I've been trying to write this blog post for about 5 months now. Ever since the last update. I wanted this to be a monthly thing. I guess I don't consider the blog sensible work, even though I get a tremendous amount of joy from working on it. It's just that now, in my life, there is a box labeled "Things that must get done or Tasha is going to go cuckoo" and update the blog isn't in that box, so it gets pushed aside. Honestly, the only reason I am able to write these words is because Erik is currently napping with Violet. I might have 30 more seconds or 30 more minutes. One never knows with a baby. hurry. type! type! ( Believe it or not, it's next to impossible to get anything accomplished on a laptop when you have a gremlin tugging at your pant legs.)
Violet is, as you could probably imagine, the light of my life. She's an active little thing and sooo mobile for a 9 month old. I feel like it was so long ago now that I was trying to keep her from doing face plants every time she pulled up on a piece of furniture (which is one of her favorite things ever). Now she's cruising along furniture as though she's a professional furniture driver. Been doing it all her life. Making stops on occasion to eat the cat, or fondle an electrical outlet. Maybe try to pick up a tiny rock to ingest, or pick the lock on the safe to find the lifetime supply of baby wipes, which she, for some reason, loves to eat. The other day for the very first time she stood by herself for 5 seconds and then a couple of days after that we were playing in the grass (which she isn't a fan of) and she had juuuust enough displeasure with it that she stood up from a crouch position on her own. It felt like she was performing magic. It just can't be real, can it? Who's holding the strings?? And then yesterday, another first: clapping! and since yesterday she's clapped about eight hundred times. I feel like baby animals burst out of my heart every time she claps.
What else? She has 8 teeth, still nurses around 5-7 times a day and is starting to enjoy food morsels more and more, but she doesn't like being fed baby food with a spoon. She wants bits of real food and she wants to feed herself. Let's see, she's been on 4 airplane trips in 9 months, has touched the Pacific and Atlantic oceans and still loves sleeping in bed with us. We put her down in her crib at night between 7 and 7:30 and she'll sleep on her own until the witching hours but ultimately cries out for us, and since we share a room with her anyways, end up bringing her into our bed. Yes, it's an easier way to get more sleep, but Erik and I also genuinely love the snuggles.
She's also really beginning to be a little chatter-head now. It's like consonant discovery land up in here. baba, dada, yaya, kaka and a teensy bit of mama. I love her obscure, native language. It may sound dull to you, but it's the most incredible thing watching her discover her voice.
Listen, maybe you're reading this and you don't have kids and you think, ugh, boring! and I'm telling you, if or when you have a baby, you will get it. I'm guilty of thinking kids (aside from my nieces) were pretty boring most of the time, but when it's Yours and you get to watch them learn and grow... That, to me, is one of the very best experiences of my life. I feel I could do it again and again. (maybe).
But I don't know, IS this boring to y'all? I honestly don't have the perspective to tell. When I was pregnant I devoured reading stuff like this. I still do (in my 30 seconds of free time). I know it's crazy but I walk around and count how many pregnant ladies i see. (13 this afternoon!) They are sooooo beautiful and I feel so envious of them. For one, because pregnancy is such a beautiful, mysterious, magical experience, and people treat you maybe a bit nicer than they used to and holy crap you have a tiny, invisible being that you created with someone else growing inside of you and 2, because about-to-be first time mothers are so innocent. Because they have NO idea how hard their lives are about to become. At least I didn't know. I mean, I knew, but I couldn't know. It's a motherhood secret. You can't know it till you're in it, so why bother explaining. If someone says it isn't hard, I'm suspicious. One of my favorite bloggers recently wrote a list of 10 things she learned in the first year of her child's life and number 10 was that motherhood is easier than she expected. Her husband is on the road 6 months out of 12 and she works a full time job from home while raising her baby. I thought I loved her. Now, I'm just suspicious of her. I think I'll unsubscribe.
I had but the teeny tiniest idea of what being a parent was actually, truly going to be like and honestly it has been Verrry different than I expected. Sure, I knew I was going to be tired, and yeah, I knew I was going to worry, but I didn't know hoooooow tired and how worried and how all consumingALLLLLLCONSUMINGallconsuming parenthood would be. I know it's not something you're supposed to say but for a few months there, the pretty tough winter months, I really felt nostalgic for the leisures and freedoms of my pre-baby life. I love Violet to the most distant galaxy and back and I would do it exactly the same in a heartbeat, but If I could, I would send a whisper to my childless self and say "Getting shit accomplished is so easy right now, so go and get your shit accomplished." I'm sorry for swearing. I don't like to swear, but it's true. The great irony (and I mean true irony, not like that Alanis Morrisette song 'Isn't it ironic', whose chorus lyrics aren't actually ironic at all, but just unfortunate) is that I get so much more done now that I have so much less time. How does that saying go? "If you want something done, ask a busy person" ? Well it's true. No, I'm not writing a book or producing a movie or really even leaving the house more than once a day, but I get an insane amount of sensible work done. Much more than my lazy self ever did before this little love-cub came along.
And yet now, sometimes, and often, I feel like I'm ready to really start thinking about a little brother or sister for Violet but other times I feel like I couldn't possibly manage it all. It's still a very confusing concept in my head and I haven't quite sorted out why I want another baby so badly so soon-ly. Maybe I'm just a bit nuts. I can't quite figure out why I want to do the hardest thing I've ever done in my life, again, and with a toddler in tow. I wish I had an answer for you. Actually I wish I had an answer for myself and I can say I honestly think about this every single day, and I have since Violet was born. Yup. I think maybe I'm just nuts. I know it's going to come down to what is meant to be, that's how it was with Violet, and that's how my whole life has been, so I'm not sure why I want to "reason" this one out. Maybe I just won't. Speaking words of wisdom: Let it Be.
Thanks for making it this far! You win a hundred points.
Three-quarters of a year into my motherhood journey and I still have no idea what I'm doing most of the time, but I am becoming more confident in the type of mother I want to be, (and am), and It is truly getting easier and more enjoyable every single day. Violet is my best little friend and the fact that I (God-willing, please, please, please!) get to spend the rest of my lifetime with her and her Daddy makes me feel like one of my purposes in life is being fulfilled.
It's not perfect, nothing ever is, but it is real and thought-provoking and fills me up with a joy I've never known and takes me deeper into the best and maybe more importantly, worst parts of my heart, than ever before. I see more clearly than I ever have, and I love her more than she will ever know.
Love to you,
tasha
So wonderful to read this!! <3 She is growing so fast and so beautifully and you are doing such a kick butt job of being a mom <3
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