And now you are one

Dearest Sían, 

You, my darling girl, are one today.

And oh my, how this year flew past. I remember how I was listening to music as I lay on the table while Dr. Lopez carefully pulled you out. Daddy saw you first, with your amazing full head of hair and long legs. And then they gave you to me. And I cried. I cried because you were so tiny. I cried because I waited nine long months for you to come, in fact, I waited my whole life to meet my little girl. I cried because I finally got to see who this little person was moving inside of me. And my baby girl, you were so beautiful. You still are.

Your pixie features captured everyone right away, and all of a sudden this little person grasped everyone around her tiny fingers and you know what?  I think you still do.  You are everyone's ray of sunshine, Síani, and with that smile of yours, you will always be. 

❤ I love that you sleep! Oh my, do you sleep. From the first night, till the next few days, till weeks and months after. And now a year later, your favourite part of bedtime is climbing into that cot of yours. 

❤ I love that you already know what you don't like. You push things away when you don't want something, you cry when you want attention, and you smile when you get what you want. You are so independent but too small to be on her own. I want to treasure this moment for as long as it lasts. 

❤ I love that you are feisty.  One day you still hold that strength in you and stand up for yourself. Don't let anyone take that away from you. 

❤ I love that you love your brother so much. He is the only one who can make you laugh wholeheartedly. He's the only one who gets you so happy that your whole body jumps with excitement. I hope this is the beginning of the most special relationship you will always treasure. 

❤ I love that you are such a happy baby. Even when you are not feeling well or extremely tired, you smile. You smile at everyone, you know? One day, that smile of yours will brighten someones day. I know it always brightens mine. 

❤ I love your little toes. Your little fingers. Your little tummy. Your little button nose. Your little curls. Everything about you I love unconditionally. I wish I could hold onto this past year a little longer. But I know every year will make me love you even more, if that is even possible. My heart feels like it will burst if I love you any more. 

❤ I love your big front teeth and your gapped smile. You have five teeth now. And I love how you scrunch your nose up and show them to me with your silly smile. 

❤ I hate leaving you in the morning. You now make it harder than it has ever been, how you grab hold of my arms so tightly, how you cry as if I'm going to leave you forever, how you look as me as though you will never see me again. It breaks my heart every single day. And I always drive off with my heart dragging behind the car. 

❤  I hate that I miss so much. The year has gone so quickly, but I feel like there has been so much I haven't been there for. Mummy works hard for your future, and I promise you that I will make sure that the time we have is quality over quantity. 

Happy first, my sweet sunshine. To many more years with the brightness that you bring into our lives. 

Just what I needed to see

I started this long, insightful post at midnight last night. I became this angst ridden person writing about desires as deep as my sleep should have been. My computer quickly shut tight before that publish button was pressed in a hurry, leaving these daydreams seen through thousands of letters typed on the screen only with my eyes. Leaving it in a folder for me to return to once my head was clear of all the murkiness that hovered over me.

I wrote about how I was dreaming about all the things I could have had. I wrote about how I sometimes thought about how I would have been somewhere else in my life if I turned another direction, walked a different path. I wrote about the places I'd be, the things I'd have, the things that would have made me into that person I always wondered about. I titled it ' Everything that I am not'.

Then tonight, before I scurried over to my drafts folder, I saw this. 

So I let go, deleted my post and wrote this one.

And I feel much better for it.

you are five today

Dear Cameron, 

You are five today. 

The big FIVE.

You woke up this morning by my side and as I started singing happy birthday, you looked confused and asked me why your voice was still the same as when you were four. You ran into my bed and asked Daddy why you hadn't grown overnight because you were the same size as you were when you were four. As if all of a sudden, after one sleep, you thought you would grow bigger because you turned five. Well, my boy, it is as if I closed my eyes after one long sleep and found you as this big five year old. As if you grew overnight, when I wasn't watching, like a time lapse capture highlighting critical moments in double speed. But I have been watching. You must know that I have been doing that. 

☆ I love that you are way beyond your years. I often wonder what goes through that clever mind of yours. I can see how fast your thoughts move, sometimes your words have a hard time catching up with your thoughts. 

☆ I love that you are caring and loving. You look after your sister and you always make sure she is safe. There are moments you argue with her, not realising how small she really is but you love with all your heart and it's amazing to see. I hope you always treat her with as much love. 

☆ I love that you correct me when I'm wrong. And boy, you love doing so. You also love being right. At five, you are confident in your doings. 

☆ I love that you read so well. You sometimes pretend to be too tired to read but it doesn't take much for your love for books to outweighs your exhaustion.

☆ I love that you have memorised words to the rock songs that Daddy is teaching you. There are not many five year olds I know who sing along to these songs word for word. It shows that you pay attention even if I think you are not. 

☆ I love that you talk so much. Yes, sometimes, I tell you to slow down. Sometimes I ask you to stop. But never stop, my boy, because your consistent chatter shows me that your intelligence is constantly developing. 

☆ I love that you are an observer. You watch people and you scope out the situation that you are surrounded in. You are aware and extremely cautious of your surroundings. 

☆ I still love the way you smell in the morning. I always wish for this smell to stay forever. I'm so happy that I still have this to hold onto.

☆ I love looking back at your baby pictures and remembering how you were. I love knowing that my memories of you grow all the time. Next year, I'll have another thousand pictures I can stare at. I will never tire of staring at you. 

☆ I love that you understand what secrets are. And I most especially love that you share yours with me. I hope you realise that you can always share your secrets with me. 

☆ I love how you run out of the front door and yell "Muuuummmmyyyyy" as I get home after a long day at work. My days are hard without you two but your happiness in welcoming me home always makes it better. I love how you are always excited to see us. 

☆ I love your craziness. Your silliness. Your grumpiness. Your happiness. 

☆ I love that I have this to write you every year. I love how some things are constant. But I also love how you are changing every year. Every day. Every minute. 

Another year. Another year of all this love I have for you.

Happy fifth, my big, big boy. 

you are four today

you are three today

you are two today

Grateful

Today I watched parents say goodbye to their boy. I watched them quietly stare at their son lying in a white, shiny casket and all I could do was look away, walk away with a heavy heart. I listened to them speak of their loss, I held my tears back as they shed theirs. I listened to each drowned out word, how every muffled syllable echoed their grief. In a large room with over two hundred people, the silence was deafening. 

Its been a sad day. 

But yet, I rushed home, eager and excited to see my children.  I smiled and my heart skipped a beat when they reached out to welcome me home. I kissed their heads as if I had never kissed them before. I cuddled them till they couldn't breathe. And when I had them in my arms, I held them just that little bit longer. I forget how blessed I am to come home to them at the end of a long day, blessed to read them books at night before bed, blessed to pull the covers over their little bodies and extremely blessed to watch them flutter their little eyes as they sleep. In this time, I realise how lucky I am to have these moments when they've suddenly been stripped from others so drastically.

Who am I to complain about not having enough hours when some people have lost all?

September blues

I miss myself. 
How I'd kick my feet up and read a book.
How I'd play Billie Holiday in the evenings with a glass of red wine.
How time was distributed equally between family, friends and myself.
How my fingers felt with paints all over them.
The way they felt after the pencil left a dent from drawing.
How I spent three hours in the morning working out.
How I seemed to have plenty of things to blog about.
And how I was getting quite good at keeping this space up to date.
How I took lots of photos.
How I dreamt of other things except work.
And how I had that extra large glass of vodka with friends with no guilt.
Why is this guilt even here? 


I miss seeing the kids all day.
How I had them by my side while I worked.
How I was there for every 'first'. So far I've missed most of hers.
How I ate lunch with them and not at my desk.
How I never counted hours before I saw them.
And how I didn't have to miss them so much.

It's been six months. 

So perhaps it's the six month blues.

So maybe this is all it is. 

Or maybe I just need a break. 

Because I'm tired. Really f**king tired.

when all of a sudden breathing isn't an option

Over a month since I last blogged. 

Absolutely ridiculous. 

I wish I could say the same about my life. Okay maybe, ridiculous may be the right word.

Ridiculously overwhelming. In a good way. In an amazing way.

 However with this sense of overwhelming excitement  comes non existent breathing space. So non existent, my little one laughed for the first time without me there.  It's a killer, you know, this feeling of guilt. But in as much as my guilt washes over me, showing my children that doing what you love is so important that it overshadows the guilt. Chasing dreams, catching them and relishing in them is something to teach them. Goals, achievement, passion, and  hard work. These are what I want my children to see when they look at me. At the end of the day, as much as my dreams are mine to achieve, they are also for them to aspire to. 

p.s. i've really neglected my little online space. who knows when I'll ever get back up to how it used to be. :(

When push goes to shove

The day I took this photo, I was embracing change. Change in my body, change in my life and most importantly change in my state of mind. On this day, I ran till my body told me to stop. And it stopped early but I listened. I walked till I knew I had to sit down and man, did my body insist. But what I didn't know was that a few days after this run, my life would hit a complete crossroad and change would be bigger than I ever expected.

I stood at this intersection where motherhood and career pointing in different directions. A choice I've never had to make, a choice that came natural when we decided to leave England. After all, moving was one of the biggest adjustments I had to make in that time of my life, how could I balance anything else? I know I didn't need anything else. But now, I've settled into my comfort zone. My office sits two seconds away from my children's bedrooms, site visits are done on my schedules, meetings are set on convenience. But they say the magic happens outside comfort zones. And I believe them. 

So I'm stepping out. I'm stepping forward and I'm running towards the magic. I've said yes to an amazing job opportunity into a career that I've worked my butt off for. As much as my company has taught me many things, I needed to let it sit back for awhile because of the stagnant waters it was sitting in. There is always room to learn more, grow more, BE MORE. And to me, the decision wasn't about choosing motherhood over my career, I was about deciding how to unite the two pathways together and cement them into my life as one. The decision has become about learning that each one matters just as much as the other. 

And I'm okay with it. After all, who doesn't want to chase after magic?