This is my first ever wardrobe post and looking at my outfit, I don’t really feel it is at all post-worthy except when I consider how extraordinarily difficult it is to dress oneself at 14 weeks pregnant. I have always plumped up right away in my pregnancies! And that makes comfortable dressing difficult, unless I am content to wear lounge pants and my pajama t-shirts everyday. Sometimes I am content with that, just not if I’m going anywhere. So, I picked up a BeBand from the maternity section at Target and it has opened up some new wardrobe possibilities at this too-plump-for-my-prepregnancy-clothes-but-not-yet-big-enough-for-maternity-clothes stage I’m in.
So the BeBand is that thing around my waist and hip area that sort of resembles a layered tank top. It helps hold up my unbuttoned, partially unzipped prepregnancy jeans and cozies up over my belly to help me feel covered. The blue printed top is also a prepregnancy top, which would be too short in length to wear at this time, but for the coverage of the BeBand. Also featured in this photo is my new hair, freshly self-trimmed and home hair-dyed, using hair dye from Mother’s Market. The cleaner ingredients are supposed to be safer for use while pregnant. Again, not really post-worthy, but the freshness at this time just feels good.
Oh and I discovered a theme song for this pregnancy! It keeps coming up (first he was a guest on the only SNL I’ve seen live in years, then I caught his PBS special, then it was on the radio today on a station my sister-in-law had left on in my car from when she drove it yesterday) so as I listened to it today on the radio, I thought of the baby and it moved me. It is Michael Buble’s “Haven’t Met You Yet.” The only lyric that doesn’t quite fit is “I promise to give more than I get.” I can’t help but feel that I get much more than I give to my children. I don’t search for pregnancy songs, I just find that I’m drawn to certain songs . . . well, really at all times, but since pregnancy is such a special time, the songs I’m drawn to at those times mean more, and they always have a common thread, that’s a feeling and words that express my heart for the baby deeply nestled inside of me.
I read in Painless Childbirth by Giuditta Tornetta that there exists a culture where the woman, when she wants a baby, goes out into the wild alone and if she’s given a song while out, then she comes home and she will have a baby. She is to teach that baby’s song to the father and they are to sing it to the baby while she’s pregnant. Then they are to teach the song to the birth attendants so that they will all be singing that song as the baby is born. Then the people of the village are to learn the song so that if the child gets hurt, whoever is there to assist them can sing their song to them to calm them. When they get married, all of their guests sing their song and when they are on their deathbed, the village gathers to sing them their song as they transition to death. I love that. My children have songs, I think music and singing well up out of the love and anticipation of a mother’s heart, as a substitute to the impossibility of fully embracing and comprehending the wonder of the unfolding of a soul, a beautiful, God-ordained person, developing, becoming, deeply within her womb. It’s mysterious, miraculous, beautiful in every way. It is a privilege, a blessing, the greatest gift. I do not have the skills to create music, but music and words become in my mind when I sit and be quiet and pay attention to the infiltration of love that annihilates my heart, that is my love for my children.
The theme song for my pregnancy with Jonny was “Blown Away By Love” by The Vibrators. This is tragic . . . I can’t remember what Aveline’s was! June’s was that song by The Cure that goes, “Show me, show me, show me how you do that trick . . . I promise you, I promise that I’ll run away with you, I’ll run away with you.” And guess what? The first time I ever got in the car with June, just she and I, I turned on the car and again, someone else had left the radio on a station I never listen to, that very Cure song was on!!!! I gotta remember Aveline’s! I’ve always made up songs for them once they’re born that I sing to them while I nurse them. Sometimes they ask me to sing them to them still . . . I just sang Jonny’s to him today (he didn’t ask me to). Ha!!!! I just remembered Aveline’s! Well, at least it was one I sang to her when she was tiny, to help her calm down. “Don’t Worry, Baby” by The Beach Boys. So sweet was when she suggested I sing it to June when she was tiny and upset one time. Aaaahhhh, mama memories. This is the good life.
Here are links on YouTube to the songs I mentioned in case you feel like taking a tour through the phases of this mother’s heart. I couldn’t find Jonny’s song on there, and I bet you can imagine the dirty stuff that came up when I clicked “search”!!
Haven’t Met You Yet
Don’t Worry Baby
Just like Heaven
I don’t usually do this, but if you can remember a song sung to you as a child, will you share? Or if you have felt moved to sing a certain song to a little one, tell about it. My mother sang praise songs to me, I remember telling her that her voice was so pretty.
