natural parenting center

simple

I have been wanting to write something here for awhile now but I've felt stuck. Where to begin? Things have changed, inner and outer things. The landscape is different. What do I talk about? What gets shared and what remains private? How do I reconnect with you, many of whom I consider friends? Do I try to catch you up since you've been such treasured co-travelers along so much of the way? What is this blog about anyways and what place does blogging have in my life anymore?

I don't know.

Seems to me that simple is often (always?) the answer. What does simple look like here? Now?

I don't know.

Here's something: I feel happy.

It seems to me that truth is alive. It moves and changes and maybe it takes a little practice (or maybe not) to follow this directional pull. Truth is an inner thing. I can't copy your truth, or even what I thought was my truth from last month.

Maybe there are some pillars. Maybe there are some things which remain stable for each of us over the long term. I don't know. Maybe there is some cycling involved, things we come back to that were once true, that we come back to after some time off.

Winter is like this for me. I love winter. When I had a baby, this changed. Now that this baby is 6 and a half years old, and another one dances through our days with us, I am remembering.  Mountains and snow and skiing and winter.  Pure joy.  Most of my life's best moments have happened in the backcountry under a blanket of cold ,white fluff. I worked as a ski patroller, took people winter camping, started an alternative high school program which spent much time in the wilderness in winter, wrote a Masters thesis called "Living with Winter", took mountaineering courses, climbed Mt Athabasca, toured many days at Rogers Pass, got my Canadian Avalanche Operations Level 1 Certification, organized a helicopter in backcountry hut week with friends at Fairy Meadows.

Bundling up chubby baby toes to go out in the cold just didn't quite hold the same appeal. Staying in the warm and cozy house, knitting and cooking and working on myself to be satisfied with what is, following the interests and meeting the needs of these little people became everything.  In a way, it's like I morphed into a diffferent person for a few years when I became a mother. Or maybe more like the pause button got pushed on those before-babies passions.

They got un-paused.

My gaze has lifted, widened from the laser focus being entirely on life at home with children. Elliott is going to school. I am working part-time teaching avalanche education classes. I run most days, cook less, wake early to read the weather forecast. I am in love with my husband.

I feel happy.

Some people might call this balance. I have satisfying parenting moments and horrible ones. I spend time with my children and time without them. I don't know what I'm doing most of the time and I surely don't want to give you advice about how to be. I know when things feel right, which usually involves me being kind but sometimes involves me yelling my brains out then watching the dynamic shift. I want to be kind to myself because there is no road map, and maybe even no right or wrong.

I guess this didn't turn out to be so simple after all, eh?

Oh well. Like I said....I don't know. (Uncertainty can be a beautiful thing.)

 

Dear friends:
I'm going to take a break from blogging for awhile. Tis the season for holidays and so I'm going to take some time to snuggle up with my family and enjoy these cozy winter days.  I wish you well and look forward to seeing you back here in the New Year. Enjoy these special days with your loved ones.

With love,
kris

terror

Let everything happen to you

beauty and terror

just keep going

no feeling is final.

rilke

 

 

one whole day

On Sunday, I arranged for the kids to go to the neighbor's for the morning and then to a friend's house for the afternoon. One whole day apart. It was a first for us. 

They were ecstatic, holding their lunches in little brown bags with handles for maybe 40 minutes in the morning, running to the clock on the stove and then running back to me to report every minute change. Chomping at the bit to be off on their big adventure with people they adore. They didn't want me to walk them next door so when the time came, they blew me kisses goodbye and off they tromped out the door, through the gate, and running down the sidewalk. 

My feelings were more mixed. And then, I settled in to this space, going for a beautiful hike in the sparkling snow, then home for a relaxing afternoon. I haven't been sleeping well, so I even dozed for awhile. What I noticed was this softness in my belly that isn't usually there. Apparently, I feel a constant hum of stress in my belly when I am with them, ushering them here and there, containing them when we are out, herding and hoping when we need to get things done. With them gone, and happy, my insides got quiet. 

I have no clue where I got the idea that it is "bad" to need a "break" from mothering. Maybe it was just that I feel so deeply in love with them that for so long I didn't want to be away for even a minute.  But I have clung to that notion for too long, even feeling irritated by others' needing time away from their kids (making them "bad" too?). Sheesh. Maybe a part of me has been afraid that if I get time away I won't ever want to be with them every day again. Judging seems to have a boomerang effect...it always comes back to me in some way, usually me noticing myself do/want/need the VERY thing that I was judging others for. Huh.

It was a good day. For everyone. They didn't want to leave when I went to pick them up. Everyone was ready for this adventure apart. It was a healing day for me, and I was happy to be with them again.

Oh life...what a trip. Thanks for this juicy ride, so full of suprises and wonders. 

 

family...and other things

My mom's long time friend, Monika, came through town on her way to the desert and stayed for a couple of nights. We haven't seen each other in oh maybe ten years and so she has never met these two niblets. Monika has known me since I was six months old when she met my parents as they moved into her same apartment complex. We hiked the M while she was here and gasped at the Missoula fall colors below.

She is family. These kids now consider her a grandma of theirs too. Family is like nothing else. I'm so glad she came. 

Other stuff these days:

::Being in charge is working. I can feel when it begins to slip and I respond differently now. There are fewer questions in my voice and more confidence. It helps to read things like this (from a conversation between Catherine of this blog and Donna Simmons.

Catherine, who is in charge here? Are you following the inclinations and desires of these little girls or are they securely held by your strong intentions, your clarity of purpose and your conviction that what you are doing is right? Let me elaborate - by being in charge, on top of things, you can then truly understand what those little girls need and not have to ask them, not have to wonder, not have to doubt and thus invite them to come in and walk all over you! This is NOT about being authoritarian - it is about being the authority, about being the loving center of those little girls' universe, forming what they do and - this is CRITICAL - thereby understanding what they truly need so that in a meaningful and not chaotic way, their needs can be met, not simply their whims. One cannot meet a child's deepest soul needs if one is trailing after them wondering what is coming next (Donna).

 

::Both kids have horrendous coughs which came on right after we ran out of our fermented cod liver oil. Gotta order more asap. Keep that vitamin D pumping through our sun-starved veins.

::We are thinking Halloween with costume plans changing rather more frequently than I'd like considering I hand stitched (sewing machine broke down) this Robin Hood tunic.

Regardless of what the actual night's costume turns out to be, I have experienced enough pleasure watching this green-clad boy prance around to make every little stitch worth so very much. 

::Other crafting news...I tried needle felting and LOVE IT

::there are things happening in my heart, leaving me a little raw these days. I'm acutely aware of encouragement I've given others to live their truth, as I recalibrate my life to align with those things I've been ignoring. It's a way of being that requires much tenderness and care, along with a big dose of courage. May I remember to breathe and stay with what's here in front of me and I wish the same for you.

xo

mothering: an extraordinary project

When you are inspired by some great purpose, 

some extraordinary project, all your thoughts break their bounds:

Your mind transcends limitations, your consciousness expands in every direction

and you find yourself in a new, great and wonderful world.

Dormant forces, faculties and talents become alive, 

and you discover yourself to be

a greater person by far then you 

ever dreamed yourself to be.

Patanjali

In the every-day-ness of being with children, of stirring soup and washing sheets and sweeping and holding and reading to and wiping and negotiating and questioning and singing, I so easily lose site of what this is: an extraordinary project. I lose touch completely of the discovery of myself as a greater person than I thought. I face my own darkest, most vulnerable, wish-so-much-they-weren't-there parts of myself in the sharpness of some moments with these humans I adore so utterly. It is different than the rush of what work used to be. It is so much more and so much less at the same time. There are moments, though, when they are asleep and I take time to think of them, of our day together, when my consciousness does expand in every direction. It is when I sit still and notice what is here. It is this love which explodes something inside me. It is this love which places me in a new, great and wonderful world. 

It is this love.

It is this love.

This mother love is everything. 

Imagine giving some of this to everyone.

 

this place we love

We had the chance to spend the night at one of our favorite places with some of our favorite people and animals.

 

Going to sleep with the sound of the crackling fire in the wood stove and waking up to the rooster crowing and piles of bear poop outside the cabin. Being amidst organic farming as it happens, during harvest, no less. Playing in haybales for hours, holding chickens and riding ponies. This, we love. Some day....

october moments

I feel such a stunning array of emotions during this month of falling...

::delight breathing in deep lungfulls of moist, crisp air which tastes like the color orange

::blissful overwhelm with the abundance of apples, plums, tomatoes, potatoes, nourishment from the earth in every shade and flavor begging to be pickled, frozen, dried, somehow tenderly kept longer than just this one moment of ripeness

::spilling over gratitude for days like this past rainy sunday of cider pressing with friends, drinking in the golden brown explosion of fresh sweetness and laughing along the hours of turning the weathered crank and scooping bucketfulls of pomme de mush

::timid dread for the months of darkness ahead, bundled inside separate houses, each of us alone in our little world of children, struggling to convince chubby toes to wear tights and boots and layers and layers and layers

::fierce determination to keep us all healthy, already seeing that the forces of seasonal change are bigger than my dropperfull of echinacea, trusting that winter is an immune builder somehow

::excitement for holiday plans to drive north to be with family

::joyful for the creativity of making holiday things, starting already

::restless which seems to be a fall thing for me, resisting the earth's wisdom to call me inside myself, to embrace quieter rhythms, to trust the cycle of death and darkness and let that be too, instead wanting to flee on travel adventures, to shift and heave and demand even bigger changes, to shed old skins like the trees letting loose their leaves

::eager to celebrate and honour, like the leaves call to bring forth their most stunning display before they set themselves free of all earthly bonds

::sad to let go of the dreams of summer which never came to bear fruit

::and happy, to be here, feeling these feelings, riding the waves, with two strong legs and a beating heart with fingers that smell like pumpkins and apples.

musings

::yesterday, the gentle man who came recently to teach me about meditation called and asked to come visit to inquire about how my practice is going. i gasped a little on the phone since i've sat once since my "lesson". i noticed i didn't actually feel like a kid in trouble but felt cared for by his willingness to tend to me in that way. it was inspiration enough to sit last night. i wept with the relief of doing what matters so deeply to me but which i have been not doing, choosing to knit instead. which i also love. 

::the sewing machine started huffing and chugging today in a most disturbing way then quit working altogether in the middle of a peter pan tunic. i feel sad about that. i'm sitting here with a needle in my mouth, ready to stitch it up by hand after i finish this post.

::i'm wondering if we each have a well-worn groove (frequently referred to as a default) which either leans more towards loose and easy-going and chaotic or strict and structured and tighter. i wonder if our work as mothers is to widen our own grooves, maybe etch out new paths altogether. i wonder if that gives us more peace, that kind of flexibility. i wonder if we go back into our most worn grooves whenever we are tired and stressed and lonely. 

::i wonder why making things is so appealing to me. it has a hold on me. that's mostly what i gently bring myself back from while i'm sitting in meditation. i wonder if meditation and mothering are even possible together. i tell myself that it's harder because i'm mothering all day. i like moving and doing. i wonder why i think that's bad. or less good than sitting still.

::i notice how much bigger the response is to a post that shares my vulnerabilities. do you think we are all so hungry to hear that from each other? to not compare ourselves to others and feel rotten, but to see others and feel more accepting of ourselves? do we all need that so much? why, do you think?

::i also notice that i don't need to post a photo to say something. i wonder if it's better not to. 

::i'm shifting from putting up food to thinking about making things for winter holidays. creativity can be such a source of light as the darkness closes in. i am feeling those familiar fall feelings of discontent, especially after two long live-ins with women and children i love in recent months. i miss them. the nuclear family thing is lonely. so much stress on relationships, even with wonderful friends in the same town. it's not the same as living together with women. the village. i want what our female ancestors had. there is so much work to do in a house with children on our own. how is it for you?

 

the best part

of this blog, for me, is being in conversation with you. i am so grateful for everyone's comments from the last post and i hope you will join in the conversation there. some new questions have been raised where you might have some insights to provide some of us. the hum of connection...i so love this. thank you for being here and giving a part of yourself to the conversation. 

oh...and the photo? my goodness i love wool. do you? a friend came over today and showed me how to wash and block a sweater, i bought a half yard of boiled wool which is my new evening shawl, and i am knitting a hat made from hand spun yarn. ahhhh. thank you sheep. what do you love sinking your hands into?

and...i just read on this blog something that i LOVE...you can go there to check it out and the lovely lady there and, here is what her post said today...

NOT TO SPOIL THE ENDING FOR YOU BUT, 

EVERYTHING IS GOING TO BE OK.