I’m back from our road trip and have tons to tell. But first let me give a big shout out to Nadine’s baby girl. Woo hoo! Little beautiful Lucine entered the world last Saturday. I have seen the results and sweet lord the child is sweet and gorgeous. Like a baby bird, I tell ya.
Congrats to Nadine and the Dog for pulling it off. You give the rest of us hope!
My relationship with blogging has been somewhat vacillating this past year. I throw myself in and then take myself out. I cheer the merits of blogging through the shit of parenthood and applaud the writing of oneself out of loneliness in the middle of the night when the baby is crying or toddler is screaming and all you want to do is crawl into a paper bag and cry. But then I also feel conflicted about my own place in the blogosphere and wonder if this is really a place for me.
And then, of course, a night like last night happens and I’m reminded of the best thing this little blogging habit has brought me: real friends. Surprisingly (seriously, for me, surprisingly), the internet delivered to me a roomful of women who walked alongside the milestones of parenthood with me.
Last night, a group of us gathered to celebrate the impending birth of Nadine’s baby. You’ve probably heard me talk about Nadine and Marla before, but be prepared because I’m all mushy these days and ready to spread the love again. It’s almost been two years since the three of us first hooked up via our respective blogs, and I can say quite honestly the two of them got me through the trenches. The weeks and months when anxiety threatened to take me down, they were both ready with a shoulder and a smirk: my favourite combo. And then I met Jen, whose grace was well matched with a perfect mix of sarcasm and intelligence. And then Andrea, whose mind works so very very ahead of my own and whom I could spend hours talking with and learning from. And of course Katie, whom I fell in love with at first eyeroll.
Then there’s the rest of the MBT crew that was there – Catherine, Julie, Jana, Kitten Pie, and Kgirl – who all rock in their respective ways, and whom have created BlogHers Act Canada which is a most excellent and important use of blogs I have ever seen. These fierce bloggers have an obvious love and deep friendship that runs between them, and it shows when they get together.
Of course despite the blogging that ties us together, we are also all very different women. We’ve had disagreements and conflicts. We sometimes stand on different sides of arguments. And god help anybody if any of us feel backed into a corner and defensive – we are all smart fierce mamas, after all! But we respect each other and our right to disagree. We all love our children, and walk the same line of mothering and guilt, adoration and a need to bolt for the closest exit.
All of this to say – thank you all for coming last night. What better way to welcome Nadine’s baby then to gather the women who have been along for her ride. And a big thank you to Marla – my partner in shower-organization. Whose ability to make almost anything pretty always blows me away. You make my life better, period.
And lastly, Nadine, can I say once again how you have enriched my life? This baby, your family, and of course lovable you – I wish you all the very very best in the next few weeks. I can’t wait to meet the newest Silverthorne and introduce it to our late night parties. You’re good to go. Now bring that baby into this world and let me shower it with love, please?
The summer is already more than half over and I haven’t been on here in weeks. I don’t know what happened. I used to cling to my small circle of blogs that I read and checked on and obsessed over. And now? Well we’re already half-way through the summer and half-way through the year and I’m walking around feeling a little stunned and off-balance these days. Work is busy, family is busy, and I seem to just be keeping my head above water.
It’s been so long since I have updated on Alice, so here’s some interesting things I wanted to get down for my own records.
A non-exhaustible list of things that seem to make up Alice Jane at 4 years old:
2) : empathetic: Easily one of the things I most love about this little wacky girl is her ability to show compassion for other people. If she senses that someone she cares about feels down and out, she will focus her big brown eyes on that someone and say things like “that’s OK, mommy, I’ll take care of you.” OK, I know that she might not be showing empathy to EVERYONE in this house, but I get it and for that I am grateful.
3) willful. Sweet jesus, this part of her will definitely be the end of me. She entered this world with a tiny fist shaking in the air and I am already taking bets on how we get along during her teen years.
4) girly. See point #3 and multiply that by a hundred. If the above does not drive me drink heavily in her teen years, then certainly #4 combined with #3 will. The pink in all of her clothes alone makes my eyes bleed.
5) hard on herself at times: Well this is the part that I handed down to her, so I feel so great about this. Especially when I see her throw away an hour’s worth of beautiful picture drawing because she decided she couldn’t do anything well after all. We’re both working on this.
I’ll try to be back here again tomorrow. Or at least in a few days. There is a lot more of Alice I want to get down.
