parenthood – Page 3 – Wonder Year: A journey to find enchantment every day

Day 48: Toddler Photography

Is wondrous. He is three! He took this! Then one from his mama ain’t so bad.

Day 47: A Christmas Letter from 1991

My dad mailed me a copy of an old Christmas card my grandma Ingrid had sent him. She had saved a stack of the Lund holiday cards for a good thirty years or so. My dad called to tell me “clip art was just in” when he created this. He thinks it’s cheesy but I think it’s the best thing I’ve ever read.

If I get my humor from someone – it’s my dad! Read this.

Also I hope someone is secretly saving our holiday cards because I can’t seem to keep them together.

Day 46: Walking into a Clean House

I’ve had a bad cough for a couple weeks. It was getting worse. I started meds on Thursday. Today I’m finally feeling a bit like I’m getting better instead of worse. Oklahoma has tested my nervous system. I hardly ever became sick in California. But here? It’s been almost every season (except last fall!).

So yesterday you’ll see I hardly posted a photo of a sign in our neighborhood that made me laugh.

Today, I’m relishing in the wonder of my husband and son who have made Love Day special. We went out for a fun dinner last night (B’s pick! Eskimo Joe’s). When we arrived home, I was gifted a fun giant card that involved avocados which they know I love. And today we went to an OSU basketball game!

But most of all: I was in wonder of my husband cleaning the house when I arrived home from doing homework this morning!

Day 43: Making Valentine’s Day Treats!

B and I were so excited to make Love Day treats for his class, we made them a night early! It was so fun and he astounded me with knowing his name. “There is the ‘ett’” he would say, referring to the last letters in Bennett. Every time we placed a sticker on a candy pack, he’d ask which friend the treat was for. Too cute! Such a kind boy, which brought my heart wonder tonight.

Day 36: Second Snow Day of the Year

I’m from California. Snow is a rare gem. Fortunately, it is for Oklahoma too. (I could never do it much more than this. I like my oceans and sunshine year round.) Cities and schools basically shut down if it snows. My campus and Bennett’s school were both closed today.

Outside, we ventured: mini snowmen, tumbling in fluffy fresh snow, tasting it on the tips of our tongues.

Later tonight I went on a walk—a path I walk or jog almost daily, but tonight it seemed new. A bird nest filled with snow nestled atop a tree, a lawn spelled the word “misfits” and all the houses looked like they were out of a snowy Christmas story book dream.

Day 35: A First Day for Swim Lessons

My son sitting on the edge of the pool, dangling his feet beyond the gutter, splashing. That’s my wonder today. As a swimmer with a dad who is still a fantastic medal winning swimmer — I was nervous/proud/excited/full of anticipation.

On a funny note — he was thrilled right when he entered, then when he accidentally dunked himself, he was cold and less sure. But he made it through the whole class! And we enjoyed some special time after the class ended, just him and me in the pool. 💙

Day 33: Super Bowl Play

When I was little I loved the Super Bowl because it gave me 4 uninterrupted hours to play with my friends. We used our imaginations and ran castles and pirate ships and went on Safaris. Sometimes we’d drop downstairs for some chips and dip or apple juice. The adults would be watching the game. Then it would be back to playing.

Tonight we invited our next door neighbors over to watch the Super Bowl and the wonder, for me, came from the anticipation and joy and delight in my son’s eyes awaiting to play. He waited out front then once the kids got here he showed them a new hot wheels course. Later in the night they made a fort in his old crib.

The crib was the safe place and the rest of the room was “lava” and it was that moment I remembered all the “lava” of my youth and wondered: when did the lava stop? I’m going to work on imagining lava spilling around me, again. More fun that way.

Day 31: Sometimes You Have to Lift Yourself Up

And I choose to do so by picking a mood enhancing coffee cup!

Day 27: The World is For You

I’ve been thinking a lot about how wonder is not quite what I hypothesized it as: deep and accessible. This experiment has complicated that definition and challenged it. I think of wonder as small surprises, natural delights, the changing of time, growth. But overall, today this phrase came to me: The World is For You….Not Against You.

What do I mean by that?

I was trying to pick just one wonderful thing that happened today, and my mind was moving like a spider across a web, trying to pick just one. So I will share them, chronologically.

At 6:45 am, my son knocked on my door. He sleeps in a crib and I’ve been scooping him up out of his crib every morning for 3 years and eleven days. The knock made me pause. My boy was getting bigger. He was a monkey and could climb out of his crib easily, but even in his athletic ability, he still called my name in the morning from his room. Him knocking startled and delighted me. I told him to jump in my bed and get some more rest. I wasn’t ready for this moment, yet, I was. Of course I was. But in a way I was sad to realize my son wouldn’t need me in the ways I’d been accustomed to. But I was delighted by his independence, his growth, his joy to come and find me.

At 10:00 am, I entered a fairly empty TJ Maxx looking for thank you cards to send to everyone who so lovingly bought my son a birthday gift and/or attended his third birthday party. I know handwritten thank you cards are so old school, but I love them. However, once inside TJ Maxx one cannot just buy the desired item one came for then leave. (Cardinal rule!) I stumbled upon an orange Nike Oklahoma State hat…..normally $25, on sale for $6. This was a moment of wonder to me. I’d been wanting a hat, there the hat sat, on the shelf, waiting.

At 4:45 pm, I was on a jog. Well. It was more of a walk than a job because it had been cold and I had been busy so I hadn’t gone as frequently. When I run I play Spotify music from my phone that cozies up inside an athletic fanny pack. And as I was running, the birds chirped like it was spring, a melody, their own song. They were louder than my music and I attuned my ear to listen to just them. Before iPhones and digital music and cassette players — there were the birds. To sing and sing and sing some more.

So, world: how do I pick which wonder? Perhaps a side effect of this experiment is noticing wonder more, subconsciously. And by seeing more than one wonder a day, I affirm that the world is on my side. I can look at the small three moments today and see this to be true.