Nova hears with his heart. He speaks my unspoken thoughts, he reads my face like a book, he understands complex problems and always has the simplest compassionate solutions. He is a thinker and a dreamer. Of all three of my children, he has seen me at my worst. He has basically witnessed me growing up. Throughout the years I have become more calm and rational, but on occasion, still tend to lose it. He comforts me and offers me love when I feel at my most unloveable. When I feel everyone else has deserted me, he holds me and tells me things will be alright. He has the spirit and glow of an angel. I have never known one little soul to hold so much love and understanding. The place where these traits hinder him is in the older brother/sibling relationship. He adores his sisters, but strongly wishes that I could be exclusively with him. He enjoys our deep conversations, rocking in the rocking chair, drawing, and making up stories, dancing in my arms, or learning about new things together. His sisters are a blockade. They require a great deal of my attention.

Ayda, my third child, is an easy laid back child. She's rarely bothered. She has this sing songy nature about her. She always hums and babbles. She's the most pleasant baby I've ever had the pleasure to love. As I type this she is sitting in the floor rolling a ball back and forth and clicking her tongue. God knew that third child had to be like this or I would have left long ago.

Nova: "Mom, you know how you say excuse me when you burp?"

Me: "Yeah."

Nova:"You know how you say excuse me when you need to get by someone?"

Me: "Yeah."

Nova: "Well, Mom..."

"What if you burp, but the person in front of you doesn't hear it and you say

excuse me and that person moves outta your way?"

When I say things have been crazy here lately I'm not just talking mood swings and busy schedules. This past week has left my home in a state of upheaval. It began last weekend with the loss of my daughter's beloved, Sallica.

This past week Ayda and I shared her last bit of warm, sweet milk. Me the maker and she the recipient of a liquid that means more than just sustenance. Nursing takes time out of our busy schedules, nursing takes tolerance, nursing takes a toll on our bodies, beyond that of pregnancy, nursing takes a mother's constant presence and finally nursing takes pillows, a cozy spot, and a lot of cuddling. I am happy that we have moved on to a new phase of our relationship, but this, being my last child, is also sad and I need to take time to acknowledge it. I will never again be the sole source of nutrition and dependance for a baby. I will never again feel the pain, intensity, and empowerment of childbirth. I will never hold up clothing so tiny, fresh from the laundry, and cry at the unbelievability that anything could be so small. I will never again call my husband to share first words or steps. I will never again hold another wet, new soul to my bosom and sigh and cry in awe of the life that myself, my husband, our love, and God created. As much as I want this freedom, this autonomy from my children, I also mourn it.

    Nova has been so inspired by the Spiderwick Chronicles that he is, once again, tirelessly drawing at his art studio. Some may also refer to this as our kitchen table. Most of the drawings I've shown so far are things that he made over two years ago. I'd love to dig up some of his older illustrations and stories and let you read the things he made up as a tot. I have never seen a child so inspired. He used to feverishly pace back and forth skipping and jumping as he dictated the content of each page for his books. What always amazed me was his creation of the drawings before the story. He'd hand over a full 10 pages of drawings and begin, immediately,  erupting with verse for each picture. He never stopped to look at what he had drawn he'd just dictate and then say "Ok, flip the page, this part goes with the next picture." These stories could take anywhere from an hour to several sittings to complete. I have kept all of them in a box to show him when he is older. They weren't always incredible stories, but I was amazed at the way they took form and the expressiveness on his characters faces. I will be sharing some of these in the future.

   For now, I'd like you all to meet Queen Best...

I found this in a journal that Nova kept when he was five. Throughout his journal he sketched cute little pictures of himself in different situations. It seems to me that this fisherman is missing a hand and has fashioned a fishing pole from a hockey stick. I love the way the fish's tail spells Nova, but I don't believe it was intentionally spelled backwards. The drawing became more endearing when I flipped a few pages to days later and found the following drawing...

It seems that the missing hand has regenerated and the happy, young fisherman has himself a new pet!

These pictures reminded me of my good ol' days touring around soaking up all the fantastic live music of bands I don't even have time to listen to anymore. Ahhhh, the days...

Those of you that know me know that I often use bad language. I have the supreme potty mouth. Despite my religious or spiritual affiliations, yes, I do often curse. It is one thing I can't stand about myself. I want to be a good example for my children. I want them to know that when anger, frustration, or silliness strikes there's other more articulate ways of expressing it. I have no problem reading blogs that have curse words. There are times and situations where the correct choice of curse word seems to be the cherry on the sundae. For example, when my son was three years old he loved to be spun, flipped, and tickled until tears ran down his face. At our Thanksgiving meal with the in-laws Nova was running in mad circles as his Dad would scoop him up flipping him head over heels in the air and putting him back down still running. Nova laughed and squealed in his sheer delight. Suddenly he stopped, dead in his tracks, and blew large yellow chunks of food all over the floor. They just kept coming in endless streams. When he finished throwing up he looked up at the entire family still gathered around the table and exclaimed,

"what the hell just happened?"

There seemed no better choice of words for that moment, even if they had just escaped the lips of my three year old.

After dinner my son sometimes likes to skip around in circles and sing or think out loud. Tonight was one such evening. As he skipped around the living room in an inquisitive frenzy he began to talk about all the different kind of animals there are. In his desperate quest to discover the link between us and other mammals he wondered out loud...

"Is a shark a mammal?"

"Nope, they do give birth to live young, but breathe with gills not lungs," I replied.

"Is a seahorse a mammal?"

"No, it's fish also, like the shark."

"Mom, is a lion a mammal?"

"Yes," I reply.

Nova begins skipping a little faster. 

"Mom, is a tiger a mammal?"

"Yes, Nova."

His skipping speeds up again. 

"Is a whale a mammal?"

"Yes."

"So, a monkey is a mammal?"

"Yep."

"Geez mom, just about everything is a mammal or a fish! There are no reptiles."

My four year old daughter, who, the entire time sat at the table picking at her green beans, pipes up and ask in her silly, cute voice, "a wrecked tile??!! What's a wrecked tile?!"

Nova stops dead in his tracks, still breathing heavy, he raises his arms in a muscle man pose and shouts...

"I AM ERECTILE!!!"

Skunk cabbage is the most curious plant, the way it grows up like large claws trying to pry its way out of the damp ground. We live near the Swift River and, in the Spring, take many walks along its banks to watch the melted snow make its expeditious journey from its frozen Winter home to new territory. Along these banks skunk cabbage and fiddleheads curl and stretch, happily waking up to welcome Spring. Lepgrass came into being following one of our meanderings along the Swift River. His body is a rotted out tree stump and from him wafts the dank smell of new Spring growth. But rest assured that this fellow has no malice in his heart. He wears the crown of luck that may have been bestowed upon him by a chance meeting with a Leprechaun and on his face he carries a smile. 

Drawn by Nova, 5 years old.