we took the trip, as he invited us to attend the premier of a movie he produced, We’re the Millers.

All dressed up and ready to go. I spent way too much time worrying about what I was wearing and shelling out $ to get my hair and makeup done. Way not necessary. Maybe premiers in Hollywood are different, but this was not the uber glamorous affair I envisioned. The huge theater (The Zeigfield) was packed with people connected to the film and dressed in everything from jeans to minis to cocktail dresses.

The movie was hilarious. I was crying from laughing so hard. That being said, since everyone in the audience helped create the movie, the entire theater was whole heartedly invested and engaged in it, making it easy for laughter and cheers to erupt continuously.

A picture of the red carpet, which was covered in a tent due to rain. We did not walk it. Turns out it’s a big faux pas to stroll the carpet if you’re not a celebrity. That’s a picture of Ed Helms, who sat across the aisle from us in the theater, getting interviewed.

Here’s a shot of Joey with Dave and our friend Bob, who was only able to stay for the premier, in front of a ginormous We’re the Millers sign.

And here’s a picture of Dave’s name on the sign.

We’re all feeling mighty proud of him, as this movie seems destined to be a success, and was his last movie, The Conjuring.

Then it was off to the party at Bryant Park Grill, where the crowd thinned out a bit. And here is where I stood just feet away from all the stars of the movie. They were all in one section of the room (near the bar), surrounded by people. It was amazing that they were never left alone. Not for a single second. Someone was always there trying to talk to them or take a picture with them.

First we saw Jason Sudeikis and his fiance, Olivia Wilde. Ed Helm was nearby. But I was waiting to see Her. The Jennifer Aniston. Joey caught sight of her first. “Look, there’s the back of her head!” And then the crowd parted, and she turned around, looking perfectly movie starred. It was like catching a glimpse of a unicorn, and I could barely stand to make eye contact. But we did, just for a fleeting second. I caught eyes with The Jennifer Aniston. Surely it was a shared moment for both of us.

There was however, one celebrity I spent some quality time with over the weekend – Will Poulter, who plays Kenny in We’re the Millers. He’s British, hilarious, and incredibly down to Earth and kind. He and Dave became friends while casting the movie, and we spent most of Saturday night with him and his friends.

But there was so much more to New York than the premier. Here’s some shots from our trip, which was filled with tons of walking, fantastic food and insanely expensive drinks. I feel like we New Yorked it properly, staying up until almost dawn on most nights. Dave’s friend, Neal, was our tour guide and he tried to cram as much in as possible. He is the reason we really saw the city and braved the subway system.

Central Park is incredible and so needed. We instantly felt relaxed as we wandered through it.

We were intimidated by the subway, and without Tour Guide Neal, we may not ever had the guts to try it. But it truly is the best, fastest and most affordable way to get around.

In Little Italy, an incredibly charming street.

We pigged out on pasta and incredible Italian food, but saved room for what really was the best cannoli in the world and spiked coffee drinks at Caffe Palermo.

A lot of Dave’s fellow producers were staying at the Crosby St. Hotel. I was beyond excited to meet up with them for drinks at the hotel bar, not because it meant meeting more Hollywood folk, but because I could raid the place for anything reading “Crosby.” P.S. All the Hollywood folk were very nice people and surprisingly normal. P.P.S This place was extraordinarily expensive. Three vodka tonics (not all for me) cost $80.00!!!! That is when we knew we were partying with people out of our league.

The 9/11 Memorial is serene, peaceful and awe-inspiring. It made me realize more than ever the real impact those events had on the city and the families.

Brooklyn! We went there in search of a suppossedly “mind blowing” pizza at Lucali (it’s where Beyonce and Jay-Z get pizza, after all), but it was closed when we arrived. So instead we opted for Juliana’s, which was great, ice cream at the foot of the bridge and a stroll over it. We weren’t in Brooklyn long, but being there was the only time I felt I found a place I could call home in New York.

The Minus5 Bar at the Hilton in Midtown was a blast. The entire bar is made out of ice, even the glasses you drink from (vodka, of course). You pay anywhere from $20-45 to rent a parka or fur and gloves and freeze your ass off. Yes, you pay $ to get really cold, despite the fur, and that price doesn’t even include drinks! We had a great time though, and I recommend it. But don’t wear sandals, like I did. I ended up with rented mittens on my feet wandering the bar looking like a penguin.

While we started at a bar inspired by New Zealand, we wrapped up the night at a sake bar that blew our minds. It was like a staircase down to Japan and drinking sake in the basement of a random Japanese guy’s home. In other words, it was unexpected and fantastic.

And…the last photo I took on our trip. Taken at 5:00 a.m. as I stood in the lobby of our hotel holding a plastic bag filled with Budweiser tall boys as I waited for Joey and Neal to go to the bathroom. We were supposed to drink them in Time Square and watch the sunrise, but we were officially spent at this point. New York wore us out. We did and saw so much more, but this post is already epically long.

I hand’t been there since I was 6, and all I remember about the trip was seeing Cats. But after this trip, I am a big, big fan of New York. If you haven’t been there, go. I’m told by those that have lived there or visited often that it becomes easy to entertain yourself on the cheap once you know where to go. Someday, I hope I will have visited enough to know at least a few of this city’s secrets.

Sold! & Movie Premier!

By Liz July 30, 2013 About Me, Celebrations 4 Comments

Hi. So, long time no posting. Sorry. Life has been totally insane lately, and I’ve spent the last months feeling overwhelmed, worn out and completely uninspired. Turns out trying to sell our house sucked every last bit of spare time and energy I had.

But the good news – we sold it! After 4 months on the market, 20 showings, a new paint job and lowering the price by $5,000, we found Our People. They’re a young couple, who enclosed a sweet little letter to us with their offer, explaining they loved old homes and want to start their family here. It reminded me of Joey and me, as we wrote an almost identical letter 9 years ago with our offer. We move out in 18 days, and will be moving into my grandmother’s home in a much more urban area, which has been sitting empty since she moved into an assisted living facility.

I’d like to be feeling all nostalgic and sentimental about leaving our house, but frankly, there isn’t time. We sold the house while on vacation in Door County and have been working to clear out 65 years worth of stuff my grandma’s since returning. We haven’t even started packing our own house yet. Not to mention the contractors we’re trying to line up to remove wallpaper, paint and update my grandma’s, as it hasn’t had a facelift in decades.

In other big news, we are sneaking in a brief vacation sans kiddos to New York to go to movie premier. As in I will be walking a red carpet in an outfit I spent the last 2 weeks stressing about and trying to pull together. What movie and how is this possible? We’ll be going to the premier of We’re The Millers, the new Jennifer Aniston film. And it’s made possible by one of Joey’s good friends, who is one of the producers of the movie. I know – CRAZY! But it’s real. At least supposedly. Watch we arrive and our friend just takes us to a seedy theater somewhere and flashes some pics of us with his iphone. Here’s the dress I’m wearing.

It’s from White House Black Market. I’m not the type to splurge on anything, but for this, I am splurging. The dress is moderately priced at $140, but my splurge is heading to Blow to get my hair and makeup done, which will cost just a little less than the dress.

So, I’m super excited, but also freaking out about trying to fit in in an environment that’s insanely far out of my comfort zone (I’m a stay-at-home-mom in a somewhat rural community who primarily only frequents Target and my daughter’s day care.). And when I’m not feeling those emotions, I’m stressing about packing, moving, my daughter starting 4K and more.

But! More than anything, I’ve been feeling grateful and blessed – to have sold our home without taking a total hit in a still recovering economy, to have a familiar and loved place to move into, an amazing family that is helping me with all of this, and the opportunity to have such an unexpected, once-in-a-lifetime experience as going to an actual movie premier.

I will do my best to post pictures when we get back. Especially if I happen to see the Jennifer Aniston while at the premier and the post-premier party (I know! I even get to go to that, too!!!). But, those who know me well can assume that I will be way too nervous and spazey to say much to her besides, “Friends…wow…god…ummm” and be totally hypnotized by all her glittery Hollywoodness. Wish me luck at not being a complete dork!

I just buried a small Christian in my backyard

By Liz June 11, 2013 About Me 3 Comments

This little guy, St. Joseph, who will supposedly help us sell our home. Apparently once he’s resting under several inches of dirt in our yard, our perfect buyer will appear and snatch our home off the market. In other words, we’ve become a little desperate.

I’ll admit that 7 weeks ago when the For Sale was first erected in our yard, I felt confident that we’d be packing boxes soon, because as the current homeowner – one who rebuilt this shack with her own two hands and then filled it with two small children – I am biased in my view of this place. But that’s not to say I wasn’t aware of its flaws when we started this process. There were two glaring issues with our home that we feared would bite us in the butts, and well…let’s just say there are teeth marks on our bottoms.

The first problem? Our house needed to be painted, badly. Joey and two friends painted it about 9 years ago, and we meant to repaint it last summer, but other things came up. So it hit the market looking weathered and potential buys didn’t love that.

Look at the peak at the top. All three of the peaks featured worn off paint and the south side of the home was covered in yellow paint peels.

The next monumental issue? The terrifying monster in our basement.
That’s our boiler – the thing that heats our house. It’s original to the house, which means it’s about 100-years-old, which means it’s scaring the crap out of every prospective buyer that sees it. It’s been running like a champ for us, and is another one of those things that we just didn’t get around to and couldn’t afford to update when we were remodeling. I posted about it years ago, and rolled my eyes when rereading the words I had typed. “I don’t know anyone else, besides us, who would buy a house with an almost 100-year-old boiler in it.” Awesome.

While we really do not want to have to replace the boiler, we did go ahead and have the house repainted in hopes of turning things around. By a haggard looking man named Larry, as in Larry’s Painting. He was incredibly reasonably priced, sweet to my kids, and despite all the cigarette butts he left lying around my house, he did a great job. No more peeling paint.

We’ve had 12 showings so far. Everyone loves the work we did inside, and now they love the outside, too. Except they want more closet space or a bigger third bedroom or blah, blah, blah. We have yet to meet Our People. Our People who decide this home is the one for them. The People who fall in love with it upon seeing the original woodwork in the foyer, just like we did.

Our People are out there. I know they are. In the meantime, I will continue to suck it up every time I have to re-clean our home from top to bottom, because there’s always just enough time between showings for it to get strewn with toys, clothing, crumbs and spills because we live with two small slobs children.

It’s probably a good thing that our house hasn’t sold yet, because we have yet to find anything we want to move in to. But I am getting excited to find our new home. To be The People that someone else is looking for.

Where I’ve Been

By Liz May 29, 2013 About Me, Adeline, Country Life, Crosby 4 Comments

I think this has been the longest lapse in content on this blog since I started it 5 or so years ago. Apologies. Updates to come (no, we haven’t sold our house yet), but here’s what our days have looked like. These were taken at our usual hangouts: my parent’s farm, our neighborhood, Target and various parks.

Every mom should know this song

By Liz May 9, 2013 motherhood, Music 1 Comment

Sunday is Mother’s Day. And mostly what I have to saw to all the other moms out there is something along the lines of, Hell ya! We rock! Gimme a high five! Because it is not easy work that we do. Being a mother is the greatest act of vulnerability. I have never been so exposed to judgement or the potential for unbearable loss. And at the core of every mother is the fiercest desire to protect, because in protecting these beings we so dearly love, we are also protecting our own hearts, our own vulnerability. So kudos to us all who dare to love and sacrifice so much, and who fight so hard and so selflessly. This song is for you. The lyric are below – they could be taken from the mouth of every mother I know.

P.S. I can’t take credit for finding this amazing song. I stumbled on it at Girls Gone Child, my most favorite blog of all time.

Kate Earl – One Woman Army

Never knew what I was signing up for
Knew it was hard but not this hardcore
Never gonna stop, never gonna give up on you
No matter what I do

Here I am baby, I’m your one woman army
I’d fight for you, I’ll die, I’ll be your protector
Here I am baby, I’m your one woman army
No matter what may come, I won’t surrender

Wanna give you everything I never had
Love you and teach you good from bad
Never gonna stop, never gonna give up on you
No matter what I do

Here I am baby, I’m your one woman army
I’d fight for you, I’ll die, I’ll be your protector
Here I am baby, I’m your one woman army
No matter what may come, I won’t surrender

What I do, I do for you the best I can
Build a life for you with my own two hands
Never gonna stop, never gonna give up on you
No matter what I do

Here I am baby, I’m your one woman army
I’d fight for you, I’ll die, I’ll be your protector
Here I am baby, I’m your one woman army
No matter what may come, I won’t surrender

When email can inspire

By Liz May 3, 2013 About Me, Adeline, Crosby, motherhood 4 Comments

A friend of mine, actually, my old boss/editor (an awesome woman complete with a big heart and loads of smarts) recently asked me in an email what I’ve been doing for fun and inspiration. And at first all I could muster was a sigh, as the repetitive details of my stay-at-home-mom day ran through my brain. Between endlessly cleaning my house for showings (9 of them and 0 offers), caring for my little kids, and, most recently, my husband, who was incapacitated for 3 days after throwing his back out (golfing), it’s been a long, seemingly uninspiring week.

But then, as so often happens, on the heels of a downtrodden attitude came insight. I looked around my life and saw that inspiration was all around me, remembering that it often lies in the ordinary moments, not the extraordinary events. All I had to do was open my eyes to it, to change my perspective from Blah to Boom, and let the smallest things whack me in the heart with their subtle beauty.

So, dear Jeanne, what have I been doing lately for inspiration?

I have been watching my handsome troublemaker son and sweet, growing-up-too-fast daughter forming a lifelong bond, one weaved with love, friendship and mutual disgust.

I have seen Crosby find fascination in the whistle of a train, the tweet of a bird and the wet lick of a dog. I have also watched him struggle to understand that markers (washable, thank god) are for paper, not faces.

I have been swept away by the beauty of my daughter and a deep desire for her to also be strong, smart, kind, confident and brave.

I have been inspired to be the best mother I can be, day in and day out, for these two little people who have been gifted to me. While I steadfastly watch over their safety, I admit to somewhat regularly failing to see the magic in our everyday occurrences.

But today was a day where I was reminded to witness them, not as a busy passerby with rooms to clean and laundry to fold, but as the person who was given a VIP pass to their childhood and whose attitude directly impacts their environment.

Thank you to all, Jeanne included, who keep me inspired.