Moments of Motherhood

In the past 24 hours, I have welcomed a new badge to my Motherhood Scout vest; holding my baby while she barfed on me, like for real barf, not newborn spitty puke, but the real deal with very obvious evidence of dinner present, down my shirt, in my lap, on my pillow, in my hair, and not once did I actually end up puking myself.  Last night was perhaps our first real initiation to parenthood (if the 10.5 months of not sleeping through the night don't count enough).  Norah woke up in her crib having thrown up with barf in her hair about midnight, requiring a bath and change of jammies, sheets, mattress pad cover, the works. She'd had a terrifically hard time going to sleep, and got herself so worked up that we thought maybe the puke was a delayed episode from swallowing so much air (is that even a theory? I don't know).  We decided to bring her in bed with us, and no sooner did we turn out the lights and she was puking again, this time on my pillow and dangerously close to my face.  Not cool, given that the smell of vomit makes me want to vomit.  Jammie change #2, for Norah and for me. Sheet change for our bed. Great, all set, ready to get back to bed and try to sleep since it is now like 1:30, and lights out...barf. This time we opted to skip new pjs for Norah, I changed again, and we layered blankets and towels between us in the bed for what now appeared would be frequent episodes throughout the night. Poor thing continued to be sick every 20 minutes until about 3:30 am, we all fell asleep, and then she woke up to puke again about 5:00.  It was not our best night, but we all made it through, and she actually seemed reasonably chipper throughout the day today, despite running a low (under 100) fever on and off all day.  Here's hoping the rest of us skip the pukes, and she's back to normal tomorrow.

Given the sense that I had puke germs crawling all over me, it felt great to get out of the house for a few hours for Zumba tonight.  Something about shaking my groove thang to fun music just melts some of the stress of the day away. It was something like 79 degrees today, and with such perfect spring weather (before St. Patrick's Day, in Michigan!) the windows down in my car, music turned up, and singing along to Usher and Rihanna, I felt a bit like a new woman when I got home.

One of the amazing things about motherhood that I find myself aware of in so many instances is how in the span of an hour, I can feel like a young, free, 20 year old cruising in my car with no worries, and then come home to my beautiful family and enjoy nothing more than singing "Return to Pooh Corner" along with Kenny Loggins as my daughter drifts off to sleep in my lap.  I snuggled her extra close tonight, breathing in the smell of her sweet, soft skin, and willing myself to create a sensory memory of that moment.  I don't think I will ever forget the way her baby skin smells after a bath, at least I hope I won't.

Once I relinquished my hold on her for the moment, I was able to squeeze in a few quick sewing projects for a baby shower gift for tomorrow, and there is nothing like feeling accomplished at the end of a day.  Even if the only things I actually accomplished today were 3 loads of pukey laundry, snuggling my sick baby, teaching Zumba, and sewing a few easy items, it feels good to know that this mama is proud of what happened this day.

Picture from Sunday, before being sick.  The camera did not make it out today!