Hi! I'm Shawna and I am a stay-at-home mom of three young girls. This is my life and my truth and all of the lessons I learn along the way. I hope you’ll sit back and savor the chaos with me!
My Christmas story
Quinn is such a little sponge right now, and she is sucking up everything having to do with Santa and Reindeer and candy canes and snowmen and gingerbread houses and sleighbells and. . .
It’s really fun. We made santas out of felt, decorated ornaments, made gingerbread, read The Night Before Christmas four billion times. That kid cracks me up that she loves that poem so much. I can’t wait to make paper stars with her, decorate gingerbread houses, and go […]
Toddler Jekyll, Toddler Hyde
It’s crazy how much being two is like being a werewolf.
My sweet, curious toddler will be just standing there, carefully arranging her Playmobil people into a little made-up scene, building a “super cool tower” out of blocks, or even cooing at her baby sister. Suddenly, her face will change as her body goes rigid. Then she’ll lash out at anything and everyone in her space. Maybe she’ll just start yelling No, or she will run into the corner and kick, […]
Ruby’s birth story
Editor’s Note: I wrote this about two days after Ruby was born, on June 5. I didn’t want to forget anything! Not sure how I ever could. With Ruby nearly six months old now, I thought I should share it already :)!
Ruby grins at one day old
My beautiful, mellow Ruby Katherine came in the wee hours of Friday, June 3– her due date. I have just been enjoying the heck out of her since then, though my hollow uterus […]
Bigger kids, bigger problems . . .
With my oldest daughter approaching 2.5, life as a mommy is getting scarier. Wait, that sounds worse than I meant it to.
A lot of things are easier. My toddler sleeps through the night in her own bed most nights ( though my five-month-old sure doesn’t so I’m not exactly reaping the benefits).
My toddler also can use her words to tell me what she needs. And she usually does. Though she sometimes resorts to a simple, effective “No, no, no!! No, […]
When you lose yourself
I remember so clearly the first time I snuck away from my newborn. The cool of the car, its strange stillness. My simultaneous ache and excitement. The feeling that I was doing something very, very wrong, and quite possibly illegal.
I remember the eerie and blissful hum of my body all alone, and my sudden acute awareness of it. Despite being so pent up inside myself during all those interminable days and nights of rocking and pacing and nursing over and over […]
I need a sister wife!
Poor baby. She wakes up in the morning (be it 4 or 7 a.m…) cooing and crowing at the window, a giant grin spread across her little pink, cherubic face. Her feet are kicking, her arms are pumping, her heart is full of gladness and she turns to me with all of the richness of her angelic little being, eager to bask in the delight of the moment together, and who better to share it with then her mama, the […]
Saving it up for mommy
When Quinn was 22 months old, and I was 8 months pregnant, she had her first overnight stay with my parents. We figured doing it then would be better than having her first night away from us be the same night her baby sister arrived. We also thought we could get a romantic date night out of the deal (of course, I kind of ruined that by staying up all night gripping my phone as Todd talked me out of […]
Mommy is beautiful, not that it matters
A few days ago, we were getting ready to go out. Not anywhere special, really, just out with a few friends who also have kids, and we were all bringing our kids. Hubby was holding the girls at bay while I got ready. These days, that pretty much means just redoing my ponytail, putting on a clean shirt and brushing my teeth. I might smear on a little lipgloss and throw on some earrings if I can find them, but […]
So glad I’m here
My bosses and colleagues were amazing, but they couldn’t hold a candle to my cooing little being back at the ranch. Too-tight work clothes, pumping my milk in the bathroom, and the million other crazy things working mommies live through every day did not sweeten the deal.
Bye, bye, baby…
“I kiss you and kiss you, with arms round my own,
Ah, how shall I miss you, when, dear, you have grown”
–William Butler Yeats
I lay in bed the other day, nurse-dreaming as Ruby suckled away at the breast. My hand cupped her head. As they often do, my thoughts rested on Ruby, too.
I remember the exact feel of her as she lay on my chest just after being born, her sweet healthy gurgle (she was born partway in her sac still), […]