The Milky Way

Did you know according to Greek mythology the Milky Way arose from breast milk. The divine hero Heracles was born to Zeus and Alcmene. Alcmene was a mortal human so Zeus gave Heracles to his other wife Hera to feed him with goddess milk to make him immortal. But baby Heracles bit Hera into her nipple so she let go and her milk poured down the sky and formed the Milky Way.

The picture is painted by Peter Paul Ruben.

Practicing Patience - Yarn along

I am not exactly known for my patience ususally. The more it surprises me to find myself rather calm and peaceful these last days. Due Date has passed without any exhiting news. Friends and families keep checking, but me, I just try to be still and listen to my body and my child. I feel so certain they will let me know when they are ready for this birth. I am just praying doctors and midwifes will give us the time we need and that I stay strong enough to trust my own feelings as long as possible.

A friend of mine has sent me this picture yesterday by the artist Itaiana Battoni. It was shown via the Mother Health International Faceboook page and said:

"The concept of a 'due' date is something that is very abstract in many cultures. If, like in Uganda, you count a pregnancy by the moons, you end up having a 'due month' and baby comes when she is perfectly ripe without causing mama lots of anxiety."

My children being half Ugandans I found this picture and wisdom so comforting and just the perfect thing to be given on my due date.

The days of the due month are special for sure. Even though it is my second child, each day is spent knowing it could be the last one of my life as I have known it. Something new is coming, someone else who will mix up everything. So there are special moments in every day that I live more aware and present somehow:
This morning, after I came from a doctors appointment I very spontaneously went for a (very short) walk into our nearby forest. There was still ice on the pond, the air crisp and chilly but the sky was blue and sunbeams stroke  my face. Almost invisible still, there was the first hint of green around the bushes. But the actual truth was told by all those birds: spring is just around the corner! It was one huge concert and I told my child how wonderful this earth is and that I want to show her all its beauty. What a magical half an hour time a spend there.

Last night I suddenly felt like baking. Something I had not done in quite a while. There was flour, milk and yeast in the house, so I decided on some buns. While the dough rose I thought I should make some special buns, some "due date buns" maybe. So I added some amaranth cerial to the dough with sesame and nuts, something that would keep me going the next days. In my blessing way book I found some simple symbols related to birth and shaped the buns like them. There is the Native American "Wheel of Life" (the round bun with the cross), the Maori "Koru" (the spiral) which symbolizes new beginnings and the Egyptian "Key of Life" that symbolizes birth.

I finished all the planned baby projects, knitting and sewing wise and most of the things I wanted to do around the house so I picked up some old sock project that has been sitting around for far too long. We'll see how far I get this time... 

My sister has gifted me to a skein of lovely handspun ocean colored single merino and I am still contemplating, what I should use it for. Any ideas anyone? It is very soft yarn but I am not so sure it will work for a baby project because it seems unwashable without felting to me. I am not sure.

There are many books on my night desk these days. One I have devoured (no photo) by recommendation of Lori is Spiritual Midwifery. Such a bible for birthing really. And of course I could not resist to get the 1000 Days journal by Nikki McClaire for my baby. I hope I will really manage to keep it up for her. Then there is a Doula book and one on my ever so fascinating topic of gender and a few others, I pick a page here and a passage there. Sweet days of due month...

I am joing Ginny for Yarn Along today.

The Blessingway Quilt

I wasn't actually sure baby and me would make it to our own blessingway on Saturday but somehow we did, and she still seems to feel comfortable enough  to stick around for another few days. Which is great because it gives me time to finish the very last bits and pieces. 

Since I read about a blessingway for the first time, I think it was over at Soulemamas, I so strongly wanted to give one myself, but as it happend I was the next one to get pregnant. So I was very, very happy to find out my girlfriends liked the idea too and made me have one, just the way we felt it suited us (not too much of the esotericism please). We got most of our inspiration from this wonderful book.

Attending my own blessingway was such a treat; I am still feeling so warm and loved just thinking about it. I didn't take any pictures of it though, it just didn't feel right, so words will have to do:

We met Saturday night, me and six of my closest girlfriends. After getting comfortable with tea, music, candles and oil (Every woman had brought one of those items) my friends started by introducing themselfs with the story of how they met me. And even though most of them knew eachother before some had not heared those stories yet and it was more then sweet to revisit those moments again and value friendship in such a way. We contiuned with sharing our own story of birth, of what our mums told us about it and those of us who had given birth already shared those stories too. Of course we didn't always focus 100% on the schedule so at one point we ended up talking about cars... but it just felt good anyway.

We talked about my fears and hopes for this birth, for Aarons sister, about family and friendship matters and just felt it all grow stronger. We each wrote a short letter to the unborn baby to give to her when it is time, maybe when she will turn 18? 

To make me feel supoorted and strong during the birth I recieved a bead for a bracelet from everyone which I will wear from now on and I also gave a small bracelet to each of my girlfriends to wear until they have seen the baby for the first time (or longer of course). It is so fascinating to see how such small   things can become so full of meaning and value if you give it the right moment, love and attention.

I also got pampered with a lovely foot massage and during that treat, one of the girls read a meditativ story she had written exclusively for this night.
In the end all my friends put their hands on my belly and spoke blessings, prayers and sweet words. 

While we talked on and off I continued to sew the last stitches on my baby quilt binding (that I started last summer right after I found out I was pregnant) and what better time could there have been to finally finish it? I can't stop myself from staring at it, I am so in love with it. Of course I will always call it the Blessingway Quilt.

It is time to give birth now...

Pilgrim

For this post, I was inspired by Emma. I so much admire the way she talks about herself and her faith to God in her blog. She made me thinking why I have such a hard time to express my relationship to God. To be honest I fear to be called a freak for believing in God. I am not sure why I care. It makes me think my faith is not very strong if I can't even stand by God, if I feel embrassed to admit I like God. But on the other hand I love talking about God ( I keep saying "God" because I am trying to not picture God as male or female) and religion if I am sure I have found a like minded soul. So today I stand up and just dare to talk, no matter who listens:

God and me, we have a funny relationship. I am not sure what to call it. I could call myself a protestant but what does that say about God and me? I work for a catholic NGO, the Caritas, but what does that tell you? I am a big fan of the ecumenical movement but somehow the combination of catholic and protestant religion is not what it's all about for me, it is not where it should stop. Maybe I could say I don't believe in religion, I believe in God. To me a religion is just one way to live my life with God, never the only possible way. I can find God in a mosque, as well as in a forest and sometimes I can't find God in a church or at home, you never know... 

Today my employee Caritas invited us on a one day pilgrimage and I happily joined in. My, what an event it was! A bus toke us to the outskirts of the city from where we walked a few miles towards a huge old monastery. There was singing and praying on the way there and a long service at the monastery. Lots and lots of singing, a lot of other rather catholic stuff I don't know how to name it. I enjoyed it immensly, despite the big crowd. We were more than 2000 people, which was rather daunting to me at first. But being part of 2000 people, singing and praying together is a wonderful experience and God was near by and he didn't mind me being a protestant I am sure... Another good thing was to stand next to my big boss, praying and singing with him, exchanging the "peace be with you".

To me God is a divine power. I feel it is easier to imagine God abstract than figurative. Jesus is another issue here. He is so very tangible but that makes it even harder for me to understand him. So hard to understand how he can be Gods son. I am sure he wouldn't have wanted to seperate religions the way he does, in those who believe in him and those who don't. So very sad it went that way, isn't it?

Since I am a mother I feel much closer to Mary though. In the monastery today there was a sculpture of Mary with her dead son on her lap. It was created during the years of the black death in Europe. It made me cry. I could feel her pain. Next to me sat my friend who just lost her baby a few weeks ago in the 4th month of pregnancy. She is heartbroken not just by that death but by what God did to her. She stopped going to church, she only came today because she had signed up for it before it happend. And she wanted to give it a chance. And somehow, seeing Marys pain helped her to understand God didn't want her baby to die, God is crying with her and wants to comfort her. I think today she toke Gods hand again.

Of course, this is not all there is to say about God and me. I hope to continue my spiritual journey and thoughts here with you from time to time.