Portrait of a Mother on Mother's Day



Motherhood Has Been a Blessing
Thank you my children for blessing me with your spirit and presence, and trusting me to be your mother and raise you in this lifetime. Thank you for teaching me many lessons, and allowing me to work towards being the highest being I can become in this lifetime.

Honoring the Mom in Our House

Homemade waffles, card and flowers make this mom feel super special.



A Mother's Day Mandala: Honoring Mothers in All Directions

It is wonderful to be appreciated and honored on Mother's Day, but for me, I like to honor all the mother's in my life, all mother's everywhere, and the Divine Mother.  Creating this mandala/alter helped to connect me to all three. 

The act of building the mandala brought me into the moment and generated great joy in my heart. I offered food, flowers, light, precious stones, love (from my heart and a visual purple heart I drew), cedar and burned sage.

I also offered a geode (bottom left). I love the symbolism of the geode. They are brown, hard and rather plain on the outside, but on the inside they are hollow and filled with crystals. It reminds me of the essence of motherhood. We offer so much of ourselves to our family. It isn't about using your energy to become the most stunning beautiful thing on the outside. That doesn't benefit our children. It is about being full of pure light and wisdom and shining that to our loved ones so they can flourish.

A bouquet of flowers and card to be delivered to a special mom-friend who lives down the road from us.

Listening To Intuition

When visiting the neighbour's pigs in the barn, my son intuitively did this with his hands. The sound and smell of the pigs was a little too much for him, so he instinctually found a way to dull his senses so he could brave going in to see the pigs. (It reminds me of a pranayama technique - sanmukhi mudra - where you cover your eyes, nose, and ears and try to breath with your senses covered)

Sherpa mom trekking home from our flower delivery. 

Up next: a butterfly hunt in our long grass and sunny sun shining.





Butterfly hunting while testing out the mai tai wrap with baby on the back.

We both liked it! It is easier on the back and nice to feel more range of moment than having her in the front.

First Real Lesson on Death

I went inside for a moment and came back outside to find this. My son looked up at me with tears in his eyes. Daddy was just finished saying a prayer for a butterfly. They buried it near the lilac bush. Apparently my son had tried to pick it up once he caught it in the net and had accidentally killed it. 

It touched me that my son felt truly sad in his being for the butterfly. He said he didn't want it to go back to the spirit world. He felt bad he killed it, even by accident. Teaching compassion and respect for living things is one thing, but you can't make someone feel it. What a beautiful Mother's day gift!

The words killing and die have been used all too easily in my three-year-olds play time. We role play fight scenes because that is what he loves to do. But it troubles me that he doesn't understand more about what it means. I am so thankful for this little lesson. 

Ending in Yoga

As wonderful as it was to spend a joyful day with my family, I also know the importance of taking care of myself. For me right now that means taking a break away from my family to connect one-pointedly with my body and breath without any risk of interruption. So I had the privilege of attending a good sweaty vinyasa flow class where I could just show up, breathe, and do what was directed. Sweet! The teacher, a new mom herself, kindly gave up her time with her family to teach us. What a blessing!

Reflection

Last year's Mother's Day started off without the men of my house showing a whole lot of respect for the women in their life. It was disappointing. However, after going to a sacred ceremony with a few other moms, I felt renewed, empowered and connected again. It made me realize how utterly important the feminine energy is to maintain peace and balance, and that although the feminine can subtle, it is just as strong. Rather like water burrowing pathways through solid rock to create beautiful caverns.

Last year I realized how important it is to gather with other women to help remember our own feminine divinity within and to unite so we could all become stronger. I had another female growing inside of me, and feeling especially hit down in a male-dominated world, I realized how important it was to me to share with my daughter in the future how special and beautiful it is to be a woman today in this world.

As you can see, this Mother's Day brought a lot of "gifts" just mindfully observing (and recording) the ebb and flow of my family as they go about the day.

A year ago, we had just moved to a new state and a new town in hopes that it would help us grow into the beings we needed to become. This year, we are definitely more settled and feeling like we found our tune.