Vulnerable and Loving it

One of the hardest things about writing an introductory blog entry is the pressure of feeling like it needs to be completely riveting and relatable. It’s like I can almost sense a swarm of index fingers slowly moving to a mouse to click off our blog and escape to a new virtual location. And to those of you who are about to do so, I say to you– Wait! Stay a little longer!

My name is Faye and I am a California-native married to my handsome and amazing Florida Beach Babe Hubby (BBH -for short) and we currently have made our home in the Sunshine state. BBH is like the cheese to my macaroni or the chocolate chip to my cookie. I seriously love this man and I have to say, macaroni would not be very good without the cheese and we all know everything tastes better with chocolate!

BBH and I married in the LDS Orlando Temple

We have been married for nine years and after several years of enduring and surviving infertility, we were finally blessed with our first daughter, Mini-me (now 3). A week before Mini-me turned one, we were doubly blessed (and our jaws literally dropped with surprise) to find out I was expecting once again with what my doctors called a miraculous “spontaneous pregnancy”. Nine months later, we welcomed our second beautiful munchkin, My-girl (now 18 months). Never did I think that after struggling to get pregnant for years, I could ever be blessed to be a mother of two children under two.

Here's a little more about me and my loves:

 1)      I love learning and teaching. I am a semi-retired high school Spanish teacher. (Sí, yo hablo español). There are times I miss it, though and find that I gravitate towards teaching whether I’m at church or at home. Currently I am a full-time, stay-at-home 30-something mama, teacher, and student to my two spunky, independent daughters.  They teach me more about myself than any classroom I've been in so far. 

2)     I enjoy long, romantic walks…to my fridge.  I love to cook. Baking and cooking are major stress relievers to me. And of course, so is eating. Which brings me to my next love…

3)      I love to run. Well, it’s really a love-hate relationship. I love the feeling I get AFTER a long, relaxing run and ultimately it makes me happy. And as we all know, exercise gives you endorphins-endorphins make people happy and happy people just don’t shoot their husbands…they just don’t. (Name that movie)!

BBH's and my silliness captured on camera

   4)     One of my favorite things to do is laugh.  I love laughing with my family about silly movie lines, at jokes, at crazy & random YouTube videos and "memes", while we play games together, while we cook, etc.. I find that laughing is very therapeutic no matter how you feel at that moment and it’s contagious to everyone around you.

   5)      I am a Mormon and love it. I also love learning about all types of religions and positive outlooks on life. When I was younger, I was a missionary for my church and enjoyed learning about different cultures and loved talking to people from all walks of life. No matter what one's background is, we can make a big difference by supporting one another in this world.

If I could sum up in one word my (limited) experience with Motherhood, it would be vulnerable. And yet, I never thought I could be so vulnerable and love it so much.  I can now relate to those who have said that becoming a parent is like deciding to have your heart live outside of your body for forever. For me, being a mom is sometimes like simultaneously feeling butterflies in my stomach, light headed, and feeling like I’m going to fall off a cliff at any moment. Or maybe I can blame those feelings on the lack of sleep or on the fact that I never fully recovered those lost brain cells while I was experiencing the infamous pregnancy brain? Who knows?! Being vulnerable as a mom has taught me humility and how to love truly and deeply. As C.S. Lewis said:  "To love at all is to be vulnerable" and how grateful I am to be able to love at all. 

Although each day I struggle and minute by minute I’m learning how to be a better mom, I try never to take it for granted. Coping with infertility and other trials have taught me to slow down a little more, enjoy as many moments of my daughters’ lives as possible, and to not sweat the small stuff (or even the big stuff…like the mountain of laundry I still need to conquer today).

Me, My-girl, Mini-me, BBH

I’m very excited to contribute to our To Each Their Own blog and to learn more from wonderful moms who hit the ground running each and every day with their little or big ones. I hope to share my thoughts and love for motherhood in a positive, uplifting way and to maybe, keep you laughing just long enough to side track you and your index fingers from clicking on your mouse button and escaping. Welcome and stay tuned for some laughs and tears and then some more laughs!