Wow!

Has it seriously almost been a month since I've posted? I suppose it has! And today I should focus my energy on Aiden since he is ONE today! (Sigh. Tear.)
I want to do a quick update, however.

Okay, maybe it won't be quick.

On Tuesday night I went to see Julie & Julia with a bunch of bloggin' buddies. On the surface it was a cute show that I thoroughly enjoyed. There was more to it, however, than that. I related to the movie on a deeper level. It was a reflection of things I have been feeling and experiencing over the past year in my life. I found it interesting that there were so many parallels of my life to the movie. First, the movie takes place over 365 days. My little journey has been about a year as well. Julie turned 30 in the movie, as did I last week. And on both these birthday anniversaries, we (Julie and I) felt satisfied with our journeys. Third, blogging was a part of it all.

I found myself wondering at the existence of my life about a year ago. I was a new stay-at-home mother who just gave birth to my last child. I realized that with Aiden's birth went a part of life that I had always anticipated: pregnancy. But with that went infancy as well. I noticed time was moving too quickly and I was not jumping quickly enough.

I had to do something.

It was about this time I decided to take blogging more seriously. I am glad I did. It has been such an sensory experience. I am more alive now as I look for things in life to write about. I notice the scent of the flowers as I walk by them at night. I appreciate the rain on my face and attempt to find words to describe it. I revel in the feelings when my children and I play.

I never find myself writing these things in my blog, however. But I do them. And I am becoming a better person for noticing the world around me.

My relationship with Dan, though always wonderful, has even improved. I love him so much and am finding myself more open to showing him that. I try new parenting techniques I read about on other blogs and have seen success. I am slowly becoming the mother I would like to be, the mother I KNOW I can be.

But there were times that I wasn't so "enlightened." It took awhile for me to put blogging into perspective. Though many do not know this, I plan to begin a new blog soon. I would worry so much about how I could make this blog better. If I couldn't get readership here, how could I get it elsewhere? There were a few posts I did that I thought were funny and learned the hard way that they were not funny to all. I had my own private "meltdowns" as Julie did in the movie.

All in all...I have learned that I love to blog for the fun of it. So what if neither of my blogs go anywhere? I do it for the love of it. I do it because it has reawakened my vocabulary, my love of writing, my love of life.

So, taking a month off has been a product of this journey. I have had a wonderful month filled with birthday parties (5 of them!), play groups, first days at school, a growing business, and many more exciting things. The best part was that I thought of you all during these times! I might not have posted, but you were with me!

Thank you for accompanying me in my self-aware walk through blogosphere!

Love to all,
Amber