Birthday Girl

Today is my daughter Grace's eighth birthday! The above picture was taken by my bestie when we were vacationing up north. It really displays her spirit and vitality towards life. Her spirit is well captured on her face. When she was a toddler she was such a peanut but she could scamper up great big slides at the park and zoom down to the bottom fearless. She's still adventurous but now I notice small fears creeping in, like the fear of storms, and the dark. I was eight too when my "summer of worry" started. We had moved into our new house and just down the railroad tracks a few blocks was a river and my middle brother and his friends would fish there all day long and I was always worried they were going to drown. I would run down the tracks a few times a day to spy on them and make sure they were ok. I just about drove my mother nuts that summer. She still reminds me of it now and then, but now we laugh at the memory. My daughter has requested tacos for dinner, and cake and ice cream of course. My oldest son's two best buddies will be there too as she has grown up with them and they are like big brother's to her. Grace shares this day with her Auntie Julie, and I must give a shout out to Julie not just for her birthday but for loosing 25 plus pnds. on Weight Watchers. She looks and feels great! You go girl! My husband took our two youngest to meet their teacher's today. Each teacher meets with the student and parents for a half hour to discuss the upcoming school year. Our children attend a parochial school and both have awesome teacher's this year. We are very blessed with our children's education. Two weeks from today is the first day of school. I'm trying to use what I have learned from my program and apply it to the upcoming year. I have some limitations such as I am the only parent available at night, and I have to do a lot of schedule flipping to accomodate sports and activities but in the past I was so overwhelmed that I felt like I was treading water, and barely keeping above the surface. I have now learned to say "no". This can be hard to say when you are a people pleaser. I've also learned not to feel guilty because I'm a full time working mom. My family depends on two incomes plus I carry all the insurance. I used to struggle with guilt about working for years, but my best friend said to me, "I look at it this way, my husband and I are partners, and working helps me do my part in the partnership". Yes, Leener I remember when you said that to me. Families aren't cheap even when you cut out extra's and at the rate my kids are growing even Goodwill is starting to get expensive (lol) but seriously I think I now realize that I have spent a great portion of my life justifying, apologizing, feeling guilty, and the bottom line is it's nobody's business but mine and my husband's. I don't have to explain anything to anybody but him. How freeing is that? I like working, I like helping people. Sure there are days when I'm drowning in paperwork and red tape but all in all I don't mind working. It is a partnership. I will get out what I put into it. I wish I could have all that time back that I wasted being concerned by what other people thought but at least I don't have to fall victim to what I think other people think is important. I admire mother's whether they work at home or outside of the house. Motherhood isn't for sissies. It requires dedication, trial and error, flying by the seat of your pants, playing fixer, healer, and judge. But it shouldn't require an explanation if you do the best with what you have. Did my kids miss out without me being at home all the time? I don't know, and I'm not going to dwell on it. I have a busy year fast approaching and for once instead of just trying to survive it, I would like to live it, enjoy it, and be in the midst of it, chaos or not. So I guess we can't stay fearless forever but once in a while it doesn't hurt to have a little fearlessness in our attitude. The above picture doesn't need an explanation it's pure in the best of forms. Sometimes we just need to throw our arms into the air and embrace life as it comes. Happy Birthday my sweet, sweet shmoopsy poo.....I love U!