A Little Saturday Happy

Today I'm thankful for many things. For my sister getting me up early to sit on the porch with her, wrapped in blankets, drinking (STRONG) coffee and watching a dark morning unfold into gold hues and scarlet and blue. Many things fill up my head - dashing around trying to get themselves in order, but the overarching themes of today is one of gladness to be alive, thankfulness and relief. Relief that we have hope in this life - and most importantly, when this life is gone and The Other Life takes true effect. How many people are searching? How many struggle with fear of eternity or uncertainty of there being one? Yet, how wonderful, too, when the truth is learned and loved and taken hold of…It sheds abroad that light of hope in our lives, so that all is touched by it. Just like the sun of this morning, it illuminates the world in a sparkling gold. 

And because of Truth and the God who loves me, 

There is hope and peace for today, 

and for the rest of our lives,

no matter what. 

Also, this pair gladdens me like nothing else. She loves her daddy, and her daddy loves his Baby Girl.

Happy Saturday, Y'all.

Ruidoso Mountains / Personal

My last memory of mountain camping is when I was probably 5 years old. Waking up in the middle of the night I remember shaking and feeling so dreadfully cold, but couldn't find any extra blankets, so I went back to sleep, thinking camping out a harsh deal.  On this camping trip, however, I'm carrying away many more memories than just being cold at night - which I was. Bella Rose stayed quite warm though, and slept - well - like a baby.  Whenever she is outside she is as quiet and peaceful as you could want, and she's been like that ever since she was a newborn.
Friday we drove to Ruidoso, where our car stopped in the quaint little town while JB took a conference call and Bella, her Granny and I walked the streets and window shopped. Bella was looking so longingly at a rubber duck in a soap shop (she was, I am sure) that I couldn't resist getting it for her. After all,  just the previous week I'd just been thinking that it was time to have a rubber ducky for her and what better place to buy it than a quaint little mountain town - in a store with hand-crafted soap at that???  Her name is Jemima Puddle Duck and I've been itching to give her a swim in the tub-pond and see what Rosie Belle thinks.

The mountains were cold and big and grey, and the days were grey and everything was quiet, except for the wind.  I enjoy outdoors, but the look on John Barrett's face when we first drove up the mountain and explored, told me he was in heaven on earth being in the mountains and fresh air. Tall creamy grass grew along the hillside in which our camp was nestled and Friday night we feasted on campfire roasted salmon and vegetables. After dishes were done we huddled around the fire with our backs to it, and looked for a long time up at the stars.  It made me think how little we are - how many lives have done the same - gazing in wonder up at the sky, feeling as if life must look like one of those tiny stars, only large as one grows close to it, but as it fades into the past, it becomes small again. Mine is big and bright right now, because I'm living it, but how small I realize it to be at times... And then knowing - and sensing the warm presence of the love of the One who "cast the stars into space" and who "calls them all by name". It's steadying - an anchor to remember the infinite love toward tiny people like myself.

Bella was snug and slept better than JB or I did, because we kept wondering how she was. It's the sweetest thing - waking up to her coos and smiles. She is learning to laugh, and seeing a smile light up her eyes and spread over her face must be one of the most rewarding experiences of motherhood so far. Saturday we hiked for four hours, Bella wrapped in her Solly Wrap (if you're a Mommy who wants a lightweight, soft, wrap that is worth the investment, think about a Solly Wrap). JB wore it like a pro, hiking the crest of the mountain and weaving in and out of woods and grasses, briars and slopes.
We found it somewhat humorous that after a year of having very few trips to hike and none to camp, that with a baby we're finding ourselves having all sorts of adventures. In her four months of life out of the womb, Bella has gone to:
Memphis, TN
Tybee Island, GA
Carlsbad Caverns, TX
Palo Duro Canyon, TX
Caprock Canyon, TX
Ruidoso Mountains, New Mexico
and lots of little trips to Amarillo, Borger, Dallas and so forth.

What do I think about camping? I think we've only just begun, because my husband is an adventurer at heart, and I'm a girl that likes following him to the mountains or the beach or wherever we end up roaming.

Setting up camp is one of my favorite parts…it's like playing house, and getting things all comfy cozy.

Of course, He did all the hard work, and I kicked back while Bella Rose and I watched. 

Talk about happy. That's when I found these moccasins in one of Ruidoso's leather stores. Handmade by Navahoe Indians and gifted by her Granny.

Looking ridiculous and cute in her mouse ears by her "Atlanta" (Lana) 

 If you're thinking about taking two pairs of socks, take three. My toes had the shivers all night long.

 Because they are cool like that, Lana and Rachel bought a fire starter kit and learned how to use a flint starter.

She's my little adventurer, and my best little buddy. I truly never thought loving a baby this much was possible.

My dream man and dream baby.

 Knowing how much I love my daddy, it fills me up to watch this man love his baby and this baby love her Daddy.

 That little kettle gave us hot chocolate, which we drank with our backs to the fire, and our eyes up to heaven, looking in vast quiet to flickering asters in a black sky.

 Oh oh oh. If I could go back and eat this meal over with the appetite and rosy cheeks and fresh air, I would. (Lana + Michael's creation of salmon+vegetable goodness with fire roasted bread)

 Panning the camera for a balance when I realized the little tree to the left was a little Rachel on the hill.

 Because, of course, a camping trip isn't official until there's s'mores. And when you're there, the black hands are all part of the experience and no one even notices. It's part of the enchantment to camping. 

"How did your pictures turn out?" he asked me back home.

"Well, reckon that depends. They're fine as far as pictures go, but it doesn't compare to what the eye sees nor what a body experiences in full when there."

"Yep," he said. "A sky full of stars and the campfire giving off heat and the way the mists roll over the mountains in the distance - those are all things a camera just can't do justice to."

Confesssions of Sponge-Woman

I admit it: I'm a hopeless sponge, drinking in my inspiration from the people, music, landscape and books around me. But mostly, people. When I come home from an event, I'm charged. I can be dead tired, but I'm supercharged.  There's something about talking with people, watching people, taking a clumsy step back and bumping into someone, then laughing about it and slapping shoulders that builds some happy sense of camaraderie. Seeing the way a lady dresses which highlights her elegance, the way she sits or stands or smilingly exits an entangling conversation, doing so as smooth and sweet as honey, the way her posture gives her the dignity of a thousand years, and her smiles and merry countenance the freshness of a mere girl - I cannot help but be drawn in and love it. Love watching people and learning from them. Immensely, I enjoy the charm of reforming myself on the way back home, and basking in the afterglow of the glimmering experience of faces and the buzz of conversations, the warmth of hearts affirming the other and such.
This summer perhaps more than others, I have thrived in mixing with my friends and family, because of realizing the sacrifice and effort it takes to see them, and because of recognizing, too, how much I need them.


 Last week JB and I sat on the couch one night, and though he'd finished work for the day the weight of burdens he'd carried throughout it seemed to hover on his shoulders like ghostly echoes of troubling business. He yawned and I sat there feeling like bursting into tears for no reason. It's that after baby thing, I know and knew then, but a gal hates it the worst to blame tears on some unseen, unknown reason.  I believe I'd rather cry over a split pea than to think I was crying for nothing. But there it was, that bothersome lump welling up at the back of my throat. He'd been talking a little, but looked over and he saw it, I guess. Maybe it'd gotten big enough to see through the throat itself.
"What's the matter, darlin'?" He asked and looked puzzled as we waded through a bog of silence. During this time I groped around in a muddy mind,  hoping I could rustle up a reason for why I'd been like this all day long - something that would justify it and have the effect of "Oh, I see why. Yes, I'd be crying too, if I were you," but it wasn't there. Just a gloomy grey all intense and miserable without reason or rhyme.
"I - …I - just feel dead inside…" I mustered, glaring through tears at the invisible Something that made me feel ridiculous and out of my right mind and petty. I thought of all the girls in the world who would look at my life and think it was heaven.  I looked around at our house, with bookshelves we'd bought with his hard earned money, the rug, the old hand-me-down couches that have seated many a person we loved.  There was the little table, given to us by dear friends all the way from Georgia, and there, the twinkle lights and photos and paintings and lamps - all the collage of things we've added that have made our little house more of a home. It is luxurious - not all the nicest things - but they are used and comfortable and - they're ours. I thought of how many people in the world now are hurting, suffering with real issues to shed tears over, and they bear it all bravely while I'm here holding a beautiful healthy baby, sitting on a comfortable (free) couch by a tall, handsome Texan with the kindest heart on the earth and I'm crying???
He reached a hand over and took mine, then asked about a trip. He said he'd work hard and take me to a church meeting in Memphis that weekend, 15 hours away from where we live, if I wanted to go. He wanted to. He would. I needed it. And he did. Driving hard during the day after work and late that night, and then some the next day, we got there. I've grown up going to this event. My family and core group of closest friends attend this event. Besides that, and the more important thing - though we don't always act like it's so - is the Spiritual aspect. Since having Bella Rose I'd missed four Sundays and at least that many Wednesday night services. My heart was dry and brittle and my insides raw from whatever eats at me when I'm not close to my Life - Source as I should be.
 I'm not dumb enough to think I don't need God for a full life. But if I were as cool as I used to think I wanted to be, I'd say I don't need people to be happy or full or inspired. That I could be one of those who seems to draw happiness and motivation from themselves. But I'm not. And honestly I don't want to be, because people are fascinating, with much to offer and to learn from. Visiting with my friends, hearing 6 sermons in three days, watching my family with Bella Rose and seeing my Grandmama, brothers and baby sister meet her for the first time - it all filled up an ache in my heart, so much so that days after I'm still experiencing the warmth of it. Still smiling over words exchanged, over memories fringed with wistful fragrance and still learning about growing as a person from my time there. When it comes down to it, I have to admit I'm a needy person. Needy of God and people and reminders of the very stuff I know, because I tend to forget it.

 "Look at those big feet! I still can't get over girls feet nowadays. Back when I was growing up, I always wore a five or five and a half, but all you girls run around in eight's or nine's! Looks like she won't be any differnt."

Mama's smart new glasses remind me of her high school year book photos. And her laugh reminds me of sitting around the table at the Grey Submarine, eating roast, mashed potatoes and gravy, corn, green beans and ocra from our garden and soaking in the general Sunday fest of stories and laughter with peach cobbler, coconut cake or homemade ice-cream and coffee to top it off. 

 This scene right here is as old as my memory and older. Grandmama, standing on her porch and waving us off with merry little chuckles and "I love you's" and "I'll see you next time's", "Don't forget your sandwich's" and "Debbie, did you get that package for Judy", will live as long in my memory, I hope, as it's been going on in real life. 

Left-Right // Melody, Merry, Dawn, Abraham, Mama (with Bella Rose), Daddy, Chris, Me, JB, Anne, Jay. And Yes, this is every time we take a picture. Me adjusting or staring mouth half open at the camera because I can't quit being a photographer just because I'm in the picture. 

 I knew he'd be the greatest Granddazzle. And he is. 

 "How about ye send me another picture of the lass?" Was a text from him the other day - he being in Ga and I in Tx.

Abe has always thought little babies look like "bald squirrels", so I asked, 

"You mean you want a photo of a bald squirrel?"

"Yes."

So I sent him one. He replied, 

"I find myself irresistibly wanting to give the lass a good squeeze and some sugar." 

I'm glad he finally did. 

 Dawn won't be called "Aunt". She won't have it. It's too "something". So she's Polly, and if you've ever read An Old Fashioned Girl, you'll see as well as I do, that it fits. 

 Uncle Chree, singing a song about how he was sure Bella was smiling because he was holding her. 

Uncle Jay vying for Favorite Uncle, and filling her in on a few of the  many stories he has to tell her.

 I guess it is one of the most heart warming things to see your family love someone nearly as much as you do. If ever a heart could expand a little more, mine did in seeing my family love this little person so much.  Are we a little baby crazy? Yeah. You could say so.

 But hey, I guess we've waited long enough.

Baby Cousins! Ada and Rosie Belle making fast friend. >>Don't let the sleeping guise fool you. Rosie was into it, big time.

I'm grateful for Mama who's taught me much and is teaching me still, what a joyful life and selfless motherhood looks like in action. 

And let me tell ya - My man?... Still can't believe he's mine. John Barrett Watson is the cream of the crop with a cherry on top, and somehow I got to marry him. 

Our Little Watson Family

"It's still surreal to come home and be handed a real live little being with wide eyes and a wriggling body and little hands that grab onto my shirt." He'd just gotten in from work and stood in the kitchen holding Arabella as he leaned against the counter and smiled at me, then looked back at our baby - wonder and glowy love in his eyes.
They told me marriage would grow a person, and it has.  Grown me if only to see the areas I want to grow in, and how looking like Christ is a long way off. It's expanded my heart, seeing the way my husband loves our baby and how he patiently forgives and displays God's love for me when sometimes it'd be easy to dish back the wrong he's been given.  But at the end of a day when I've been moody or stressed, or down right snappy, I've found him perched at the end of the bed, motioning upward with his thumb for me to pick up my feet so he could slide a towel under and massage them.  Many times in the past year I've shaken my head with wonder, puzzling over why I don't get what I deserve, because this fellow is above and beyond anything I ever could.
Then there's Arabella.  At a little over a month she is beginning to coo and smile and every morning that I wake up to her, I have to put out a finger to touch her little self and make sure she's real.
Motherhood seemed like such a mystery from the outside, veiled to all but the ones who were inside its experience. Anne Shirley saw a similar veil surrounding marriage, and when Diana was on the brink of it, the evidence of it being Strange and Incomprehensible to Anne was all too obvious in Diana's dreamy distance to All Things Present But Fred Wright.
But Motherhood, as it was with marriage, slips onto a body like a shirt, and once in it, there seems to be nothing more normal and natural and uncurious about it than to BE it. To be married is simply the most unstrange thing.

The first year of marriage and the first month of raising a baby have come and gone quietly.  My heart is full to the brim. People have said and keep saying "treasure this time…they grow up so fast". We know it. We've watched her change every day - wrinkly hands and feet growing softer and more cushiony, thin lips growing into plumper pink ones.  Her round, swollen face growing less puffy and more oval, how she begins to follow our voice with her eyes - now turning her head - now she's turning over from stomach to side - now she is growing rolls on her arms and legs and is heavier to pick up from the bed - growing oh so much. And HOW do I treasure it - besides taking as much of it in as possible and feeling my heart 'plum swoll up t'bustin'? When people say it, I wonder if they mean "Stop time and ensure you let this phase soak in completely. When you're done being amazed by it, move on". Of course, they're not saying that. It's impossible to think any phase WILL soak in completely. I must settle for existing in a state of blissful wonder. The only way I've found to "ease the ache of joy", and help my heart expand a little more, is to thank God.  Every time she nurses, every time we sleep, every time she smiles, every time it enters my head throughout the day to do so - thanking Him for something incredible and priceless...for growing my heart to hold the joys He gives, for growing my marriage a whole year, for growing our family and our awe for Him.

"Arabella, do you know your daddy loves you? He loves you so much, darlin'.  In fact, did you know that you are my favorite baby in the whole world? There's lots of babies in the world, Bella Rose, but none of'm are as sweet to me as you."  JB walked the room with her and once again I realized life is made of "these small hours".

First Days

The whir of a box fan drones outside my door and white sunshine falls on the covers and sheets. It falls on the tiny features of a bundle lying in those blankets and a small, quick rise and fall of little breath paces gently under them. Arabella Rose was born last Thursday at 6.44 am into a peaceful room of a small group of loving hearts and helping hands. The birth is my first note of thanksgiving. How grateful I am to have had the support of people dedicated to helping John Barrett, our baby and me through that experience.  They rubbed my feet, ran a bath for me, fed me ice chips, held the bowl as I threw up multiple times, prayed for me, cheered for me and molded themselves to meet whatever need I had. My husband was my strong rock, there for me the whole time, and held his arms tight around me in our comfy little birth pool as I pushed out our baby.  Mama's hand, her words, her instruction, her calming reassurance that God designed me to do this and I was doing fine, steadied and strengthened me.  God was so kind to give me the birth I was dreaming of. Loving, calm, full of peace and joy.

All last Thursday I floated through a haze of relief and peace, pain and blood, thankfulness and awe. John Barrett and I never considered ourselves "Parents-to-be". From the time we knew we were expecting we claimed ourselves as parents already. So I won't say we "became" parents that day. But we entered into the fuller joys of it by meeting our daughter.  From the moment we met her, she began weaving more closely to our hearts. John Barrett blows me away at being a daddy. He wakes up with her, comforts her and sleeps all night with her on his chest.  He sings to her, croons out lullabies, prays for and knows how to calm her when she's fussy. Seeing him with her is one of those things where I feel my heart expanding more to be able to bear the amount of love I have for him.  Last Sunday we sat in the sunshine on our back porch.  He'd stayed home from church to take care of us while the rest of the family went. He bent over her tiny body and kissed her little head.
"Did you know," he said to her, softly, "you are the best gift I could ask for.  You are our baby…that's scary and exciting. I want you to be safe and well and happy... I love you, Arabella Rose."

These first days are hard and beautiful. The joy of having my family here for the birth and a week or so before and past it is only checked at their leaving. As Daddy read Little House on The Prairie to Arabella the night before he left for his two-day trek home, I couldn't help the lump in the throat and tears.  He rocked with her in the chair, her ear to his chest and the velvety strains of his deep voice rumbling underneath. How well I know that voice and how many times have I too laid my head on him and heard that same comforting voice. He held my hand before he left, tears in both our eyes and said, "I pray God will bless and keep your little family, through all the many miles between us."

Today marks one week of us meeting our baby.  One week of beautifully sleepless nights, of taking in the wonder of our child, of learning each day what it means to love as a parent, and as I do so, I see more of how my Mama loves me. One week of dreamy reality, of witnessing the miracle I carried for nine months and watching the gentleness of my husband which makes him great.  One week of humbling, because I see how freely people give of themselves for me and our little family, and how merciful and long-suffering God is with me, though I am horribly whiney and ungrateful and proud at times.  It has been a week of life changing before my eyes.  Simply, it is more than I can describe in words and an incredible blessing.