feeling the love, feeling grateful

"oh my beloved,
kindness of the heart,
breath of life
i bow to you
again and again"



i am flooded with grace. time with these angels is my fairy tale come true.

joy is available in every moment...even when i don't choose it

in the moments that i can drop all "shoulds" i steep in the magic of chilhood

water, bubbles, sand, mud, flour, rice....the simplest things

they are like little mirrors... i see so clearly that when there is chaos, i am disconnected from my center. i feel strongly the great responsibility as a mother to hold the emotional balance for my family. i know that it is human to lose it and to be overwhelmed, stressed and tired but how i choose to react to those feelings i model for the family and that choice has an affect. i am growing up with my children. i am consciously choosing in more moments than before how to "handle" myself.

they are my teachers

my loves

(the building in the middle is where we live, 8th floor and the ocean is to her left)

tears well when i see these little ones love each other like i love them

mama madness

From a few weeks ago....

My eyes are puffy slits this morning. The bag of frozen peas didnt do much. I had a good cry last night and my eyes do not let me get away with it the next day. It was a good sob session. One where you feel like a little child, huffing between sobs while your chest palpitates and your nose gets all stuffed up and you have to breathe thru your mouth.... you know that kind? oh, it feels good. such a release.
i have been feeling so much pressure lately, so much judgement, i cracked. mostly its an inner critic and then bits from the outside world. this inner voice has been slamming me nonstop for months now.
she's an old hag, a perfectionist, a know-it-all who narrates EVERYTHING i do. she's worn me down and brought me to sobbing tears. When i am drinking my coffee or tea in the morning she pushes me to "get going, the kids need structure, get them outside, they're bored to tears" and then when we go on our morning walk she picks "you should have an idea, an intention for the walk, you didnt bring baskets, you could be gathering treasures, you cant just meander thru the day without meaning. what are you teaching the girls about life?" And then when we are carving our jack o lantern she wonders why i dont know any halloween songs or jack o lantern stories to go along with the project, why didnt i prepare for this? it's so like me to just jump into things half-assed and unprepared"
Leave me alone you f****ing hag! AHHHHHHH, she goes on and on every day. and i know they are just little things but because this work is my job and i take it very seriously and i try to give my whole heart to my days with these precious souls....this witch's banters pierce me and wear on me. Plus, as i wrote yesterday, i feel alone in it all. No co-workers, few comrades....it's bound to drive me mad. i feel like i am taking crazy pills!
A part of me thinks i should be running this household like a preschool, I guess. Is that what i am supposed to do? Is that what stay-at-home mamas do? Sometimes i think I focus too much on the girls...i think i am supposed to do things for myself as well but it is so hard to get into projects with little ones around. i always think that maybe when satya is a bit older, it will be easier to get my paints out, write my novels :)....right now i get interrupted every 5 minutes.
some days are very smooth. there is a nice in and out rhythm to the day... a bit of outside time, projects, snuggles, stories, swimming...maybe i got a bit of yoga in. and then other days i stare at my children and wonder what the hell i am supposed to do for the next 12 hours!!

there aint nothing like it

I need my women clan. I really need my sweet, sensual, powerful, raw girlfriends. I miss the intimacy, the holding, the talks, the laughs and the cries. I miss eating and drinking and cooking together, and basking in that sweet, comfort that is friendship. I cannot live without it nor do i want to. Life is so precious and way too short to live without the people that bring me such balance to the craziness of the world.

We cannot survive, let alone thrive without that bond that we create with our women. There is nothing like it and nothing can replace it. It is a life sustaining bond that allows us to carry on in our darkest moments. The words, the touch, the thoughts of a dear friend are nothing less than a miracle, a gift of breath that will sustain you to the next.

Home is where the heart is......

Oh, I ache. My heart physically hurts and the tears are surfacing. I have been feeling like I want to go home lately. I didnt know i had a "home" or where that might be as i have moved so frequently in my life and my family is spread out over the globe. But now that i am here in Panama i think about Boulder as my home. It is the place i find myself yearning to return to. After we visited a few months past I returned here so detached to the people and the town of bloulder. It was a strange feeling. At the beginning of my visit i was scheming to stay for good and then by the end i was wanting to go home to Panama. It was a strange sensation but i was glad to not be wanting so badly what i couldnt have. I think i expected that all my empty parts would be filled by those that i had been missing so deeply. And i was disappointed. We all get busy with the days, with our lives and we don't have time to nourish the village in a way that i crave. So, i detached and pretended that those things no longer held the same weight in my heart when in fact they do.

And now? I want to go again. It didnt last long. I think mainly i just miss being around people that i know and who know me where we can do the small talk or we can ask deep questions or we can just enjoy the moment so freely without much judgement. I want to create the village that i hold in my heart. I want my children to be around men and women who hold similar truths and who strive to be authentic. I want to be supported by others who live in a way that i do and who can help me to deepen my spiritual practice and bring vision to child rearing and education. Here, i feel that i am doing it solo and am having to defend my views from the "norm" which leaves me weakened and doubtful.

I feel like i am waiting to return. Waiting to be a part...and i dont like to live like that. It is a constant reminder to stay present and to fully take each moment, each day while i am here and live to its greatest potential. And maybe some moments have the greatest potential for buckets of tears or raw, pillow-punching, tiger-growling tantrums!!!!



my gorgeous niece Bella pushing Aiyana on a tire swing at her new house in the mountains...i miss that fresh air without exhaust, cars honking, trash everywhere...pure, raw, silent nature



Back of the Trident, my favorite coffee house! where they have a sandbox for the babes, soymilk options, organic teas, friendly passers-by, english books galore, oh and a Chipotle across the way!!!....its the little things



Love from Auntie Lia, irreplaceable...we need it daily!


Cousins...how can i keep them apart?



dinners with friends and family made with fresh, organic produce straight from the garden...oh, i neeeeed this!



And the wide, traffic-less community walking areas....ahhhhh. i'm telling you, it's strange the things we miss....its home