A Special Tea For The Mom to Be

Giving birth and being born brings us into the essence of creation, where the human spirit is courageous and bold and the body, a miracle of wisdom.  ~Harriette Hartigan

I began the weekend at the beach with my loved ones where shots of week 37+ were taken...

Progress

Yup - that's 37 weeks of baby

How can the weekend get better than beach time with my family?  Well, a tea to celebrate the mom to be, didn't hurt.  about a month and a half ago, Meghan and mom Dease asked if my mom and I had a free weekend on our calendars.  They wanted to do a small celebration of the baby to be at tea.  My mom and I looked at our schedules and found a weekend that seemed to work out perfectly for everyone and we all began crossing our fingers that the baby would stay put until after we got together since I am full gestation and just waiting for this little one to come on down (so to say).  I had no idea what spoils awaited me.

I went into the tea thinking that this would be about the baby to be, but to my surprise, I was the one to be spoiled rotten.  My mom had given me some gifts when she met me at the house before we headed down to the tea, and I thought that it was quite exciting to be spoiled when the baby is who this was all about.  The tea was a gift to me and needless to say, once we were happily seated with views of the ocean (and no toddlers to chase) I was really in my own version of pregnant utopia.  However, when packages started coming my way and the theme was not baby as I had thought it would be, but was all about me with carefully chosen gifts of my favorite things, I was overwhelmed.

Do you ever find yourself in situations where your heart just feels so full of love?  Well, let me tell you, for me this was one of those moments.  Sure, you may be thinking that the pregnancy hormones help with such feelings, and normally I would agree.  But, in this case as I sat there with these women, all eagerly anticipating the arrival of the little Miss or Mister, taking time to celebrate the very pregnant mother, my heart was about to burst and pregnant or not, I realized how special the bond that women get to share truly is.  I couldn't believe that I was being pampered beyond the spoils of a tea with a group of amazing ladies.  The gifts were wonderful...a new diaper bag (I LOVE IT) filled with some adorable bibs and burp clothes for the new addition, a special gown for a not so pregnant Jill (who is that?), candles, lotions, books, soaps, a gift card to one of my all time favorite stores...you get the idea.

We sat and relaxed, laughed, shared stories - hopes, fears, all the things you can do when you are with ladies who are also your support group and family.

The dads and kiddos (dogs included) survived the day just fine without our company, and they even enjoyed the spoils of our tea (thanks to mom Dease) who was happy to share some of the leftover goodies that we just didn't have room for, despite our best attempts to eat every yummy treat in front of us.

                              

We capped the weekend off with some fun in the sun.  The pool is officially open and there was no shortage of kids, parents, friends, or neighbors out enjoying the day.  Clare is a fish in training and had a great time playing with her friends outside, but mostly thought daddy was the coolest guy in the entire world since he had no problem making sure she could play in the pool as long as she wanted (mom's not much help with that these days).  I can already tell that this is shaping up to be one of the best summer's to date.