A gentle assignment

January delivered a beautiful day today. Yesterday was rainy and chilly and gloomy; this morning is blue skies and mild temperatures, full of false spring teases.  So I did what many a New Englander does on rare days like these: I went on a walk. Glorious vitamin D therapy! Fresh air in my lungs!

On the way home I passed a mom on the bridge, one child in the jogging stroller and one dawdling behind her. The stroller baby was asleep and the dawdler was poking at sticks and peering over the bridge at the water and squatting to examine bits of something-or-other. The mom was relaxed and watching, crouching sometimes to examine right along her son.* 

As I trudged up the hill and left the trio behind, I regretted not crossing the street and telling her how awesome she is + how lucky that boy is to have someone who lets him set the pace now and then + how she's making the world a better place a little at a time, every single day.

Shoot. I think I'm going to regret that all day.

So my gentle assignment to myself (and you, should you choose to accept!) is to catch a mom who's doing a good job and tell her.  Write a note, pipe up in the grocery store, leave a wide smile and a compliment.  

We all can use a little feedback + cheer now and then, right?

{Let me know how it goes + I'll do the same.}  

. . .

*Ah, I miss having a three-year-old dawdler, although I'm not sure I appreciated as much as I should have at the time.  I should channel that child wonder pace in my life now and then. Stop and look. Marvel and wonder.

Ah, normal days.

"Normal day, let me be aware of the treasure you are. Let me learn from you, love you, bless you before you depart. Let me not pass you by in quest of some rare and perfect tomorrow. Let me hold you while I may, for it may not always be so. One day I shall dig my nails into the earth, or bury my face in the pillow, or stretch myself taut, or raise my hands to the sky and want, more than all the world, your return."

~Mary Jean Iron, via Ali

I had a fantastic and energizing trip to DC last week...also very humbling and overwhelming! I feel like I'm standing at a threshold of a door and taking a deep breath before stepping through (do I want to step through? what does it mean for my life and my family? what can I give? what should I hold back?)

I'm relishing the return to normal days this week. Sam is home sick with a fever (and will be fine soon) and we are enjoying being cozy and homebound for now. I'm baking a bit and lighting candles and breathing. Folding laundry into tidy squares. Ah, I love margins and space between the busyness of mothering/life.

photo via

happy jumble

Happy to take off my mind:

• Did I register Lauren for driver's ed? Yes, I did.
• the paper for the class last night. I finished it yesterday. Whew, that was a close one.
• the presentation at the Harvard Faculty Club on Wednesday. Turns out, when I get exceptionally nervous I get really, really drowsy. In spite of my desire to find a quiet corner and nap, it went really well. And best of all? It's over!
• Was my house clean enough for the houseguests last night? No. Not even close. But oh well.

Still whirring in my mind:

• how to teach Lauren to be a good (safe, no accidents, please) driver?
• hmm, why does the stake have a big youth dance on Valentine's Day and New Year's Eve?
• are my kids too busy? and (unrelatedly) when will they learn to clean a bathroom really well?
• and, especially, how to best love and support an awesome friend who has been massively betrayed? and help her see that she's incredible and strong and will be fine?

Happy to look forward to:

• time with 2 longtime friends and 1 new one, staying with us for a long weekend*
• touring around Boston in this lovely early fall weather
• going to a concert by a little band that starts with U and ends with 2*
• slowing down a bit more to enjoy September
• maybe finally hanging a few pictures around the house? And curtains?
• apples and pumpkins and mums and soup and pies...autumn is my favorite

Happy weekend to you

* I am justifying these fun things and my trip to NYC (and, I'll be honest, anything else that comes along--hear that, Christie?) by classifying them as my happy 40th birthday fall extravaganza.

photo via loveyourchaos

Dispatch from up north

Bay View cottage, Adirondacks

(4 stings of three people in the first 15 minutes here. Ouch. We stay away from that side now.)

Conference call with a view

We're having a deliciously relaxing time in the woods of New York.

Rainy today, so we spent the day playing a 6-hour marathon of Monopoly.

If I ever run away from home, you might try looking here for me.

I'm loving this simple life of early bed times,

leisurely mornings,

and simple meals in a three-room cottage.

Why do I make life so complicated?

(I found a bar of internet coverage for a little window of time...we'll see if it loads!)