Mothers and Daughters

Time is such a strange thing.  We measure it in increments we barely understand.  The significance of it's passing doesn't hit us until that which we've walked through is over.  While experiencing it, time is so real.  When we reflect on it, it seems almost a mist.  Time.

When Addison was about to enter her last year of high school, a time period that seemed so uncharted and mysterious to our family, I took her on a Mother/Daughter get-a-way.  Because she is the first child and the object of all manner of experimentation, I didn't know what I was doing.  Time as our tester of that which is good, showed me that this idea was a good thing and worthy of being repeated with each of my girls in similar life stages and has thus become an Elledge Girl family tradition.

This was Parker's turn ... a making of a Mother/Daughter memory.  We took off for Hungary (only 45 minutes away) and retreated for a Spa weekend.  Toes, fingers, backs, heads, faces and arms were massaged, peeled, oiled and scrubbed.  We clothed ourselves in white robes and enjoyed AC that we set real low.  We feel asleep to the voice of the narrator of A & E's Biography and woke up to my child telling false stories of my snoring.

Resting with someone is important.  Resting with someone who is in a life transition is priceless.  Together we explored possible options and outcomes of the year to come.  We unpacked real feelings.   We related to one another without the trappings of normal life.  We took the time to embrace what we normally would put off.  We participated in intentional rest together.

What Time and Motherhood has taught me is to enjoy my daughters at the life stage they are currently experiencing.

This summer I got to spend the night with my grown-up, adult Addison in her space.  I followed her around while she worked, did errands and life.  I was her spectator.  Then we got to fall asleep  in the same bed and listen to each other brush their teeth the next morning and share heart issues about something that would rise to the surface.  We did it because we knew time was limited and needed to be taken advantage of while it was being offered as sacred.

Mothers, have the courage to rest with your daughters.
Mothers, have the courage to be still with your daughters.
Mothers, don't rush moments but take advantage of them.
Mothers, don't try to fix daughters but let them explore options.
Mothers, love your daughters well.

Making time for more of my daughters,
Christina