I am tired. The girls and I left this morning and headed to Fort Lauderdale for a lovely visit with a friend and returned just a bit ago after a long, quiet drive across the Alley.

But get this. On the way home?

70 mph, open freeway. Stage left: Palm trees. Stage right: Palm trees. Babies sleeping in back seat, heaving sweet sighs every ten minutes or so. And the most fantastic sun show ever. Like opening-scene-of-Lion-King kinda good. Like lava lamp kinda good. Like pull-over-to-rest-area-and-take-pictures-kinda good. And then I found Gypsy Kings on some great Latin radio station and I just drove, like Thelma and Louise. But no cops. Or Mormon missionaries on bikes. The only thing that would have made it better was if I was driving a convertible and not a minivan that smells like Jr. Bacon Cheeseburgers.

Normally, cruising on a Florida freeway at sunset would elicit all sorts of good ponderings for me. Good deep-in-thought moments, but tonight my mind was free. I thought about the sun. That is all. I thought about what words I would use to describe that moment to someone who could not see the sun, and it involved all sorts of colors that bled into the sky and some good unicornish gushing. Because I liked that sun tonight, I did. And I liked its encore performance of pink sky that wouldn’t end. Bravo.

There are moments when fessing up about the challenges of parenthood are good. Moments where I’ll come here and write that there’ve been lots of whining, babies who won’t sleep, a mama who’s popping Excedrin and can’t keep up with the laundry. And it feels good in that whole everyone relates kind of way. And it’s kind of cool and in-with-the-times to be honest and lay some good self-deprecating parenthood admissions on the table because this generation is realizing it’s good to be free and honest and, in doing so, we’re going somewhere good with it.

There will be times when my patience is shot and I’m all hey-look-at-the-crazy-mom-who-can’t-keep-her-s&*t-together because it will feel good to write it. But, I can honestly say lately my girls and I have been completely in synch. I am blathering on about how good and funny they are, kissing the little valleys between their eyes even more, noticing new blonde streaks in their hair, new sounds in their vocabulary. And I am feeling present and thankful and patient and not even seeing the half part of that glass-is-half-full. It’s just full right now–pure and simple.

Maybe they are growing. Maybe I am growing. Maybe–and far more likely–this is one of those precious slivers in parenthood when things are so in tune even Nella’s cockeyed middle-of-the-night routine isn’t making me sigh. I welcome their moments of neediness as opportunites to be needed and sometimes, that feels good. Sometimes a cry in the night reminds me that it’s fleeting–this little window that presents me with the precious gift of feeling her skin against mine in the dark and pausing just a moment to smell her milky breath before I lay her back down and return to my covers.

The Lock-Eye-Nursing Gaze. Belongs in my Top Five Motherhood Moments of all time. Nursing baby stares. Mama smiles. Baby squints eyes and smiles back. But never stops sucking. Cue angels, clouds parting, unicorns neighing and striking ground with hooves, pre-flight.

Sometimes. Not all the time. Because there will be days when, come the third middle-of-the-night cry, I shake Brett and awaken him with one of those pathetic “Help Me” whispers that’s really not a whisper at all but more of an agitated shout with a little bit of breathiness to mask it over as a whisper. And it will be funny when it happens. But right now, I’m enjoying my sliver when it’s all good. Pure parental bliss. Even if it’s a sliver.

But hey, not every sunset looks like tonight’s performance. And that’s what makes it even better.

I spent a lot of one-on-one time with the girls this weekend. Doesn’t always work out that way but since we’re talking slivers, I took it and ran. The opportunity to be with them. Like really be with them.

We took a blanket to the park and unintentionally aligned our visit with an outside performance of the Naples Concert Band. So I watched my Mowgli climb trees–the ones with the thick branches that lie low and staggered, perfect for little climbing feet–while we listened to trumpets followed by long periods of applause. Applause which made Nella smile and clap and wonder what she did that was so celebratory.

We walked downtown, popping in stores, stopping at a fountain to make a wish, forgetting what time it was and deciding even after we realized it was late that we’d keep walking because we were having fun.

Nella’s new Oh-face, our favorite face. We applaud the “Oh.” And take pictures of it. Repeatedly. You will see lots of Oh.

We went swinging in the park and I flipped out when I saw a rat hiding under a play structure. The rat with the long skinny tail that made me gag and shiver and grab kids and run. I can do lizards and bugs. But I cannot do rats.

So there. For all the this-is-hard times to come, I am happy to report this weekend was just purely good. Like honeymoons are good when the reality of real-life marriage is more complicated, even though it’s good too. Honeymoons are for getting drunk on love and gazing into each others’ eyes and thinking that there might not possibly be another moment as good as this one here. I like drunk on love.

Surely, the Oh-face makes you happy, eh?

I’m excited to announce a new sponsor near and dear to my heart. I don’t have a lot of time to read these days, but I need to read because it is fueling, I enjoy it and it broadens my perspectives and deepens my beliefs. I love a good parenting magazine, but I love even more a good parenting magazine that isn’t just fluff or been-there-done-that. I’ve been a Mamalode subscriber for a year now (I was their first subscriber!), and it’s a given that when it lands in my mailbox, there’ll be a long bath later that night.

Mamalode is good writing. Uncensored, honest, raw insights that plunge into topics of motherhood that are relatable and make us better. And I’m even more excited that I get to be a part of their next issue. It’s a gift for your mailbox, for you, and I know you’ll love it. Buy a subscription here.

A commenter on this post will be winning a one year subscription to Mamalode. Lucky you.

The wild sun performance is over, the babies are asleep.

Oh, what the heck. One more Oh.

Outside, a skinny moon smiles. Tonight, it’s just a sliver.

Baby had her first strawberry.

And she flipped her lid when it was gone. So I had to give her more, not just because I wanted to satiate her strawberry-lovin’ heart, but because I was enjoying watching her eat it so much, I had tears in my eyes.

Love for these little beings that belong to me hits me unexpectedly sometimes…in swells that knock me off my feet. And I get up, starry-eyed, and thank the heavens that they are mine.

It is the most grounding, centering love I know. And that unsure thing I was talking about? Those not-so-confident feelings seem to crumble to non-existence when I am fully present with my other hearts…the ones that beat outside my chest. When I am with them, when I am fulfilling their needs and performing even the simplest of tasks in the greatest role of my life, I am so very sure.

We had a girls’ date to the produce market.

I was craving fresh tomotoes and corn but more so a nice dose of color, an opportunity to be outside in this magical climate and something fun to do with the girls.

And shopping among the colors of peppers and tomotoes and ripe corn makes me more excited for the coming months for they will be drenched in even more vivid colors…from the blues of Spring sky and pool water to rainbow-colored kayaks at Isle of Capri.

Today, it was fruits and veggies.

Best beefsteak tomatoes ever.

And many strawberries for Nella who devoured them Thoreau style…sucking the marrow, Baby.

Have a fabulous weekend.

And Congratulations to the winner of the Shabby Apple dress, Commenter #17, Team Lando:
Oh, oh, I am lusting after that dress for my little girl who is being born TOMORROW! Induction tonight! So I very much get the “unfinished” feeling. I’ve been sort of in a daze all day. That being said, I finally got myself a DSLR camera thanks to a) your website and b) little Ellie’s inspiration.

Team Lando, e-mail your contact info to kellehamptonblog@comcast.net and a pretty dress wil be on the way! And pretty please, attach a picture of your new little love…welcome to the world!

I drove alone yesterday—only a half hour to the pottery place downtown to pick up some pieces Lainey had painted and intended to give away for Christmas, but in true Hampton fashion, we forgot about them and they’ve been sitting, homeless, on a shelf since December 21st.

Family, see anything you like? Make your dibs.

Brett stayed home with the girls and I had a small window of time to get there and back as Nella had therapy and I like to be there for it. But traffic was a real rhymes-with-witch-and-starts-with-a-B, so come the third red light on the way home and getting stuck behind some old man who might as well have pedaled his bike along 41, I was tense, tapping the steering wheel and muttering a whole lot of “Oh, Come on”s. Until I realized I needed to chill out. I was alone, and I’m never alone. And though I love tilting the rear view mirror to catch a blonde head behind me to the left and chubby feet kicking to the right, sometimes it is nice to breathe and think and replenish the parts of myself that are separate from the all-encompassing title of Mama that defines so much of me…even though I wouldn’t have it any other way.

So I rolled down the windows, cranked up the volume and sang with gusto Sheryl Crow’s Strong Enough so loudly, I’m pretty sure the old man who should have pedaled his bike heard it too. I know every word to that song. I owned that CD when I was 16. Except a week after I got it, my church youth group said it was worldly and evil and coaxed me into breaking it in half along with the other 12 worldly CDs I had just scored for free from my BMG music club subscription, and I’ve never gotten over it. It makes me sing that song really passionately. Pent up anger.

I want my CD back.

I called Brett and told him I’d be home in two seconds. Which means “I’m going to Dairy Queen by myself and I’m not going to tell you.”

So, while Lainey helped Jonah coax Nella to stand and stay on all fours and Brett waited for me to roll in the driveway in my promised “two seconds,” I hovered over a hot fudge sundae with extra whipped cream under the old red A-frame roof of the Naples DQ and downed my ice cream like a Hoover vac.

I picked a hidden picnic table in the back, but I saw one of the workers watching me eat from a window where he was making a Blizzard or something, and I was embarrassed because of how fast I was eating. I inhaled that poor sundae, scraping the last bits of hot fudge with my fingers and licking them clean. But, oh you have to do that sometimes, eh?

I drove the rest of the way anxiety-free. I waved on anyone who tried to cut in front of me. I smiled. I pulled my left knee up on the seat all cool and casual and heard my driver’s ed teacher yelling in my head. I tried to memorize the words to the new Kesha song on the radio and imagined how I’d bust out the lyrics later when I had it down pat. Maybe I’d throw in some cool moves. Definitely something my old youth group wouldn’t approve of. To get back for all those CDs they made me break.

Oh, but I’m off on quite a tangent. Redirecting…

I returned for the last fifteen minutes of therapy and Jonah joked I should have stayed away. Because my girl is stretching and reaching for me and she’ll have nothing to do with crawling and standing now. I love that my girl stretches and reaches for me.

I missed them. I missed them for two silly hours and though I very much liked my car solo and riding with the windows down and learning the words to the Kesha song (hot and dangerous, if you’re one of us then roll with us cuz we make the hipsters fall in love when we got our hot pants on and up and yes of course we does…okay, that’s all I got and I’m good at botching lyrics)…where was I…yes, though I happily swim in the tranquil waters of my rare alone times, I even more happily cannonball into the vibrant ripples of the good, the loud, the empowering laughter and neediness and loveliness of my family.

Today, we drove again. A different drive. One where I was reaching back to shovel wheat puffs in a little mouth and asking Lainey to stop kicking Daddy’s seat. And after a few errands, I asked Brett if we could just drive.

“You just want me to drive?” he repeated.

“Yeah, can we just drive for fun…like a local road trip?”

And he smiles and turns the opposite direction of home. And I am happy.

We ventured down hidden streets and found secret horse farms and empty lots. And on the way home we passed my favorite tree, and Brett pulled over so Lainey could pick some fallen flowers.

And the funniest part of this story is that A, you should know I’m terrified of cops. Like I think I’m going to get arrested at any given moment. Like I’m not kidding, if I go in Dunkin Donuts to get a coffee and there is a police officer paying for a donut, I am quite certain he is going to think I stole my coffee and cuff me. And B, while we are picking flowers, I see two men on bikes. They are pedaling toward us and they are wearing white shirts and ties. And I freak out and say to Brett, “Here come the cops.” Because I just know they’re coming to get me for picking flowers and they are going to cart me off all cuffed and arrested on the back of their bikes. And I’m not joking. Brett starts laughing and says, “Kelle, I think they’re Jehovah’s Witnesses” and I suddenly see their backpacks with their Bibles and my shoulders drop and I am so relieved I’m not going to jail. Even though I know there is nothing illegal about picking fallen flowers in an empty lot.

I love how Alone and Together live in harmony. Like orbiting planets pulled together by gravity. We don’t have to be defined by motherhood because there’s an intricate infrastructure of talents and dreams and passions that makes us women who are strong enough to stand alone. And yet, ask any mother and she’ll probably tell you there’s nothing more incredible she’d rather be defined by than the amazingness of her littles and her family.

Lovin’ my solar system tonight.

And thrilled to lick and turn the pages of the next chapter, soon to come…spring is on the way. Brett predicts the significant cold fronts are over, and we’re in for the steady incline of blue skies and hot sun. We are preparing appropriately with popsicles and garden hose showers.

Nella’s first popsicle, but you would have never known it. She knew just what to do, thanks to watchin’ her sister like a hawk.

Happy Sunny Skies.

The winner of the Tiny Hiney onesie is Commenter #426, Emily: We curse tile, too (and hard wood, and concrete…the boy has a BIG head!) Beautiful analogies and gorgeous pictures. That Millie is adorable, as are her big sis AND mama! Craving frozen yogurt (and a sunny afternoon to enjoy it!) now…

Congratulations, Emily! Please send your contact info to kellehamptonblog@comcast.net.