What am I darlin'? A whisper in your ear...

A piece of your cake?

Today I learned that I am leaving for Colorado on Saturday, not Sunday. Not a bad thing, just caught me by surprise. I feel a little rushed, but I am thinking I will throw everything warm I own in the North Face and hit the road. I have a fear when I travel that wherever I am going will not have certain essentials if I leave them behind. The first time I traveled to Europe I was so terrified that I would forget something. When I arrived in Paris I realized, hey...they have everything here. Toothbrushes (the thing I generally forget), deodorant, pajamas, etc. I guess I tend to look over the fact that people live there, and those people need the same things I do. All of this to say, I am not worried about leaving things. As long as I have my debit card and my credit card I should always be covered, right? Watch me say that and then something completely unexpected and unheard of happens.

Dakota is back from the vet, safe and sound. She makes me sad because as I type she is laying beside me and whenever she shifts in position she moans; it's pathetic. I realized my dog calls the shots when she was laying on the couch tonight and I actually brought her water bowl over to her and held it where she could drink from it without having to move. I have become my dog's servant. When did this shift in power occur? Oh well, she repays me by keeping me warm with her crazy shaggy fur.

Tonight brought some things in to focus for me. I have always had tremendous respect for young and/or single mothers, but tonight was a complete wake-up call. As a favor to my friend Rachel's family, I watched her three nieces so her family could attend a party. I only had to watch them for two hours, but with a three year old, a one year old, and a three month old, that was long enough. The oldest two are sisters and both of them are just getting over a cold so I was constantly wiping their noses, making sure that if they were on the stomachs in their cribs they could breathe, making them bottles, changing diapers, carrying two kids (one on each hip), peeking in to make sure the youngest one was still asleep, reading to them, trying to decipher what the three year old was saying, wiping more noses, etc. I can't imagine keeping up with all of them day in and day out. They are adorable and I love spending time with them, but it really is hard to keep up. Zoe would be punching buttons on the phone as Eden started going through a make-up bag. Who do you stop first? Zoe is spilling milk down her sweatshirt while Eden is spilling the contents of her mother's purse on the floor. What do you do? Well, after about two minutes of this I placed everything within their reach on a higher surface-- cell phones, dishes, purses, keys. This tackled the primary problem and things were fine. I sat on the couch with both of them in my lap, reading a magazine and wondering how their mother does it when something happened. I realized everything was quiet. Zoe had fallen asleep sitting up but leaning back against my chest, and Eden was laying beside me half-asleep, her right hand playing with her hair, her left hand underneath her back. They were sitting there, curled up in their winter pajamas (the fleece ones with feet), and I realized why all of the chaos their mother deals with is worthwhile. She is the mother of two adorable kids that love her. They say cute things; they play dress-up in her shoes while she's away. And, at night, she can sit in silence on the couch with one of her little girl's hands curled around her finger and the other's head in her lap. I think it must be moments like that, when things slow down, that being a mother is most rewarding.