Learning To Share {+ a Mother's Day Giveaway From The Vintage Honey Shop}

Motherhood is learning to share all over again. 

Maybe really it is learning that we've never really known how to share fully. 

I'll never forget the first night at home with our daughter, the girl who never slept, when my husband red-eyed looked at me and said "I can't do six weeks of this" as he vigorously rocked our newborn.

Somewhere along the line in baby book reading and childbirth prep he had gathered the idea that the inconsolable crying and sleepless nights would magically go away in six weeks. First time parents. Oh to be so innocent again.

It's funny now. I shake my head, close my eyes and I belly laugh because I hardly recognize that man and woman worn out and wondering what they'd gotten themselves into with their new daughter at 3am.

Teething necklaces from The Vintage Honey Shop are intended for adults to wear only.

It was a few weeks ago on a Sunday afternoon- the time of the week in the Hoover home that is unarguably devoted to naps for all. Once again the wee girl was in an all out revolt against sleep and so while mama tried to nap she jumped on my stomach, asked to watch Aristocats forty billion times and tried to open my tired eyes by pulling my eyelashes out one by one.

I capitulated moment to moment during that sleepless afternoon between crazy anger at the wide awake toddler and head over heels love for the tiny girl whose breath tickled my ear with each "I love you, mama."

We think that learning to share is the work of childhood. We grow up and we learn social cues and how to get along in an acceptable way in our day to day with others. Then these little people barrel their way into the our worlds and make us share in ways that are uncomfortable.

We share our bodies. We share our personal space. We share our lunch even when they have the same thing on their plate. We share our hearts and they are wrenched and wrung out by our own flesh and blood. We share in knowing a teeny tiny bit what it must be like for God to love us. 

There are evenings that I collapse on the couch unable to do one.more.thing. in the name of keeping someone else alive. I flip on Netflix and realize that every thing that has been on today was animated and meant for the under five crowd. You know you're a mama when all your suggested programming contains a cartoon animal. 

We share until it can feel like there is little left to give and then from somewhere deep we find a well that pours out more. We tip up the pitcher and we pour it out and find that somehow in our weariness there is a bit more to give, just enough to share.

Then there is this one day a year designated "Mother's Day". The day that they will make us breakfast in bed and sign cards in magic marker covered with goopy painted handprints. We will clean up the messes of that day too and share it with tiny people that have made our life harder and sweeter.

Because no matter what the parenting books say...Sharing is hard. 

My mama always had a chocolate bar in her purse and I've always had a sweet tooth the size of Rhode Island. I knew better than to fish it out for myself, but my mama (whose sweet tooth made mine look tiny) would open it slowly, the silver paper reflecting my grin, and she'd break off a piece for me.

Who knows the last time she ate a candy bar in silence without my hazel eyes begging at her knee. I realize now that my mama was broken open body and soul when she became my mama.

Motherhood breaks pieces of us off and somehow there is always enough to go around when Jesus is the one filling our baskets. 

The sharing can be pure joy. A brownie batter covered spoon licked clean by little boys who'll wield them like a musketeer's sword. Wakeful nights shared with a nursling who can't get enough snuggles with mama. The laughter peeling from a wrestling match turned tickle fight turned family hug all before someone gets a bloody lip.

The hard moments. The why-won't-you-sleep-moments? The sweeter-than-chocolate-cake moments.  Every single shared moment that makes us mothers. Every single moment that turns us inside out, breaks us apart and remakes us into mothers who give, love, hope, dream and share with everything we have.

Cup your hands mama-sister. Turn your face up to the gifts of God and raise your empty and you'll find there is more than enough to share. Take courage. Sharing is hard but always worth it.

I'm so glad to be learning to share all over again with you. 

Happy {early} Mother's Day!

Oh, and I have one more thing...a surprise {giveaway} to share!

Today I'm giving away a beautiful gift for mama and baby to share. Jen & Mel over at The Vintage Honey Shop are giving away a teething necklace ($20 value) to one of my readers. I have a standard new mama/baby gift and each one includes one of their teething necklaces and now a copy of Lisa-Jo Baker's Surprised by Motherhood. Don't everyone invite me to their baby shower at once.

Teething necklaces from The Vintage Honey Shop are intended for adults to wear only.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Don't believe my love for The Vintage Honey Shop's wears? Here I am a year and half ago rockin' my own. Praise the Lord Millie has grown more hair! I still wear it even though my sweet girl isn't teething or nursing anymore because...look at it! It's gorgeous!