Lavender

photo: freefoto.com

This week we used the last of my daughter's baby (no tears) shampoo.  You know the yellow one that everyone gets a dozen bottles of when they have a baby.  Well I used the last of the 2 1/2 year old gift.  So off to the store I went and stared at the different types, finally settling on the lavender one.  Now I know that lavender is supposed to help one sleep but I've never been particularly in love with the scent.  Maybe it is too mellow for my taste.  Tonight I washed her hair in it for the first time and, yes, she promptly took a nap (much to my dismay at the time as we are strict nap boycotters in this house).  After she woke up she was very cuddly with us and her brother, father, and myself all spent considerable time smelling her hair.  It is a beautiful, intoxicating smell that caused us all to come back for second and third sniffs.  Later, as I read her Winnie the Pooh in bed she laid her head on my chest and I just absorbed the delicious scent of her.  As she fell asleep cuddled there all I could think was this is why I do this, this is why I'm here as a "stay-at-home mom".  I'll never have the time again to lay in bed with my vivacious two year old at one a.m. smelling her hair and loving the very essence of her.  

Maybe that is what embracing today means.  That I need to slow down and smell the lavender.

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Figuring it all out

Last year I discussed the concept of not having resolutions but instead using three words to focus the year on.  My words for 2009 were Reorganize, Define, and Explore.  I'm not really sure how I did with it as I spent a period of last year being depressed.  I mean really depressed.  Black hole end of the world depressed.  I tried to do many things but didn't feel like I had the energy.  I couldn't find happiness in my life.  I'm sad to admit this as I was looking forward to this time being mommy and trying to define myself but I instead found all this alone time to be daunting, scary, and well . . . lonely.  I felt trapped (especially economically) more than free.

Now my daughter is nearly 20 months and my son is about to end second grade.  I'm no longer black hole depressed as I was last fall.  As spring arrives I find myself coming more alive: digging in the garden, planting seeds, becoming more eco-focused, and wishing I had a more minimalistic (but creative) life.  I look at all the clutter in the house and wonder what I could make disappear all while accumulating more clutter.  My interests are tending to focus on other woman reinventing their lives.  I know that I need to have a more creative life than I currently have so I've been exploring the media of other's quests to reinvent themselves.  I loved Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert as well as her sequel Committed but was ironically disappointed that she found her happiness (in the end) in a man though I enjoyed her exploration of marriage. I am looking forward to the movie coming out with Julia Roberts.  I listen to Kimberly Wilson's pod casts almost religiously and have bought both her books.  I was actually jealous when I read on a theatre friend's blog (The Domestic Dandy) that he goes to her yoga studio.   I watched Julie and Julia this week.  I looked into buying the book but was surprised by how negative the reviews were.  I also looked into The Happiness Project which I found similar reviews.  I will probably read both of them in the future to form my own opinion.  I also have bought The Artist' Way and while I started reading it (before my depression set in last fall) I have not instituted the concepts (morning pages, artist's dates) into my daily life. 

I would love to make a declaration here on my blog that I am going follow these courageous women (and men) who have sought to reinvent their lives and write about it but I am not sure I'm ready for such a step as I m afraid to state so and disappoint (mostly myself) so I'll let it lay here that I am in the process of exploration.

Picture: View from Bike Path back of building overlooking Spring Creek