Infants are so easy, and then they have to go and cross the 6 month mark and get all complicated! 🙂 Once they hit 6 months they start eating, they start crawling, they start becoming ANOTHER CHILD, rather than just a baby. One more mouth to feed during mealtimes, one more kid to chase after, one more little person to train… THIS is where having two kids starts to get REAL.
Oh, Selah B…how do I love thee?? Well, let me count the ways…
1. Play
Selah just LIGHTS up when Elliott is near. They’ve really been playing together this month. Here is one of Elliott’s favorite games to play…bring as MANY TOYS AS POSSIBLE to Selah :).And then, of course, HE takes a turn :).Here is her other favorite playmate…the mirror!“Well she looks like a fun friend! Let me get a closer look.”“Mama, I want to be friends with her forever!”“What? Did I do something?”
2. Laugh
He just makes her laugh……SO HARD!!!
This is our lives…EVERY.DAY.
3. Stand
She is SO HAPPY when we set her up to stand at her play table! SO.HAPPY.
For a couple weeks, she would go into “push-up” position while on her tummy. Just toes and hands touching the ground. And then she learned how to get herself into the “moving” position…
“i really want that balloon.”“…but I can’t reach it.”
“OHHH…so THIS is how you go from a sit to a crawl! That was exhilarating!!”“Look at me! Look at me!!”
Her very first “movement” was a crawl, but she hasn’t really “crawled” in the typical sense of the word since. But boy, does she MOVE! She mostly pulls herself with her arms to get around. And wowsers! She is ALL OVER THE PLACE.
7. Explore
With moving, comes exploring! She got to experience grass for the first time at the McCabe’s house!
“Now what is THIS? It looks more interesting than that food my Mom is feeding me…”“Mom, is this dessert??”
8. Chat
This month, she has started having conversations with us! I love it!! Her favorite word is “Bap” but she also likes, Mamama, Bababa, and the raspberry sound. One night at dinner, she and Elliott had an entire conversation like this for a good 10 minutes. IT.WAS.ADORABLE. We only caught a few seconds of it on camera, but at least you get a glimpse of the cuteness factor!!!
9. Total and utter cuteness…
“We love our coordinating outfits from Auntie Melisa!!”Simply adored.My delight.“He-ey!!”The eyes!The wink!The lashes!I love thee to the depth and breadth and height my soul can reach, when feeling out of sight for the ends of Being and ideal Grace…
Happy 7 months, my darling, precious, standing, dancing, moving, eating, laughing, babbling bundle of joy!!!
I dread starting solids. Solids makes everything about infants WAY more complicated. You start solids and suddenly they’re applying for college. Not my favorite. 🙁
I delayed as long as I could, but I could tell Selah was starting to need more to eat in a day. So, at about 6 and 1/2 months, we finally took the plunge. We decided to start with carrots…
“Ooh! That looks different…and quite yummy!”
“WHOA! Mama, I think you’ve made a big, BIG mistake!!”“Bleh! That DOES NOT seem edible!”“I mean, seriously! Should I spit this out? What’s going to happen if I swallow??!!”“Let me get this out of mouth!”“I think my tongue’s on fire.”“I’ll eat this instead. Yes, this tastes MUCH better.”“Whew! Well, glad THAT’S over…”
Elliott’s very first real word was, “more.” He had been saying “Mama” and “Dada,” but “more” was the first word that he used in context and consistently. And other than, “Uh-oh,” it is still his favorite word. When he’s especially passionate, he doesn’t just say, “more,” he yells, “More DA MORE!!!”
He uses it all the time, in every scenario you can possibly think of.
I’ll never forget one of the first times we were at Sea World watching the dog show (dogs are HIS FAVORITE). The “Who let them dawgs out” song blasted loudly as dogs of every type sprinted out from behind stage and into view, running to the beat of the music. I looked at Elliott and said with expectation: “Big guy!! Do you see all the dogs?!?! Aren’t they so cool?!!!”
“MORE!” he insisted, bluntly and impatiently.
This is–literally–how ALL of our conversations go:
“Elliott, did you have fun playing with your friend?”
“More!”
“Elliott, did you like going to the zoo?”
“More!”
“Elliott, was that a yummy special treat that you had?”
“More!”
Elliott, you did so great throwing that ball!
“MORE!!”
“Elliott, are you grateful that we got to take a special airplane ride??!!”
“More DA MORE!”
He is simply not able to truly enjoy or appreciate the present because he’s always looking to the future, and he wants to make it very clear that we know that he wants more of that thing that he loves.
And my heart breaks. Doesn’t he know that I long to give him “MORE”? Doesn’t he know that it fills my heart with utmost joy to lavish him with good things? Doesn’t he know that I want to spend the rest of my life giving him good gifts, whether the form of those gifts looks like special play dates, balls, a chance to serve, or every-once-in-a-while–sugar?! Doesn’t he know that his daddy has to literally hold me back from buying every thing I see in Target that I know will bless him???
But mostly, the state of his heart breaks mine because he reminds me so much of me, and my heart towards my Father.
Sometimes when I am really, really, really grateful for something, a sneaky lie creeps its way into my mind and quickly tries to convince me that that something will be taken away. So as a result, I cannot fully celebrate gifts or the ones whom I love because of this little lie that they will probably be snatched from my hands. It is a rotten trick, but nonetheless it has been trying to persuade me to grab hold of its false comfort every since I can remember. “If you don’t embrace it too much, it won’t be as hard on your heart when it’s taken away…”
I remember being a little girl and not being able to fall asleep some nights because I was so afraid that my parents were going to die. One specific night when I was about 4 years old, I cried and cried one night in bed until I finally ran to my mom for solace. And I don’t remember anything that she said, but I clearly remember what she did. She scooped me up, sat me on her lap, held me close, and rocked me. What brought peace? Not promises of what the future would hold, but the comfort and security of my mama’s love.
Fear robs. It robs from me. It robs from us. My God is not a God whom I should look upon with fear, because there is, simply, “no fear in love,” (1 John 4:18) and He is all-consuming Love. My God is not a God who tells me that I should live in fear, because He has “not given us a spirit of fearfulness” (2 Timothy 1:7).
It’s difficult to put into words how grateful I am for all that the Lord has given me in this simple life I lead. It is not glamorous or easy, but it is perfect. Perfect because of the ones I get to do this crazy life with. He’s given me a husband who adores me and lays his life down for me. Children who bring me more delight than I ever could have imagined possible. Friends who love us. Family who takes care of us. Yet as I approached my 31st birthday, and I examined the state of my heart, all I could honestly find was, “More DA MORE!!!” I don’t want more things, I don’t want more money. I simply want more time with the ones that I love. More days with my daughter, more days with my son, more days with my very best friend who has added such a tremendous amount of joy in the last few years that he has loved me. I want more giggles with my Selah and more tickles with my Elliott. I want more games of “Get you!” and more rides on the swings. I want more soccer and I want more tea parties.
And, of course, all of that is GOOD! It’s good for me to want more time with my family instead of less! It is good for me to miss my husband like CUH-RAZY when he hasn’t even been away from me for 24 hours. But it’s not good when there’s fear robbing from my gratitude. It’s not good when I am so concerned about what tomorrow may or may not bring that I can’t fully, fully value and enjoy today.
Colossians 3:15 says, “Let the peace of God rule in your hearts…and be thankful.” Don’t you love how the “peace of God” precedes thankfulness? I do. Not peace from financial security. Not peace from a known future. Not peace from the guarantee of prosperity. No, what brings peace? The comfort and security of my Father’s love. I love that it is only because I am at peace with Him, at peace with His love for me, that I have the ability to be thankful.
Peace from His perfect love, which covers and fills me. The peace of God.
Because of THIS: “If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him!” (Matthew 7:11).
Ahhh, peace. HE longs to GIVE me more…more than I can fathom. Sometimes I think of Elliott and how little he really understands about the world. To him, Heaven would be a ball pit filled with every type of sports ball that there is. And while that does sound great, 🙂 he doesn’t even know…oh, he has no idea of the incredible joys that will be made known to him as he grows…the incredible gifts just around the corner. He, like me, literally cannot fathom what MORE there is to come. And that’s okay. I only desire for him to take great delight in the gifts and treasures of today, and simply trust that I long to give him more.
So this year, I desire MORE. More understanding of God’s love for me. More revelation of how much he lavishes me in love. More trust that He desires to give me good gifts. More peace in my heart that allows me to be filled with real gratitude..
Real gratitude for DA MORE…
More play dates at the park with my son, throwing balls, climbing high and swinging hard.
My morning birthday buddy.
More special treats at a cute little coffee shop, reading books together in a new, fun place.
Because SOMEONE’S gotta treat this birthday girl to a latte with whipped cream the size of her face when Daddy’s out of town!!
More HUMONGOUS, MEDAL-WORTHY tantrums thrown upon leaving said cute little coffee shop, if it means that I get to be the one to train and shape my son into becoming a godly, wise, filled-with-self-control man.
(No picture available. I’ll leave the scene of me trying to get him into his car seat while screaming, crying, and flailing next to a busy road up to your imagination.) 🙂
More scraped up knees and bloody faces if it means we were playing a rousing and hilarious game of “who can get the ball first?”
But you shoulda seen the other guy…
More special birthday outfits of yoga pants and maternity t-shirts (not because I’m pregnant! Only to hide my post partum belly!) because my crying, wounded son’s pee leaked completely through his diaper and onto my much-cuter, pre-blood and pee clothes while I was consoling him.
Well, at least I was showered when he peed on me!
More snuggles and kisses from my baby girl, who was so excited for my birthday today that she woke up earlier than she has in 4 months so we could start celebrating during the 5am hour…
Worth EVERY extra minute of missed sleep.
More ribbons and bows from my teething, fussy, adorable little blue-eyed beauty!
“If you’ll just let me chew on this spoon, I’ll stop crying.”
More laughter and love from this perfect face …
Elliott is entertaining her; can you tell she simply adores him??
More fun treats that bring the perfect end to hilarious days…
More, more, MORE of my handsome, strapping husband. More emails and text messages and phone calls from the love of my life, who has lavished me with celebration today, even from thousands of miles away. Who lavishes me with celebration every day, loving me and exhorting me and encouraging me and spurring me on and fanning me into flame and filling me with truth.
Mother’s Day
MORE. More DA MORE!! of days and days filled with the peace of my Everlasting God, which drives me to gratefully enjoy the many abundant and perfect gifts that He has lavished upon me.
Happy 31st birthday to me!! And may I have many MORE DA MORE!! 🙂
*This post is part of a series on Victorious Parenting. Click on the label to the right to read all posts in this series.*
I am determined to know my daughter’s heart.
Selah is more complicated than Elliott. And unfortunately, we tend to view the characteristic, “complicated” as a criticism. But it’s not a criticism, it’s a part of who she’s created to be. I’ve seen it from the time she was a teeny weeny baby… she would cry at times and I had NO idea why, whereas Elliott almost NEVER cried at odd times for no reason. Her naps have been totally unexplainable for long seasons of time, whereas Elliott was quite predictable. Selah is much more sensitive than Elliott ever was. Elliott was always perfectly comfortable and happy with every stranger or friend that he met, and always content to be in their arms. But Selah has shown lots of partiality to her mamacita, and has definitely had her fair share of tears at times when passed off to another.
In short, she has been hard to figure out sometimes. There have been MANY, MANY times in her short 7 months of life that I have said, “I just don’t know what she needs!! If I knew what she needed, I would give it to her!” I have been exasperated and frustrated–not at my sweet little daughter, but at my own lack of understanding. I so desperately want to give her what she needs.
And now, she’s in a new stage. She’ll be playing quite contently and then all of a sudden start to cry. She’ll spot me from across the room and look at me with pleading eyes through her tears as if to say, “Why have you abandoned me, Mama?! Please, please come!!!” I’ll go scoop her up, the tears instantly stop, and then…and then she pushes away from me. Seriously. She takes both her hands and pushes against me as if to get down. So, I put her down. And she begins to cry.
Tonight, days worth of this underlying frustration began to rise up in me. We were playing on the floor and she spotted her Leap Frog table. She bolted towards it with urgency, and I put her up so she was standing to play. And suddenly, she began to twist her entire body around and reach for me. I scooted closer and she grabbed onto my face with both her hands. So I picked her up, and–like clockwork–she pushed away and towards the play table. So I put her back, and she began to whine, again twisting her body around and reaching for me. I picked her up and put her on my lap, thinking she must just want the best of both worlds–to be in Mama’s arms and also be playing with her toy. But no, she twisted and squirmed, reaching for my face again. So I picked her up. Maybe she wants to cuddle? Nope. Instantly she began to push away.
“Sweet girl, what do you want????” I asked her, feeling the tension rising up in me.
I am so quick to give up, to push away, when I don’t understand. When I feel rejected. When I am hurt. When I don’t know what to do, I flee. Far too many Mother/daughter relationships and friendships are brought to destruction because of this pattern. One feels hurt, one seems to be distancing herself, the other doesn’t know what she did to hurt the first, so they both push away…and away…and away…until they are too far out of reach. It is so sad…how chasms as big as the Grand Canyon are formed through misunderstanding that leads to insecurity that leads to distance.
And I refuse to do that with my daughter. I know it sounds crazy. Yes, I know she is just 7 months old. Quit making a mountain out of a molehill, Susanne, you might be thinking. But, you see, I know the biggest of Oaks, formed over hundreds of years, started with a tiny seedling. And I want the seedling of my relationship with my daughter to grow up healthy, tall and strong. A tiny tree that starts to grow crooked because of an obstruction may not seem like a big deal when it’s only inches tall. But once that tree is full grown, it will be very apparent that it didn’t grow straight. The bigger it gets, the more the imperfection will be made very, very clear.
So I never want my heart towards Selah to be, “You are too complicated! I give up!! Just play by yourself and cry about it if you must!” Never, ever, ever. Even when she is “just” 7 months old. I am sure that Selah will be like me in some ways, and I am certain she will be very different than me in others. And I do not want to push away in exasperation because she puzzles me at times. I long to know her. To truly, truly know her heart. To understand how her mind works. Please, Lord, let not my frustration or my frustrated efforts lead me to push away from my daughter. Let not my insecurity that tells me I’m a bad mom if I don’t know what she needs, push me away from my daughter. Let not my fear that she will push me away, push me away from my daughter. I long to understand, not to reject. I long to know, not to run.
I read in a book once that a woman’s central fear is that she is too much, too complicated. Do we not all cry out to be known? To not be given up on? Oh, and how hurt we are when others choose to turn away from the journey of knowing our hearts because we are “just too much!” We see a woman sleeping around with men and are critical, instead of learning that she never had a dad to tell her of her worth. We see a woman who flaunts her body with short skirts and low shirts and we judge, instead of realizing that she never had a mother to teach her dignity. We see a woman who settles…oh, how she settles…instead of understanding that she has never tasted of her Father’s love; a love that died so that she could taste abundance. We push away because we do not know. We see the behavior, and we refuse to understand the heart. So we turn and run.
What destruction is brought upon women because we act this way. I will not tell my daughter she is too complicated, too sensitive, too fickle. I will not turn away when I don’t understand her. I will not settle for not truly knowing her heart.
Instead, I will find her. I will discover what makes her heart beat and I will fan that beat into flame. I will help teach her what to do with her emotions, instead of running when her emotions hurt my feelings. I will patiently bear with her in love when she knows not what she does because she is learning how to handle all of her own intricacies.
And lastly, I will celebrate her. I will celebrate how God made her–complicated and perfect. I will celebrate my Selah, whose intricate, beautiful heart within longs to be known and loved.
