A year?? I can't believe it, everyone told us how quick it goes. I wrote the following for her baby journal, I thought I would share it...
The rising sun casts the most peaceful hue of yellow orange on the morning of your birthday. You knew that dawns' energy is best. I thought I would only see it in our home, but here it is illuminating our room in New Orleans. My heart is filled with absolute purity and sense of new beginnings that you brought with you into this world. The time is - ha - I just glanced at the phone to see the time and it's 7:59, your exact birth time. I wasn't really planning to acknowledge that until the correct time zone, but seeing Feb 17, 7:59 can't help but bring a sense of sacredness for me. It's when I became a mother. It's the moment I could feel the presence of a brand new person in the room and in the world, breathing separately from my body. When I waited for your voice, your cry and when I was shocked by the truthfulness of the break in the silence when you did. Suddenly all there was in my view was this beyond beautiful bright baby girl, shockingly recognizable as a piece of myself, with the purest, deepest, straight from the starry universe eyes I could ever imagine. The most graceful curve in your brow bone down your cheeks and through your jaw line. In an instant my breath was made for someone else. My limbs were strong to provide a place for you to rest, a sanctuary for you to come home to, always. My heart went on to beat to protect you, to teach you. And my eyes shone back into yours to define for you compassion, kindness, joy, honesty and a lifetime full of shaping virtues.
I could not believe my eyes. This gift.
Now here you are a year later, still in my arms, enjoying such earthly delights as pears and girly folk music. I grasp to the moments passed with a wavering intensity, because I know the excitement every new day brings. There is so, so much to look forward to in watching you grow and learn, our hearts overflow with pride. The trick is living so very much in the moment as that day of your birth. I'm not sure of its possibility.
The Past Year
You've been awakened to two people that you've come to know as Mama and Daddy, they are your constant companions, your entire universe, in fact. They envelope you in their arms with warmth and security, make it more than clear that this is all for you, and soon enough you will know this and come to rightfully expect it for as long as we live.
Within weeks, an endless spectrum of colors and shapes appeared to you. Your hands, fingers and feet became participants in experiments of yours. You learned to fling your legs up and over with enough power to land on your side and finally your tummy. You bonded with the warm and cool fur of sheepskin. You discovered a way to express, to release the build up of joy with your first nervous smiles and laughs. You learned how welcomed and reciprocated they are until soon they traveled straight from your belly. The flexibility of your spine to create the most beautifully perfect arch when you stretch was replaced with a new found strengthening of the muscles supporting that energy channel enough to perform all sorts of new feats like lifting your head and finally your whole chest off the floor. You discovered mobility, becoming just adept at one technique before swiftly moving on to the next. You began to express fondness of certain animals, flavors and even textures. Namely dogs, grassy flavors like spirulina, and the green 100% cotton hat over the yellow knit one. You began to prefer sleeping on your tummy, which in our case this means laying across my chest with all of your 20 plus pounds. You loved to give kisses from the start, big direct kisses that swallow whole cheeks. Halfway through your first year, we already found you engrossed in books, sitting on the floor flipping through them on your own. Your hair is slow coming and soft and golden. It smells of earthy fire when you awake from having it against my skin.
The Next Year
You may now eat citrus and your eyes will light up at your first lick of fresh raw honey. I look forward to dancing with you and I promise to sing to you more. And to fill our days with creation out of nothing, to play and to connect. To nourish you with the very best the earth has to offer, both through my body and directly to you. To instill a love of water, everything water. And green. I anticipate the summer months when we can again be free in our skin, days of sunshine and grass and fruit. Juicy days.
What light you bring, Amaya, please let it shine, always, and help to bring it out in others. We love you and we welcome you with such happiness.
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