The beginning of transition

I just attended a yoga class and was dubious about the teacher. During the class he gave us a lecture on the importance of "super greens". When asked directly (there were only four attendees so the chatting got a little personal), I admitted that I had recently bought spirulina to feed my baby. I acknowledged I might eat some myself. Yoga Teacher then challenged us to guess his age, stating that if someone guessed right he would buy them a box of tea from the shop out front. This brought him a notch lower in my eyes - isn't yoga supposed to be about avoiding ego and not promoting it? 

But he said something during the class that I just loved. We were all standing at the top of our mats with hands in prayer position and Yoga Teacher said: There they were. Five olympians standing at the edge of their diving boards, about to twist through the air... I love it! The idea of us, together but separate, poised there and gathering what we needed to take the plunge. I don't think I've quite put my finger on what that brought up for me but it was a shining moment in my brain.

And now I (and my family) face many things that both thrill me and fill me with apprehension. It is time for this.

That is the big picture. The small picture: Leo doing some things he loves.

 

Riding the "El" in Chicago

 

Playing in the water in Millenium Park, Chicago

Belated musings on the homecoming

(written a couple weeks ago)

Home again after many weeks away. Although I wasn't desperate to stop travelling I am happy to be here. And on the final stage of our journey, the drive from Toronto to Ottawa, I found myself really excited for a number of things coming up in the near future: reconnecting with Ottawa friends, watching Leo change and grow and achieve new milestones, and organizing/tidying/purging in our home. 

 

Cactus garden in Holon, Israel

I hope to maintain that excitement and inspiration as this family once again finds a daily and weekly rhythm. I'm also striving to lighten up on the pressure and expectations I impose on myself (and others, namely my husband). Hmmm, where is the balance in motivating myself to work towards goals while being patient and realistic with my process? 

 

View over Playa Hermosa, Costa Rica

In a recent yoga class, when the instructor asked us to set an intention for the class, I had a realization that my intention is usually to remain grounded. Perhaps I need something a little different now, I thought: inspiration! I don't think it's too late to revisit this idea for this year... I aim to inspire myself and to keep my spirits joyful and uplifted. To enjoy what I have and also to keep my eye on possibility and creativity.

 

Playa del Coco, Costa Rica

Travel time

I've never travelled for an extended period of time but I have seen those travellers - sitting around in the common rooms of hostels, writing in their journals, and revisiting their favourite haunts in whichever city they've found themselves in rather than racing from one tourist attraction to the next. This series of short trips feels a little like the extended travel variety of travel. 

Family portrait at a monastery on Mount Carmel

Not that I'm leisurely wandering from hostel to cafe and writing in a journal. But I am taking things day by day, not too concerned with seeing the sights but enjoying where I am at any given time. Granted, this approach was partly because I left all the Israel planning up to Ze'ev, but there was little stress in just going along for the ride. I do enjoy a more active approach to travel as being in Israel felt almost too normal rather than being and international trip for us; I have a mental list of things I want to do for our next trip to Israel but I enjoyed this trip for what it was. Family, showing off my baby, eating delicious food, as well as some adventures like hiking up Masada and walking along the rampart wall around Jerusalem's old city.

Family portrait at the Dome of the Rock

People have asked me how it is to travel with a seven-month-old baby and in some ways it is easier than being at home - I don't have to clean, I cook less often, and my husband is around full time. This is a different way of being and a different rhythm to our day to day. I am looking forward to being back home again and getting into a new routine with Leo but in the meantime... onward to Costa Rica!

Leo on his seven month birthday in the old city of Jerusalem

Three months later...

Wow. [Enter cliché about time moving quickly.] I've actually had two friends remind me recently that I haven't posted on this blog in a number of months. Well, despite travelling like crazy for the next while I resolve once again to post every two weeks or so.

 

Leo on December 18 - his sixth month birthday

I heard something... somewhere... in the last couple weeks that people rarely smile when they are by themselves; smiling is a social expression. This started me thinking about how much more I smile since I have a baby. Not necessarily because I'm happier or feel more fulfilled (do I? This would require a complicated response...) but because I'm almost constantly talking to Leo with bright and exagerrated expressions. In some ways this is tiring, to be "on demand" all the time - but it is so sweet (and so worth it) when I realize I've been lost in thought or looking at something else and then catch Leo fully staring at my face and breaking into a huge smile when I finally return his gaze.

 

He didn't enjoy the crown, but hey - at least I'm smiling!

I also wonder whether this does make me/mothers/parents happier in general. Isn't it often repeated that smiling more will make us happier even if we're consciously initiating the smile rather than waiting for smiles to issue forth from our happiness? Ok, I'm not even sure if it's happiness I'm after in the grand scheme of things but I do wonder about the effect of all this smiling on my overall mood and sense of well being. 

 

Snowshoeing near Jasper, Alberta

I remember as a child and a teenager trying to capture or consciously realize the moments I felt most content, alive, inspired, full of life. I had one of those moments while snowshoeing with my family in Jasper almost a week ago. Smiling is wonderful but I also need to get myself walking through the trees regularly for the sake of my well being and inspiration.

 

Ze'ev and Leo looking over the Jasper townsite

Three months ago

 

Photo by Avital Zemer

During my pregnancy, I felt as if I was anticipating and preparing for two very different things: labour and a baby. I was surprised by a few things in my labour, but I really feel I entered the experience with openness and curiosity. As a record of my experience (and somewhat out of appreciation for all the labour stories I read to prepare myself) I've finally finished putting together my labour story! Both Ze'ev and our doula, Gina, took pictures throughout the day (mostly in between contractions when they could spare a moment from hands-on support) and, although there are some images that I will probably never share with anyone who wasn't in the room, I really like the pictures and it's fun to have them complementing the narrative. 

Of course, some people will have no desire to see even the pictures I feel comfortable sharing, so I've made two versions of the story: the G-rated version doesn't show any more skin than you'd see if I were wearing a bikini and doesn't mention any lady bits (like the v-word); the R-rated version (which is probably more like PG in today's world) has nipple shots and a slightly more colourful description of the events. Just email me with your version preference if you're interested in reading my labour story, culminating of course in the birth of Leo!

 

The top picture is of my finished "labour flags" which I asked friends and family in Edmonton to make me inspired by these ones. They used fabric paint and fabric appliqué to make the flags as above and then I sewed them together with homemade bias tape. Ze'ev and I hung them whwn I was in labour and I love them. They're actually still up although we plan to take them down - I'd like to keep them over Leo's change table for a while though to keep that good energy flowing.

Back on the knit-wagon

This post is about a week late, but I still want to get the sentiment recorded here. Leo was such a great traveller (i.e. sleeper) on our trip to Toronto a week ago that I was able to get more work done on the sweater I started last winter. He actually slept so much in the car that the knitting started to feel monotonous! Very exciting for anything non-baby-related to actually start to be boring. The pattern is Roheline from the lovely online magazine Twist Collective. The body is done up to the armpits (waiting to attach the sleeves and knit the yoke) and the sleeves are probably one third done (knitting them simultaneously with two double-pointed needles). I had hoped to finish before Leo was born... yeah, that's usually the way it goes. 

 

Last week I met a mom with a son the same age as Leo and she mentioned she will be hosting a Stitch and Bitch group at a nearby yarn store this fall. I asked her with some amazement if she was able to knit with such a young baby and she said, "Oh, yes! I just sit him on my lap like this and he watches me." This blew me away. I felt better a bit later when I talked to my sister and she said that even if I could knit right now with Leo, in a couple months he would be grabbing at the needles and the yarn anyway.

I do appreciate hearing that someone *is* able to knit with a young baby because it plants the idea in my head and I might try it! And I'm also more encouraged to attend a knit group if I know there's another breastfeeding mom with a young baby there. So I don't know if posting about this project will give me motivation to keep trying to work on it here and there or if I'll just find myself looking back on this a year later with it still unfinished... but I love the sweater and I'm looking forward to wearing it.

In Leo news, he attended his first music festival this weekend! Unfortunately the weather was cold and windy (thanks to my mom for all the warm knitted goods that kept my baby warm!) and the music was so-so, but I'm glad we did it. Much more to come next summer, Leo!

Finding Rhythm

At a breastfeeding group yesterday, one woman talked about people asking her how long her son goes between feedings, when he naps, and how long he naps for. She has to answer that she has no idea - she just "goes with it". She then asked the group, with quite a bit of hesitation, if there is any way to have some kind of schedule with a baby since it seemed like the people asking the questions could predict and plan their day around their babies' naps and feedings. I interpreted her hesitation as being worried about how she might come across mentioning "scheduling" in an environment that promotes baby-wearing/attachment parenting/breastfeeding on cue/etc (in which schedule is generally a bad word). But I can totally relate to both things: one, that I only have a vague idea of how long Leo goes between feedings or how long he naps for (and this is a wide range depending on the time of day); and two, I have also wondered if I could get us on to a routine to guide our day together.

Another mother responded with an idea I've also considered doing: she wrote down everything her baby did for a few days and discovered to her great surprise that he *did* have a schedule! Small things (an extra feeding, for example) might change from day to day but in general there was a common sequence to his day. She also noted that if he got up at a later time, his routine would shift ahead by that amount of time. She noticed that there was a period of a few hours in the evening when he was particularly fussy and so she decided that his bedtime would be before the fussiness started - he's now not awake for that part of his routine, so it doesn't happen! I didn't get the sense that she now was able to predict exactly what he would do (and babies do seem to change things up when parents think they've got things down), but rather that she was reassured that his behaviour wasn't random and so just let him do his thing while knowing that there was a pattern for him.

The facilitator of the group nodded and said, yes - we talk about Rhythm. Ok: scheduling bad, rhythm good. I'm not sure what practical use I'll actually make of this, but I loved hearing about the idea and the possibilities of discovering more about my baby this way. Then I started thinking that I could probably actually learn more about *myself* this way. Before having a baby, I would often have a moment in the late afternoon of a day off work where I was mad at myself for "doing nothing" all morning. I think I was trying to impose a schedule on myself instead of learning about my own rhythms. And now, my goal is to harmonize my rhythm with my baby's - and also dedicate some part of the day to myself in some way. A roundabout way of saying that I hope to reflect and write about me and my own (non-baby-related) thoughts and identity soon!