Originally posted on Milk and Confetti, click here.
It’s hard to believe two years have gone by. Two years since my introduction into motherhood. Two years since my little blondie forever changed how I viewed the world. Two years since my life was so shaken, that I can’t ever go back to who I was before.
I love my children equally, but there is something transformative about “firsts”. My firstborn altered my view of humanity as a whole. Time, circumstance and people who do us good or who harm us, affect our being and our very core. The annoying person, the outcast, the delinquent, the boisterous, the recluse … the people who are different from us … all arrived on this earth the same way – as vulnerable babes. It’s easy to judge, to be impatient or to be angry with those with issues (ahem – that’s all of people!). But when you know this isn’t how that person started out, that this person was once rocked in a mother’s arms as a seemingly flawless baby. Yet continually stained and marred for better or for worse with age and life experience. It brings me to a place of deep compassion and desire to love and forgive and heal.
Tonight, like most nights, Hazel brought the most joy-filled smile to my face and laughter to my heart. While telling me about the terror of getting her head stuck trying to put on her pyjama top and while she prayed for each Paw Patrol character by name at dinner, I had to pause and really look at this little girl overflowing with delight. How she licked the bar of stain remover soap, but won’t eat ground beef, how she has me ad-lib the silliest songs about princesses, owls and her little sister, and how her tender heart is always asking after others, especially great Granny. Honestly, she is wonderfully outrageous. How did I live life without her? I often question how I ended up being so lucky to be the mother of not one, but two completely adorable little girls. My heart is selfishly full.
May I always treasure my role as mother and my view of grace.