Swimming Lessons

You have been taking swimming lessons this past week. Three nights a week, we go to the pool over on Quantico. We missed the first night, but that was not because your dad and I forgot. It was because we remembered the start date wrong.

On Wednesday, you had your classes and we played for a bit before going home. On Thursday, we got there early, had a bite with your dad and then had a few minutes of play time after the class.

Grace and Eleanor were excited to show us what they had learned. And you, sweet Jordan, were becoming more and more comfortable in the water. Blowing bubbles, splashing, even wading up to your chin. Such a huge difference from your first few days there. Your dad was playing with your sisters while you and I were talking with another mom and her little boy. You were right there. Right near my leg in about 18 inches of water.

You will never know how much I regret not keeping my eyes on you.

It was ten seconds. Maybe twenty. And I looked around for you. The rest of the family had drifted over to the very exciting three feet area and were showing off their scooping hands and kicking feet and you decided to follow.

Your head was tipped back and you bounced up from the bottom to grab a gulp of air. Your hands were going underneath the water and your were bicycling your feet. A dive later you were coughing on my shoulder and I was sure the pounding in my ears was never going to stop. I cannot believe I failed you like that. I'm supposed to be keeping you safe.

We want you to enjoy going to the pool and the beach. To learn to swim and love the water. You've powered through timid and scared of the slightest wave to a girl determined not to let a little thing like lack of oxygen stop you. And that terrifies me. I want you to be brave. I want you to have the courage to try new things, to fail and to continue to try. Your dad and I just need a little help with the adjustments of attitude and the rapid rate and which you and your sisters develop and grow.

I'm not proud of letting you down. Of failing to keep you safe. Of endangering your life. I woke up on Thursday night with you bobbing in the pool - over, over and over again. At one point, I got up and went into your room just to lay down next to your bed and feel your chest rise and fall under my hand. The possible consequences of my actions are not something I wanted to think about and kept running through my head.

So I'm going to do better. Your still probably going to swallow some pool water, but we're going to be watching you daredevils much, much closer.

Although I doubt I'll be of much use as I won't be sleeping for the next month or so.

You are five.

Five years old today. You still have blue eyes like your dad and hair that was the color I had before Ms. Clairol and Loreal started helping me with my greys. You have freckles on your nose and a mole on your forehead that I find adorable.

You wake up groggy. You rub your eyes and wobble a bit, but you usually follow it up with a smile. You and Eleanor are still in love with night dresses and fight over who gets to wear you dad's T-shirt at night.

For some reason, you don't prefer milk. Oh, you'll drink it if we put it in front of you, but you would rather a glass of water any day. The cheese sticks and yoghurt that tempt your sisters hold no appeal to you, but an ice cream sandwich is welcome any day. I believe that to be universal.

You love to tell a story. You're getting better at it every day.

You're the little mother. For good and for not so good. You lead, you plan, you boss, you help, you direct, and you say "now!" a lot. The mirror I get to look into every day is not always pretty. But you read to your sisters- the most wonderful made up stories. You encourage your sisters and tell them what a great job their doing, you hang their pictures on the fridge and you always want to rub their backs and kiss any owies. God help anyone who pushes or shoves your sisters on the playground.

You make your bed every morning. "Nice and flat" just like Granne taught you. I think your Granne is so proud of this because she still hasn't trained me to make mine every morning. You are her success story.

You are smart. So smart. And I worry that the group activities that we do are not challenging you enough. I love the way you are always willing to assist your sisters, but I worry. Hopefully I'll find a lot of things for you to do this summer with just Mommy-Gracie, Daddy-Gracie time. Your dad and I are trying to find a few things for us to do with you and your sisters one on one, but we have yet to overcome our biggest obstacle- getting out of pajamas. We're working on that.

You can reach my waist. You wrapped your arms around my waist last week and I wanted to cry. When did you get so big? When did you grow so much? HOW DID I MISS THIS?? You hugged me with your wonderful strong arms and told me you loved me and all I could think was, " Jordan hugs my kness, Eleanor grabs my leg, Holy crap....."

I love you. I love your beautiful smile and your bad knock-knock jokes and your made up songs. You are five today. Five. Happy Birthday, Grace Anne.

Today is mother's day

My mom taught me

• to love reading and books.
• resourcefulness. Imagination and creativity are powerful and not to be wasted.
• to change your mascara every year. That's why we give it to each other at Christmas.
• how strong a woman could be.
• that being alone doesn't have to mean lonely.
• to always show up for weddings and funerals. This was the tip of the iceberg of "just show up" because people remember who came to a wedding and a funeral. (And to always have a black dress or appropriate clothes for a funeral because in a time of grief you're not going to want to shop.)
• to be independent
• that oatmeal cookies are for breakfast if you change the name to "breakfast cookies."
• how to sew. She taught me about quilts and then encouraged me to run with it.
• to give quietly. That helping someone else financially or otherwise has its own rewards.
• that apologies are important.
• that family is priceless.

I've had a lovely day. There were breakfast muffins (batter baked with crisco, rolled in butter and dipped in cinnamon sugar are not cupcakes if eaten before ten in the morning) church, then the hardware store, hammock swinging and lots of gorgeous Mother's Day art. And tonight? Tonight I'm going to be SO surprised when I get Mother's Day cookies for dessert!

Dearest Jordan,

I cut your hair for the first time this morning. Not a lot, but enough to even out the long strands from the top of your head to the ones you've rubbed short on the sides and back. You've got a cute little bob that reminds me of your sister Grace and Katie.

No more baby straggly hair. No more floaty wisps. My head knows the haircut looks good but my heart doesn't like it one bit.

New Hampshire

I went to New Hampshire last weekend.

Because I could.

And because I was invited to go on a road trip with Kerry. But mostly because I could. It's been a long time since I went adventuring for adventure's sake. For the last several years this has comprised mostly of day trips to or mini outings to learn the terrain or inventory of an area. Sounds boring enough, but I liked going to a new place and finding something extraordinary even if it was at the local International supermarket.

When Kerry started talking about a weekend up north, I remembered my road trips in college. Forget about the destination for a minute, even the journey was a marked improvement. Where I was usually in the backseat, I got shotgun. Checking a map every five minutes? Now we have mapquest. Limited budget of college years became a cooler full of snacks, a six pack of diet coke (we'll talk about Mommy's addiction later) and a few twenties designated for crappy, greasy delightful road food. And foraging for decent music every thirty minutes was replaced by an ipod full of swing music, gravelly voice seducers and an audio book about the CIA that had my attention for over six hours of the ride home.

Or maybe that was Kerry's evil plan so I would shut up. Didn't work, but I was distracted for a good portion. I consider myself well read and have an okay understanding of history but even I had to ask a few questions along the way. I mean, who uses Halcyon in every day conversation? And just for reference sake: hal c yon

n.

1. A kingfisher, especially one of the genus Halcyon.

2. A fabled bird, identified with the kingfisher, that was supposed to have had the power to calm the wind and the waves while it nested on the sea during the winter solstice.

adj.

1. Calm and peaceful; tranquil.

2. Prosperous; golden: halcyon years.

We left Virginia on Friday and drove up north, carefully avoiding Interstate 95 and all the traffic that always seems to accompany that road. I'm sure it won't have improved by the time you're old enough to read this and drive that highway. It was a gorgeous drive and I got to see some areas of the country that I either haven't seen before or have forgotten. We had french fries, milkshakes and a slew of other food that I would have tried to avoid feeding the three of you. And it was gooooood.

Kerry's home town was a delightful and I kept looking around her parent's house and finding wee surprises. I unknowingly usurped Kerry's usual bedroom and found ABC blocks nestled underneath the bedside table. Her mom used a small quilt rack to hold the towels (or maybe we've been reinventing a towel rack all these years?) and had a tiny pastry box holding four incredible chocolates tied up with a pretty ribbon. I wanted to move in. Or at the very least steal the bed and put it in the back of the truck. But that would probably mar our chances of going back, so I'll wait until next time.

More later. You guys are getting frantic on the playground and are a bit distracting. I wonder if popsicles would help?

I am so proud

Let's forget for a minute that your mom is a loon. We won't talk about how she spent her hard earned cash to have Becca come over so that she could scrub down the bathrooms and use bleach in peace. Because only serial killers and other mommies of multiple kids would enjoy that kind of thing. Because that's what I did this morning and you can bet I told at least three other mothers who were envious.

No, we're going to talk about you guys. And your new game that is always set off by the fact that Grace suffers the indignity of STILL having to use a booster seat at the ripe old age of four almost five. "When I'm old enough- When I'm as big as you" is our new game. First, Grace buckles herself into her car seat. Then she starts mentioning her car seat. Then, she starts a sentence with "when I'm big enough" or "When I'm as big as you".

The first one is almost always, "...I won't have to use a booster chair." which is quickly followed by one of Eleanor's quips and then the volleys begin between Eleanor, Grace and a word or two from Jordan. They include being able to drive, borrowing my shoes, having your own purse, being able to fly (not in an airplane), being able to fly an airplane, going to the moon and a whole assortment of other ideas. But this morning Grace blurted out, "When I get as big as you, I'll be able to get the butter all by myself!"

Paula Deen be praised.

Mom's day

Mother's Day is coming up. In two weeks, there will be joyous celebrations and shouts of "I love you, Mom!" on one Sunday in May. Mother's everywhere will be given breakfast in bed, flowers, cards and dragged out to brunch in crowded restaurants everywhere by adoring families in order to show their love and appreciation.

And then the following Monday everything goes back to normal.

I've got two things to say about Mother's Day. The first being that I'm a freak. Really- Mother's Day is no big deal to me. Your father shows me every week, almost every day, how much he appreciates my efforts here at home. Either he's putting on a really good show or he knows that a day with the three of you can be...chaotic. Joyful, fun and adventurous, but also frustrating, confusing, annoying and HARD. And because of his example, you girls routinely make me feel as though my work is worthwhile.

Bestides, I get breakfast in bed almost every Saturday when I hide out upstairs and you make pancakes with your dad.

The second thing I want to say is that motherhood should not be an accident. Motherhood is a CHOICE that you can make in your life, not just so you won't be left out on Mother's day and have to face all those annoying comments and questions every year. This is not saying that you three were not an incredible surprise to us, your dad and I never knew we could be this blessed. But from the moment we found out about you, we wanted to have you in our lives.

We have friends, both married and single, who have chosen not to have kids. These people are dedicated family people, adventurous, ambitious, talented and brilliant. And they know that they do not wish to be (or feel they would not be good at being) full time parents. I can respect that. While I could never imagine my life without you, I respect that they took the time to think about what they wanted rather than blindly doing what society demanded was the next step to marriage and biology.

They are generous with you three every time they see you. To a person, they smile and talk to you like small people; NOT babies. They read to you, they listen to you, they are patient with you. They would be great parents, but instead stand firmly in the position of aunts, uncles, godparents and friends.

You will be so lucky to have them in your life.

What I'm trying to say (and saying badly) is that if you decide to have kids, love them and raise them to the best of your abilities. If you can't have kids and want them, blood is not an issue. You love that kid, they are YOURS. Which makes them my grandkids. If you can't or decide not to have kids, it doesn't make you any less of a woman. Not one bit.

To be clear- I want grandkids. I want to spoil them rotten and see you grow your family in a way that will bring you joy. But if your choice takes you down a different path, I'M OKAY WITH THAT. Just make sure I get to make quilts for SOMEBODY. I can say that. I'm your mother.