Mother's Day

I wanted to put up a couple of pictures here, but not of Joel this time.  Well, I'll put up a couple of those too, no doubt.  I wanted to put a picture of my Mother's Day gift here, on my blog.  And a picture of my calendar too.  Yeah. My calendar.

I bought this beautiful calendar.  I love it.  Calendars should not only be functional (as the one I have in the hallway phone nook is, complete with whiteboard and space for "planning.") but I firmly believe they should be beautiful.  As the one hanging in the dining area is.  I needed to get two calendars this year, so that I'd have both function and beauty.

And then I take my beautiful calendar, the one with the "ocean motif," and I write a verse or two for the month on it.  It definitely takes it down a notch or two on the visual aesthetics of it.  But it ratchets it up a notch or two as soul food.  And that is very important to me.

So I am including a photo of my calendar and the verse, my apologies for my ugly penmanship.  All my school-hood I constantly heard the same thing about my handwriting/printing.  Here you shall see just what the teachers meant.  But I love the picture, and I love the words.

These are the words for the month of May.  And they seem to go well with my Mother's Day gift as well.  Two Christmas's back, my in-laws gave me a lovely figurine of a mother holding a baby.  And yesterday my husband and son gave me a figurine of a mother holding a child about Joel's age.  Here is a picture of them.

Doesn't that say it...

I carried Joel from his birth until his death.  And now he is carried by God.  And as the verses on my calendar say, God has carried me, in the same way, from my birth until now.  And will carry me, even to grey hair!

The figures make me sad, because there won't be a new one for me to add.  My carrying Joel is over.  Yet the figures give me joy too.  And I remember how it felt, to carry my son in my arms in just that way.  It was very beautiful.

And now for some pictures.  I will try and include one of Joel in his favorite place, my arms.  He had trouble really sleeping through the night with out his night time meds.  But he also established a clear habit.  He would fall asleep almost every night in my arms.  Sometimes he'd be in his bassinet at sleep -time.  Sometimes the meds would work and he'd just drop to sleep.  But most often, he would just stubbornly wait for me.  If I was grabbing a snack or finishing a chore at that time, or whatever.  He'd lie in his crib before or even after the meds and keep awake until FINALLY I arrived.  And as soon as I picked him up, we'd snuggle in.  He'd immediately close his eyes.  And be asleep in five minutes.  It was very beautiful.