Perspective

This is what it’s all about. Right here, in these beautiful faces. This is my family. This is the summation of my life- in one picture.
I just read CJane’s post about motherhood and how it permeates everything we do, even when we’re trying to do something else. And it hit pretty close to home. I love my crafting. I will give you that when kids are screaming, toilets need to be cleaned (after they get unclogged) AGAIN, laundry is piled up, floors crunch as you walk over them, and life is an incessant chorus of MOM!!!- escaping reality seems like a survival mechanism. Hence crafting, and blogging about crafting. It fills a need, for me it’s simply part of who I am, like my moles and my extra (few) pounds 😉 .
When I started linking up my projects a couple months ago I didn’t know really what I was doing. My very first project I linked up was my batty felt pillow- and it went BONKERS! I was featured on UCreate, Someday Crafts, Tatertots and Jello, Eighteen 25, and tons of other blogs. I was totally overwhelmed- and hooked! I mean feedback, positive feedback- mind you, was what this poor mama was really missing- and I got it, in droves. Life became about the next thing, the next project, trying to top the reaction to the bat pillow, getting more followers, link parties, comments, and on and on. Not one item on that list has anything to do with my family.
Then last week I had a couple experiences that brought it all back around for me. First my sweet friend has a daughter with handicaps. And her sweet little girl started having seizures and had to be taken by ambulance to the nearest children’s hospital. We arranged care for her other children and took in food to allow them to do what they needed to do for her (she’s doing fine now, she has seizures about once a year and they’re always scary!). Then, later that week, I had my wisdom teeth pulled. Drugged up on Loritab I was next to useless, (the more useless side of useless). I would come downstairs for my requisite cup of pudding so I could take more drugs and then schlump back upstairs to fall into my hazy stupor. When I finally came to- I trudged back downstairs to see my sweet almost 2 year old toddle over to me with arms outstretched yelling MOMMY! with a huge smile! I realized in that very moment that I LOVE being a mother! I LOVE being the one who takes care of ouchies with a kiss, who reads stories goodnight, who knows what’s going on. And in my hurry to quickly come up with the next BIG crafting thing- I was missing out on some of that.
So, after that long winded diatribe, I’ll cut to the chase. I love crafting, I always have, I always will. And I love the community of craft bloggers– you are all so sweet and supportive. I am thrilled to my toes to have 74 followers! I hope you all think it’s worth it to keep coming around! I saw a button on a blog that said “I’m so crafty, I make people!”. And my people are what’s really important to me.
So, after this dose of perspective, I’m going to slow things down just a little here on the blog. I will still be linking up, still hoping to come up with great ideas that anyone can use to find their own little bit of creative spark, and still trying to hawk my wares (goal for 2011- stocking my ETSY store) so that I can do it all over again. Just not as often as I have this last 6 weeks or so. My babies will only be babies for a minute- and I don’t want to miss it.