We're Ba-ack!

Song: Up up and Away by 5th demention (again)

We arrived home yesterday lunch time from our vacation to New England. It was fabulous! Just what I needed. To recap... Russell went up to Peabody, Mass last Sunday for work, and I flew up Wed night to join him. Thanks to the gabillion business trips he takes a year we had enough miles to get my ticket for free, woohoo! And thanks to Russell's work for paying for Wednesday night's hotel stay, phew.

We met up with Russell's BU college friend Gideon in Boston late Wednesday, straight from the airport. I am crossing my fingers for this guy... he is looking for a gorgeous, Jewish, highly intelligent, red head to call his own, so if you know anybody, let me know! ;)

Thurs we headed up to Vermont. We stopped by the little picturesque town of Quechee, where we had lunch at Simon Pearce. Simon Pearce is a glassblower who moved to VT from Ireland in the 70's, and opened a studio at this gorgeous mill. It is his original location, but now has like 12 across the US. His restaurant uses all his hand blown glasses and pottery, very cool. Good creme brulee too!! You'll see the pics below.

We came back to Quechee for our balloon ride before sunset. Russ promised me a hot air balloon ride as a wedding gift, but we never had a chance to do it. When I saw that they did balloon rides near where we were staying I jumped all over it! I love the fall, it is my FAVORITE season. So seeing the changing leaves from above sounded like a dream to me. It was everything I had hoped it would be, and more. The people from Balloons Over New England were wonderful. Russ and I shared the balloon with two lovely ladies from Bellingham, WA and the pilot. We flew over the hills and dense forests for a bit over an hour. The landing was adventurous and bumpy, but made for an exciting end. We landed in a privately owned pasture which was at about a 30% or more angle. The balloon basket hopped and tipped over about 5 times before coming to a stop. I loved seeing the changing trees from this perspective, they looked like coral. As we pulled away from the landing spot in the truck, the pilot got out and gave the land owners a bottle of champagne as a thank you. I guess its a 200 year tradition to do that. How sweet is that?

Anyway.. the rest of the weekend was fab as well, we went to a working farm where they make their own cheese and maple syrup. I have a new respect for those who still produce this sweet sticky yumminess the old fashioned way. In the snow with buckets collecting sap and boiling it down on a wood fired evaporator. 40 gallons of sap to make one gallon of maple syrup, pretty cool.

We also went to a fine woodcarving festival in nearby Woodstock, VT. Our Bed and Breakfast owner did the PR for this event, so she encouraged us to go. I am glad we did, really cool stuff! Someday I will own furniture that my kids will not destroy. For now... Goodwill is good for us! :)

Glad to be back, the kids look different, but had a smashingly good time with Grandma! Enjoy the pics!

Gulp, swallowing my pride

Sometimes events happen that force you to swallow your pride and admit you were at least a little wrong. Life's hardest lesson is to see the bright side when something feels like it happens to you. I admit, I did not match someones expectations of me. I understand as well that I did not have the same expectations for myself, which is ok. I am glad in many ways for the decision that was made. It relieves me a bit of responsibility and allows me to focus on school and Orion's birthday. Every challenge presents a learning opportunity, I have learned and am moving forward. I will not make the same mistakes again. Sigh. Inhale. Exhale..... moving on. :)

Happy Anniversary Sweetie!

So its not quite our anniversary, but I will be packing and flying before the actual day. Sept 25th four years ago I promised these things...

To put our marriage first, always

To be faithful to you

To be truthful and honest to you

To listen with and open heart and mind

To make our home one of love and understanding

To show you my love for you through my words, touch and actions

To bring joy and happiness into our lives everyday

To encourage you to achieve your full potential

To honor the divine in you for you are God's love and creation

I can only hope I have kept up my end of the promise as much as you have. You inspire me every day! I am the luckiest woman in the world! I am honored to call you my husband. I love you always and forever!! Thank you for being my best friend, my partner, my cheerleader, my confidant, the best Daddy in the world, the family bread winner, and all around great guy!!

I can't wait to spend the weekend with you in Vermont! (and thanks in advance for the balloon ride... I am SOOOOO excited) Happy Anniversary! Love you!!!

Love, Your Honey Bunches of Oh's!

School's out... till November

Whew! I am done with this module! That was 5 intense days, and I can't stuff another piece of information into my head at all! Thank goodness I have 10 weeks to digest everything and to practice it all!
I always feel like I fall way out of the loop with all of my friends when I go to school. Its nice to merge and become one with the work and the material, but I find it so hard to start reconnecting once its over. I guess I change a bit every time I go. I have a drive to be better, nicer, kinder, more patient, better to myself, but somewhere I like my old comfortable self. I am familiar with my old self and patterns. Its easier. I would however like to move forward in life and bring my friends along with me. I want to stop gossiping so much, and offer my hand to help instead. I want to keep the same kind of space I provide in a Craniosacral session for everyone I come in contact with. I suppose some of these will be on my vision board. That's way to start.
Time to pack! I am heading off to VT on Wednesday to spend some much needed R&R time with Russell over our 4 year anniversary. First time away from either child since well before Leilani was born. Russ is already up there. Miss him already.

Sacral Unfolding... BCST insights (long)

I realize that this will be a bit much information for some readers... if you have no desire to know about some very deep and personal aspects of me, skip this post. :)

Again, this is a journal entry for Module 3 of Biodynamic Craniosacral Therapy Training.

I am the first and the last.

I am the honored one

and the scorned one.

I am the whore, and the holy one.

I am the wife and the virgin.

I am the mother and the daughter....

I am she whose wedding is great,

and I have not taken a husband....

I am knowledge, and ignorance.

Thunder, Perfect Mind, Gnostic poem, 100 A.D.

Sophia, by Alex Gray

2 days ago I had major shifting in my hips and sacrum during a session that John our instructor continued after class ended. It was not the first time I had encountered these physical movements during a session, but I had yet to resolve the swirling of emotion or feelings that felt like an arising from there. I sat up after the session was over and knew that the actual movement I felt in the session was related to the movement I felt while in labor with Orion. With every contraction I would need to twist my hips and bend my left knee down and to the right. If I didn't follow this pattern I was in terrible pain. So I twisted like this for 9 hours until he was born. I recognized the pattern quickly, but I knew in my heart that the motion was not alone. Why did I have to bend and twist? Why do I still feel echos of that now?

Yesterday morning I was reading articles on a website from Jaap van der Wal an embryologist from the Netherlands. (If you ever have some time and have a curiosity about the development of a human... not just our physical body... read this website, fascinating). He mentioned the "gestures" humans go through in life, the shifts we all go through from before conception to death. He says that all of these gestures are like deaths. For instance we die being in utero when we are born into the world. Our infancy dies when we become toddlers, childhood dies to emerge as an adolescent, and so on... These gestures make us human. I was happily reading for a while then hopped into the car to go to school. While driving it hit me like a TON of bricks. THATS IT! EUREKA! I realized that I have not been able to "grieve" the death of Leilani my baby into Leilani the toddler, or the pregnancy to new baby, or from having one child to having 2. It all happened so fast with difficult nursing and no sleep thrown in for fun. I was thrown into this without the knowledge of how the sort it all out.

I am also dealing with feelings (that I have known about) that I don't believe belong to me. I feel like they could be my maternal Grandmother's or Greatgrandmother's. I am deathly afraid of getting pregnant with a third child. It has become a phobia almost. I can't imagine how I would feel if I got pregenat with a third child. Its weird, I loved being pregnant, and giving birth, but I just can't do it again. I feel like I do not own this feeling. My maternal Grandmother had 3 children in 3 years. They are all 11 months apart. I don't believe that was her choice. She ended up having a nervous breakdown during her 3rd pregnancy (or shortly after, can't remember) and never really handled having 3 kids very well. I am sure part of my feeling comes from just knowning her story, but there is part of me that feels like maybe I have an actual echo of her story in my physical body, passed on from my own mother.

SO, now that I know all this info what on earth do I do with it? I asked John, and he said I should continue getting sessions as well as talking to someone, and in this case it will be Carrie Contey (since this is her specialty) she just so happens to be in my Craniosacral class too.

One more interesting story from yesterday. GB Khalsa, a local midwife is in my Craniosacral class as well, and was kind enough to bring a placenta to class yesterday. It is a few days old, from her last birth. Since we had started learning about embryology, she thought this would be an amazing addition, it was. I was standing watching her talk about it and show each part. At first I felt fine, and was interested in every detail, then all of a sudden I couldn't take it any more. I turned around and immediately laid down on my massage table face down. My heart ached so bad and I was having a cramp (very similar to menstrual cramps) in my pelvis. My heart was beating out of my chest. I just laid there with tears rolling out of my eyes trying to use "Body, low, slow, loop" to come out of this. I have no doubt that seeing that placenta just set off the same feelings agin, maybe even more intensely. There is no organ in the body that symbolizes the bond between baby and mother like that of the placenta. whew. I feel just fine this morning, but I am looking forward to talking to Carrie about it all.

See I told you it was TMI. :) Thanks for reading. :)

Warning... Loooong Post Ahead!!! BCST insights

Thine own consciousness, shining, void, and inseparable from the Great Body of Radiance, hath no birth, nor death, and is the Immutable Boundless Light.
Padmasambhava, The Tibetan Book of the Dead

Universal Mind Lattice by Alex Gray

This post is going to serve as a collective journal entry... I needed to write it out for a classmate, but thought some of you may have an interest in reading this so here you go....

Notice there is no music, there is no piece of music I know of that can compliment my experiences from the last two days, so for this post I must omit the tunes. :)

I had a piece of homework from our last module (held at the beginning of the summer) to complete before this module. The assignment was to write a page about our experience with what is called the 3 stage process. Simplified, this is where we find a pattern in the body where there is movement, great stillness, then more movement. I thought I understood what this was, but had the most difficult time "labeling" it in my clients. I thought I was just not "getting it". I figured that I would just get it someday, but not right now. I have allowed myself the gift of practice and time to embody this work. There is so much to learn and I will learn it all eventually. Some things will only be learned through repetition and others from the written word.

Yesterday John, the teacher, was demo-ing a new way to hold the body and mentioned the 3 stage process again. He says... "the 3rd stage can be any movement in the body, anywhere, not just where the original movement started." Seriously?? This whole time... I was thinking it was something else. I felt that!! I felt that a bunch with my recent clients! Woohoo! A sigh of relief washed over me after he said that, as if he turned directly to me and said "You have what it takes to do this work, you are on the right path, stay with this". A huge weight was lifted. Sometimes we need to be in a different place to accept information, I am sure he explained the 3 stage process in great detail last module, but I just wasn't ready to embed that information into my cellular memory.

We learned about the sacrum and a sacral hold yesterday in class. Our sacrum is vital to our Being. It makes up part of the cradle for life, potential and literally, it grounds our energetic centers to security and to the Earth, and soooo much more I don't have time to write about today. My lovely partner B did a session on me first. Her right relationship was so comforting and safe. (right relationship is like energetic distance). When she placed her hand under my sacrum I had an intense sensation at the bridge of my nose. It was like a string was being pulled from behind the bridge of my nose and my 3rd eye. Little tugs and pressure. I have never felt anything like it before. The sacrum (specifically the coccyx) is tied to the ethmoid (a bone behind your nose) among others in the same area. My mom asked me today if that feeling was scary, NO not at all. It is fascinating to feel the movements big and small in your body. Your analytical brain tells you constantly that you are safe and you are not actually being split, rocking, falling off the table, or whatever the movement feels like. You might be making that movement, but it might be fascia or even energetic. The bones DO move, but the oceanic movement that you feel might not be able to be seen by the naked human eye.

When it came my turn to be the practitioner, I felt more grounded, closer to the Earth. I had no trouble finding right relationship with B. Our TA came over to help, but I sort of lost what I was feeling. I decided to go down to the sacrum and hang out. The TA stayed by B's head while I focused at her sacrum. Earlier in the day we practiced the technique of focusing on an object then just the space around it and between us. Object. Space, so forth. SO I tried to do just that with B at her sacrum. So I broadened my scope and focused on the physical space between us. Then the space between my hand and her sacrum. Then, I focused on the space between her midline and my midline.

Spiritual Energy System by Alex Gray

This would be a midline represented in art by artist Alex Gray. Its actually very similar to what I got as a visual in my minds eye when working on B. I got a rush over me that we are ALL JUST MIDLINES! That's it! There is no body, no happy no sad, no duality, just pure Being. I realize this can be a bit much for many people. I truly believe that this is what enlightenment must be. When you can live in a state much like this, where you realize the impermanence of physical life on Earth. Where you can see the bigger picture. It was AMAZING! During this whole time B was experiencing many big movements and shifts. I wasn't really tuned into them because I was out there. Good thing the TA was close by to talk her through her own breakthroughs. My ultimate goal is to keep that same space for my clients, but also stay in my thoughts to help them through their shifts and own awareness. I want to recognize the anatomy that is speaking and be able to reflect it back to the client. All in time, I am just thrilled to have had that experience. I feel like an infant. New to this world, making discoveries, practicing new skills.

I don't feel "special" that I have had these experiences, just honored. I am delighted that I have found a way to connect with other humans in a unique and healing way. I feel as if I have discovered part of my Purpose here on Earth.

If you are a friend of mine and you have read this far, thank you. Thank you for taking an interest in me and my experiences. I hope I can reciprocate the same to you!

Namaste!

Number 6

Holy Smokes! My Life Path Number was SPOT ON!! I saw this on Andrea's blog and tried it for myself. I thought it was going to be wishy washy close to me but, nope its all true! :) WOW!

Your Life Path Number is 6

Your purpose in life is to help others You are very compassionate, and you offer comfort to those around you. It pains you to see other people hurting, and you do all in your power to help them. You take on responsibility, and don't mind personal sacrifice. You are the ultimate giver. In love, you offer warmth and protection to your partner. You often give too much of yourself, and you rarely put your own needs first. Emotions tend to rule your decisions too much, especially when it comes to love. And while taking care of people is great, make sure to give them room to grow on their own.

Find your own Life Path Number here

Holes

I could not resist adding Age of Aquarius to this post, sorry. ;) Fifth Dimension

I started my 3rd module for my Biodynamic Craniosacral Therapy Training today. I am romantically in love with this work. I am passionate about what this work has to offer people. It is subtle and mind blowing in the same breath. Only in stillness can the movement be felt. Or should I say in the stillness there is movement. The first couple hours of each module we spend catching up from the last 10 weeks. In that time one of the women said something so profound... I thought it might help those of you who are planning on making a vision board too...

When talking about the "empty spaces" or cracks that everyone is always trying to fill in themselves... she said "well if there are no holes, where else is the Light supposed to come in?"

How can we see the Light without room to see it? aaahhhhh, I love these people like they were my own family. Each person brings something so special to class with them. I am one of the youngest in the class, always, I am always the youngest. Actually in this case I am NOT the youngest, there is a girl who just turned 20, she beats me hands down. I am so impressed with her desire to do this work, on herself and others. I was most definitely not prepared to do this kind of profound work on people at 20, ha!

Again I have used the art of Melanie Weidner , this one named Imago Dei.

Looking forward to sharing this work with all of you!!

Direction

Song: Somewhere over the Rainbow... Iz

My first goal board 8 years ago... long before hubby or kids

Every once in a while I realize that I am stuck. Its not always for the worse. Sometimes it just feels as if I am spinning my wheels in place, I try so hard to get somewhere, but I don't seem to move forward. I have the keen ability (now, I never used to) to know when I am straying off the path that was meant to be my life in its perfect form. In times it comes as un-organization or clutter, other times heartache and despair, or worse... injury. Thankfully its not any of the latter right now. I have been running around placing my energy in so many places lately that I have seem to forgotten which of those is most important to me, and what I need to do to see it all clearly. Its like I have been trying to figure out what's on my to do list when its on a million post it notes all over my house. Normally I like lists, but I don't think that linear and straight forward.
I prefer making goal boards. Like 3-D brainstorming maps for my goals. I started making these 8 years ago in massage school, and fell in love (with making them). They take a while to create, you have to search for words and pictures that jump out at your intuition. Sometimes I would put words and pics on my boards without a specific goal, but sure enough it came into fruition in some manner. Its crazy! I would LOVE to host a MNI with the O'mamas to do these boards together. We support each other so much as it is, it would be great to share the excitement in our goals with each other, perhaps even spark some ideas for each other we didn't think about ourselves. So... we'll see if there is interest.

I need to start gathering... this should be fun!

Speaking of music

To hear this video, hit pause on the control bar on the playlist at the bottom of the page. :)

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This is a video for another one of Renee and Jeremy's lullabyes. I can't get this one out of my head. I love their music, easy to sing. I had their Welcome To This World song for my "Welcome Baby" post a couple days ago. I found them on Playlist.com. They are a couple of musicians who got married, and got preggo then decided to make a cd of lullabyes for their little unborn angel. I also love the night mantra song... actually I'll post it here... enjoy!

My budding artist

Song: CSS... Alala



Leilani has suddenly moved into the next art development stage, stick figures. I LOVE it! She literally just started drawing these one day last week out of the blue, as if a light went on in her brain. I just love how they change and grow and learn, even when they are sleeping. Right now we have at least 15 or so of these drawings scattered around the house and in chalk on my parents driveway. She will draw a stack and then decide who is which drawing. See above likeness of Orion ("because he so small" :) ) and Leilani herself. She drew me a picture tonight of a stick person (which turned out to be herself) and a bunch of spots with color... she said they were chocolate chips and tumberries. Ohhhhh, tumberries, riiiiight. She said "yeah, tumberries... yuuuummmmy" and rubbed her belly. I love toddlers.
Oh, the song I know you're thinking whaaaa? Leilani loves this song... Uncle Stan sells Sub Pop music online and this band CSS is on the Sub Pop label. He made us a mix CD for Christmas, and for some reason, this child inappropriate song is her fave. :) She bobs her head and sings alalalalala, so cute.

Welcome baby!

I don't know who this sweet baby is... but its not baby "Jane" :)

song: Welcome to this World, Renee and Jeremy... so sweet!

On Monday I had the absolute honor of being at a birth of a beautiful sweet baby girl! The world is even a better place with her in it. Her parents called me at 2am to let me know that they were admitted at the hospital since mom's water had broken 8 hours before that. They were having a party at home with friends and she never told them she was leaking. :) Unfortunately her contractions did not kick in in a hospital timely manner so they had to start pitocin, grrrrr. Sweet baby "Jane" (not her name) was born via Cesarean at around 6pm. I hope I was able to give her some pain relief before she got her epidural. She was a superstar, I am totally impressed with how well she tolerated labor before her epidural and eventual C-section. Dad was a champ as well, what a perfect team! Baby "Jane" is so lucky to have such wonderful parents, they are 100% Austin, way cool and fantastic people. In some ways I feel like I could have done more as her doula to help prevent the Cesarean birth, but I know that I do not control anything nor did I make any of their decisions, but you always play the coulda-shoulda-woulda game, at least a little bit. I was glad to have been a help with delivering information to their patiently waiting families. Their excitement was emotionally overwhelming for me. I don't know how so many of you have your families in the room during birth, whew.

On a personal note, watching mama in labor made me want to have another baby... not gonna happen ;) It is truly magical touching a laboring/birthing mother or just being in her presence. The world trembles when another soul is about to enter it. It is probably the closest to "the the other side" you can get (other than death). I am still vibrating with that energy, way cool!
My next mama is due around Orion's birthday in November, I can't wait!

Happy Half Birthday Sweetpea!

Thursday is Leilani's 2 and 1/2 Birthday, we celebrated last night!! Russell and I decided that we wanted to make another special day a year for each child, what could be easier to remember than their half birthdays?! She got half a cake and one present after dinner, no big parties or friends over, just fam. :) Leilani loves it! I tried to make a gluten free vanilla cake mix (by Namaste) but I couldn't stomach it. It was horrid!!! Ugh, gag! It tasted like soggy cornbread, that wasn't sweet and didn't contain corn, gross!!! So I made the Pamela's brownie mix, cut it in half and frosted it, delicious!!! It is supposed to look like half a cake. It ended up one of the ugliest cakes I've made in a while, but it tasted great!! Leilani and I designed her monster on our mama friend Stephanie's CurlyQCuties website about a week ago. She had SOOO much fun choosing the monster, we played with the design for about a half hour. This color, no this one, no this one, that belly, this mouth, yada yada... Stephanie was lightning fast in making it for her, WOW! When Leilani opened it last night, she was SO excited! She knew was it was right away! "Its MY monster!!!!" she carried it around all evening and slept with it last night. She even tucked herself in with it while playing. :) I can't believe she's getting so big so fast! 21/2, yikes!

Happy Half Birthday Sweetpea!!

Hook 'Em Horns!

SO I got to attend my very first UT game on Saturday, its about time! I was born a cougar fan (Washington State Univ) my parents met there, its my brother's alma mater, and I attended for a semester (I know that barely counts), therefore I am a cougar through and through, until I moved to TX, when I officially became a Longhorn. My Bro in law is am alum as is my father in law, which means I'd be disowned from Russell's family if I didn't automatically bleed burnt orange. Its a good thing my kids were born with burnt orange hair, lets hope it will help their application into UT. I LOVE football (in person, I despise sports on TV). I was an athletic trainer/manager for the football teams in high school, loved it. I have been preggo or nusing a wee one every football season since we moved here, so I have never been to a game. My inlaws have season tickets which they are never in town to use. :) Unfortunaely I had a terrible sinus infection and blew my runny nose every 5 seconds until half time when we snuck out after the band played. I did get to see Matthew McConaughey and his gorgeous girlfriend (and slung baby), they made an appearance at half time, of course. I am obviously an old lady because when they showed him on the Jumbo-tron they first thing I thought of when the crowd burst into a roar of applause and whoops was... isn't it awfully late for a newborn to be at a football game with a screaming crowd of 98,000 people??? What were they thinking? He is hot, but come on. :) Yeah Horns!!!!