We clean things so they can be destroyed right exactly before you drop by. I don’t mean to brag, but my kids are capable of making my house a major health code violation in ten seconds flat. Sometimes I think about posting pictures of what my house looks like when it’s clean – just for reference.

Welcome to my home. Here is a picture of what my house looked like one time last week.  It could also look like this more often if I had 47 maids and manservants.

Due to a current cash flow problem, we have had to reduce our Downton Abbey staff size.

Please come back in 25 years to see it like this again.

Thank you.

We are always smelling things. Pillows. Clothes. Carseats. Butts. My life is just a game of: where and what is that horrible smell? Did something die? Did someone poop? Is that a piece of pizza under there??

I just need you to know that I KNOW about the smell. Okay?

There’s only one thing worse than being stinky, and that’s been unknowingly stinky.

I am not that girl.

I have been trying to solve this mystery since Tuesday.

I appreciate your patience.

We take family photos and hang them on the wall so that we can live vicariously through those happy…and remarkably clean people.

Look at them, aren’t they precious?

Laundry. We are literally always doing laundry.

Step 1: Wash load.

Step 2: Forget.

Step 3: Smell Load.

Step 4: Hmm. Smells fine. Dry load.

Step 5: Smell dry clothes.

Step 6: Dammit.

Step 7: Re-wash and dry.

Step 8: Pull out dry clothes to fold “later” and throw them on your bed.

Step 9: Forget until you go to bed. Dammit.

Step 10: Throw clothes on floor.

Step 11: In the morning have children run through clothes until you can no longer tell what is clean.

Step 12: Throw pile back on bed because you cannot even.

Step 13: Repeat until you die.

We are keeping people alive.

We are just saving lives, one pair of adult scissors at a time.

Delivering the children. To school, from school, to birthday parties, to dance, to sports…

I’m just a girl, sitting in a minivan…praying you don’t ask me to get out.

These Lorelei Gilmore shorty shorts did not anticipate leaving the vehicle. I brought the kids and they are dressed. I can not guarantee any other kinds of hassles or formalities such as bras, pants, or shoes.

The kitchen counter. We all have our one thing that makes us feel like we might be in control. Mine is my kitchen counter. Kids engaging in WWF wrestling? Toddler screaming while being permanently velcroed to my calf? It ACTUALLY being cloudy with a chance of meatballs?

I do not care if the heavens have opened and giant chili cheese dogs are bouncing off my front porch.

I can’t control everything – but I can control one thing: and that is my kitchen counter. If you need me, I will be wiping it down for the 102nd time today.

Feeding people. I serve up three meals a day so that people can cry, fall on the floor in convulsions, and agonize over which is better: my cooking – or- starving. Then they choose starving…because my food is just. that. bad.

Insert eternal eye roll.

And then the Lord gave us wine. Thank you, Lord.

Grocery Shopping. I am making moral decisions at the grocery store.

Do I spend my life savings on organic – and feel very good about my healthy and conscientious choices?

Or…

Do I fill my cart with hormones and pesticides and feel like a money saving boss?

Life is so complicated.

I cope by buying mostly organic and hitting up Dairy Queen on the way home for lunch…because balance.

We are not searching for unsolicited advice.

Things you can do instead of give me advice:

Clean my minivan.

Get me a Roomba that eats toys.

Pour me a coffee.

Tell me I’m pretty.

That is all.

We are not judging you. 

You know what I don’t have time for?

Judging.

I do not care if your kid eats fruit snacks or cucumbers. I don’t care if you homeschool or are a working mom. I just don’t even care.

I don’t care if you don’t want kids or are on the career track. I say more power to you – and please while you’re up there, break a few glass ceilings for my girls, would ya?

I don’t think my life is harder or that I’m some sort of martyr. I think that this is exactly what I chose to do – and sometimes it is hard, because that is the nature of things that matter. Just like any great dream, it is worth the cost.

Things worth believing in are also worth fighting for. Sometimes that looks like hard work and sacrifice.

These kids – they are my dream.

And I believe in them 100%.

You do you my friend.

****

***Our hearts go out to all suffering from Hurricane Matthew. One way to join ongoing efforts in Haiti is to donate to Doctors Without Borders by clicking this link.

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It was magic. Birth is magic. It is terrible, it is messy, and it is brilliant. After 24 hours of hard labor and zero results, my friend had gotten a epidural. She cracked jokes as she nibbled graham crackers between pushing contractions. What a bad ass. She was so strong and so powerful…I have never seen her so beautiful. Her husband stroked her head and held her hand as she used all her strength to bring new life into the world.

We cheered her on like it was the World Cup. At one point we offered to leave the room and the midwife looked at us intently, “No, she needs you – she pushes harder when you encourage her.”

“This is how it used to be,” she said, “Women gathered, supporting each other during birth.”

As she gave the final push, Flora Milo became, and I watched her dear parents also become. They will never be the same. We all burst into tears as this tiny being was placed on Allie’s chest. Magic. Blood, sweat, and tears, had brought them to this moment. Crushed hearts, tragic loss, health battles, and doctors that said this moment would never happen…yet here they are.

And here is this baby who says I beg to differ.

And we cry, because magic.

As I held this precious one, I thought of my own babes when they were brand new earth-side…and my heart hurt. I remember the magic. I remember the simplicity of eat, sleep, eat, sleep.

That night I was looking for pictures, and I came across Facebook posts from 2 and 3 years ago. My heart sank. Their precious tiny faces.  Oh how I miss it! How’d it go by so quickly? The moment didn’t seem special when I was in it. It seemed stressful and hectic. It seemed like something to survive until everyone was finally in their beds, fast asleep.

I was disturbed by the regret that gripped my heart. What was I worried about then? I was worried about my pant size and whether Scout would ever stop throwing tantrums. I was worried about the budget and whether or not my floor was clean. I was worried about me.

How am I ever going to stop worrying so much about me??

I have somehow misplaced this magic. This magic that lives and breathes and wakes up in my house every morning.

Haven with her big hair and puffy eyes. She sometimes is cute, other times she growls in response to our cheer with clenched fists and an arched neck. Her eyes say DO NOT SPEAK THESE GOOD MORNING words to me.

It will get better when you can have coffee dear-heart, hang in there.

Magic.

Magic is the smell of Oaklee after a bath. It is all of us dancing in the living room to Shakira and Robin Thicke after movie night. Magic is when Haven sings to Bob the cat about how she wasn’t trying to hurt him. It is Scout crying because Malachi got in trouble. It is that four kids ask to have sleepovers together on their bedroom floor.

Magic.

There is magic happening all around me every day…why do I miss it?

Sometimes there is no coffee strong enough. Sometimes I look inside my bottom fridge drawer and witness things a person can never un-see. Sometimes it’s the whining and the bickering and it’s the constant of eat, clean, eat, clean. Sometimes it’s that life is painful and it feels like it is closing in from every side.

It’s the constant, persistent, wondering if I am doing this. all. wrong.

It’s the wondering if I can really raise these children into the incredible adults I know they can be. Will they be kind? Will they be strong? Will they be healthy?

I think about my friend giving birth.

Could it be that the process and pain of labor isn’t really over? Our mother hearts are in the wringer daily. With each transition and every stage of growth – our minds often scream, “I CANNOT DO THIS.”

And we lose the magic…

for good reason.

Because it is damn. hard.

Birth isn’t that magical when you’re doing it. It is a lot more like pain and really really hard work.

But, we are not doing it alone. We are a sisterhood. A sisterhood of flawed mothers doing our very best.

So my friend, wherever you are at, and whatever your story,

As one flawed mama to another,

I want to take your hand and say LISTEN TO ME. YOU ARE A BAD ASS. You are DOING IT!! This is HARD, but you are CAPABLE. Look at the amazing children you are raising…WOW! Look at how STRONG you are…

Because we can most definitely, certainly do it better together.

Mama, YOU are INCREDIBLE. Look at you.

Childhood is magic. It is terrible, it is messy, it is brilliant.

Lets cheer each other on like it’s the World Cup.

****

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