...adoration.

I just cannot get enough of how my two girls look at each other. Both of them always delighted to see the other. Every once in a while I catch myself in some melancholic thought process that leads me to a time, not too far away, when this will not always be true. When curious hands will ruin a well loved toy or tear up an art project. When the hot tears of frustration will well up in the eyes of a babe that cannot follow her sister up the stairs or join in her more mature games with friends. But I do catch myself and bring it back to what we are so fortunate to be enjoying right now. This incredible adoration for each other that seems to know no bounds. Because for right now I continue to be amazed that no matter how many times Lola grabs and pulls Meg's hair, she never complains. And no matter how over zealous and wild Meg can be in her hugs and helping, Lola seems to tolerate it and mostly even enjoy it. When Lola cries or fusses and I have my hands full, Meg will dance and sing to keep her amused. She has learned the complicated lyrics to an old Scottish folk tune and will sing it with gusto whenever it's called for. She will endlessly pick up the dropped toy while we try to sit together for our evening meal. And she will cry in sympathy when Lola seems inconsolable. I could not have imagined a better sister in Meg. And Lola... well she just comes alive when Meg walks in the room. In fact she has burst into fits of laughter just at the sight of her. The other morning Meg climbed into bed with us and pulled the covers over her head. Lola clawed at the duvet to try and uncover her big sister. For now I am completely satiated with this incredible relationship I am so lucky to witness.

I was going to delete this photo but it actually really sums up the two of them. Meg moves slowly and intentionally in everything she does. Lola is a blur!

And then the funny faces...

LOVE

...teeth, teeth, teeth.

For a week in December I felt the heart-tugging, hot tears that come when one realizes that her babies are growing and nothing can be done to slow the process. And it came in the form of a seven day toothapalooza. On December 11th, I ran my finger along Lola's gums to soothe the ache of teething only to find that that razor sharp tooth had finally sliced through her gums.

Why was this so jarring to me? I knew it was coming. I could feel the raised line of the tooth straining against the tissue of her lower arch for weeks. She was approaching 6 months. She had been drooling, red-cheeked and a bit off her game for weeks. This was not a surprise. But still I was jarred by it. I sat on the sofa in a bit of a stunned, silent moment of disbelief or perhaps denial.

Five days later Meg lost one of her front top teeth. I pulled it out in fact and then proceeded to sit on my knees in the middle of our living room with her little stump of a tooth in between my fingers and a tear in my eye. What had I just done? This was the tooth that would make her say "toof" instead of tooth. This was the tooth that would change the shape of her face and soon be followed by an adult tooth that will look awkward, and misshapen and ten times too big for her little mouth. And here I was holding it in my hand.

Closely on the heels of this, on the 18th of December, Lola's second tooth popped through her tender little gums. This was more than I could bare...

My mother has often spoken tenderly of her time spent with her fourth baby. She knew that this would be the last of her brood and she relished every little moment of that little ones first years. She held her, rocked her and cuddled her more than any of her three previous babes. At that point she had a 7 year old and three children under four years old. And yet she managed to create the time and space to give this baby a little more... Or in fact to give herself a little more of this baby. She has spoken about this so much in my lifetime that I wonder if she feels a little guilty that she never did that with the rest of us too. It comes up again and again when we are holding our babies as they sleep in our arms. I think she is trying to tell us that we will never be sorry that we did that. And as I hold this baby I now see the depth of what she was speaking. She was saying "don't be in such a rush". "In your joyful exuberance of motherhood don't wish away these precious days for the can't-waits of tomorrow" Meg cut her first teeth at 3 and a half months. I was proud. And I "couldn't wait" for the next great thing she would do. I was in a rush.

Now I am clutching at the moments and holding them close. The pendulum has swung wildly in the other direction. I am melancholy and wistful with each small change that takes Lola closer to becoming a little girl. I am so thoroughly ensconced in her infancy that I am forgetting that she is growing. One day a few weeks ago I sat her up to see if she could balance. She had it mastered in a few minutes. She had been ready for that weeks earlier but I had been blind to this fact. In my heart and mind she was still a newborn.

I absolutely and completely adore the people my two girls are becoming. Lola has a quirky charm that brings a smile to light on my lips hundreds of times a day. She looks at her sister with complete and total adoration ... Meg is a truly creative and independent soul. She loves deeply and does not hesitate for a moment to show it in any situation. She makes me laugh a lot and I admire her in a way I did not know was possible. When asked in the past who my hero was I would have answered "my mother" but now I would have to add that my daughter is too. This is a surprise to me. So I do look forward to seeing more of the people they will become. I really do... and for now I will try and find some balance. I will hold fast and let go. Or maybe for a little while longer I will just hold fast.

Tonight Meg lost the second of her front top teeth. She worked away at it herself all afternoon. It was hanging on by only one side and when it was very nearly falling out she lost her courage. She said she was scared and she didn't seem to know why. I was too. She called my mom and asked if she would come over. She wanted her to pull that tooth. Nanny is the go to lady when it comes to teeth. She pulled every last one of mine. I remember it clearly. Most of the time she was sitting on the lid of our green toilet seat with me standing between her legs. She would expertly squeeze my tooth right at the gums and it would painlessly pop out into the tissue she had used to get a grip. Tonight was no different. And immediately my big girl's face was changed. She looks beautiful. The huge gap in the front of her mouth making her look incredibly vulnerable and yet more mature. She made quite a production of the tooth fairy preparation tonight. Insisting that we leave her a snack, a small gift and a note. She has an absolutely blind obsession with fairies at the moment so this is almost a spiritual phenomenon for her. She mindfully prepared a beautiful alter on the bathroom counter for her fairy to behold. A snack of tiny chocolate covered sunflower seeds in a very tiny dish, a small piece of soft fabric that she found after a soulful search in her room (she imagined the fairy could use it as a sleeping bag), her tooth floating in a small dish of water, and a lovely handwritten note with pictures.

She will wake tomorrow to find that her fairy has taken her tooth and in doing so has dipped its wing in that dish, revealing its colour by tinting the water green. We have kept the water from each tooth she has lost in the freezer and in the spring we plan to water some flower seeds with it in hopes that they will grow with a bit of magic inside. Kinda like my girls...

...growing with a bit of magic inside.

...my genius of a husband.

Lately Dave and I have been struggling to find time to spend together. He is in the throws of the final weeks of his work for the year, he has been sick and I have been hitting the sack at the same time as Meg every night. We barely have time to discuss the very basics of our daily lives. Last Thursday evening I regrettably had to miss Yoga to go to our one and only prenatal class. It was just a little "preparing for your homebirth" session with our midwife. But I left that class feeling like we had been away for a weekend retreat! The 15 minute ride home in the car was bliss and I can't tell you why. It just was.

Last night we lay in bed together and talked about this whole"baby" thing. We are having a baby... Holy crap. I have got past that phase of "what the hell were we thinking" but I haven't completely gone beyond my anxiety about how this one singular event will change our family forever. Right now I am loving our Meg, even when she is whining and not cooperating. She is spectacularly cool right now and the way that she nurtures me is heart-swelling. I just worry about what direction things will turn in when our family grows by one. What I hadn't considered was something that Dave pointed out to me. Meg is who she is today because of this change in our lives. We have no idea who she would be if she wasn't growing into the role of big sister. She has become nurturing to me as a result of my needing it. She has matured in the last 8 months as a result of our circumstances. I am falling more deeply in love with her because we are both feeling the need to securely tether those heartstrings before we know their strength could be tested.

Isn't my husband a genius?

...something that feels like love.

The last few days I have found myself falling in love. The first little flutters of love are so sweet and exciting. And this has been a long time coming. Since I found out I was pregnant I have questioned our decision to do this whole thing again. With 6 years past since we were immersed in this world of indigestion and leg cramps leading to sleepless nights, boobs and poop, we were in the clear. We have a nice little groove going as a family of three. We struggle to find time for our adult relationships and squabble over parenting choices (among other things), but we have a happy family. Our daughter has grown into the coolest 5 year old on earth. All of the ups and downs of the first five years are finally paying off in the richness of this blossoming mother-daughter relationship. I crave to be around her and yet she doesn't NEED me in the way she used to. We just are. It is perfection. And now I have leapt. One of the only leaps in life you can't return from unchanged or intact. And we are now only two months away from our solstice baby. You would think that I would be growing more and more anxious about this fact but I am surprised at how things have changed...

This sweet little soul is finally making its way into my heart. I have to admit I am not the kind of person that goes gaga over babies. Maybe it is a result of my birth work and my love of mothers and fathers and their journeys into parenthood. I don't always hold the babies whose births I have just witnessed. Weird? Is this part of my ambivalence to this baby? Has it just taken this long for it's soul to settle in? Maybe I have been too preoccupied by my own struggle with pregnancy and just getting through each day. Or maybe as I suspect I have been doubtful all along that this was the right choice for our family. And now over the last few days I have begun to feel the first flutterings of falling in love. Baby is now moving in ways that feel so.... baby-like. I feel it's little foot push against my belly and when I push back it yields against my hand. It's like a game. Like we are discovering each other. In a way that dates and numbers don't tell you I can feel how close it is. Soon I will know it's little face.

Love Part II

Ironically another love has grown that I will soon lose to the emergence of this baby... I love a woman's pregnant body. I actually really love women's bodies to be honest. So round and soft ... almost as if you can see the fullness of life that they are able to bear. But that pregnant shape, it just looks so juicy! Like ripe fruit. It beats all other body shapes hands down. And I know I am not the only one that feels this way. The compulsion of other women to look at a blooming belly is obvious. Try and stop yourself. Having said all this I have never been in love with my pregnant body. In the year before conceiving Meg I lost 100 pounds. And although I felt great and looked fabulous with my clothes on... that extra hundred pounds had left it's lasting signs on my body. I was angry with myself for ever allowing that to happen. No amount of exercise would tighten the now loose and empty skin. I imagined that my full and pregnant body would once again fill out that belly which then lay deflated at my hips. I was so disappointed that it never did. That I would not be the hot mama in the bikini top and floppy sun hat in our families home movies. Instead I had this misshapen belly that never quite burst out with the ripeness of a watermelon.

This time I have slowly been won over by my body. Gradually I have watched my fullness force me to give into the reality of what was going on inside of me. And in the last week or so I have fallen head over heels in love with my big round belly. I choose clothes that cling to my shape and leave no doubt that I am heavy with this child. The baby doll style maternity clothes have found their way to the bottom of my dresser drawer in favour of shirts that I bought off the rack in the "regular" department. My belly precedes me wherever I go and yes, people are compelled to look at my ripe body.

Last weekend we put up a mirror in the front entry of our house. It has always been something I wanted. To check my hair on the way out the door or make sure there was nothing in my teeth before I went out in public. At long last I have a big, huge, beautiful mirror to greet me as I walk in my door. A gift from my aunt for our wedding 15 years ago. Made of wood reclaimed from a barn and an old school house I believe. It now has the perfect home. On Tuesday I walked in the door from my daily walk to drop Meg off at school and was greeted by the reflection of the most beautiful pregnant woman I had ever seen. Certainly not love at first sight... but nonetheless quite a sudden revelation.

So now the bittersweet irony settles in. I have finally found myself falling for two things at the same time. Two things that can't really co-exist. Or do they? Right up until I re-read those words I thought this was true. But how can I not be in love with this vessel and it's contents at the same time. Perfect! So for the next two moons I will drink deeply from this well of love. I know I will have many moons of love to follow as I get to know my newborn but this love is like no other. Maybe these next two months will allow me the opportunity to show Meg that there is more two having babies than puking and pain!