name: Andi Williams  

age: 44

current city: Brevard, NC (outside of Asheville) 

living situation: Living with my husband and me in our home are two kids: Boy Child (14) and Girl Child (13). We have two rescue mutt/labs from Memphis and the world’s oldest guinea pig, Wilbur.

Boy Child is brilliant, big and strong, older than he should be, and wants to live off the grid. He cannot put his big stinky shoes away, plays three types of guitar, and will ask for Healing Touch when he is hurt. He has a bear skin on his bed from a bear he shot and is tremendously proud when the game he shot is on the supper table. We have discussions on the best way to take out zombies. He swears I could learn to use a shotgun. I prefer to run over them or use a bat or golf club. 

Girl Child is brilliant in her own way, curvy and girly, will always be my little girl but has an old soul. She talks to angels and has moments of profound wisdom. I expect to write a book one day about her and with her. She is living proof that the things that come out of teenagers mouths are genetically and developmentally encoded. She loves us best one minute, then turns around the next and says, “Watch me” in a talk to the hand sort of way. This is usually in reference to more time watching PBS. 

My husband is lovely, wonderful, and (as most) could be the topic of a whole nutha blog. 

The dogs are middle-aged and lovely, except for the increased squirrel patrolling that is occurring this fall. Wilbur should be dead by all accounts, but continues to show no signs of stopping. 

occupation: I am the Coordinator of Integrative Healthcare at Mission Hospital, Asheville. I have a special interest in Whole Person Theory and Healing Touch and have completed certifications in these areas. Maintaining a balanced life between work and home is not always easy with two teenagers (one with significant special needs). 

how do you structure your time and space? My space has become showroom tidy. Our house has been on the market since April, so a lot of my “stuff” is in boxes. Turns out that we didn’t need so much after all, so we have made many trips to Goodwill and had a garage sale. I would like to say I’m very zen with it, but honestly, I don’t like living this tidily. I miss my packed up art studio and the scatter of books, magazines, and art projects. My desk at the office compensates for this.

I have two email accounts (work and home) and two calendars (work on the hospital computer system, home on the fridge). I commute 45 minutes two times a day with our high school freshman to Asheville, cook once a week for the whole week, and schedule “girl days” with our special girl. I work out while Boy Child is at wrestling practice, then we commute back home, at which point I can hear my husband snoring in the bed. We are ready to move to Asheville if someone would buy our house. 

using the metaphor of seasons to describe the phases of women’s lives,

-what are the particular challenges and highlights of your current season? Let’s be literal here. This is the season of SUMMER for me. I am hot often (hot flashes, hot and bothered, hot to trot… you name it). I am often uncomfortable in a new job, new transitions, and new thought processes. I feel new and green and in full bloom in a life role I didn’t really want, but (ha) here I am anyway and stuck to the hot seat.

The highlights of this hot season are learning new skill sets professionally as I switch from being a very task-oriented critical care/resource nurse to being a very holistic nurse/educator/organizer/writer. I am published (as of a few weeks ago) in a national nursing magazine and will be presenting in the spring at a national nursing conference. I’m freaking out (in a very holistic, zen, present sort of way). Breathe….. 

-what season(s) preceded this one? Spring preceded our current season. The kids were young and fresh, and going to the playground was fun and the best part of the day. We were young marrieds then and not worried about much. I was a student, learning and growing and training. There was so much new growth.

-what season(s) might your future hold? Summer is going to last a while.  

favorite family activities: Girl Child loves to eat out. Boy Child goes along good-naturedly for the most part. The oldest has out grown us both in size and strength and engages in risky behaviors that we are no longer capable of or never dreamed of like rock climbing, wrestling, and jiujutsu. The youngest abhors Mother Nature and would prefer to spend her day shopping, dancing, and dressing up. Both fit their gender stereotypes to the extreme. Therefore, we do a lot of divide and conquer type activities. Boys are backpacking and camping this weekend while girls are shopping and eating. We do switch off. Dad can seriously boogie to Abba and Mom can hike a good eight to nine miles without complaining (whining starts at mile ten). We all also like music (got to meet Ricky Skaggs back stage this summer!) and have family music afternoons with the boys on guitar and girls on vocals (loud, not good).

favorite solo activities: painting, pen and ink, yoga, reading trashy novels

source(s) of inspiration: Anne Lamott’s books, my parents, Janet Menken – the founder of Healing Touch, Lucia Thornton, Brene Brown

best MakeShift moment: For Boy Child’s fourth birthday party, the fire department brought the big truck by the house for an hour and let the kids climb and look and visit. I sent them back to the fire station with brunch. We used to frequent the stations every three to four weeks to look at the trucks and visit with the crews. It was cheap fun and civic involvement (we took cookies). Now my kid wants to be a fire fighter (smoke jumper to be exact). Be careful what you makeshift.

Another day I took both kids out on the front porch and let them finger-paint the entire front glass windows and door with cool whip, chocolate pudding and shaving cream. We then hosed the porch and them off. I miss those days. They were fun! Now i can torture teenagers with threats of putting near-naked chocolate-pudding-covered-toddler pictures on facebook. These days are fun too!

  [if you know someone who would make a good “mothers of invention” feature, check out the nomination process and questionnaire located on the sidebar to your right.]

one of the best parts about spending the month in western north carolina is getting to spend time with my brother, who lives in asheville. and one of the best things about his status here as a local is that he takes us on adventures that cannot be found on trail maps and in guidebooks. who knew that there are hidden trail heads on exit ramps and places on earth where poison ivy and private property give way to scenes like this?

the monkey and bird were experiencing  their first day of clubs, a day camp at montreat, while the adults were embarking upon waterfall hike. but i could not help but be distracted by daydreams of a future time, when my little boys will be big boys, old enough and eager to climb the rocks and dunk their heads under the rushing water. sometimes there is so much promise in the future that it is difficult to stay in the present.

in our current stage of toddlerhood, afternoon naps, and the boys’ almost constant need for assistance, it is so easy to get swept away by far off notions that someday, adult conversation and uninterrupted sleep will re-enter our lives. and then i catch myself forgetting that this time of sloppy nose-kisses, uninhibited delight, the honest articulation of fears, sweet sweaty ringlets, triumph over small accomplishments, and the natural wisdom of innocence is fleeting and precious.  i know i will long for this stage when it is gone.

when we were on our way to the mountains on friday, i received an email from the rental company pressuring us to decide upon our rental plans for next year. never mind that we had not even begun our mountain adventure for the current year. never mind that we were, at the time, simply trying to make a bag of pipe cleaners last for the remainder of our trek down I-40.

the world will lure us prematurely into the future if we haven’t already wandered there ourselves. for me, being fully present in the moment is something i talk about and value, though i find it almost impossible to do! apparently, as i learned on our hike, wearing a t-shirt emblazoned with the words, “BE PRESENT” does not automatically calm the multi-tasking mind.

funny how this does, though:

i take solace in the fact that there are moments scattered here and there that seem to stand outside of time. thank goodness for a spontaneous plunge into frigid water; the surrender of the bird, who stops resisting his nap long enough to rest his head on my chest; and the first cup of coffee enjoyed on a tree-top porch.

speaking of coffee, let us not underestimate its importance when it comes to living in the present and parenting small children.

“in the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer. –albert camus”

name: Annie Price

age: 34

occupation: Small Business Developer, Artist

how do you structure your time and space? There are two windows of time on most days in which I am full-on mom, generally from  8:30 to 1:00 and 4:30 to 8:30. During this time we try to strike a balance between activities out of the home that involve interaction with others and the natural world, and time together creating, playing, discovering, and loving. Then, during nap times, evening times, one scheduled morning a week, and other random times that my daughter is in another’s care, I am oscillating between giving energy to my own artistic creations, the part-time work that I love as a small business developer at a local microenterprise development non-profit, my commitment to developing my own yoga practice, and time-honoring the adult relationships that I hold dear. 

There are certainly many days when I am filled with a sense of gratitude and abundance and feel like I have a good handle on all that swirls around me. And then there are the days when I feel utterly overwhelmed and paralyzed with exhaustion, and I opt to spend my daughter’s nap time curled up in bed regaining my own strength for the next shift of parenting a toddler. I am indebted to the precious loved-ones in my life who see the wonder and grace that lies within my daughter and are willing to step in and give me space and time to reconnect with myself. This time is essential to me. I have had to face my guilt about wanting, craving, and needing time to myself. It took my husband and me over four years to conceive our child, and now here I am demanding time away from this precious being? But I have discovered that I cannot be the mother-wife-friend-colleague-creator that I pride myself on being if I do not seek solace for myself, and I am finally confident in verbalizing that.

using the metaphor of seasons to describe the phases of women’s lives,

-what are the particular challenges and highlights of your current season? I am currently feeling the bounty of spring more than usual. We live in a cabin in the woods, and each day in my time outdoors I try to take note of what is coming up around me and then connect it to what is coming up within myself. I still feel like I am emotionally residing in early days of spring; I am not ready for the full-on explosion of summer. I am still feeling protective and am nurturing my own tender shoots. 

-What season(s) preceded this one? It was the darkest, roughest, longest winter I can recall, on many levels. I became extremely ill with meningitis at the end of last fall and spent a little over two months recovering. We had to call in reinforcements to help with our daughter and day-to-day tasks, and this was very humbling for me. I had to surrender to the mess and chaos around me and simply rest; this was incredibly hard for me. I remember lying on my front porch swing one winter afternoon in my sleeping bag, and I just stared at the trees and their naked branches for an hour. I felt so emotionally connected to them and how exposed and still they were. I listened to them as they whispered to be patient and that spring would inevitably come for all of us, and that my only responsibility at that time was to be quiet and patient. They were right. 

-What season(s) might your future hold? I am awaiting summer, though I am not fully ready for it. Truth be told, I feel like I have been emotionally awaiting a full summer for years. I always cling to spring and anxiously await the coming of fall. I am curious what this means for me metaphorically. When am I going to feel ready to come into full bloom? I am looking forward to really embracing “summer” again one day and entering into that realm of discovery, play, laughter, spontaneity, fearlessness, and a little more personal and professional risk-taking.

favorite family activity/activities: creek stomping and outdoor exploring, snuggling, baking together, and dancing either in the living room or at local live music events.   

favorite solo activities: yoga; escaping to my favorite little hiding places in town- antique shops, bookstores, coffee shops; going out to breakfast with a book, magazine, or journal in hand; road trips!

sources of inspiration: the changing of seasons and the endless beauty found in nature; the little details of my daughter- her hands, expressions, or the way she looks from the back as she runs down a path; the pages of unique home décor coffee table books; fabulous finds at vintage and thrift shops; my soul sister girlfriends; my family; countless musicians and artists who are pouring their souls into their craft with little financial reward; and a long list of women authors. 

best MakeShift moment: Oh gracious. MakeShift moments are the modus operandi around here. One example is that last Christmas, we didn’t feel like our daughter needed a lot of stuff. I decided to simply turn a huge cardboard box into a play space for her, and we filled it with Christmas lights, cut out windows, et cetera, and gave her a bunch of art supplies that she could use to color the walls and such. She also received a baby doll for Christmas from her grandparents, and she took it into her little cardboard house and stayed in there for hours pampering her baby, singing to her, loving her, and acting out all of the things we have done while raising her. It was so moving. I just sat there and cried. When it was raining the other day I cleaned out a section of her closet and put a little mattress in there, along with more lights and pictures on the walls and she spent hours in there in make-believe land. Creating these little spaces gives her a small, sweet place of her own and gives me an opportunity to pour myself a glass of wine and sit back and relax.

 I have also learned that saying “no” to everything is no fun for anyone, so I have started giving in to some of the ongoing requests like letting my daughter play in the driver’s seat of the car  (she could do that for hours), making a big ole mess while letting her help me cook, or dumping out all of my jewelry and tangling it up in make-believe play. I will miss these days and their sweet mess. I know this.

[if you know someone who would make a good “mothers of invention” feature for this blog, please check out the nomination process detailed in the sidebar pages to your right.]