Mother of Invention

Parenting often feels like a constant cycle of trial and error. And often those trials don’t feel particularly productive. There are lost causes, like trying to find matching pairs of toddler socks. There are upheavals, like a newborn’s sleeping patterns. There are outright forfeits, like handing over your iPhone in the grocery story line to stave off your toddler’s meltdown. But strife is also extremely fertile ground.

Ripe for innovation.

So long as the parent can be patient and wait. Because somewhere amidst all the failures, a genius breakthrough is able to bubble up to the surface and change your life forever.


Stair Basket

Growing up, my best friend Kate lived in a two-story house. This meant that—unlike my own family’s small one story farmhouse—she had stairs. As if that weren't fascinating enough, she also had a stair basket. This was not just any basket. This was a basket that takes on the shape of stairs. A step-patterned profile that can sit atop two steps simultaneously. This basket blew my f*cking mind.

The basket at my friend’s house kept the stairs free of clutter, allowing everyone to put in various items that actually needed to go upstairs but were not worth making the trip up for.

Last Christmas, my mother asked me for some gift ideas and I mentioned the special stair-shaped basket. Now that Jim and I had a staircase of our own, I longed for an oddly shaped basket to place on it. Christmas morning she gifted me with an irregular shaped basket—unwrapped, because, come on, how would you? So happy was I finally to have both a staircase and a basket to put on it. I felt unstoppable.

And yet, for months I couldn't figure out its purpose. At first I tried to put magazines in it. But magazines are really only needed on nightstands and toilet tanks, so that idea was scrapped. I tried putting throw blankets in the basket, but because we only use blankets on the couch that’s typically where they stay. I tried putting my purse in it when I came through the door, but frankly it just looked stupid having a bag inside a basket. Week after week the basket contents changed until there was an odd month or so when nothing was in it at all. It just sat vacant on the stairs. Amazing, but empty.

But then one day, one magical day I shall never forget, my oldest child took off her shoes after school and left them on the stairs. They were muddy and in the way, so I, in a fit of rage, scooped them up and slammed them into the basket as I walked up the stairs. As I ascended, I felt my anger replaced with something far bigger: a revelation. When I reached the top of the stairs I practically shouted out in excitement. Shoes! The basket could be for my three-year-old’s tiny, muddy, scattered everywhere, can-never-find-the-mate, shoes! I ran into her bedroom and gathered up every pair she owned. I raced back down the stairs and yelped when I realized all eight pairs of her tiny, dirty shoes fit perfectly into the stair basket.

The next morning, without provocation, my child came down the stairs and dug through the basket to find her favorite pair of sparkly TOMS. That evening, when she came through the door, dirty and muddy, she took off her shoes and threw them in the basket.

I had never loved her more.

We embraced in a way that most veterans do with their loved ones when returning home from war. We spun around the living room joyfully realizing that both of our problems were solved by one gloriously mutated basket. Our lives would forever be improved by this solitary piece of woven wonder.


Hair Purse

My three-year-old has curly hair. This statement means something to people who have curly hair, or mothers with children of curly hair. And if you are neither of these, you probably know someone with curly hair, or perhaps know of someone who knows of someone with curly hair. Send them loving thoughts.

My own hair, which is straight, can be easily brushed and pulled back into a ponytail with little to no whining and not a drop of product. But, as I’ve learned, curly-haired people are not afforded the same luxuries.

As an intentional strategy on my part, I give my child freedom over her hair. This means that every morning she gets to decide how she wants to wear it (this does not apply on picture day, national holidays or her birthday). She can choose a ponytail, pigtails, barrettes, a headband, or down and curly. For a while she demanded the Elsa braid from Frozen, which is improbable given her short, spiraled hair. Sometimes she demands to wear a hat, but never a stylish hat. A ski cap or an old birthday party hat. But, with my styling abilities being the only limits, she gets full follicle freedom.

Each morning she chooses a different hairstyle, which requires accoutrements scattered around the house. The spray bottle is always in the laundry room. The hair gel stays in the bathroom. The hair ties, clips, bows and headbands stay in Lowery’s room on her dresser. And the brush and comb are usually in places we fail to look as we are hurrying in the morning.

For her third birthday, Lowery was gifted with a little canvas purse with two leather handles. It’s adorable and she loves carrying it around. She likes to fill it with things a gal-about-town would need, like raisins and socks. But one day, after I had pulled her hair up in two glorious pigtails with sparkly bows and a pink clip, I asked her to pick up the living room before we left for school. Lowery looked at everything strewn on the couch—hair bows, gel, a water bottle, detangler, a comb and a brush—scooped them all up into her arms, took them over to the little canvas purse and dumped them in.

“Let’s hang this with the coats!” she declared.

I shrugged, happy she was helping pick up, and hung the bag of hair products on the coat rack next to her rain jacket and my umbrella. The very moment I hung the bag on the hook, my life forever changed.

For a year I had tried different approaches to our morning routine. Getting her ready in the upstairs bathroom. Fixing her hair in her bedroom. Wrestling her to the ground to put in a sparkly clip. Doing her hair before she even got out of bed in the morning. But no matter the process I tried to implement, we always ended up doing her hair by the door right before she left for school. And this was always stressful because I was running around looking for clips and combs.

But now, there by the door hangs a bag of all of Lowery’s hair products. So as we walk out of the house, I can easily access everything I need to get Lowery’s day started off right: perfectly coiffed.

Shopping Cart

There are few activities I hate more than grocery shopping. I find it long and boring and expensive, and I never get home with everything I needed. Jim is more than happy to go for me, and usually does, but I still have to write out an extremely detailed grocery list. I can never decide if I should go during the week after work when I’m tired, but without the kids. Or on the weekends, when I’m more energized, but am with the children. If I go with the kids, I usually come home in such a state of depression, or exhaustion, that I refuse to cook anything I bought.

But one Saturday, a few weeks back, Jim and I needed to get diapers and wipes and a variety of foods to nourish our children. While we have done many configurations of grocery shopping, we’ve never gone together with both children.

When we went to reach for a cart, our three year old demanded to ride in one. Because we had the infant in her carrier, there simply wasn’t room for both children and groceries. Jim and I looked at each other blankly.

“I guess I could just get a cart by myself and Lowery could ride in that…” Jim shrugged.

“Ok…” I said. Unaware of how my life was about to dramatically change.

So with London safely resting in her carrier in my cart, and Lowery in the seat of Jim’s cart, we began rolling one after the other into the grocery store. And I swear a fluorescent light came on above me.

“Do you think you could take your cart and go get toilet paper?” I asked Jim.

As he left, I gathered up everything we needed in the produce aisle and then texted Jim to get eggs and butter. I went off in search of meat and bread. After a bit, we saw each other across the store and he yelled down the aisle: “MILK?”

“YES!” I declared. “I’LL GET RICE!”

Texts whirled back and forth:

Got diapers

Got chicken

Pancake mix?

Yes. I’ll get syrup

I’ll get diaper rash cream

Oh no….she has a rash?

Ketchup?

Yes. And get mayo too.

This is fun.

You’re fun.

Stop flirting. Get bagels.


On and on until we finally met up at the checkout lane with two carts full of food. And children. We looked at each other proudly. We had done it. We had figured it out. We had invented the smartest, easiest, quickest, most productive and relaxing way to grocery shop with children. We embraced each other passionately. A tear rolled down my cheek. Swollen with pride and elation, we wheeled our carts one after the other into the checkout lane.

“We are together!” I exclaimed to the checkout lady.

She looked up and over her half glasses. Peered at my cart and then at Jim’s. And I could tell by the expression on her face that what she was seeing was nothing new.

Becoming a parent warrants ingenuity. But for the first few years of parenting, everything felt like a loss. A loss of sleep. Loss of time. Loss of privacy. Loss of identity. But eventually, we began to have some victories. We began to see our lives adjust and accommodate our children. And when we are open to it, we can see how we are innovative when we patiently allow for circumstances to take over.

Because it is true that necessity is the mother of invention.

So long as she mates with Father Time.

The Grassy Knoll

For the past year, Jim and I have struggled to grow a nice lawn around our new home. It seemed that no matter what fertilizer, or watering routine, or rain dance we did, our grass refused to grow in anything but irregular and unimpressive patches. We spent so much time looking down at the grass, inspecting the soil, researching the seeds, and trying different aerators, we failed to ever look up.

But once we did, we realized the problem was not our seeds or our soil. Our problem was our trees. Our small lot has four enormous trees, one of which is an historic sycamore with branches reaching out to shade the entirety of our backyard, and our neighbors' yards on either side. Our yard is so shady that the simple act of complicated photosynthesis is impossible for our desperately darkened lawn.

It quickly became obvious that the only way we would ever grow the lush lawn of our dreams was to trim back our trees. And we didn't just want some run-of-the-mill tree trimmer. We wanted an expert. The Lorax, if he made house calls. So I found a certified arborist to come assess the trees and guide us on how to get some sun on the desperate blades below.

He pulled into our driveway, stepped out of his car and gasped at the site of our trees. Two beautiful, enormous pin oaks in the front. And in the back, a wickedly twisted and deviant elm, and the massive sycamore. He went from tree to tree, placing his face close to the bark, squatting down around the roots, assessing the health of the leaves.

"Well," he finally said, "You have two options."

"Oh?" I asked.

"Yep. The trees or the lawn."

He went on to show me that on a lot our size, the trees and grass are competing for resources. He pointed to moss growing at the base of one of the oaks. This indicated that the trees were being overwatered with our attempt to hydrate the grass. And while trimming back the trees would allow more sunlight in, which could help the grass grow, we could never truly have a lush lawn unless we chopped the trees down completely.

"So," he said, "Trees or lawn?"

Trees seemed like the obvious choice. The trees came first. They will far outlive us. The trees provide oxygen, shade, a habitat for squirrels and birds, and have--as it were--far deeper roots.

Lawns are, honestly, a waste of water. They are transient. Not truly a priority. And yet, grass provides curb appeal. A place to lay with my children on a warm day. A soft landing for birds. It provides proof we care about our property. And it keeps the soil in place. Soil, which nurtures the trees.

The arborist stood there awaiting my answer. He needed to know whether to take substantial branches from our beautiful canopies, or whether to trim them gently, tenderly and conservatively. He needed to know if I was person who would side with the trees. Or opt for the American dream.

In the moment, I chose the trees.

As he looped a harness around his waist and powered the chainsaw, I got in my car to leave for work.

Three months ago I started my new position, as a faculty member at the university. In the short time I've been there my life has dramatically changed in ways that might only appear subtle to others. On paper, perhaps my life seems to be the same. I work for the same university. My commute is the same. I still have the same coworkers. I still park in the same spot and still pee in the same stall.

For seven years of my professional life I was a student, working in a dark basement office I shared with two other students. My mission in life was to take classes and research. My ultimate goal—graduation—was always so far away it was easier not to think long-range. So day in and day out I worked in small, achievable goals, like a term paper here, a research project there. Semester by semester, slowly chipping away at one large goal. My life at that time moved so slowly it sometimes felt as if it had stopped.

This isn't to say those seven years weren't fun and challenging, or that the people I shared a desk with for that long aren't now among some of my closest friends. Because it was, and they are.

But until I stepped out and up into my new position, I had no idea how I had grown to feel about myself. Or my life. Because it’s only in retrospect that I can see so clearly how isolating and lonely graduate school and researching were.

I enjoyed the courses and seeing classmates. I enjoyed conducting research out in the community. But I spent a majority of my days, my weeks, and the last seven years, in a basement office studying, analyzing data and writing. Or at home taking care of my young children, while I studied, analyzed and wrote during their naps. And while my children are certainly my life’s work, they aren't the greatest conversationalists.

This shift in my life and in myself was so subtle I was unable to see the restrictions I felt. While I enjoyed my work, appreciated my growing knowledge, and valued my time with my small children, I found myself desperate for more human interaction. More conversation. More connection.

And so while I worked to cultivate my professional career, I unknowingly longed for more sociability. I found myself planning more parties, initiating more happy hours, scheduling more lunches. I responded immediately to text messages, emails, and Facebook. I could drop anything to be at the side of a friend or classmate or a family member. I never caught on I was able to do this as a direct result of my student status. But I truly enjoyed my ability to give fully to my friends and family.

But when my job began, three months ago, I felt the sun finally shining on my face. I shifted over night from an anonymous student worker in a basement, to a visible faculty member with privileges. The graduate program I'm tasked with running and growing in Tulsa has, itself, suffered from sitting in the shade for far too long. My position was created for the sole purpose of breathing new life into the program, cutting back the branches and facing it toward the sun. Every day I carefully nurture the program and I'm faced with even more ecological choices. In one specific instance, part of my task is to grow the program while maintaining its reputable rigor. But often those two tasks are competing for resources. Growing a program is easy if we remove the rigor. Adding to the rigor shrinks the pool of those willing to apply. How do I choose between the lawn and the trees?

But then, the choice isn’t any clearer in my own life. Instantly my professional world became a breeding ground for discussions, debates, meetings, presentations, recruiting and phone calls. I spend hours a day meeting with prospective students, advising current students, talking to administrators about program needs, answering calls about the program, responding to student emails, talking with faculty to set course schedules, presenting research, meeting with public affairs to promote our program or talking with community leaders about partnerships. And this is all before I get to class in which I stand in front of a room full of students talking for three solid hours.

For an extrovert, my job is a dream.

And yet I find myself, at the end of a long day, wishing there were time for happy hours. Realizing the days are too packed to schedule lunches. My energy is too zapped to plan a party. And my phone is full of unread messages.

While I'm finding myself immensely satisfied, my skills better used and my personality more adequately leveraged, I miss the ways in which I once tapped into that need for interaction. Connection. Community.

My life as a student in the shady basement was a selfish and introspective time. I only had to worry about my research, my goals and myself. My life as a professor, warmed by the sun, is about many things bigger than me. No longer am I just thinking about my deadlines, my classwork, my graduation date. Now I’m thinking about the students, the program, the university and the community. Once the sun shines on you, you have no choice but to spread and grow.

When I returned home the day I met with the arborist, I found our trees to be delicately and beautifully trimmed. Their canopies were still full and lustrous, but they no longer drooped unnecessarily low to the ground, or hung heavily over the fence. Standing in the middle of my yard I could see, for the first time, the sun dapple subtly across my shoes.

That evening, with a few limbs gone and our hope rising, my husband and I worked to aerate the soil. We delicately and equally spread the seeds we'd spent time researching. We raked over the seedlings and watered the ground until the seeds had a cushiony bed of soft soil in which to lie. Each morning that followed, I’d go outside and walk around the yard, inspecting the seeds as they nestled into the fertile soil. I’d monitor the sun at various points in the day to ensure it could poke through the thick branches above. We water in careful intervals so as to give the yard enough, but not to drown the trees. We are mindful of the delicate balance.

And finally this morning, I saw--in the dead center of a patch of dirt we've never been able to cultivate--a tiny sprig of grass emerge triumphantly out from beneath the soil. I’m trying to temper my expectations. I remind myself that one sprig of grass in a barren spot doesn’t mean a Master’s quality golf course will follow close behind. But at the very least, perhaps it is proof that the trees and grass might both be able to pull from the same resources available to them in the confines of our small yard.

And honestly, deep down, I think I truly believe one day the grass will sprout and thicken and thrive. Perhaps it will be as lush and impressive as a forest.

But I won't be able to see it for all the trees.