4

We're only four, but it seems like ages longer - IN A GOOD WAY of course! It's hard to imagine life before us as it were, not that I don't remember - cos I do, not that it wasn't fab, cos it was in many ways. It's just that we make more sense being we.
It's just that I love being we so much.
I love Chris, and I love us.

Wise Words

Bono wrote the closing essay in this week's TIME magazine. As the EU commemorated its 50th Birthday he challenges them to look beyond Europe and respond to various situations in Africa - Darfur, the AIDS crisis, water sanitation and malaria.
As ever Bono said many inspirational things - but the following lines really spoke to me. Yes about Darfur, but also about global poverty, 21st Century slavery, the inconvenient truths about the environment. About what it means to be a Christian, a woman, a mother, a wife, a leader - a human being with a shred of a conscience for crying out loud - in today's world:


Our humanity is diminished when we have no mission bigger than ourselves.

History suggests it sometimes takes an emergency for us to draw closer. Looking inward won't cut it. As a professional navel gazer, I recommend against that form of therapy for anything other than songwriting. We discover who we are in service to one another, not the self.

I HEART my village

That well worn African proverb,

"It takes a village to raise a child" is proving very true

On Monday night Shaina popped over to babysit and we returned hours later to a sparkling clean house!
Tuesday morning - One of Zoe's godmothers - Jo came over with her kids to look after Tia and Zoe while I was at work. I got home to the smell of Beef Casserole in the slow cooker and the sight of two very nice pizzas in the freezer!

Tuesday night Sal came over and left with some of mine and Tia's clothing that she is going to adjust, take in and do seamstressy type things with.
I get tips and recommendations on food for the girls, sales in the shops from friends like Lizzy and Trena and Amy and Josee. And just yesterday - my own not so little goddaughter Bex told me some things about toddlerdom from her Early Childhood Degree that gave me some insight and perspective - something my girls will eternally thank her for!

And those are just the things that have happened this week!!!
I love our community. Truth is we are not always in an out of each others houses, we don't spend every waking moment of every day together. It took me and Lizzy a month or so to get things together and meet up - we've both cancelled on each other too many times!
Nonetheless - I think we are a village, of sorts. We may not see each other all the time, but somehow we do belong 'together' And I think my girls, (as well as Chris and me) are reaping the benefits.

Because They're Worth It

Ten days before we moved to the States, I got offered my dream job. I mean like total dream. It was more than a job, it was like an opportunity that would have changed our lives forever. And I knew it wasn't right to take it. I was gutted. And if I wasn't there I wouldn't have believed that the conversation where I said "Thanks but no thanks" actually happened.


In the months that followed, I'd often wondered what that was all about. This wasn't one of those choices that you lay something down and God does an Abraham and Isaac with you; this dream was truly slaughtered! Like Robert Frost, I'd taken a different road and I knew that I wasn't going to see the old way again.
Occasionally I grieved the loss; other times I place huge expectations on our life here, as though Phoenix owed me something special for what I'd given up.

It took awhile to see what I'd gained. One day I tried to imagine what our lives would have been like if we'd taken the other road. I could see financial security, fun, endless opportunities . The negatives were harder to see! It was hard to imagine the cost.

Then I noticed that there was something I couldn't see. Someone. Someones. I couldn't see Tia there. I couldn't see Zoe. I would have had to have delayed having kids, for awhile. Delayed the sleepless nights, and the nappies, but also the giggles and the first kick, the hugs and the games and the songs.

At that moment my so called loss became my incredible gain. And at that moment my questions and any hint of regret was over. Permanently.

I've not suddenly got all earth motherish - whatever that means. To steal a phrase from my fave mummy blog - I am still totally an Alpha Mum. Juggling the commitments of work and family life like so many of us. Sneaking sweet potato into Tia's pasta sauce, working out talks for a conference. Swaddling Zoe AGAIN, planning future writing projects. Dreaming big dreams, attending to the little details of everyday life. Living with ambition and the mundane! Feeling elation, exhaustion, boredom, and excitement all in the same hour.Longing for adult conversation, missing my kids like crazy. Wanting to lose myself in idyllic stereotypes of motherhood.Wanting to find my mind, my figure and my individuality.
Exploring the landscape of being a wife and mum, a Christian, a woman, a leader, a friend. And accepting that I'm learning and will make mistakes even in the places that I am most desparate not to.

And maybe most importantly for me - embracing the fact that life is not something that one day is going to happen, but the journey i am on right now. Life? This is it.

I grew up determined to realise my "potential". But potential is far broader than I thought it was, in work, and professional achievements and financial gain. So now I'm realising it when I teach Tia a new word, or get Zoe to sleep, equipping them for life in ways that are far more substantial than an event or a task accomplished.
Maybe potential is realised best not when you achieve something for yourself, but when its invested in others, enabling others...

In a bid to bury the cult of the yummy mummy ( see earlier post), Times columnist Rachel Johnson wrote
"I do think that once you’ve given birth, you pass the baton. Becoming a mother is nature’s way of calling attention to the next generation, not the current one."

I think she's right. Because they're worth it.

Blogs for Mummies

Always the last to catch up - I've been exploring just what is out there in the bloggersphere or whatever you call it. And I have found some great stuff from a mum's perspective. Working mums, stay at home mums, entreprenuerial mums, every kind of mum. Mums trying to work out how to juggle their priorities, raise their kids, work out who they are. Mums of a certain generation trying to make their mark somehow and navigate their way through this more settled phase of life....

It makes for some intense debating sometimes in the comments pages, simply because the topics raised are often quite emotive.
But they've been eductational, inspiring, sometimes ridiculous and humourous, poignant at times.
Anyway here are a few that I've discovered from both sides of the pond. Enjoy.

Alpha Mummy, Mommy Track'd, Working Mom's Blog, MumsNet, The Juggle ....

A Shameless Plug Worth Knowing

Just wanted to take the opportunity to give a shameless plug about a book that is out (UK) that I have contributed to. Its called Worth Knowing, a book for Christian women in their 20's and 30's... and written by loads of Christian women - the likes of Amy Orr- Ewing, Michele Guinness, Fiona Castle... And then me and Sal (of Breen) added a few thoughts too!!

Hopefully it'll be a great resource to young adult women who are working out how to follow God in every area of life...

For more details - check out this link....

The Best of British....

...wrote my bro on the bit of paper encasing the two CD's he sent me for my birthday.

The CD's were Corinne Bailey Rae and Amy Winehouse.

Corinne Bailey Rae : There's something about Rae that just seems kind of wholesome, which is a terrible word to use for something that is not wholemeal bread, but bear with me. She just comes across as genuine and unaffected. Her style and look are vintage and attractive. Her voice is distinctive, yet pure and simple. In interviews she seems laid back and, well, secure. Its more than that she's a nice girl. She just seems to have it together. And her music and sound is her own.

Then there's Amy, Amy, Amy...
To me Amy Winehouse is something of a siren.Not so together. Not at all. Lots of attitude and all that. I loved her first offering Frank. However call me prudish, but I kind of wish her lyrics were cleaner.Right now though she looks seriously in need of a few roast dinners, and that if the wind changed direction she might snap in two. It just doesn't look right on a woman with that kind of sound. Her songs may be in the charts alongside the likes of Girls Aloud, but her voice sounds like it hangs out in smoky jazz clubs with the likes of Sarah Vaughn, or occasionally shares a studio with Lauryn Hill.

If the girls are in the car with me and I can get Tia off Veggie Tales and Toddler Tunes - Corinne is my artist of choice..

So who else is out there in British music right now people? What's that Lily Allen like? She looks like half the girls I went to school with back in the day - is she any good?