Month: May 2014

My second Mother’s Day event this week was the Grace Lutheran Mother’s Day Tea on Friday. This was the first year to celebrate the tea with just Mateo. Sometimes I feel sad that Teo doesn’t get the same one-on-one time that Sienna, as the oldest, got for those three years she was an only child. So, I love any chance to spend time just the two of us!

I got there a little early and got enlisted to help finish up the food, which I was happy to do. I’d just washed my hands and announced that I was going to get Teo from his classroom when I saw a teacher bring in a bunch of the kids. I spotted Teo and made a beeline for him. He wasn’t facing my direction and I saw him scan the room of mothers, clearly looking for his. I felt a rush of emotion seeing him look concerned and so vulnerable, plus the rush of excitement of anticipating his face breaking into a smile when he finally saw me. My expectations weren’t off. I said, “Teo, I’m right here.” He turned around the broke into the biggest, best grin and folded into my arms as I stooped down to hug him. Love is awesome.

Lunch was nice- I had chicken salad on an amazing multigrain bread (anytime I eat bread is a momentous occasion!). Teo and I got to chat – I asked him about his Wee Dance class that had just ended. We chatted with the other moms and kids at our table. This was a much lower key event that Sienna’s performance, but really fun and relaxing. At one point in our meal, Teo asked the little boy next to him (either Carson or Garrett – they’re twins!): “Wanna chase me?” Sure enough, the end of lunch turned into the kids running around the Fellowship Hall while moms and teachers told them to slow down and otherwise diverted disaster. Fairly typical for preschool events.

Mateo’s gifts for me made me giggle and cry. One is this picture of him holding a flower in a frame that says “If you were a flower in the Garden of Love – I’d choose you.” Cute. My favorite was this sheet of questions that he answered about his mom (his teacher interviewed him):

My Mom’s name is: “I think it’s mommy”

She is special because: “she goes to bed”

I like it when my Mom: “makes good lunches”

My Mom can do anything! I think she is best at: “going to bed, and I don’t know…”

My Mom has the best smile. It makes her smile when I: “make silly faces”

My Mom is so smart! She even knows: “how to go potty”

My Mom is as pretty as: “a wedding dress”

I asked Mateo if the going to bed comments meant me going to sleep or me putting him to bed? He confirmed what I guessed, he was referring to me putting him to bed. Our nightly routine is the best part of my day too. The potty comment made me laugh so hard I cried!

At the bottom Teo wrote his name! I know I’m biased but looks pretty good for a 3 year old. 🙂

Happy Mother’s Day to all the mommy’s out there!

The week leading up to Mother’s Day is so fun!  Today I joined all of the mommies of Sienna’s classmates to be honored by our sweet Kindergarteners.  Their class put on a play called “The Enormous Carrot”, sang us songs, and made us gifts.

All the moms were ushered into the classroom and seated at the kids’ small tables.  We found our places by locating the picture of our child along with the name we’re known by around campus: “Sienna’s Mom”, “Leah’s Mom”, etc.  At each place setting was a plate made by our child with a slice of carrot cake (keeping with the theme), a small bottle of orange soda, and some healthy treats.

The performance was adorable and well done!  But, the best part was when their teacher read aloud each child’s description of their mom.  The sheet prompted the kids to put their mom’s name, height, weight, favorite food, and favorite activity.  She read the last four items first and we were supposed to guess who it was.  Most of the kids had outrageous heights (over 20 feet was common) and weights that were all over the map (the largest of which was 100,000 pounds!).

Sienna wrote: “My mom’s name is Kelsey. She is 5 feet tall and weighs 8 pounds.  Her favorite food is soup.  Her favorite thing to do it play Barbies.”   I asked her later if she sees me eat soup often (I don’t) and she replied, “You do when you’re sick.”  Fair enough.  Then she said that Barbies are my favorite because I just gave her all of my old ones and play with her sometimes.  So sweet!

The whole after-noon was very touching.  I loved watching all the moms gaze at their children so lovingly and the kids beaming at their moms with joy. I was smiling constantly for a full hour!

But, the thing that got me most misty eyed was when I first arrived and Sienna’s teacher leaned in conspir-atorially to tell me: “Sienna was really concerned and told me that you can’t drink the soda.  If you want something else, I have bottled water too.”  Earlier in the week, Sienna told me that she suggested some healthy food and drinks for the event because her mommy “can’t have that stuff because of her diabetes”.

It’s hard to describe the feeling of having my daughter display this kind of insight and concern about me.  Being a parent and having diabetes each cause emotion in their own right – put them together and it’s kind of overwhelming.  I hate that she would worry about me but then I feel proud that she’s thoughtful and aware of my disease.  Mostly, it just makes me feel how much I love my sweet girl.

On Friday there’s a Mother’s Day Tea at the preschool.  Can’t wait to have special mommy time with Teo too!

Dennis and I are starting to see and feel the fruits of doing less, particularly on the weekends. For the past four Saturdays, we’ve had very little planned. The day before Easter we went to a party in the late afternoon to dye Easter eggs with friends, which was super fun and relaxing. That’s literally the only event or activity we had predetermined, going into the weekend, for the past month. This is honestly uncharted territory for us, but we have loved it!

Last weekend we ended up getting ladybugs and plants at our local nursery. We then put in our little vegetable and herb garden and spent the rest of the cloudy, cold day hanging around the house and watching movies. A couple weekends before that, Dennis worked on a puzzle, Sienna did dozens of rainbow loom bracelets, and we got some cleaning done around the house. All the while, there was plenty of time to listen to the kids stories, play spontaneous games, and indulge any silly whim (like setting up a fort for all the kids’ stuffed animals) that Sienna and Teo dreamed up.

This weekend Sienna had her buddy over and they played in the kiddie pool in the backyard for hours. Teo imagined that he was a tree, an apple tree, specifically. He described his trunk, branches, and leaves and I pretended to grab apples off of him and eat them. That led to imagining he was The Giving Tree and I mock chopped him down. Such a simple moment of play that absolutely requires being in the present and entering the world of a child.

Last Sunday evening, Dennis and I remarked that these unstructured weekends have felt so long. I’m sure that partially has to do with Mateo waking us up at 6:00 a.m. each morning! But, it’s mostly because we’ve relaxed, had space to do whatever felt right at the time, and really connected with each other as a family. We’ve enjoyed this change of pace so much that we’re finding ourselves reluctant to make plans very far ahead! Making space and time in our lives for spontaneity has been amazing.

Our little guy Mateo (aka Teo) is really coming into his own and displaying quite a personality!  My favorite thing he often says is the inspritation for this blog title: “I love you in the whole wide world and Jesus made you in the whole wide rainbow!”  He’ll tell us this in response to “I love you, Teo!” or really for any reason.  This video was my attempt to record him saying this endearing phrase:

He’s also got some interesting little quirks.  The most ridiculous is his absolute hatred for mommy wearing a ponytail.  Whenever my hair is pulled back he becomes really upset and begs me to take it out.  “Mommy, no ponytail!” he’ll whine and cry.  If he even sees me reach to pull my hair off my neck, he’ll shout “Mommy, don’t put your hair in a ponytail!”  I’ve tried to figure out why it bothers him and he’ll say it’s scary.  I think it just doesn’t look like mommy to him.  For the record, I don’t take a ponytail out at his pleading.  But, I may postpone pulling my hair back until he’s left for school sometimes… why stress him out unnecessarily, right?

It’s so fun to watch him grow and display all these parts of his personality.  Sweet, loving, quirky… he’s just our Teo.