DIY boat bookshelf

Last July, Eric and I drove out to Lake Victoria to pick out an old fishing canoe as our anniversary gift to one another.  We saw an old one with lots of holes, half-sunk and rotting away on the banks of the river, with several pieces of trash floating in its mucky water.  It was the one for us.

This sounds like a strange anniversary gift, I know.  But we had a project in mind, so we got the help of several locals to load the boat on top of the truck, unsure if we could make it home with the huge load.  We were told to have an "African heart" and that it would all work out.  Our carpenter friend rode along with us, calling out the window to everyone along the way who were giving us strange looks, "Da flood is coming! This is Noah!" Despite the excitement, we managed to avoid all traffic police and we took every bump and pothole along the way as slow as we could, and we made it home with our rickety boat in one piece.

It was not in one piece for long.  After unloading our rotting treasure, our carpenter cut the canoe in half and there we left it, sitting in our yard waiting for the wood to dry out.  Several weeks later, the carpenter came back and nailed a few planks into each side of the boat to make shelves.  And viola!  Our anniversary gift to each other - now a unique bookshelf with a story - adorns the corner our dining room and may just be our favorite piece of furniture.

Kreitzberg family photos

When we returned to Uganda with Leo as a fresh addition to our family, we took him to a farmers' market one weekend and there I met another mom with another baby boy, just a month older than Leo.  Danielle and I quickly became friends and so did our boys, Akai and Leo.  Her husband, Brock, and Eric also became friends and shared life together in a weekly guys' group while Danielle and I had regular play dates.  We cheered Brock on about a year later as he boarded an emergency flight to the US, trying to make it to Danielle in time for the birth of their second son, Ari, who decided to arrive a bit early.  Brock did make it in time, with an epic story to tell of a trans-Atlantic Skype session on the plane while his wife was in labor.  Thank God for in-flight Wifi!

The whole Kreitzberg family have become friends with our whole family and it was sad news to receive when we heard Brock would take a new job stateside and they would soon leave Uganda.  I was honored to capture their sweet family before they left us and capture their life here in Uganda, the only home their boys have known.  The Kreitzbergs will be missed by all of us, but we wish them well in this next chapter!

Birthing blessingways

When I was an expecting mother, a friend threw a birthing blessingway for me and it was one of the most treasured ceremonies ever thrown for me.  This friend is quite gifted in leading rituals and blessings and she taught me (possibly without knowing it) the incredible beauty of honoring time, honoring seasons of life, and bringing a community together to bless an individual facing a transition.  The space she created for me, with women who knew me intimately and loved me well, was indeed a blessing. 

My friend left Uganda a couple of years ago, and I have tried to fill the gap she left in our community by hosting birthing blessingways for other expecting mothers. Now, this ceremony has become absolutely sacred to me and is always a time I feel a great sense of Connection.  In no other ceremony do I feel as many goosebumps trickle up and down my arms as I do when I am with a group of women who surround a creator of life and honor her coming transition, honor her body, honor her excitements and her anxieties.  The spirit created in these circles of women is beyond expression and it has truly become the most sacred ritual I take part in.

Below, I share some suggestions for hosting a birthing blessingway for an expecting mother in your life.  When done with a spirit of reverence and community, I know it will bless all who attend.

A birthing blessingway is quite different from a baby shower.  Gifts are not necessary, although they can be incorporated if the host or the mother wishes.  Rather, this gathering has an emphasis on emotional and spiritual support for the expecting mother by those women who are closest to her.  It is not a gathering for the whole family and all of her friends, but rather a gathering of the women in her life from whom she feels the greatest love and support.  It is important that the mother make the guest list herself.  Preferably, it should be a rather short list to make for a more intimate gathering. 

It is also best not to incorporate time for guests to dole out advice for the mother.  Chances are, she's already overwhelmed by the unsolicited advice she has received from everyone else.  Encourage this to be a time of simply listening to and validating the mother.  It can be hard to hold our tongues with advice we want to give because we want to "help" our friends, but encourage guests to notice if the advice will truly serve the mother or if it might be coming from a place of making the advice-giver feel better about their own motherhood knowledge.  This can be a tricky line to draw, but it is one that encourages mindfulness in our interactions with women bearing life and facing many emotions.

Here are suggested elements to incorporate into the blessingway ceremony:

• Ask guests to write a blessing to the mother before the ceremony, which they will read aloud.  In this blessing, they can include characteristics they see in her that will make her a great mother, what they will pray for, and what they wish for her, etc!  If you would like, you can ask the guests to arrive earlier than the expecting mother and when the mother arrives, the host can blindfold her and lead her through a line of women, who will each hold her hand and read their blessing to her one-by-one.  Collect the cards and papers these blessings were written on and give them to the mother.
• Invite guests to bring a bead with them to the ceremony that reminds them of the expecting mother or represents a blessing they would like to give to her.  For example: "This is a red bead and red is a strong, bold color.  You are one of the strongest women I know and your boldness will serve you well in motherhood."  Each woman will give their bead and their explanation of it to the mother.  String these beads together for the mother to have with her during labor to remind her of all the women standing with her and to squeeze in her hands during a contraction!
• When guests have been seated, go around the circle and have them introduce themselves through their maternal heritage as far back as they remember.  (You may want to give them a heads up on this so they can look it up before coming!) For example: My name is Dani and I am the mother of Leo, the daughter of Ruby, the granddaughter of Ruby, and the great-granddaughter of Blanche.
• While each women introduces herself, pass around flowers and a piece of ribbon.  Each woman should wrap the flowers in the ribbon during her introduction, adding to each other with each woman to eventually make a flower crown.  At the end of the introductions, crown the expecting mother!
• If the guests did not read their blessings to the mother as she entered the gathering, you can go around the circle again and do this.  Perhaps you can provide a ribbon that each woman wraps around her wrist after reading her blessing.  When all the guests have finished, note how the ribbon literally ties all the women together and remind the mother that all these women are here for her during this season of life.  You can then pass around a pair of scissors to cut the ribbon so that each woman can tie it around her wrist as a reminder to pray for the mother.
• Provide a time for the mother to share about anything on her heart and mind regarding the coming baby and birth.  Invite her to share her excitements, fears, and emotions about anything from the changing relationship with her partner and other children to finances or the birth itself.  Encourage the guests to listen well to the mother without interjecting pieces of advice.  Don't rush this time - the mother may find herself processing emotions she has not had the time or space to acknowledge.
• While the mother is speaking, one woman (or multiple women!) could draw a henna mandala tattoo on the mother's belly!
• Say a final blessing or prayer over the mother.  This can be done by "anointing" her belly with oil - perhaps a special essential oil.

Do you know a mother you would like to bless, but you live far from her?  Throw her a blessingway from a distance!  Ask her for the contacts of her closest female friends and invite her to write out her thoughts and emotions about the birth and baby.  Share her thoughts with these women and ask them to send the mother a card with a written blessing, as well as a bead, as explained above.  It is sure to encourage her and remind her of the women in her life who will support her through this time.

Here I am at my blessingway, surrounded by very special women and feeling more than blessed.  I do, however, acknowledge that I look more hippie than ever with my flower crown, labor beads around my neck, henna belly tattoo, and rainbow California shirt! Ha!

White Sands, New Mexico

With a few days to ourselves in New Mexico, we took a short road trip to one of the state's most fascinating landscapes - White Sands National Monument.  The majestic white sand dunes are made of a mineral called gypsum and are formed through a crazy geological process that I can't pretend to explain, but I could at least appreciate the aesthetic beauty of it all.  This unique place, with its own unique ecosystem is so large that it can apparently be seen from space.

We took two evenings here and I discovered a love for minimal desert photography.  Both evenings, when the sun began to set, the wind died down and the horizon slowly tinged into subtle pastels as the shadows grew long.  The desert presents a minimalism and requires an appreciation of each element in your path - each plant, each texture, each curve of a dune.  I could have photographed this landscape for several more days if I had the chance and these photos are now among my favorites.

Small sites in New Mexico

We recently returned to Uganda after about 6 weeks in the states, jumping all over America once again for all kinds of different purposes.  Between this and that, we had a few spare days and we took them for ourselves, for a real family vacation.  We tend to travel a lot, but it is hardly ever just to get away or site-see, so these few days offered us that opportunity.

We drove from Albuquerque, New Mexico to White Sands National Monument, but stopped in the quirky little town of Truth or Consequences for a couple of nights.  There wasn't anything particularly striking in the area beyond the natural hot springs, and that was just fine with us because we mostly just wanted to relax and be together.  We did drive through a wildlife refuge on the way there and stop by a petroglyph site on the return trip, both semi-interesting stops to break up the trip.  Besides our couple of days at White Sands, which I'll feature soon, it was all quite uneventful.  And sometimes uneventful is just what you need.