finding today – loving the simple

My tears welled up as I sat on our worn couch in the family room.

I had spent the day travelling – stuck in DC sitting on the tarmac for three extra hours while storms rolled through and then finally four hours late I arrived home. Exhausted. Wondering what I learned and gleaned from my whirlwind trip to New York City.

As I pulled around the corner, there in the yard were the kids. Waiting. Holding signs. Singing.

Because I was home.

All the glitz, glamour, events, parties, swag and more can’t rival in comparison to those faces filled with joy in seeing me. Their mom. Their worn out mom, whose tired face broke into a smile at the site of those faces thrilled to see mine. They didn’t care that I looked like I had spent the day travelling, or that I was going to slap my hair in a pony tail, or that I didn’t have anything witty or clever to say.
For them? It was just our family together again.

It reminds me of the conversation that I had with Ted Rubin on the last night at Blogher about living present and awake and in the moment. It’s all too easy for us mothers to step on the fast track race through the day train of motherhood and life that we begin to miss the simple beauty in the everyday. You know, those things that I write about, the sun in the morning, little ones jumping outside, joy over some new toys, jam on a toddler’s chin, the sound of singing, a ripe tomato from the garden – simple, little things that celebrate and find today.

Which brings me back to the tears.

It was a simple movie that my daughter Hannah made while I was gone – a video celebrating morning – and in those beautiful moments I saw my family, living, doing, while I was gone. And it cut to my heart. It reminded me just how much I want to be the one with them in the morning, and how the big things the huge events while they’re fabulous, they don’t really matter as much as those everyday moments. Our morning, our simple mornings, became the beauty, the simple moments that mattered most to me. It was seeing my life, the everyday simple life, and realizing how much I love it.

I am so thankful to have gone to New York. But, I am even more thankful to be sitting at my table, with the chatter of kids awake in the morning all around me.

Make sure to slow down, step off of the race, and celebrate and find joy in today.

It is good to be home.

And this?

This is why.

M O R N I N G // a short film from Hannah Nicole on Vimeo.

{A real thanks to my daughter, Hannah, for letting me share her work with you.}

What simple and lovely thing do you need to remember today?