Week #8 (late again...)

I really don't have anything witty or particular mindful to go along with the pics this week. It's just a look at what's happening here. I probably don't have much to say because Elise isn't letting anyone get much sleep...

Abstract art at it's finest. 

This is her new thing, when she doesn't want to listen to me she throws her head up, like so, and marches away from me!

Pretty much everyday of every week we have a princess or ballerina in the house, or even a Princess that is a ballerina!

Week #7 Family Day Weekend

We were really lucky to get to have an entire Family Day weekend all together. It included swimming, pizza, movies, walks, adventures to find unicorns, magical fairies and butterflies (all were found but the butterflies).

Searching for the Unicorns, Fairies and Butterflies

I also had a little 'aha moment'. One of those times your kids stop you in your tracks and make you instantly analyze what you just did or are about to do.

Ben has not been feeling well so we popped him into a walk-in clinic. When Ben was called in the girls and I hung out in the waiting room. They were hopping between chairs and generally having a good time. Shortly after Ben left us a man walked out of a room from just being seen.  Aubrey looked him up and down as he walked past us, then asked "Mom why is he wearing pyjama pants?".

Elise believes in Jammie days, and wearing 5 pairs of undies on top.

Not wanting the man to be embarrassed, I instantly started to say "shhh" but barely got the sound out of my mouth before I stopped. I knew if i told her to shh, she would instantly ask why she should. . When I thought about how I would answer I didn't have a good enough answer to continue. I also thought if I say that would it have more impact on the man, maybe he would think I thought it was a shameful thing. I looked at her and replied "Well I don't really know why, but if I were to guess I bet it's because he is sick and just wants to be comfy.". Satisfied with my answer she went back to playing with Elise.

I was left to think of the impact me telling her to shh could have had. Would it have made her think it was a bad thing to wear comfortable clothing? That the man should be embarrassed?  Would it have produce a seed of judgment inside her for later years?

The rest of the weekend was much less eventful, unless you count the unicorn/fairy hunting.

I think she spotted a unicorn!

Week #6 (a day late)

Last week was a laid back week with the cold weather and everyone still working at recovering from colds. So just a couple of pictures...

She was wearing this giant skirt and dancing around, I had her stop for a few seconds so I could take a picture that was not her twirling. This is the look I received. 

Showing Dad how to multi-task, sweeping while colouring! Girls got skills!

I loves her. This picture reminds me of so many of her from when she was about 6 months old. 

I'm Kelly and I judge others...

My Mom recently sent me a link for a photo project that was done by a group called Connecticut Working Moms. The intent is to encourage women to stop judging one another and end the ‘Mommy Wars’. 

They describe the Mommy Wars as the negative comparisons and judgements on things such as post-baby bodies, feeding methods, choice of diapering, maternity leave, the list could go on and on really.

This article was sent to me about a month ago and I have been sitting on it, stewing. Probably overthinking, but at least it got me thinking.

I applaud the effort. A great step in calling the woman population out, saying “ lets all just love one another.”.  The Utopian world in my head looks a lot like that. Everyone having true compassion and empathy for one another, being fully accepting of all no matter how different it is from themselves.

But here’s the thing that I think gets missed. Understand this is all just from my own experience.

I feel like in order to truly have the change, people need to be honest that they do it.  That even the moms who held up the amazing signs in this photo project have at some point, and likely still do (even if its silently) judge other mom’s choices.  

See I look at it like an AA group. The first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem. 

Before I became a mom I had a lot of judgments towards parents around me. I judged the choices my sisters made, the lady down the street, the lady in the mall. Because obviously when I was a mom it would be different.  Well, then I became a mom, and I did do a lot of things different in comparison from the moms I had judged.

Luckily along with becoming a mother, a new pathway of empathy opened up for other moms that wasn’t really ever there before.  But it unfortunately didn’t shut down the judgment pathway that was created many years before. Since reading this article and other blogs, board forums, I started wondering why.

When I started this blog, while going through PPD after having Elise, I was blown away at how many messages I received from women that had gone through the same thing. These are women I had known, or thought I did. And I think that is where things start to go a little haywire.

See we rarely know someone’s whole truth. What makes them tick, what breaks them down, what lifts them, we are not an open species with each other. We hide. It’s like the ultimate game of hide-and-seek. Whoever hides the best, looks the best. And we all know we wanna look good.

Since exposing myself to the world wide web and stating I indeed was very flawed it helped dissolve some of the judgment of other people. Sadly not all of it.  The thing is though I am more aware. I can catch myself in the moment, then I start a little mental conversation “Kelly, do you know where this person is coming from? Do you know that that Mom might have spent her entire night up with a teething baby and now has about 5% of her patience in working gear? Do you know that she is a single Mom doing what works best for her family?”

The more I have dived into questioning what others lives are really like, I realized I don’t know much.  And even though I have more understanding of others now than ever before, I still get caught in the mudslide of judgment. Because I still have flaws, I still have insecurities that loom looking for others who might be weaker at something than I am to boost my self-esteem. 

Maybe a photo-project that would be more impactful would be one with signs saying “I judged her because she fed her child sugar cereal” and the other holding a sign saying “I accept her even though she judges me because she has an insecurity that other people think she doesn’t feed her children well”. 

I can join the chorus of Kumbaya singing “Love one another”, but I don’t think we can all truly drop judgment until we can admit we do it, even while we try not to. I think it's about taking the opportunity to stop and self reflect when we find ourselves in judgement, and work towards self growth. All the while trusting that with growth true compassion and empathy for others will organically grow with you. 

Week #5

This week was a rough week. All pictures are from my iPhone, I never pulled my camera out once. We were a house full of sickness, crocheting and crazy babies. 

My sister Angela came to my house a little over a week ago with a ball of yarn and a few hooks. She taught me the basics to crochet in about 20 minutes. Now I have gone a little overboard. Elise is wearing some leg warmers I whipped up, she had to be tricked into wearing them, now she loves them. 

Aubs and I sporting our infinity scarves I did. 

With my sinus infection I became a bit housebound, which in turn created crazy kids. So, I finally dragged myself outta the house and took the girls on a date. 

At Edo in Camrose the cooks can see pretty much everyone in the joint. They kept smiling and waving at Elise. This was her response. You can't see her hand but she was poking her fork at them with this look on her face. 

Sick mom + sick baby = multitasking put to the test!