a glimpse.

on monday, i had one of those days that gave me a glimpse of motherhood in another stage.

maggie took an unusually early nap, so we went to our church's playgroup for the first time.  she loved it. she just walked around, throwing her hands up in the air or chewing on a random block, so delighted by everyone and everything that it almost made my heart hurt with joy.  i love seeing her with other kids and, better, i love seeing her so totally brave. she didn't need me. she'd come over, say hi periodically, but she didn't need me.  she was on her own in a giant gym and she was totally fine.

amazing.

then we went straight to the grocery store, where she rode in one of those racecar carts. she got to face forward, which she always wants to do in any cart, and see the world. she was totally delightful the whole time.

we got home, and she got a big new (to us) toy. after a few wary interactions with it, she spent about a half an hour checking it out (it's a riding zebra bouncy thing) and then got on...and started bouncing.

monday taught me something.  i always had this idea in my head about the kind of mom that i would be. i would be the library story time/playgroup/grocery store/outing mom. we would go places, and see things, and i would be happy to let my kids explore.

i haven't gotten to do that much yet. it just hasn't been feasible, for various reasons. but it's starting to become feasible and it made me cry. i was describing it to my husband and i didn't realize how much it meant to me until it made me well up with joy.

i'm going to be the mom i want to be.  no one can ever picture what the first year of a baby's life will be like when you've never been through it before. maggie and i, we've been finding our way.

i think we've found a bit of a stride, though things are always changing and things are always frustrating to a certain extent. i know that will never change.

but i see a whole world opening up to us, and it's so exciting to me.

i know i complain a lot on here, about how hard things are. i hope you can always sense my joy in my journey at the same time. sometimes things are hard. sometimes life is hard for a while. that's okay.

but on monday i got a glimpse of what all this hard work and investment does.  my courageous, delightful girl.  that's who we've been raising.

darn if that's not worth every sleepless night, every exasperating highchair experience, every disgusting diaper change.

delightful, happy, smart, courageous, amazing, beautiful girl.

i'll take it.