changes are afoot

As I confront returning to work, I've been thinking a lot about how hard it is to be a mother - at least the sort of mother who has any aspirations for herself beyond the flourishing of her family.

It's hard to be a stay at home mother. The extreme division of labor - the roles for mother and father that seem to have such little overlap or flexibility - well, you know, I've talked about this here before. I do find myself looking around every so often, wondering how exactly I got to be a 1950s housewife. The crucial difference being, I suppose, that Mike and I can talk about it and consider together how to find a more satisfying sense of partnership in our relationship. But given our roles, it feels like the deck is stacked against us.

It's hard to be a working mother. I feel a deep attachment to my kids, a need to be with them and care for them. And man oh man, are they are wacko for me too. The kind of clinging to my legs, climbing on my back whenever I squat down to pull something out of a lower cabinet sort of wacko that can drive me batty. But what can you do? There it is. Is it about nursing? Spending nine months inside me? However it happened, they are attached.

I have been feeling ready to return to (part-time) work for months now. I've certainly been looking! But now that work is a concrete possibility, I'm confronting what it will really mean to leave my children in the care of someone else. I've got a bad case of maternal desire, and though it doesn't have to be duking it out with my desire to work outside the home, it sometimes feels that way. The truth is that Gabriel sobs nearly every time I leave the house. He knows something is up these days, but he's kind of always been that way. I feel a deep sorrow, anticipating what we both will go through when we make this change.

Is it worth enduring the pain of separation?

I miss my independence. I resent the way becoming a caregiver for dependent children has turned me into a dependent myself -- financially, certainly, but in other ways too. Every solo trip to the gym, every haircut, every errand that falls between the hours of 5:30 am and 7:30 pm requires some negotiations. (Perhaps this is why the old world abuela system seems to persist. Think of all those abuelas who have spent their entire adult lives as dependent caregivers! There should be World Abuela Day, when everyone is required to not only give grandma the day off, but to bring her to a massage therapist and foot the bill.)

And ugh, resentment can be so corrosive. Mike is an emotionally astute, supportive and caring husband who absolutely wants me to be happy (even if it means giving up homemade bread and all the other perks of having me at home). But his job is terribly demanding and engrossing, and he needs to work a lot. And we don't have an abuela to boss around (thank goodness, dear mother and mother-in-law, that you are not that person in our family!) or an au pair, or a maiden aunt next door, and so it falls on me.

I do believe working will help us balance out our roles and lighten some of those nagging, quiet resentments. Maybe it will send the children clinging to Mike's calves a bit more. Certainly it will reshuffle the family roles in such a way that I feel very good about; as the children get older I am aware that I don't want them thinking this is what men and women are supposed to do. And if I don't want them thinking it, that might suggest I don't want to be doing it myself.

So maternal desire and professional desire need not be battling it out after all! (Have I convinced you? Have I convinced me?) No, really - deep down I know it wll be good for all of us when I have meaningful work that requires me to leave my children for a few hours a week in order to do it. I won't have to ask permission to go. I'll use parts of me that long for exercise and exposure to the open air.

I only wish it didn't have to hurt so much.

crafting notes

This was the scene in my kitchen at 6:15 this morning.

Gabriel's idea - and he took such pleasure in his ability to identify colors and guide the little beads onto his pipe cleaner. Behold, fine motor skills! It is not surprising that the two kids ran downstairs and immediately started in on some crafting. We've been stepping it up around here lately - and it seems to generate more and more projects (perhaps because we are terrible about cleaning up and there are bits of markers, beads, paint, felt etc all over the place and accessible, to inspire the next round of creative work.)

Besides awful clean-up practices (or rather, the lack of clean-up practices) I think Gabriel's new abilities are inspiring him, and in turn inspiring Frances. And maybe inspiring me, too. Look what I just bought!


I purchased this from a lovely woman via Craigslist. She was my age, and told me she had received it as a present for her 15th birthday. She was only selling it now because she had upgraded. I admired her in so many ways. A true crafter! It took having children, and the joy of sharing all sorts of artistic and creative endeavors with them, to get me started. Unlike so many of my friends, blog readers, and mother, I just didn't seem to have it in me. I was exposed to knitting, quilting, sewing, and gardening since I was a wee speck in her womb, so there's simply no excuse for my indifference. When I was fifteen I wanted to read novels in our hammock all day, the pleasures of stretching out in the warm sunshine and deepening my tan being secondary to the pleasure of checking out of regular life and spending open expanses of time in a world made of words.

Oh, that still sounds so good, doesn't it?

But back to the sewing machine. What will I do with it? I don't know! But I am very, very excited to try it out. If any of you have any suggestions for a beginning sewer, do pass them on.

I also experimented over the weekend with stenciling using freezer paper, a method I learned about in Amanda Blake Soule's lovely book, The Creative Family. So many great ideas therein. I used one of her images - I drew a larger picture by hand, to fit the t-shirt we were working on. This is a gift for Frances and Gabriel's cousin Lily, who is almost four, and loves giraffes.



It's simple to do and very satisfying: draw an image on a piece of freezer paper with the shiny side down. Use an exacto knife or a tiny pair of scissors (think manicure) to cut it out. I did this on a piece of cardboard. Then place your stencil (still shiny side down) on whatever you want to beautify, and place another sheet of freezer paper underneath the fabric (in this case, inside the shirt) with the shiny side up. Iron for a few seconds, to make the stencil 'stick.' Paint using fabric paint, let it dry for a few hours, then unpeel and voila! Your transformed shirt (or tote bag or pants or dishtowel) is finished.

As you can tell, this is a mostly adult project. Between the knife and the iron, I thought it best to work on it during naptime. But Frances did enjoy painting in the stencil and helping to peel it away. And she also loved coloring in the giraffe that was cut away to form the stencil to make a little birthday card. And I have all sorts of ideas for gifts to make for the kids using this technique...

Finally, I found these pictures on the last 'roll' when I uploaded this morning. Check out Frances and her friend Henry, decked out in their kingly best, reliving the joys of a first real sleepover the next morning.

when in doubt, bake cookies

No new insights to report tonight. No charming anecdotes, no hand-wringing over sleep or peer groups or plastic toys. I am still feeling my returned health as a small miracle, and because of that, I seem to be reveling in the basics. I have been reading stories and singing songs all day, with renewed gusto. And now that my appetite and digestive operations are back on track, I just want to bake. And eat.

Just in case any of you are in the same mood, here are some delicious cookies I made today, sans small helpers, just for the smell and taste and overall satisfaction of it all in my quiet kitchen.

I had a can of pumpkin in my pantry, intended for some holiday recipe that was conceived and never realized. I had half a bag of determined, sturdy little cranberries in my fridge, having persevered in the same corner of a crisper drawer for weeks.

Muffins? Nah. Today, I am thinking about going back to work. I am anticipating a second interview next week for an intriguing job, feeling strangely peaceful in my not-knowing what the outcome to all this will be. Mike has been a patient and supportive listener for days on end. The kids were great this afternoon. Gabriel insisted on many kisses-on-the-lips from Mama and a million hugs from Didi.

Okay, so it's not just my health inspiring this mood. It feels as if someone opened a window wide in my life, and a new season's breeze is gently blowing us all about.

An occasion for cookies, if ever there was one.

This recipe is adapted just a tiny bit from Joy the Baker's Super Soft Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies:

2 cups white whole wheat flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg

2 eggs
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup canola or corn oil (I used 1/4 canola and 1/4 coconut, only because that's what I had on hand)
1 cup canned pumpkin
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 cup chocolate chips
1 cup roughly chopped fresh cranberries

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

Stir the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and spices together in a medium bowl and set aside. In a large bowl, using an electric mixer on medium speed, beat the eggs and sugar until smooth and lightened in color, about 1 minute. On low speed, mix the oil, pumpkin, and vanilla until blended. Mix in the flour mixture to incorporate it. Mix in the chips and cranberries.

I used a soup spoon to drop these onto the parchment paper, then gently flattened the tops so they weren't quite so lumpy.

Bake the cookies until tops are firm, about 16 minutes. Texture will be cakey; cranberries lend a lovely tart bite to all that sweet softness.

If you are lucky, you can time this to be able to offer your toddler (or partner, or roommate, or co-worker) a warm cookie as he emerges from his too-short nap, rubbing his eyes and teetering on the edge of grumpiness - and voila! The afternoon is saved.

my return from the abyss

Dear readers, I am finally feeling better!

But what a terribly long and discouraging illness it was. Last Friday, I woke up, went downstairs to shiver on the couch under a blanket and watch the children do their morning thing - nibbling on cereal and enthusiastically greeting all their toys after the night's separation. After a bit I felt the then-familiar wave of nausea crash into me, dragged myself up the stairs to the bathroom, and huddled over the toilet until I finally threw up. But before I was done I heard Gabriel happily burst through the door behind me, exclaiming, Mama's here! Hello, Mama!

At which point I realized there was only thing to do - only one way to make it through this awful illness - and so I waited what seemed like an eternity, until the reasonable hour of 8:30 or so, called my mother, and begged her to come. But begging wasn't called for. She just came. She came with the makings of chicken soup, beautiful pink tulips, and other groceries I needed. She came with a bright and decisive attitude. She sent me to bed and took over everything. And she stayed for four days!

Usually when my mother comes to visit us, she's the grandmother, I'm the mother - and the host - and the children enjoy us accordingly. I make dinner, I change poopy diapers, I make sure there are clean towels (or at least try to) for my mom to use. My mom reads lots of stories, plays games, comforts and entertains, and brings treats. It works rather nicely, I think. But this time, when I opened the door to my mother feeling very ill and shaky, she walked through the threshold as The Mother. The Mother In Charge.

So I did what she said, and went to bed, from where I could hear her mothering my kids. She made them snacks, and tied shoes, and asked them to behave, and put the dishes away. She made decisions about dinner and baths. She was amazing. I sat and coughed in my haze and listened. Sometimes I came downstairs for a little and curled up on the couch and watched it all happen.

I was watching bits of my own early childhood - my mother at the stove, my mother on the floor building train tracks, my mother reading stories flanked by two small children who could easily have been my sister and me. This was so very familiar. I also had a sense that I was standing back and watching my own life with my kids; this was what we usually did. This was our life, and honestly, it looked pretty good. How nice to know!

I felt a continuity between her mothering and my own; I realized that what I do and how I do it with my kids is something I started learning a very, very long time ago. I wonder about Frances's far-off mothering. Will she hold her head just that way? Will she sing song after song with pleasure? Will she bring the same energy, and the same vulnerabilities to frustration, to life with her own babies?

(I also wondered about Gabriel, and how this chain of mothering will impact who he grows up to be, and how he fathers his children. I thought - am still thinking - about gender, and not without some sadness. It is harder to imagine him at the stove with trains at his feet as an adult - but of course my children surprise me all the time.)

And so, my mother gave us the extraordinary gift of her care. But she also gave me some perspective, and a sense of awe - I felt my own indebtedness to her, and to her mother and all the mothers who came before. Whether they were 'good mothers' or not, in ways that I am still unaware of, they brought me here.

And now, thank goodness, I am much better. What else has been keeping me from the blog? A delightful weekend spent with friends. Outings to Kinder Farm Park and the SERC, taking advantage of glorious sunny days.

And finally, a job possibility that has me very stirred up. There has been a lot of talking and a lot of thinking about this one in our house. Confronting change is never easy, is it?