Babies teach you suprising things

I am a mother to a 6 month old baby girl (officially Tuesday April 25 is her 6 month mark) and I have been learning lots of things from her. For one, I have discovered just how selfish I can be. For instance, I sometimes react with "Oh crap! I want to watch more TV or read my book and she's woken up early from her nap crying..." rather than "What's wrong with my little girl? How can I make it better?" Or simply, she begins to cry while playing and I am annoyed by the sound rather than concerned for her well-being. I do not like this in myself, I would rather be the loving caring Mom I ought to be rather than the perfectionistic, sometimes self-focused person I am. On a more positive note, Millie has also been teaching me to take delight in small things. She smiles just to see my face at the crib or a brightly colored object or even her own hands. Ah, to delight in the simple things! I have moments where I am utterly thrilled with the smell of clean laundry or the fresh lemon scent of my bathroom cleaner this morning (which reminds me of the taste of a lemon Starburst candy). Sometimes the sunshine on green leaves fills me with joy to deep for words. And yet there are times when I am so caught up in the tasks and concerns of life that I need my little girl to remind me of the joy of simple things and the importance of relationships. She laughs when I laugh now and just the other day she turned her little head while on my shoulder and kissed my neck with a delightful wet kiss only an infant can give. My heart melted and such utter joy filled my heart that I felt life cannot get much better than this!
Millie is also endlessly curious. She loves to watch the mechanism of her swing work or the way the faucet works. She finds Daddy's puttering about the house fascinating. She likes to look at the shade on her stroller and on her carseat. The feel of different fabrics is profoundly interesting to her. God gave us children, I am convinced, to remind us of what is good and beautiful around us that we have pushed to the background of our conciousness but need to see afresh.

Baby's mood swings

Something wierd happened today, or at least it struck me that way. My 5-month-old daughter Millie did something I didn't expect from someone her age. It happened when I fed her her lunch today. She eagerly took the portion of the bottle I gave her before I fed her cereal. But, when it came to taking the cereal she began to squirm, scream and cry inconsolably. I knew she would have a little bit of difficulty with this feeding since I was feeding her thicker cereal than she had had before, but still, I did not expect an all out temper tantrum. She would calm for a little while and then start up again when I put food in her mouth or trying to clean her face. She grabbed the bowl and got cereal all over her hand and was constantly sliding down in the highchair. I was beside myself to keep my temper in check. She also kept putting her hands to her face, as if it itched or perhaps to cover her mouth when she sneezed (which she had been doing). She eventually burped, which seemed to calm her some. After an hour and half she had her cereal finished (requiring the help of my sleepy husband to keep her calm) and we moved to the sofa for the rest of her bottle. She fussed a little but then took the bottle quite well and burped easily. She filled her diaper while drinking, which is typical of her, and then at the end of her bottle she began to giggle while she brought the bottle to her mouth and then pulled it out again. She was delighted to be able to do it for herself and seemed in a very jovial mood. Wierd!! Just a few minutes before she had been seemingly angry or upset, and now she was laughing!? So strange to see such a rapid mood change in someone so young. I guess that goes to show that rapid mood swings don't just happen with pregnant women, menstruating women or adults in general. I find myself exhausted and yet happy about her progress in holding her bottle too... Motherhood sure has it's unusual moments!

Babies, weather and wierdness...

Life is filled with weird moments, and last night one of them happened to me. It all started as my husband and I were leaving church with our baby girl Millie in arms. It had just started to rain and we needed to get her into the car quickly without getting her wet (or at least as little as possible). This was the first time we had brought her into church without her carrier/car seat. It would figure that we would want the little awning on that carrier the first day we decide to leave it in the car. :-) But, we made the best of it by covering her with Royce's suit jacket and bringing the car as close to the door as possible. This may seem simple enough, nothing to strange about taking a baby through the rain to the car.
But, it was only the beginning of a series of storms that would come through our area that day. The rain began to pour steadily throughout the day, ruling out the family walk we had planned. Then, suddenly, around 10 PM a forceful wind began to blow through our neighborhood. It was blowing hard against our front door and we scrambled to close the windows we had opened to cool off our apartment. I hoped that Millie's window was closed, but (being fairly sure it was) did not want to wake her unnecessarily. As I made the coffee for Royce to take on his night shift doing security for the seminary, the tornado sirens began to sound nearby. It was not in the immediate vicinity, but still it sent chills up and down my spine. Normally I can handle tornados (or potential tornados) just fine. But this time was different. This time I had a 5 month old baby to protect. Our power went out twice in the space of 15 minutes and I began to pack Millie's diaper bag for an emergency run to the tornado shelter in the basement of a building across the parking lot in our apartment complex. I wanted to be able to warm, feed and comfort her if I had to rouse her from her crib and run for shelter. My husband was distressed that he could not stay and make sure we were safe. But he had to go protect the lifes of those living and working on the seminary campus last night. With assurances that I knew what I needed to do and checking the local news station for information on the storms coming through, he left for campus. I was watching the weather reports for a little while as I contemplated which of our two cats I would attempt to take with myself and my baby girl if we needed to seek shelter. As I drifted off to sleep, flashlight and clothes beside me, I decided I would attempt to carry Millie in the Snuglie pack on my chest and the two cats in each arm (with or without their carriers) if they could be caught fast enough.
This morning it struck me as odd, why was I thinking about which cat to save? Is this sort of like who would you throw off a sinking boat? Why were my thoughts growing so morbid or certainly quite serious? Was the threat real? Probably not. Would I even think about the cats if there was a tornado headed our way? I'm really not sure. Would there be time to catch them if I did think of them? Good question. They would probably try to hide under furniture and be very difficult to catch. I'm not even sure I could get their carriers down from the high closet shelf very easily. Could I carrier two frightened and squirmy kitties along with having a frightened baby strapped to my chest and lug a diaper bag too? It seems so bazaar, so dramatic. Perhaps I am a drama queen, or perhaps I just enjoy the adrenaline rush that comes with the thought of rescuing or protecting someone or something. What is reassuring is that I was not thinking about all the stuff I wanted to save from a tornado, but the lives under my care. My need to purge hoarded stuff is a topic for another day...

Why would I want to be like everyone else?

I believe everyone is unique. Whether they let themselves be unique is another question entirely. Many of us go through life trying to conform to what our peers have decided is good or "cool" (fill in the current term for popular here), only to discover that this is not possible for us to accomplish. Rather than mope about in futility, trying to be "normal" I have decided to be who I am and that means: unique, different (yes, even wierd). Life is much happier, I've discovered, when you find out who God made you to be and just be that person. To heck with those who think they know what is good or pretty or funny. I'm tired of those pretentious souls who see it as their mission in life to make others feel they must conform to their idea of what to wear, what to do and what to say.
Lest you think this is just another nonconformist rant, I do believe there are things to which everyone ought to conform. Such as breathing oxygen, eating non-poisonous things, having good manners etc. and answer to God (whether one acknowledges Him or not, answering to Him is unavoidable).
Being unique does not make you friendless, contrary to what those "popular people" tell you. On the contrary, you have more real, genuine friendships than you would ever have conforming to the popular ideas of the day. People can like you for who you really are, not just what you pretend to be in order to "fit in." Those who would reject or criticize you for being who God made you (and this doesn't mean being a jerk) are not worth your time. There will always be people who do not like you for one reason or another (or even no reason at all). Ultimately, as long as God is happy with you; nothing else matters. God is the only one who has a consistent opinion anyway! People are changeable and fickle, especially women (I should know, I'm a woman!).
The thing about this is, there are people who should know better than to criticize others for being unique and unaverage and yet they persist in tearing down those who do not reflect the typical or average. Case in point, my husband was recently singled out by someone for being different than the typical or average seminary student in the way he reads and preaches. This person roundly criticized him for it. I was truly amazed and think that the person should know better than to impose his jock herd mentality on others, and should know that God made us all unique with our own personal style. Some things are just part of who we are and are neither right nor wrong. From talking to others who have heard my husband read and preach it is pretty clear that this is this particular person's personal problem with my husband and not (at least to the same degree) shared by most others. It is pretty clear from our history with this person that he had thought my husband and I were weird from the day he met us. Fine, I readily accept the title of wierd. What I reject is the notion that it must be changed automatically and cannot be appreciated. I believe unique is good and average or popular is boring. To conform to what everyone else is doing is to demonstrate that you cannot think for yourself (in fact, that you do not dare to do so). How sad.