A creative year: 2011

This year we became four, when we met the most exhausting little beauty with wild eyes. After many months (6 or 7), I felt like I had finally grasped being a mother of two. Two children who are so opposite that I can’t even begin to tell you how, except that I haven’t sleep through the night since 2010 and I have never been needed so very much.  Having both of them here is my favorite and my greatest challenge to date.

And somehow in the midst of this, I remained sane because of art and the great life-giving, calming, energizing power of creativity.  I learned to paint before washing the dishes and write before sweeping the floor.  And by doing this, I found enough strength to carry out the long list of responsibilities with my name on it.  I left the house once a week all by myself.  I wrote my thoughts, my prayers, and dreams in the hours after those children were sound asleep.  I took nap time for myself.   I was unbothered by this idea of having to have everything so perfect, and choose simplicity and peace instead.  Strangely, the year of great exhaustion was also my most creative.

Truthfully, the year was long and often lonely, as good friendships here are few, but I can’t help but notice that this season was more about collecting invaluable lessons within myself and practicing gratitude for the magically, common everyday.  It was about taking long breaths and realizing that the often intense demands of motherhood can be done as an act of worship, and thus the hours of each day can be spent in connection with the one who supplies all our needs and is strong when we are not.  It was about finding contentment on the water’s edge, when there were so many questions about being here and what is next.  It was about scribbling down the tender moments of quiet mornings or sweet goodnight hugs and silly antics.

We chased after a dream and felt it was the right to begin and together used our creativity to work turning, wouldn’t it be great into we’re really doing it.

Nothing ever happens how we think it will,  and really, do we still believe that silly old myth, because past the long hours, the nights spent dreaming of sleep, and the restless within,  I can’t consider the past twelve months without a recognizing a sense of great accomplishment. It may look small and humble, but in a way, it’s been pretty huge.