The Mommy Hug

I was deeply saddened to learn of the death of Elizabeth Edwards. I don't know if I was already in need of a good cry or what  but after reading several stories about how she chose to prepare her three remaining children (two of them are under thirteen, one grown) for her inevitable good bye, I found myself running to the bathroom in desperate need of tissue. I'm still emotional as I write this. She prepared them. As best she could. To her satisfaction. Then she could go. We know as mothers the plan is to live long, but not longer than your children. That's unthinkable. And so while I know she wanted more time, like any good mommy if given the choice, she would rather her children live on. She had a son who died at sixteen (unthinkable) and she called him an angel and was comforted by the thought of being reunited in Heaven with him. My thoughts went to my own feelings about being a mom. How could they not? I thought about something I now had that only my son could have given me. The Mommy hug. It's the hug I give my child every day several times a day. Oh, I always gave warm hugs. I come from a huggy family. But the way I hug now is... I realize that I hug my child with all my soul. My prayers. My hopes and dreams for him. Each time. Subconsciously I want to reassure him that if God forbid, something happened to me and it was my last hug, he would know how very much I love him and that I know how much he loves me.That it's going to be alright. He would know that being a mother is the greatest gift God gave me in a lifetime full of great gifts. He would feel how much I pray to God for his safety and his extreme happiness. He would know that with every fiber of my being I know he is going to rock the Universe the way he rocks my world! He will never have to wonder if he hugged me tight enough. In fact he will know that he gave me the Mommy Hug. A hug so jam packed with love, that when talking to his grandchildren or great-grands, he would be able to recall with perfect sense memory what my hugs felt like. I can imagine Elizabeth poured her soul into each and every hug. And although it could never take the pain of losing her away, those children don't have to wonder about the most important things ... the love between them. I totally get why my own Sweet Mommy's hugs are so comforting to me. Her hugs turn me into an instant four year old and I want to just curl up on the sofa and wait for her to make me a grilled baloney and cheese sandwich (even though I'm a veggie) with the crust cut off and a cup of hot chocolate to dunk it in! I'm smiling because my brother and I gave her that hug. The Mommy Hug.The cool thing is, when I meet new people or when I greet those I already know, all of my squeezes seem to be wrapped in this maternal blanket. So here's the deal ... every story about Elizabeth had the predictable paragraphs dedicated to the retelling of the non cancer related drama she went through these last few years of her life. What stood out online and on TV without exception was her love for her children. Because that is ultimately what matters. Go on. I know what you're going to do. I'm going to do the same thing right now. Elijah just woke up from his nap. Hug time.

Things to do... when you don't have the time!

My mornings are always rushed and hectic,which I know you can all relate to. So as I sit here blogging while putting on lipstick and running back and fourth to the kitchen to make breakfast for my guys (I should have been fully dressed a half hour ago), I remind myself of something. Don't forget to breathe deeply, don't forget your lip gloss and travel size hand lotion (running late is no excuse for dry and ashy parts) , and most important don't forget to say thank you. I choose to say thank you to God for all of my blessings. Starting off my day with gratitude instead of attitude helps me make a much needed adjustment before I let stress get the best of me.There is always something to be thankful for. So here's the deal... if you're reading this now and it's almost 8 AM, you're probably late.Go on, get outta here! Hurry! But don't forget to say thank you first.

The CYCLE of life!

It's really something how certain things in our daily routine can unify people from all walks of life. I've just dropped off my six year old son at school and I hear a mom pleading with her boy, "Please be good today. Listen on the first time. Keep your hands to yourself. Finish your work. Please. Pleeeze!" It's the same exact conversation I had with my son only moments ago! And her son is giving her the same exact visual response my son gave me! Not a full roll of the eyes because he knows that won't be tolerated, but it's a half roll with a side stare off into the distance. I whip my head around to see who it is because it feels like we all have the same kid, we just didn't realize it. I hear a husband and wife in the grocery store debating whether or not it matters what kind of toilet tissue they get and why do women use sooo much of it anyway? I have to back up and check to see if the wife is talking to Billy because we just had this talk! It is the same thing with our Dance With Me classes. Women come up to me after and share their stories or ask my advice about things. It never ceases to amaze me how alike all of us are. Most women grow to learn that if they are around a certain group of other women all the time, eventually their menstrual cycles will be in sync. If that's not a great example of God's sense of humor, I don't know what is.Woe be unto the men who get on the wrong side of that! So I guess it shouldn't have surprised me that many of our mommy students were going through the same issues at the same time.We all hug each other a lot and that's how the pheromones get moshed together in the first place. A couple of weeks ago there was a cloud of doom over every class we had one day. It was one story coming out of the mouths of several different women. The guilt involved with wanting to be a good wife or mother or both depending on the individual situation. It was tearing some of our students apart.You don't worry about putting yourself last on the list because you're not on the list at all! You love your family so much and yet you feel over stretched and under appreciated. Somebody say AMEN!  You can't get ahead. You're overwhelmed. You want to be successful at everything but you feel like you're failing miserably. And worst of all, sometimes you're not as patient with your kids as you want to be. Sometimes when you're trying to think for just a second and your children are calling MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY non- stop... you have the audacity to let it get to you.You feel like you're going to snap! There's the guilt. Your husband keeps missing the trashcan and so a pile of trash  (unnoticed by everyone... but you) has accumulated right beside it. You are maniacally amused by this.You're also tired. And don't get sick! There's no sick leave for you! Your arm is falling off? Tape it up and get back to work! The house won't clean itself ya know. What? You're not a stay at home mom? Shame on you. Shame. How selfish. No wonder things at home are crazy. You only care about your own needs. Does any of this sound familiar in any way? Think I can't relate? Ohhhh but I do. I relate to all of it. I consider myself to be both a working mom and a stay at home mom. I know that sinking feeling when you're trying to be on top of everything and instead you're plummeting toward the bottom. It finally dawned on me that we beat ourselves up because we are good wives and mothers. We do care! Very much! We are trying our best to do something that even on the greatest day will never be perfect! Forget about perfect. What we need to remember is, there is a difference between being selfish ( which some people truly are) and taking care of yourself first so that you can be strong and whole enough to be the very best you! Which ends up being better for everyone around you. An exasperated, resentful, mommy is not what we set out to be. But on certain days when we feel ourselves going down that road it's usually because we've answered everyone's call but our own. We know the best life is a well balanced one so tending to all things but you may seem like the right motherly plan at first, but it has to implode at some point. It is necessary to get a handle on this concept because you are setting an example for your children. You are teaching them how to treat themselves and how they should expect to be treated. You have to stop feeling guilty about needing time to regroup. You have, after all, the hardest job on the planet! Billy and I feel our marriage should come first so that we set a good example for our son. So that he sees his mom and dad love each other and him as well, not just two parents that only deal with each other through the child. There's a difference. Michelle Pfeiffer has this great line in the movie The Story of Us where she says that marriage is a dance perfected over time. I say you better get a great pair of dancing shoes because life is never going to be perfect. That's not the point of it. It's about the dance itself. Now I  could definitely be accused of being partial to dance metaphors, but what I'm really trying to say is... GIVE YOURSELF A BREAK !!! And give yourself credit for being able to keep all the balls in the air at one time. Life is already a roller coaster, and our hormones are on their own up and down ride. It's like sitting Disneyland's Matterhorn on the lap of Magic Mountain's Colossus. Wow. I'm pretty sure I just overdid the metaphor thing. Yeah. So, here's the deal... the next time you start to feel like you're falling into the abyss, remember a few things; You're definitely not alone, you should give yourself some extra TLC, and most of all take time to laugh at the fact that if your touchy- feely behind weren't so overly huggy,  friendly and wonderful , there wouldn't be so many of us wearing your pheromones and going through the same thing!

So Absorbent!

If you are the parents of very young children, some part of your day probably consists of mentally drowning out the jingle of an insanely popular kid's TV show that evidently has more purchased airtime than CNN. Yes.You're going about your adult duties like the grown up grown person you are, not stopping for any reason except for the millisecond it takes you unconsciously mouth the answer to the questions posed by that jingle. 'Yat dat da da da da yat dat da da?' "Sponge-Bob-Square-Pants!" 'Yat dat da da da da yat dat da da?' "Sponge-Bob-Square-Pants!" It's like breathing. You don't notice. You mouth the answer in rhythm and you even do the whistle at the end but you don't notice that either. What you do notice (and at times rely on) is that no matter what time you turn on the TV, the maniacal laughter of that eternally optimistic cleaning pad will be there to greet you. It's the under age version of the movie Groundhog's Day. At some point will also spend time wrestling DVDs of  The Sponge (you know you own 'em) out of your child's hands, explaining to him/her that they should read a book, clean their room, play outside, color, anything other than watching the Krabby Patty flipping fry cook again. After all, Billy and I are a hard working couple trying to set the best example we can for our son and we're not going to let some mindless TV get in the way of that.We want him to learn to seek joy in every situation. Find the good in people. Take pride in his work. Be a loyal friend. We want him to learn never to lie, cheat, or steal anything no matter how small. It's like that time Squidward wanted to go on strike against Mr. Krabs because Krabs is so greedy and SpongeBob didn't know what striking was because he truly loves his job so much but he was being a loyal friend to Squiddy and happily went along with it thinking that it was a fun thing and... uh... well what we are trying to teach our son is that he has a purpose in life and he doesn't have to be a celebrity to have self worth. Like the time SpongeBob ripped his pants by accident and then because of the reaction by his friend Sandy the squirrel and the rest of the inhabitants of Bikini Bottom he thought he needed to keep ripping them in order to be funny and popular but then he learned that he was special just as he was because... well... I know it seems like... but it was actually a great lesson for... it was a pretty good episode. Okay, I can't be the only person who has noticed over time that aside from having a laugh that makes you want to bang your head against a brick wall to make it stop, the Bobster isn't such a bad little guy... sponge. He lives in a pineapple under the sea without one bit of concern for whether or not his pineapple will be featured on MTVs Cribs, he is honest, genuinely joyful, encouraging to everyone (even when people... uh fish are openly mean to him), he's hard working, helpful, and yes, funny as H-E-double hockey sticks! So here's the deal... even though sometimes it may seem like you are fighting a losing battle with everything your kids are being exposed to, remember you are the parent. You're in control. TV, like anything else can be used as a learning tool and you have the power to use it a little or not at all. Not to worry. You are your child's first and most important teacher, and they are soaking you up like a... well you know.

What Goes Around, Comes Around... and around...and around...

When Billy and I first got engaged, one of our favorite things to do was go to amusement parks and ride whatever was the biggest roller coaster over and over again. We'd go on a weekday while school was in and we'd have our way with whatever park we chose. Most of the time it was Goliath at Magic Mountain, and when they added bigger ones we'd conquer those. I say conquer because we were cocky about it. We'd go through the gates with a swagger knowing that we were going to ride at least fifteen times in a row. Our bodies could take any G forces a coaster could dish out. We could eat and go right back on. In fact we would eat in line so as not to lose momentum. This went on from whatever time we got there until the park closed. We watched as lesser couples, mere mortals, eventually went home. We threw our heads back, hands on our hips, Super capes blowing in the wind, and we laughed our hearty Super laugh. Leaving already? Ha ha! We're off to get Churros! Those were good times. Fast forward ten years later. We are taking our son to the indoor merry-go-round at the nearby mall for the first time. I elect to hold the "mommy bag" and all of Billy's stuff so that he could buy tokens (a handful of them) and take our little one on the ride. Now Elijah has eagle eyesight so he knows daddy has enough tokens to ride... oh at least fifteen times in a row. Elijah picks the cup that spins instead of a horse or elephant. Billy crams his six foot three frame into the tiny cup. He is unsuspecting. Innocent. Blinded by love for his son. It's the merry-go-round for goodness sake. Each cycle is only like a minute long. It's tame. It's for children. It's... spinning faster than anything I've ever seen in my life! When the minute is up, Elijah leaps out of the cup and runs around to the front of the ride. My big strong husband has been replaced by a shaking, wobbling, shell of a man and he's... green. "Again daddy!". The look on Billy's face is hysterical and I'm loving holding the "mommy bag" right now. I mouth the word 'wussy' to him as he pitifully gears himself up for another cycle. Another dizzying minute passes and Elijah seems to be gaining strength from the revolutions. Billy is more shaky, much more wobbly, and greener than algae. "AGAIN DADDY!!!". "Mommy should take a turn. We don't want to leave mommy out.", Billy says."No daddy, you and me five more times, then me and mommy." OHHHHHHHHH SNAAAAAAAAP!!! Somehow, after the third go round Billy convinced our son it was time to eat. Actually I think he said if we didn't stop for lunch we were going home. That always does it for a child. At some point during lunch (Billy couldn't eat) the "mommy bag" conspicuously moved over to my husband's side in preparation for me to take over spinning cup duties. I had been cracking on him for the last hour and welcomed the chance to prove that he was being a big baby. I happily jump into the cup with our son. The ride starts. It's not Magic Mountain but hey, we're parents and this is so much fun, so cute, so... sickening, I think I'm going to vomit my skin off! What is this carousel of pain?! Now Billy is all 'I told you!' and I'm trying not to fall to my knees. I'm also trying to keep Elijah from noticing that Billy has five thousand tokens left in his pocket. I am not going to ride this four more times! Mommy's not goin' down like that! I tell Elijah that the rest of the tokens only work for the other little games and such in the mall and steer him in their direction. I know. I lied to my son. But the bile was rising in my throat. I panicked. As Elijah bounced over to the games, Billy and I walked close behind him holding on to each other for dear life because the mall was still spinning. Fearful that this was an indication of our getting older, we chalked up our sickness to the fact that the cup was spinning inside something that was already spinning. Yeah, that's it! Of course. We still got it. We're still the coolest coaster riders everrrrrrrrr! Fast forward a few months later. We take Elijah to Disneyland and he begs us to go on Space Mountain. That's our ride! I'm proud and terrified at the same time. He's only four. How could he not be afraid? I know Billy and I can handle it because Space Mountain is our light work, if you know what I mean. Billy assures me our boy can take it, so we swagger in. It's darker than we remember. Faster too. I remember being able to hold my hands in the air but for some reason they're locked around the safety bar in a Kung Fu death grip. Before the ride comes to a complete stop, Elijah is already yelling to go again. I'm proud and terrified at the same time. He's only four! How can he not feel the onslaught of nausea that Billy and I are now feeling? We stagger out. What?! Not Space Mountain too. Please Lord, not like this! We wobble our way back to the beginning of the line with bouncy boy right in front of us. Ohh prepares you for losing your coolness. So, eighteen year olds call me ma'am. So what?! At least that's respectful. What really hurts is that I'm pretty sure I saw a younger couple mocking us that night. We were on our way home. Early. They threw their heads back and laughed, their Super capes blowing in the wind. They were eating Churros.

Shake Your Beauty!

My husband and I just finished celebrating National Dance Day with all of our Dance With Me family and their families and friends. In addition to having the absolute best time, I was really moved by the look on everyone's faces as they danced.We challenged them to "bring it" and they did! These were men, women, and children who are not professional dancers and over half of them consider themselves to be shy or introverted. Yet, here we all were on a sunny Saturday outside surrounded by two hundred other people who cheered on or joined in at various times. The power of music and dance. What I saw was what it looks like when one feels supported and encouraged and loved. No one was judging anyone else. We don't allow that in our classes anyway. I saw freedom and pure joy in their faces and it was... beautiful. In a city where "networking" is often mistaken for connecting, I saw people look each other in the eye and really see. There was a soul blending that, in my opinion, was very Avatar... except without the tail touching thing. They were exposed,  vulnerable, honest, sweaty and it was BEAUTIFUL ! Why can't that be on the cover of a magazine for a change? No fights broke out. No one got drunk and made a scene.The party went on for hours and everyone  remembered every bit of what went on the next day. But I was struck by the glow on each person's face.There are many products on the market to help simulate a glow but this was the real thing. And it came from the love we all share for dancing and how it makes us feel. Billy and I felt so grateful to be a part of it. The very best way I can describe it is this: You know when shows like Nova or the Discovery Channel show the fast motion footage of a flower from bud to full bloom? You get to see how many times the stem sways from side to side as it's growing and moving toward the light. That's how we feel watching our students work it on the dance floor. With much of our society focusing on artificial attractiveness, it is such a blessing to be surrounded by all that natural beauty. So here's the deal... the next time you start to feel that you are not pretty or handsome enough, stop right there and work what your mama or papa gave ya and dance it out like it's a Friday night because there's nothing more beautiful than your "glow" light!

Add Me!

    Can anyone remember when people used to go out and buy stationary to write letters on? I didn't realize how many potential phone calls I don't make. So much easier to text or email. No conversation needed.I think deep down I never really liked having to be on the phone. Modern technology caters to that considerable part of me that is shy and private. Yet... there is the bizarre need to be popular. Hmmm... what to do? And that's when you realize that all the cool kids have a MySpace account and you have to have one too! I can remember  how obsessed I got with adding "friends" to the profile that Billy designed for us with all the intensity and dedication of a brain surgeon. It could never be enough just to add our actual friends. Oh no. You're nobody until you have 20,000 people you've never met on your list.You know it's important because you start judging other people's profiles by their friend number. "Their band must not be so good...only 8,000 friends." Then you suspect others might be as shallow as you've now become so you add MORE friends. By this time something else twisted has set in. What if they don't accept my friend request?! Don't act like you don't care. You know you do. Does it mean I'm not cool enough? That's when it dawns on you that you're not cool because MySpace is sooooo two days ago and all your "friends" are on Facebook. More profile designing, more friend adding. And those numbers better be high. I can remember the days when I was ecstatic just to have a website. Now it's all I can do to juggle husband, child, home, career, and how many people wrote on our wall or poked us. Not one to be outdone, I flexed my politically savvy muscles and joined Twitter... and of course added "friends". What is really going on here? It's not as if we don't already have a million things to do each day. Do we truly have time to upload every move we make from our mobile phones? The internet has become the new school yard complete with cool kids, nerds, and jocks, etc. How many winking blinking gadgety things do you have on your page? But I'm not in school anymore and quite frankly didn't behave this way when I was. I jump up and down like a maniac when another person "likes" (thumbs up) our Meet The Blanks fan page, I track the ratings on each of our YouTube videos like Dorothy on tornado watch, and don't EVEN get me started on how high I need my score to be each week on Bejeweled Blitz! What's that about? Is this really connecting? Or have we just childishly developed a slick, high tech way of saying na  na  na  nee  na  na? Maybe I don't want to know. So here's the deal... if you're visiting this blog for the first time or even if you've seen it before, don't forget to click the Follow This Blog button before you go. All the cool kids have a lot of followers.

You Are Here

You know when you first go into one of those huge mega malls? You're excited. You're overwhelmed. You know what to expect. At least you think you do. Most of the big malls have pretty much the same thing so you know which places you want to hit. And because it's a "mega" mall, they don't just have a Tarjay, (Target, for those who don't speak French) they have a three story Tarjay, a stadium sized Sephora, rows of massage chairs to help you stay relaxed so you'll keep spending, and a food court on the top floor big enough to have it's own zip code. You're almost euphoric and you immediately calculate (the way you do at amusement parks) how much walking you're probably going to do in a couple of hours.Hold on there, hot foot! That's when a giant alarm should go off in your head because you are unconsciously preparing to trick yourself. Although you do burn calories just by being alive, shopping does not come under the heading of exercise no matter how fast you pull your money out.Yes, walking is great but you're window shopping a lot and that's more of a stroll, really.If you hit a snag and can't find what you're looking for, one of those thoughtfully placed "mega" information signs will point you in the right direction as well as give you some perspective on how much ground you've covered. When "Where You Are" is all the way across from "Where You Want To Be", you might even feel justified getting that cinnamon ball the size of an ottoman to keep you from getting light headed during your long trip up the escalator.That amazing smelling hunk of dough is just close enough to the helpful directory to make it seem helpful as well. Saved you from extreme hunger! Ohh, the mall design is no joke. It is far more clever than that of your local grocery store. The mall is cunning. You're not going there for food. You're going there for electronics, and baby clothes, and shoes, and linen, or to buy a gift for that thing you gotta go to that you don't really want to go to and... wait... is that Meatball On A Stick?! Right next to the ponytail kiosk? If you've been shopping longer than a half hour you are no doubt already feeling dwarfed and a little bit dizzy from the mega-ness. It's just one meatball, after all. Not a whole sandwich with bread or anything like that. Just breaded and on a stick. No, you didn't come here for food. In fact, the "food" is kept relatively far from you in that zip code needing food court. However, the frozen yogurt place is only two steps away, and Personal Pan Cookie is right around the corner. But with all the walking... surely by the time you actually get to the top floor to grab a bite you will have walked off those little pit stops.Yeah, right! Too bad that mall directory can't tell you where you really are. In between your favorite boutique and the penthouse smorgasbord (where things can get out of hand), is a mine field of strategically placed comfort eats and if you don't have your wits about you, you'll set yourself up for failure faster than you can say Dippin' Dots. The truth is, although it's more convenient to eat in the mall, it's actually better to have a well balanced meal somewhere else before you go in. I know many people don't like to try on things after they've eaten but it makes more sense to switch it around. You eat first.You're not starving so you're less likely to go for the first edible thing you see.You walk around for awhile, giving the food time to digest.You shop, you leave, you win! Seems like a small thing but when you connect enough of these conscientious decisions together, that's when you get the positive change for the rest of your life. So here's the deal... mall hopping is not a cardio workout, but making better choices for yourself will lead to feelings of giddyness and the irresistible need to dance with joy and that, I can assure you, is where you want to be.