March 22nd, 2010
by Sarah Juliusson of www.MamaRenew.ca – Find Mama Renew on Facebook & Twitter
We came across this wonderful blog post from Meghan Rathwell, holistic nutritionist, on the reality of new motherhood and nutrition.
in my past life i was a nutritionist: a shopping, chopping, soaking, fermenting, well-fed nutritionist….i found contentment as a foodie and confidence in practicing what i preached.
but that was my past life. 9 months ago, i became a mama. while pregnant, i imagined that motherhood would further immerse me in the glorious world of REAL food. i would bake bread, and make yogurt while my child played at my feet. my counters would be lined with soaking grains and living sprouts. Instead….the counters are an assortment of pots i’ve burnt, a sippy cup, the old carrots that were once a teething toy, and a pile of pear peelings.
Sound familiar, y’all?
We all have images of what life will look like as a mother, and countless ideals and expectations we hope to live up to. There’s a whole lotta letting go that most of us need to do once we meet the reality of parenthood. How to make peace with the contrast? How to be gentle on ourselves? How to accept that “good” is “good enough”?
Read the rest at www.mamarenew.ca
[ 0 comments ]
March 2nd, 2010
With your kids on a rainy afternoon…a sobbing baby in your arms…or at a club?
If it has been too long, one night this week close the curtains
and light the candles after bedtime.
Turn on the music, Loud, and dance – just dance
alone or with a loved one, dance wild and free.
“When did you stop dancing? When did you stop singing? When did you stop being enchanted by stories?
When did you stop finding comfort
in the sweet territory of silence?
Where we have stopped dancing, singing, being enchanted by stories,
or finding comfort in silence is where we have experienced the loss of soul.
Dancing, singing, storytelling, and silence are the four universal healing salves.”
[ 0 comments ]
February 22nd, 2010
It was almost a year ago that we participated in the Healthy Families Conference in Vancouver, BC. It was a pleasure to meet Peggy O’Mara, editor of Mothering Magazine – looking again now at her thoughts on building community, it seems appropriate to share them here:
O’Mara proposed that within each circle of parents is the smaller foundation community of the family itself. We were touched by her sharing of home as a sanctuary - the place where we feel safe enough to let our guards down and be vulnerable, fall apart, and then regather. Within this sanctuary of the family we can put into place elements to facilitate this sense of safety such as privacy, beauty, quiet, regular meals, and freedom from overstimulation. With this strong foundation we are then able to reach out and contribute to our larger community of families, building the social web that will support us through the years to come.
Read More from Peggy on Community -
Click here to go to the Mama Renew blog…
[ 0 comments ]
February 16th, 2010
A dear friend recently changed her facebook relationship status. Now any of you who do facebook will know the hub bub this usually brings about. Couples who have married for a decade annnounce their status and get a flurry of congratulations. Public breakups or the dreaded “it’s complicated” status invoke our collective curiosity and a certain discomfort. When someone announces out of the blue that they are “in a relationship” we all want to know more More MORE!
Now, this particular friend had been in a longterm relationship, then was listed as single, and then suddenly reemerged as “engaged.” What? A closer look revealed the following text just below:
Engaged…with myself. It’s about time!
I can’t stop thinking about how marvelous that is. What a gift to all of us who are in relationship with her through facebook. With a simple status change, she announced to her community of friends that she is committed to loving herself. We could all use a relationship like that….
**************
Self-Care Inspiration
We hope you had a lovely Valentine’s Day
but we’re thinking it’s time for a new romance
because you’re One Hot Mama.
How’s your relationship with marvelous you?
Perhaps you could use a special date together to help rekindle the romance
& fall in love with You…
[ 0 comments ]
February 3rd, 2010
How full is your drawer….?
Take five minutes right Now to clean out your junk drawer.
We know you have one.
Are there random keys in there without doors to match them? Let them go.
File, recycle, toss, do whatever you need to reclaim that space and pretend you are well organized, at least for another week or so!
this message brought to you by our biweekly RENEW newsletter…
[ 0 comments ]
January 19th, 2010
In the spirit of supporting your best intentions, Mama Renew is pleased to offer you a new feature on our Mothering blog. Watch for our RENEW post in which we will seek to inspire, challenge, and encourage you to care for yourself with a self-care inspiration. While we undoubtedly will suggest the occasional yoga class or a candlelit bubble bath, we plan on expanding your vision of self-care to include far more.
We encourage you to take each RENEW inspiration to heart. Some will be simple, others playful, and still others challenging, but we will do our best to keep them small – because each small step makes a word of difference in moving towards reconnection, balance, and renewal.
We know you’re busy. We hope that our prods and nudges will help create the space for you to care for yourself. And a few steps down the road of self-renewal, you might just discover that by caring for yourself, you are better able to care for your family.
You can come here to our Mothering blog every other week to read the latest RENEW, or sign up to receive RENEW for free every other week by email. Learn more here!
Here’s a sample RENEW, posted January 4th!
[ 0 comments ]
January 7th, 2010
The New Year is a wonderful opportunity to declare our resolutions with the best of intentions and the hope that maybe this will be the year . . .
At the core, our resolutions are often based on our desire to reconnect, rebalance and renew. We’ve all seen friends who successfully make extraordinary changes in their lifestyle, fitness, relationships, and more. We know that resolutions can be met with success, but also require time, dedication and support.
In the busy life of motherhood making a commitment to a resolution isn’t always easy. The needs of family, work, and household can make it difficult to follow through. While stating our desire to change is of course, the first step, it is the following steps are where we tend to lose our way.
Here are a few practical ideas to help you have your best chance at success:
* Talk with a friend who has made a successful change – what helped?
* Share your resolution in a public way – Blog? Monthly e-mail updates? Support group?
* Ask friends to check in with you about your progress.
* Journal the ups and downs and strive to understand the underlying beliefs and patterns that can get in the way of successful change.
What is your next step to support you in living your best intentions in this fresh new year?
Originally shared by Mama Renew on Kindervibe, January 5th 2010
[ 0 comments ]
© 2009 Mothering Magazine