Mother Love

WEEKEND + FIVE THINGS

August 04, 2015

The last five days have been super busy, fun, and full of family and friends!

We went down to Nashville last week to do some work on our new house and make it all ready for our move in three weeks (!!!). My parents and brother met us there from South Carolina, and my sister came with us from New York so we had lots of hands for painting and cleaning. And lots of hands for holding baby Ayla too, of course. She was a nice distraction for all of us, hehe! We got all of the main areas painted that we wanted to get done before moving, bathrooms cleaned, kitchen cabinets scrubbed, and floors swept and mopped. The carpets need some serious love yet, but we’ll get a steam-clean service to take care of that in the next few weeks and hopefully it will all feel super fresh when we walk through the doors to make it our new home. It’s hard to believe how fast the move is coming up!

The major highlight of our trip was a real, live date night that Ben and I went on Thursday night…the first one without the baby since she’s been born. My parents kept her for the evening, and she did so well for them! We hit up a majorly delicious Indian restaurant for dinner and then spent the rest of the evening at the Outcry tour concert right in downtown Nashville. The concert was so good, and an evening spent with great music, fellow believers, and worshipping together was just what my soul needed. We hadn’t been to a concert together since a Hillsong Live one that we went to when we were dating about three years ago, and it was just a great evening together. We love our baby girl to pieces, but there really is nothing like having a great time out on the town together alone.

We finished up our painting and work on Friday afternoon, and then headed down to my hometown in South Carolina for the rest of the weekend. It was a full couple of days with seeing all kinds of friends and family, and it was so much fun to introduce Ayla to all the ones we love from home. All the cousins and aunties wanted turns with her and she was such a trooper with all the newness and activity over the last five days.

I had a bunch of friends over to my parent’s house for breakfast on Monday morning and it was honestly one of the most inspiring, fun couple of hours that I’ve had all year. There is just nothing like connecting with old friends that you grew up with and spending time together talking about raising babies and growing spiritually and learning to love those around us. We got to hold each other’s babies and pray for the one that’s coming at any time (my best friend is about to have her first!) and it was just a spark of life for my soul. We left for New York at noon on Monday, and had a mostly uneventful trip home…minus a MAJOR HUGE EPIC diaper blow out in the carseat when we were only two hours down road. We spent twenty minutes at a station taking the car seat apart and changing Ayla and trying not to get poo-poo all over us and the car. It was one of those laugh-or-cry kind of moments and we mostly just had to laugh. And now we’re veteran blow-out-in-the-car parents! Woot.

Have a superb week, dears!

Here are five things I love:

– this pretty rug
– this recipe
– this perfect shift dress
– this challenging word
– this song

What about you: what was the most exciting thing about your weekend?

I’d love to hear your thoughts!

JUST A LITTLE THING

July 30, 2015

Sometimes it’s easy to think the little things don’t matter.

And in all reality, sometimes they don’t. We can do things, say things, think things that have little to no impact on our lives or those around us. But sometimes those little things that seem so small and insignificant can turn into things much bigger than we realize. And it’s only by their compound effect over time that we suddenly see what the little things can do, either to us or to someone else.

I talk to Ayla a lot, even though she’s too small to fully understand what I say. I talk to her when I’m nursing her, bathing her, changing her diaper, putting on her clothes…or when she’s just sitting in her swing watching me or when we’re driving along in the car. I tell her about what is going on or what we’re planning to do or just whatever conversations come to mind. It might seem silly to talk to such a little person who doesn’t know what’s going on, but I really believe that talking to her now is a way of showing her respect as a person and developing a relationship with her.

One of the little things that I’ve become aware of in my conversations with her is as simple and small as one little word. I caught myself doing this thing in the first few weeks of her life, and the day that I realized it was the day that I stopped. It’s such a little thing really, but I think it’s something that over time could create thought processes and beliefs about herself that I don’t want for her. Whenever she would do something good or that I liked, (i.e. burp after eating, going to sleep easily, not getting worked up when I would dress her, etc.) I would praise her with the words “good girl.” There’s really nothing inherently wrong in saying this…I mean, she was being a good girl. But one day I was giving her a bath and she was being so good and I looked her in the eyes and told her she was a good girl…and something inside of me suddenly just didn’t seem to feel right in calling her that. It was odd at first, but the more I thought about it, the more I didn’t ever want to call her a good girl again.

Because what I don’t want for her is this: I don’t want her to ever believe that her goodness or value is dependent on what she does. If she does good, than she is good. I realized that if I were to repeatedly tell her “good girl” when she did something good, there is a good chance that over time she would come to believe that she had to do to be good. She was a good girl only when she did good.

But I want something different for my little girl’s heart.
I want her to know that because of Jesus she is good.
I want her to grow up knowing that her identity is rooted in something greater than what she does or doesn’t do.
I want her to believe that her parents are proud of her and love her no matter what.

So now when she does something good, I just tell her “good job.” I want her to know that she did good, but whether she did that good or not, it doesn’t change who she is or how I see her. She’s a good girl who does good jobs.

It’s just a little thing, but sometimes those little things actually really matter.

What about you: what are some little things in your life/speech/actions that could potentially cause bigger effects than you realize?

I’d love to hear your thoughts!