Schmoopy

twelve

Dear Isabella,

I have sat down countless times to write this letter, but I am still not sure of what I want to say. When I think about the fact that you are now a year old, it's hard to wrap my mind around. Surely it wasn't a year ago that your daddy and I went to the hospital to meet you for the first time, was it? It doesn't seem possible, and yet it somehow feels as if you have always been here with us.

You have grown in so many ways and I could write volumes about all the cute and highly entertaining things you do, (like how when you hear music you put your hands in the air and shimmy shake) all the ways you change and grow each day (the photos tell that story), as well as the things you do that test my patience on a daily basis (can we please keep the books on the bookshelf?), but what I really want you to know is how much you were wanted by your father and I. We dreamed of you and waited a very long time for you, and for a while questioned if finding you was a possibility for us.

I had been told many years ago by someone who sees things that a little girl was trying to come into my life. He said that she would try a few times, but would only arrive when the time was right. I didn't understand what he meant at the time, I was 22 years old, but it all makes perfect sense now.

Experience has taught me a bit more about the mysteries of life and how sometimes, some of us, need to travel different journeys before we can walk the next. You indeed arrived at the right time after a couple of attempts, and in doing so allowed me to be a very different mother to you, and perhaps a better one than I may have had I not had to walk some difficult paths on my journey to you.

This gentleman also said that you would become my world and that you were going to be very special. It turns out he was right on all counts. Well, except for the part about how the man I was going to marry already had two children of his own. Unless there is a huge secret your father is keeping from us, or perhaps is unaware of, I believe you are the first child for us both. 

The day I gave birth to you was planned. I had a c-section scheduled due to a couple complications I had while pregnant with you. This means that mommy didn't experience the kind of labor that you see in movies of a woman's water breaking on someone's expensive shoes followed by the zany car ride to the hospital where lots of screaming and madcap hilarity ensue. There was no one boiling water or telling me to breathe. No one was screaming at me to push and I wasn't yelling at your father that I hated him and he did this to me. Au contraire, we were falling in love all over again with each passing minute.

Because we were prepared in advance for your arrival, it was all pretty calm, except for the excited nerves both your father and I had along with the giddy anticipation about finally becoming the three of us. However, let me just add that having a c-section was one of the strangest experiences I have ever had, I think your father still has nightmares about it, in fact. But none of it mattered because in the end, we held you safely in our arms.

I don't expect you to understand this feeling of pure love until you have a child of your own, should you choose to do so. But wow, that single moment of hearing your baby cry for the first time, no matter how your baby is delivered to you, is like the meaning of life being revealed. It's powerful beyond imagination, any mother will tell you this.

One of the reasons I had a c-section was that you were sitting breach in my belly, which means you were sitting upright like a little Buddha, rather than turning upside down like most babies do. We tried some gentle exercises to help you turn on your own, but found out while mama was in surgery that you weren't able to turn at all due to the positioning of your leg. Seems like you were practicing your high kicks in utero as you had one leg straight down and the other straight up. You are my super flexible baby.

Even now, you are most comfortable when you have your left leg straight up in the air. Whether you are in your stroller, your high chair, or a grocery cart, the first thing you will do is maneuver your leg so it is upright in some fashion. Where this comes from, I have no idea, but should come in handy should you decide to practice yoga, become a ballerina or join Cirque de Soleil I would imagine.

 

Angel, this first year spent with you has been the most blissful, challenging, wonderful, life-expanding, and yes, exhausting year of my life. Everything shifted the moment I heard that first little cry you let out as you entered the world. You were instantly familiar to me, you had my heart. I looked at your sweet face and felt that we already knew each other somehow and had much to share. For all three of us, this year has been about surviving in a strange, new world, growing, healing, bonding, laughing, dancing, singing, changing, learning and discovering. 

I am so excited for all the years to come. You bring us endless joy.

Love,

Mama

p.s. I have so enjoyed openly sharing these letters of your first year with friends, family and, well, the world. I want you to know that I made a decision a while ago to stop posting your letters here once you turned one. While it feels right to me to stop at this point and keep your future letters for your eyes only to do with as you please, mama still reserves the right to post as many photos and videos as she wishes of you through the years, because you're too cute not to.

photos: the day you were born, right after you were born, mother's day 2008, the morning of your one-year birthday

she then went on to eat almost the entire thing

quiet happy

 
photo of Isabella taken by my sweet and talented friend, Suzanne Leon

Jimmy and I decided to start a daily ritual where we check in to tell each other the happiest moment of our day. While we were settling into our evening I realized that this weekend was filled with many happy quiet moments; it was hard to choose just one. These moments were nothing over the top, just those teeniest tiniest simplest of moments (our ordinary sparkling moments) that warmed my heart and had me feeling quiet happy...

* Wrapped up in a scarf slowly sipping warm caramel tea on a breezy patio at an outdoor cafe
* Holding Isabella as she slept soundly in my arms while soft music drifted in from the other room
* The first glimpse of a faraway friend Jimmy and I haven't seen in a very long time
* Isabella feeding me toasted brown rice bread and laughing
* Listening to Isabella and Jimmy laughing hysterically in the bedroom while I was working
* Sharing cupcakes

Please feel free to share any quiet happy moments you experienced today

whispers

vintage letterpress letters on my bookshelf

From a very young age I have always wanted to be an artist. My big dream as a teenager was to live in a loft space in Sausalito where I could work and live. My paintings would be shown and sold in galleries and I would travel the world and meet interesting people. My smaller dream was to teach art in some form. I have done a bang-up job of ignoring both of those dreams.

I've been recently reading through old journal entries and this longing of wanting to be an artist is revealed on most every page. It seems no matter what I was writing about, the passion for living a creative life is documented throughout the years. There have been times in my life where I called myself an artist, and would feel like a fraud for doing so. Because I felt that I was lying when I called myself an artist, one day I just stopped. Stopped calling myself an artist, stopped dreaming about it, stopped trying to do anything creative at all.

Do you want to know something rather embarrassing? I have 6 blank canvasses that I have been holding on to since my early twenties, that would be about 17 years now. I often stare at them and think about what it might be like to paint on them... but it stops at the thinking part for the fear of actually doing it and not having it be perfect is paralyzing to me. Where does that come from? Art isn't meant to be perfect. Allowing our creations to be ugly is part of the beauty at times. But there they still sit.

Both Clover & Sage and Bella Wish allowed me to finally take the first steps to revisiting my journey of being my own boss and living a creative life. The birth of my daughter has been a great motivating factor for me in finally becoming a creative business owner. Something deep inside me shifted when she was born and time is something I no longer wish to waste. Starting my business has opened up a sort of flood gate of creativity for me. New ideas are flowing out of me like crazy and I am excited to be announcing some new projects very soon.

But still, in those quiet moments, my heart is calling out to me about something deeper. I have a longing, a yearning to be truly honest with myself after all these years about what it is that I really really really want in this life. Looking back over the years I have been an explorer. I would leap from one thing to the next in the hopes of finding my niche. I am sure many people, myself included, found this behavior quite flaky at times.

I now recognize it as something else. I am wondering what would happen if I were to revisit my original dream, the one that whispers to me still after all these years. In the past months, I have been collecting books on mixed-media painting techniques. I have fallen in love with my camera and we have built a solid and deep relationship based pretty much on play. I am still somewhat shy, but ready to reintroduce myself to paints and spend some time getting to know each other once again.

Through blogging, I have discovered mixed-media artists such as Sabrina Ward Harrison, Kelly Rae Roberts, Susan Tuttle and Christine Mason Miller and photographers like Susannah Conway, Darlene Kreutzer, Thea Coughlin, Denise Andrade and many many more. This has opened up a world to me that I never even knew existed. These are women who weave their stories into their art and help me see that being alive in your dream is possible. They give me permission to explore my truest passions. Their work, based on stories and images, resonates with me on such a deep level that I can feel my soul deeply sigh.

I can hear it whisper to me to claim my place as an artist and to forget about my sixth grade teacher who scolded me in front of the entire class for not drawing my fish exactly like hers. It reminds me to pay no mind to another art teacher my first semester of college who said my work had no symmetry and I should try and be more like the cute blonde girl with the mini-skirt and boots who did everything perfectly and was his favorite student. Ugh, I roll my eyes still thinking about it now. I suppose I am an asymmetric kind of gal.

On the softer side, it gently reminds me to also remember my 9th grade photography teacher who submitted one of my photos in a contest, because I was too shy to, and the photo won second place. It reminds me of one of my graphic design instructors who loved one of my typography assignments so much that he uses it to advertise his class. It reminds me of the large wall mural I painted in Alaska and the joy I receive from designing pieces for Bella Wish and watching my little indie business sprout wings. My soul is now reminding me that art changes people and the world truly needs artists. It reminds me to not be so afraid to let myself be seen. It reminds me to share my story and that perhaps I was ignoring the whispers all this time simply because I just wasn't ready. Perhaps I needed to live through some life first and gather a well of experience in which to draw from.

The people I have met through Bella Wish have shared their stories with me, telling me what their necklaces mean to them and how they seem to arrive at the perfect time in their lives. I smile when they call me an artist. This soothes my soul and gently urges me to stretch and break through the self-imposed boundaries which limit me, and have for so many years of my life. For their gift, I will always be grateful.

I have been writing in my journal when I can find the time and I am realizing much of what has kept me from pursuing my mondo beyondo dream is the sitting still part:
The part where I need to be really quiet and really pay attention to what is being whispered.
The parts that are uncomfortable because they force me to take a long look at the path ahead and determine what is no longer working in my life... and to gently let these things go.
The parts that will hurt and be sad and ugly at times, but will (hopefully) morph into something beautiful and honest.
The part that understands and accepts that this is a lifelong journey; there is no real destination.

I have resisted these things for so long because lets face it, it's not a fun place to go. It's so much easier to stay on the surface of what is comfortable and familiar. I have tried for years to be a square peg trying to fit into a round hole and I am ready to release myself of that pressure, but it's not easy. Writing all of this now reminds me of that quote about suffering for your art. But for me, to create something true, it has to come from a place of peace, where I have let go of the gunk and muddle I have been carrying for years. I also believe I have resisted fully living a creative life because sometimes it's easier to keep the dream alive rather than be alive in your dreams. But I will save that for another stop along the journey.

I often let my mind wander when Bella and I take our daily walks. She listens to me tell her all my dreams. She is a fantastic listener and encourages me with hugs and smiles. The other day as we walked I was letting it be known that I wanted to explore painting on, and working with, found objects ~ sort of my way of being a green artist. She seemed to like the idea. It seems the universe was also listening in on my plans because some truly beautiful found pieces are presenting themselves to me, if not practically left out in my path for me to trip over. I will soon share a couple of those stories of serendipity here.

Years ago I inherited boxes filled with vintage photos, letters, sheet music & books from my grandmother. I didn't know what to do with them at the time, but knew I had to hold on to them and not give them away. Now I feel as if I have the answer as to why I have them in my possession. I feel as if in some strange, magical way a challenge has been extended. My job now is to get past the fear of the challenge presented to me and accept it.

I've been talking about this for a while, but am at a place where I need to go deeper into this journey. I imagine this will be a somewhat slow process for me as my days are not my own, but I am a big fan of baby steps. I am scared yet ready to swim through those murky waters so I may dive deeper into what's in store for me. I am ready to make my intentions known and give them a voice. I have also decided to chronicle this journey here on my blog. What better way to make yourself vulnerable then by stripping away the layers and cracking your soul wide open on the internet... she said chuckling to herself.

And so it begins...

spreading some love

* The magical mermaid has done it again. McCabe left her dayjob to empower girls. Now she is wants to empower all of us to do the same. She is teaching an online 6-week workshop on how to set up and teach your own mermaid warrior art camp.

She made the video above to give us an idea of how fun, beautiful & important these camps are to girls ~  to boost their self esteem and empower them while they are young. I truly can't watch it without tears streaming down my face. This is indeed the class I wish I had when I was ten.

If you look closely, you will see Isabella wanted to help promote this wonder-filled workshop as well.

* The lovely, Susannah, is someone I have been watching bloom for the past couple of years and it is awe-inspiring to watch her metamorphasis from grieving to healing to full blown rockstar.

I have been hearing nothing but good things about her e-course, Unraveling: Ways of Seeing Myself. In fact, I am signing up to be in the next session myself. Please join me!

* My own mentor, Christine Mason Miller (aka Swirly ~ Miss Swirly if your nasty) just got herself published in this month's Skirt! magazine.

* I want to live in the photos of this site. Hello, dream loft!

* I will be attending Squam this year. Will you be there?

* I have been spending some time soaking her up. Yum.