In two weeks my book, The Beauty of Motherhood: Grace-Filled Devotions for the Early Years, will be released.
It's surreal to think that this book will be born so soon, and, to follow the birthing metaphor, the exhaustion of expectation has set in. I'm overjoyed and terrified. I'm still finishing up a few more things that need to be done before the (book) baby arrives. Everything aches, literally and figuratively.
Indeed just yesterday I came down with a dreadful set of chills, undoubtedly passed along by my sweet — but sickly — kindergartener. At bedtime, I shivered in bed under a stack of blankets, sipping tea and ruminating over the many emails I had yet to answer and the title of our book. Why had we decided on The *Beauty* of Motherhood again?
"Beauty" was the last word I'd use to describe motherhood at the moment. Overwhelming, yes. Crushing, yes. But beautiful? Well, I wasn't feeling it after a day of struggling to care for my kids and barely hanging on to good health myself. This led to an angsty journal session from which the following prayer emerged:
Dear God,
There are messes
upon messes in this house,
the baby and I are playing an epic game
of spill or save the dog's water bowl
(for the record, I'm losing 3:1),
my oldest is home sick from school
and passed his cough onto me,
thus, we are both suffering
but only one of us is being served...
I confess, on days like this, I count
the hours until bedtime, I imagine
sleeping alone
or being anywhere but here
(Hawaii sounds nice, don't you think?)
I need a prayer to snap
me out of this funk.
Later, when I'm snug in bed,
I open my photo app on my phone and see
my life more clearly
how my oldest wrapped
his arms around his baby brother
at the grocery store
how the baby isn't much of baby anymore,
he's toddling
here there everywhere
and, I forgot to take a picture but a few days ago his brother lost
a tooth and found
he could read me the majority of "Go Dog Go" on his own
you know I took a picture of that (!),
Plus the way Light cascaded
through the trees when we visited the playground
and the shadow of my silhouette holding
my youngest, his weight pressing
against me,
God, thank you for this love
this humbling, holy call
to nurture for my children
Let me taste it all — their sweetness and sourness
Let me embrace it all — our messes and our milestones
Let me hear it all — the cacophony and melody of grace
in their small voices
Let me feel
the beauty of motherhood
again.
Amen.
My friend Kim and I wrote The Beauty of Motherhood for every mama searching for spiritual refreshment while raising her young children. As moms in the thick of the early years, we're acutely aware that the messages of grace we crafted for readers' growth are words we still need to hear — daily.
Because we know motherhood manifests in a variety of ways and thus, our stories are limited, we encouraged our reader to share her story, too. I adore connecting with other mothers through storytelling, and so, to both raise awareness of our book and elevate the stories of other mothers whose stories and backgrounds contrast ours, we've organized a Writing Tour for The Beauty of Motherhood. Over the course of this March and April, mothers in our network whose voices we admire will respond to the prompt, What does the beauty of motherhood look like in your life? Our first writers will debut their stories this week.
Kim and I will be sharing on social media, and you can follow along on Instagram with me (@erinstrybis) and Kim (@kknowlezeller) and the hashtag #thebeautyofmotherhood and join us, sharing your story. At the close of the series we'll offer a concluding post that links to each story.
Learn more about the book and preorder your copy here.
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