Birthday Love

Well, there's my darling baby with her darling husband at her birthday lunch. We had such a good time! Lily, Lauren, and Liz Sparks were all there too. 

The restaurant Jessie chose is a good one. I haven't eaten there in years- hadn't even thought about it in years, really. The food is always so fresh, the menu changes daily, and there's something for everyone. I thought I had taken a picture of what I got but somehow, I didn't. Oh well. 
It was a very pretty plate. Very Florida. It was on the salad menu and I guess it was a salad of sorts as there were baby greens on it...under the fried green tomatoes and three large, perfect shrimp. 
Good GAWD, Y'ALL!

I was so very glad that Liz Sparks could come. Thirty five years ago, just about right now, she was with me when I had that baby girl. One of the best things about having a home birth is that you get to have the people with you that you want to be there. No residents you've never met wandering in and out of your room pretending that they know what they're doing, or nurses changing shifts on you just when you've bonded with one. 
I will say that I had far more people with me when Jessie was born than I needed to have. But it was good! I wanted all of them there. They were the people I loved the most in the world and I do not think all of them were actually in the room when I gave birth. 
My husband was there, of course, also Hank, May, and Lily, our dear, dear friend Anne-Helene from Norway, all three of my brothers, my darling Lynn, my midwife Erice. She had been with me for all three of my previous births, even the one I ended up in the hospital with. A different midwife actually caught May but Erice was right there. And she caught Lily which was not an easy birth at all. 
I had met Liz Sparks a year or so before when we were working at the Birth Centre together and we had known we were meant to be from the very start. So I asked her too. 

We talked today about how I'd told her before the birth to please not fucking tell me that I looked beautiful in labor which is something that gets said frequently. Sometimes it's true. Often, it's true. I never felt like it was for me, though. So when Liz got to my house, I was in the bathroom vomiting, which is what I do in labor, and she said, "You're right. You look like a cow." 
It was so funny although I did not appreciate it in the moment. After the birth though, I bought her a wind chime with a cow on it and she says she still has it and it's her favorite wind chime ever. I'm just so grateful I still have her. She has played a huge role in our family and with my children. We were indeed meant to be.

So back to lunch- we all had a very good time talking and celebrating and catching up. Lily and Lauren really do love the new house and they said that the kids all like it very much too. Even Gibson. He loves his new room. Hurray! 

Speaking of Lily, here's the beautiful cheesecake that she made from a description that Vergil texted her of what Jessie had said her dream cake would be.

She did not bake the cheesecake. She has not yet unpacked her kitchen and this all happened last night. Luckily, Lauren had still been a work and brought home a Boar's Head cheesecake from Publix and all the ingredients and Lily took it from there. She had to cut the strawberries on a paper plate with a plastic knife! That's a caramel drizzle and it's got shaved chocolate on top. We didn't eat any at the restaurant so that Jessie and Vergil could take it home and share it with the boys tonight. 

I've been so very emotional today. This is normal for me on my children's birthdays. The days my children were born were the absolute most important days of my life as well as being the most profound and spiritual days of my life. 
And hardest days of my life to be truthful. I am not an easy-birther. But I think that only adds to the great joy and relief and rush of all the love hormones when those babies are finally born and I am holding them in my arms. I literally cannot think of those days without crying. 

The day Jessie was born was rainy and gray but Mr. Moon and I took a lot of walks because walking is how I deal with pain, and the magnolias were in bloom. I will always remember that. And I will also remember that there was a rainbow in the sky when she was born. 
It was so perfect. Her daddy had picked one of those magnolia blossoms and put it in a jar of water and set it on his dresser so one of the first things that baby ever smelled (if babies can smell and I know they can) was a magnolia. 

Well. Enough of that. I need to wipe my eyes and get on with it. 
Besides the birthday lunch I haven't done much. I've felt very tired for no known reason. I went to bed at a reasonable hour last night. It had been a slightly stressful evening in that there was another example of TOO MUCH NATURE. 
Maurice, who I am sure was worried that with Glen gone I might not have enough to eat, provided me with the fruits of her hunting. 
Y'all- it was bad. 
I went into the kitchen bathroom to find what I will only describe here as three separate portions of what I think was a black rat. She had butchered it for me, as a good hunter does. 
There was blood. Also organs. 

What could I do? I managed to get it all cleaned up without puking, all the while screaming, "NO, NO, NO!" which shocked Maurice who went racing from the bathroom, baffled, I'm sure, at my reaction to her noble and generous gift. 

From gecko to guts. What a day.

And then the cat had the temerity to sleep with me. 

And I let her. 

Ah me. 

Oh! And let us not forget- I absolutely must quote my Lynn who always used to say on this day of the year, "First of May, First of May. Outdoor fucking begins today."

Do with that what you will.

Love...Ms. Moon