Dear 30 year old me,

Dear 30 year old me,

In exactly 30 days you will be 40 years old. When Dad turned 40, the entire store of JCP was turned into a graveyard. The "marketing ladies" made tombstones, his office was filled with black balloons, and I think black crepe paper was just about everywhere in the break room.

Needless to say, we thought 40 was "near death" old.

I have other ideas about this milestone age now. But today isn't about nearly 40 year-old us... it's about 30 year-old you and a few things that helped us survive and maybe a few things I wish I would have known... but before we get to that, let's look at us at 30...

I specifically chose this picture because know that it's one of 4 times that you will look this good for the next 10 years. HA! (Shout out to professional hair and makeup for Niki's wedding!)

Life isn't going to be exactly what you planned and that's ok.
Not one single bit of your life can be orchestrated solely by you. It's impossible... and that's what makes it so beautiful. We can get all the degrees we want, pick out the perfect house, say yes to our dream job, and even decide how many kids we want. But we actually control zero parts of what happens to us - and that's life. Every disaster, every success, every challenge, every easy day, every obstacle and every milestone... there's beauty in each piece of our individual puzzles.

No one has a better life than you do, different? Maybe. But not better. 
(Spoiler alert: this is still something we're gonna be working on at 40) Say this to yourself every time you get a case of the greens - you know, jealousy? We all have different stories to tell, and life would be so sad if you missed out on telling yours because you were so wrapped in someone else's. Don't fall for the lie of social media - we all show the highlight reels... but the good stuff, the REAL stuff is important, too. Sometimes it's hard to watch other people do things that you aren't doing and not feel like a "failure." But, there's a strong possibility that those same people are looking at you and wanting a little slice of your life, too.

Get in a selfish routine. 
Sounds weird, right? Don't get me wrong, doing for others is awesome, but making time for yourself is important, too. When you pour into yourself (by reading, relaxing, sleeping, eating well, exercising) then you have a lot more to give to those around you.

It's okay to ask for help.
Asking for help doesn't make you weak - it makes you smart. "It" really does take a village. Raising children, owning pets, working, going to school... even being married takes more than 2 people sometimes. Ask your village for support - they will never let you down.

Cheer on your friends. 
Be excited about the success of your friends - even when you aren't accomplishing big things. Remember that "no one's life is BETTER... just different" lesson? It applies here. Be on the front row, cheer the loudest, support their dreams, buy their products, like their pictures, comment on their blog posts, share their story... CHEER THEM ON!

Recognize the power of no.
Girl. JUST SAY NO. You don't have to be everything to everybody every single day. Those two little letters hold a powerful punch. And by saying "no" more ... you give strength to your "yes!". Sounds weird, but it's true. People will come to realize that your YES means you are committed because you don't give them away so easily. Let's practice, real quick: "Sorry, I can't commit to that right now." ... "I know that I've done this before, but this just isn't my best yes." [Thank you, Lysa T.] ... "It's a no from me." ... "My talents are better suited else where." ... "I've already committed my time other places."

Girlfriends are one of your greatest gifts.
You are going to meet new people throughout your life. Be grateful for the individual role that each woman plays in shaping who you are. Your work friends, your best-friends, your new friends, your old friends... they all have a piece of you and you need every single one of them. Savor that time, appreciate that kinship and foster every single one of those relationships. You will laugh and cry and cheer and scheme. You will solve each other's problems. Your girlfriends are one of this decade's greatest blessings.

Everything doesn't have to happen now.
Believe it or not, you don't have to drive a fancy car, go on exotic vacations, build a dream home, cook lavish meals and also have a six-pack. (Which is great, because, spoiler alert, 10 years later and you still haven't checked off any of those items). AND THAT IS OKAY! We (hopefully) get to live on this earth for a long time... enjoy the season of life you are in without worrying about all the things you haven't done.

Your spouse/partner is not actually trying to drive you crazy.
It may feel like it, but they're not. :)

Your children's favorite toys will be blocks/legos, cars, dolls, books and dress up clothes. 
Don't waste money on the "latest and greatest" fad. They always come back to those five things. The money we would have saved??? We could have gone to Italy and back 15 times by now!

No one has it together. 
Yep. We are all a bunch of big fat fakers. All of us are worried we aren't doing something right, we're messing up our kids, we aren't giving our all at work, we could be better partners... the list goes on. The truth is we are all doing the best we can, and that's all we should expect.

Choose your joy.
By now, you are a broken record at telling the kids "choose your attitude"... sometimes we could use those same words of wisdom. As Ms. Hawkins ended 95% of her announcements in Jr. High... "Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% of how you react to it." There is so much power in our choices to choose joy, happiness, gratefulness... in those moments that have you stressed, worried, angry... choose joy instead.

Seek Him first.
Most important piece of advice in this list. Seek Him first. Seek Him always. There is nothing that we can do to ever lose the love of Christ. You are going to walk through stress, disappointment, anger, fear, joy.... give it all back to Him. The beauty of Christ is that we are never alone... we never have to solve on single problem alone. He is there for all the big and small and hard. Seek Him first.


In closing, you are going to love your thirties. There is such a gentle gift in aging. You begin to focus on the important things, you hold on to the dear things and you let things that don't matter fade. And you finally FINALLY figure out your best hair. Savor every single second of this decade. The best really is yet to come...

Love,
Your older, wiser (and honestly better looking) self.

40 to 40

I've always been a believer in celebrating birthdays BIG. I'm going to attribute this to my mom, who managed to always make us feel special and loved on our special day each year. Whether it was saying yes to a sleepover turned midnight makeover, renting the skating rink for a Rainbow Brite themed blowout or a surprise Sweet 16 (complete with a car with a GIANT BOW on top) - she and my dad made us feel loved.

Basically poor Ryan inherited a spoiled rotten person. But I digress.

Sunday marked 40 days until my 40th birthday. I've been count downing on my phone, looking forward to the milestone and trying to decide how I wanted to celebrate the big day.

Turns out... I get to celebrate for the next FORTY days.

Ryan, Cindy and Jenni have crafted the most amazing (and overwhelmingly humbling) birthday gift of my life. Each day, for the next 40 days someone from my life is going to wish me happy birthday.

I can't get over it. I'm sitting here in Blue Baker crying as I type this.

I don't drive a fancy car.
The floor in my house is being held together with wood glue.
I can't use my shower.
I've never been to Europe.
I don't have a giant savings account filled with the moneys.

But, without a doubt... I am loved. And I am so completely grateful for every person that God has placed in my life. Every hard part, every easy friendship. Every tiny moment has been carefully crafted just for me. Just like every part of your life has been carefully crafted for YOU.

Parts of my life are absolutely nothing like I imagined... but everything I could ever dream.

This aging thing, y'all... I just can't describe the freedom you feel. I quit apologizing. I take time for myself. I listen before I speak. I am zero percent impressed with material things. I love the reflection in the mirror... but more importantly, that pistol of a woman inside... man, she's pretty cool, too.

So here is to the next 40 days of celebrating every gift that has entered my life. I treasure these people, these memories, these divine miracles that crossed my path. Each of them have helped shape me into the wife, mom, daughter, sister, friend... the list goes on. I am who I am because each of you and that is the greatest gift by far.

By 40...

So I celebrated my birthday two months ago but honestly, my mind has been on my NEXT birthday for much longer than that. I celebrate the big 4-0 next February and I'm pretty excited about hitting a milestone.

20 years ago, 40 seemed like forever away.
15 years ago, I thought I was a "real" adult.
10 years ago, I couldn't believe I was in the middle of 20 and 40.
5 years ago, I decided that this 30 something life wasn't so bad.

And now, I'm convinced that 40 is going to be even better.

When my dad turned 40 the entire JCPenney office was adorned in black. The "ladies at work" pulled out all their tricks of in-store marketing and displayed tombstones, black balloons and an infinite amount of "over the hill" signs.

He did not take that well.

When my mom turned 40 we went to dinner but I don't remember any major hoopla. Perhaps it's because we were trying to be kind and pretend that she was still young (which she clearly was, but I was 11 so I didn't get that). Perhaps it was because she didn't want a huge celebration. Or perhaps it's because she's a mom and sometimes we get looked over. (LOVE YOU, MOMMA!)

When Jody turned 40 we surprised him by flying him to Texas for Thanksgiving.
When Jeremy turned 40 he wanted to ignore it because he doesn't like attention or getting older.

Ryan turns 40 in May and I'm not going to tell you what we have planned.

And soon... y'all... I AM GOING TO BE FORTY!

My friends have celebrated 40 in tons of different ways and I'm looking forward to this "road to 40" journey that the next 10 months will take me on. I've made a list of 40 things I'd like to do in this year and I've gotten a pretty good start. I'll share my thoughts from time to time and hope that you enjoy coming along on the ride with me.

Some items are silly.
Some items are hard.
Some items will require courage.
Some items will require time.

And I'm honestly excited about what I will discover through the process. I thought about sharing the entire list but I think I'm going to keep it to myself for a while. I do plan on journaling along the way and some of that will be included on the blog.

So to all of my friends that have done something similar - anything I should think about? What would you put on your list? What would you leave off your list?

Here's to the journey...not the destination....

Flowers and weeds...

The girls and I spent the Saturday morning before Easter working in our garden. The months of neglect left nothing more than dead tomatoes, dried up basil, a resilient rosemary and weeds. Tons and tons of weeds. As we were tilling up the dirt, cleaning out the dead leaves and pulling those weeds, Emersyn asked, "Mom... why do the weeds grow so fast?"

I didn't bother with a scientific answer because, frankly, I'm not sure. Instead, I used the quiet moment of the three of us together, filling our finger nails with dirt, knee deep in literal weeds to hopefully teach a lesson. 

I explained that the weeds are like sin... creeping in to take over the good parts of us. Flowers and gardens are harder to grow because they need attention and care - they need light and water and fertilizer to bear fruit. 

Just like us. 

We need His light. 

We need to be baptized in His water. 

Her need his Word to fill us and help us grow. 

I told them that we get to choose what we want to be.... 

A weed. Or a flower. 

Telling lies is easy.

Not standing up for someone is simple. 

Disobeying is in our nature.

Those are all the weeds. The weeds can take over quickly if we let them. If we ignore the truth. If we don't stand up for someone. If we do what we want instead of what we are asked... the weeds creep in. 

"But some weeds are pretty, Mommy... are they bad, too?"

And I looked at her sweet face smudged with dirt and said that yes... we can be deceived by beauty. The enemy puts beautiful things right in front of us to trick us but we have to look around that distraction and focus on what God tells us to do. 

And He tells us to keep pulling those weeds...making sure to grab them by root to make room for the flowers that are waiting to sprout. 

Texas forever and ever...

Spring time in Texas ... when the pollen tickles your nose and makes your eyes itch to the point you wish you didn't have them. One day it's 90 degrees and the next you are kicking yourself for putting away your winter clothes. The rain falls the hardest in the morning when you are dropping kids off at school or picking them up in the afternoon. Thunderstorm warnings are followed by endless tornado watch postings and kids and animals are running into your room in the middle of the night because they think the actual lightening is out to get them. 

But then... there's.... 

bluebonnets!

(Which also leads to #momswithfancycameras pretending to act like they know what they are doing and force their children to sit in the bluebonnets and smile.) 

This year I promised them it would take 10 minutes or less if they just sat and smiled... 

Years of picture taking practice paid off... 

and we were done in 10 minutes exactly!

Emmy even found time to twirl (and if I was more than just a #momwithafancycamera this picture wouldn't be blurry). 

I can't get over how big these kids are getting... 

the tops of their heads keep getting further and further away from the tops of those bluebonnets. 

And because I'm a sap... I decided to take a stroll down memory lane and... 

This kid is going to make an awesome husband and dad one day for like a thousand noble reasons, but also because he smiles on cue. 

Favorite bluebonnet pictures of all time were when Emmy just was not having it. And she hasn't changed a bit... when she doesn't want to do something, she's not doing it. 

This sweet baby - I have pictures of Rad and Emmy in this spring tradition but they aren't on this computer, so it just feels like I didn't take them until Landry was born. I mean - that's the exact opposite of third kid mom behavior! 

So, spring time in Texas may be crazy... but it's also awesome. 

Texas forever and ever and ever... 

(ignore my Colorado tshirt!)

Let down your hair...

We have a lot of hair around here...  and I'm going to be a little vulnerable and let you know that I'm slightly attached to our hair. I'm scared if we cut it, we'll be like Rapunzel and lose our super powers. 

I know. I'm weird. 

I grow my hair super long (like obnoxiously) until the point that I can't take it and want to go all Britney circa 2007. And then I chop it all off. 

I repeat this pattern every  18 months/couple of years. I'm ridiculous. But like the old saying goes, I stick to what I'm good at... and I'm apparently amazing at having a ton of hair and birthing children with a ton of hair. 

I honestly grow my hair out for two reasons:

1. I'm lazy and long hair is way easier than short(ish) hair

2. To donate

I chopped 8 inches off again last week and I'm all set to send those locks away!

 Here's a few of my favorite places to donate:

Children With Hair Loss: Non-profit organization that provides human hair replacements at no cost to children and young adults facing medically-related hair loss. CWHL was created when the founder's niece lost her hair after undergoing chemo as a child. CWHL accepts 8 inches of hair or longer and also accepts color treated and gray hair as donations. Learn how you can donate your hair here. 

Pantene Beautiful Lengths: We've never donated to Pantene, but I do love that they focus on providing wigs exclusively to women going through cancer treatments. Hair must be 8 inches, untreated and no more than 5% gray. Read their policies here. 

Wigs for Kids: Similar to CWHL, Wigs for Kids provides wigs exclusively to children.  However, they require a minimum of 12 inches of hair for donations. (So the actual Rapunzel's of the world!) You can read more about their requirements and process here. 

Matter of Trust: Y'all. This organization is SO STINKING COOL! They take ANY amount of donated hair and create matts and broom booms to help clean up after oil spills and other hazardous waste disasters! This is the organization Radley chose to donate his hair to a few years ago! Y'all - they take ANY LENGTH of hair. Scraps, animal fur...even used lint and use this to CLEAN OUR ENVIRONMENT. I seriously love this so much. You can read about their Clean Wave program here. 

** Their process is a little more involved than simply mailing hair to a physical address. They try to live their mission at all levels, which means using as little storage space and resources as possible. They have you register through a donor match program to arrange drop off/pick up when the need for your donation matches. You can read about it here. 

My number one recommendation if you are considering donating your hair is to do your own research and choose a place that you feel good about. This is personal, you are giving a literal piece of yourself away and that is AWESOME! It's also important that you are happy where that donation is going! Here's a great article I found that can clear up some confusion on the rumors people hear about some organizations that accept hair donations.  

Hope this helps anyone thinking about donating your hair! 

Ninety-nine dollars...

Some new parents-to-be spend tons of time reading books, going to baby prep and birthing classes and really work to be "ready" for baby. Ryan and I spent lots of time perfecting the nursery.  Ha! We really wanted to bring Radley home to a special place and needed every-little-thing to be in a special place... right down to the antique golf clubs we hung on his wall. Looking back, I wish I would have just purchased neutral bedding to use for all three kids because, newsflash, babies don't care what their room looks like. 

We had every little detail planned out except a rocking chair. While I dreamed of ordering one of these, our budget had different plans so we ordered this instead. (And way back in 2007, that chair was only $99.00.) Money has never been spent so well. 

The moments spent in that chair are some of the most precious of my life. Time spent rocking a baby is never time wasted but there was so much more in those moments than feet propped up rocking back and forth. 

There was grace in His goodness.

There was prayer. 

There was fear.

There was pain (nursing, y'all).

There was joy.

There was sorrow.

There was gratefulness. 

There was regret.

There was confidence.

There was ease.

There was frustration. 

There was solitude.

There was silence.

There was noise.

There was laughter.

There was tears.

And there was love. 

A love so fierce that it frightened me.

I held my babies. I fed my babies. I sang to them. And read to them. And prayed over them. 

And I watched. 

I watched their Daddy rock them.

I watched their Daddy read to them.

I watched their Daddy give them their first bottle.

I watched their Daddy pray.

And laugh.

And sing.

And be scared. 

And be happy.

And be filled with amazement. 

I watched him come home exhausted from work to sit and rock. 

Who would have thought that a $99 purchase would be worth so much to me over the course of ten years? The value of that investment was found is so much more than the money we spent. 

There were moments well past the baby years that this space still brought comfort. High fevers, big storms, hard days at school - we faced them together with the calming lull of rocking.  This chair is worn and stained and squeaks when you sit down. The foot stool is long gone and the pockets have more lint, crumbs and dust than could ever be picked up with a vacuum cleaner. The wood is dented and it's missing a button in the back... and I was still so sad when we finally moved it out of the house. (I say out of the house, because it currently sits in the garage and still gets used during afternoons of "Mom, watch me"... but mostly serves as a throne for the cats.)

Those books that we barely glanced through don't talk about the things you'll miss. They tell you all about colic and the "5 eses" and how to have the happiest baby on the block. They talk to you about schedules and on demand feeding. They encourage you to let them cry it out and also claim that attachment is the way to go. But they never mention the seemingly insignificant parts of parenthood that become your fondest memories. 

I never would have guessed that a $99 rocking chair would be one of mine. 

Tuesdays...

Tuesday has become everyone's favorite day in the King household. We don't have any major plans or commitments except for Emersyn's art lessons with Anna right after school, which means that Tuesday's are spent with the besties. 

Emmy and Anna come home either hiding their latest work for a future surprise reveal or telling us all about the new technique they learned. This week they came home with butterfly tattoos hand crafted by their gifted and creative teacher. Tuesdays are their favorite by far. 

Radley and Caroline are often attached to a screen sitting next to each other either creating videos or forming clans (I think).

Landry and Millicent are usually playing school, being mommys, or jamming out to their anthem. 

And the actual mommys get to spend time solving all of the world's problems. 

Sometimes we even manage to feed them a home cooked meal. 

All of this on a Tuesday. 

The Gift of Time...

Since they got their big giant gift of Disney in November, the kids knew that Christmas was going to be "small" this year. They got two gifts under the tree from us - personalized books filled with pics of that amazing Disney trip and one more thing that they asked for. To add a little something extra, we decided to give them "date certificates" of an activity that went with the present. 

Radley asked for a board game so we got him Jumanji + movie tickets to see Jumanji with us. (Which also included alllll the popcorn he could eat.) 

Emmy wanted an art portfolio and we were happy to oblige and throw in a date at U Paint-It to go along with her goodies. 

Landry wanted new gymnastics clothes which we gladly paired with an afternoon at one of our local trampoline parks so she could show off her new skills. 

Isn't it the same for everyone? We all just want the gift of time with each other. Friends, family, loved ones... knowing that someone has made time for you is pretty much the best gift in the world. 

Katy the Cleaning Lady: Detergent Review

For as far back as I can remember, I have loved to clean. Like unusually enjoyed the practice of cleaning house. All my friends wanted to play teacher or house - not me. I literally played "Katy the Cleaning Lady." I remember asking for a broom and cleaning supplies for Christmas. One summer, I convinced Jenni that we should be chemists and invented our own cleaning solution.

I have tried having housekeepers and I just didn't enjoy it. I mean, it was nice to come home to vacuumed house, but I am that person that just was never satisfied. Just call me Alexander Hamilton. (Double points if you get the reference.)

So I'm pretty darn excited to debut this new little series where I review cleaning products for you dear readers. (I wish I would have thought to take an awesome picture of me holding some cleaning supplies or paid someone to make a me an image, but let's be honest - I'll get sidetracked and won't follow through with this.) But in case I do... Let me know if you've been dying to try something and I will do my best to try it for you!

I'm starting with an oldie but a goodie because I posted a picture on instagram a couple of weeks ago while we were making a batch of laundry detergent and got tons of questions. So, back by popular demand - I'm going to give you some of my opinions on using homemade laundry detergent.

In short...

WE LOVE IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Catch that?

I did a three month review way back in 2015 and I haven't really changed my tune. We still love this stuff! Wanna know why?

1. Annoying odor that comes with front load washers - gone
2. Saves tons of money! (I'd estimate $200/year)
3. Less waste because you aren't buying detergent
4. Clothes feel and smell so fresh and our whites are brighter than normal
5. Super duper easy to make...

The original recipe calls for... 

1. 1 box of Arm & Hammer Baking Soda
2. 1 box of Borax (4lb 12oz)
3. 3 bars Fels Naptha soap - grated**
4. 4lb Oxi Clean**
5. 1 box Arm & Hammer Washing Soda
6. Purex Crystals (optional)

** Y'all. Save yourself time and tips of fingers and buy the Zote washing flakes instead

** There is no such thing as a 4lb box of Oxi Clean - we just estimate

Clearly if you are looking for a green, all natural laundry detergent recipe, this isn't it. But if you want your clothes clean and smelling great - see above.

A little goes a super long way which is why this lasts so long. We have a house of 5 people and I do on average, 6-10 loads each week. In the summer, I do at least one load every day because I can't stand damp bathing suits and towels sitting around.

Other things to note:

1. Some recipes call for Ivory soap, I actually use Ivory soap to clean stains from clothes prior to washing
2. I love the new Purex Crystals we bought - smells so good! Curious how Downy unstoppables would work.
3. I still use liquid Downy to soften clothes - but my next project may be homemade fabric softener. Any recipes I should try?

You basically feel like you invented biscuits in a can after you make this. I mean how much more Martha can I be??

Happy Tuesday and happy washing!!!

Weekending...

Long gone are the days when I carried my camera every where I went documenting each little thing that one of the kids did so I could upload them and then recount the day minute by minute. Now I'm lucky to pull out my phone and snap a pic here and there and this weekend was no exception. Now while I love looking back on those posts filled with 100 pictures of the kids moving the same piece of dirt, I'm just as happy that sometimes I just enjoy the moments as they come. We just had the best weekend with the only negative thing being that it had to end. 

Like most of our Saturdays, we started at the soccer field. Landry and I made an early exit so she could get to Parker's birthday party. This sweet friendship brings the biggest smile to my face - Landry has been loving "Pawka" since they were two. Their teachers would relay to me the latest things they said to each other and they can never leave without giving big hugs. This has now turned into him picking her up and I die. 

We took advantage of the clouds and spent most of the day outside. The Big Event helped get things started last weekend while we were at Paw Print Festival, 10 Aggies were here with Ryan ripping out pitiful shrubs from the front. We have an entire blank slate before us and we are so excited to get to work.

While we were moving dirt, clearing the garden and working up a sweat, Emmy and Landry set up a "store" - please let me know if you need any of these items and I'll make sure you get a fair price.

Hudson joined us for most of the afternoon and since I wouldn't let them sit inside, they brought all their legos to the driveway.

Meanwhile, Emersyn and Landry set up a roly poly habitat. Tiny houses for tiny creepy crawlies.

They are obsessed. So obsessed that I found these homes IN THEIR CLOSET this morning. 

oi. 

Last spring the FISH execs gifted me with a gift card to Messina Hof complete with a free night of babysitting so I surprised Ryan with a date night! Landry insisted on taking a picture....

We celebrate 18 years of dating this week - 18 years. That is almost half of my life sitting across the table from him. I wouldn't change a thing.

Today we avoided the rain, meal prepped, cleaned and managed to make our way to Lowe's to start buying plants that I will kill by July.

I wish every weekend could be so good!

ABCs of Spring Break...

It's 8:25pm on Sunday.

I have been in my pjs ALL DAY.

I didn't even do the thing where you shower at 5pm and then put on clean pjs.

Nope.

Spring Break is here and the King family started strong.

We have some major plans to continue on our trek of nothingness and I honestly couldn't be more excited. Do you ever feel like your life is just too scripted? That we have a plan or activity every single day of the week? Goodness - it's just exhausting. I love looking at all the pics of friends that are already spread across the map on super fun trips, but we are staying home.

Instead, we're going to find some adventure here. I was so inspired by Shelly's "daycation" a few years ago so we put a twist on it and did the "ABCs of Spring Break" to keep us occupied and hopefully away from the "I'm bored" syndrome.


The kids and I made up a list today to get us through the next five days of fun....

Radley, Emmy and I made the list while Ryan and Landry took a late day nap at 5pm. Emersyn took her job extremely seriously. She added "turtles" because "we never feed the turtles anymore" (I'm not sure when we've actually ever fed turtles) and insisted that we recognize Landry's birthday. I mean, good thing, or we would have totally skipped over it. 

;)

I'm really looking forward to "Q" and "I". 

In case you want to do something similar with your crew, here's a blank one you can use! 

I think you can right click, save and then upload to your favorite photo editor to add your own title and prompts. I used Picmonkey. You could also just pin it to save for later!

Happy Spring Break, friends!

Watch me, momma...

Watch me.

How many times have I heard those words?

Watch me jump.
Watch me dance.
Watch me draw.
Watch me race.
Watch me walk.
Watch me ride.
Watch me cook.
Watch me ::insert bodily function of choice here::

Watch me.

Sometimes it's tiring. Sometimes I don't want to watch or listen or play. I just want to sit in the quiet of the house or room and do nothing at all.

But I watch.
I cheer.
I play along.
I guess.
I pretend to eat a five course meal of strawberries, tacos, hot dogs, hot fudge and milk.
I watch.

Sometimes I want to close my eyes because their bravery takes my breath away. I falter between watching and looking away. Trying to convince myself not to say "be careful" and instead allow them to have courage and test their own abilities.

I watch.

And in me watching them they see that I am there. Interested. Engaged and willing to spend my time cheering them on to whatever feat they try next. Even when I'm tired or busy or just not in the mood. For me the watching can be repetitive, but for them, the adventure is always new.

I'm so thankful to have front row seats of their adventure. To be the cheering section and coach. The medic and the instigator. The mom and the audience.

Because one day all too soon, the tables will turn. They won't need me to watch. They won't want me to watch. When that day comes, I'll have these days to look back on and remember.

Watch me, momma.

Watch me.