I’ve never been a baby person.
Not when my adorable little brother came home when I was eight-years-old. Not when my sweet baby niece was born when I was 19—and not even either time I became a mama to the world’s two most precious boys.
I think babies are a lot of work and I know with certainty I’m not alone in this thinking. I wished away most of my firstborn’s first two years of life just because it was so darn hard—the colic, the crying, the postpartum. I wished it away. I wanted him to be five-years-old instantly. And today, he is.
Time has a way of sneaking up on you. Tomorrow, next week, or two years from now always seems to be so far away. Our elders always tell us how quickly it all goes by, which always reminds me of that Kenny Chesney song, “Don’t Blink”—we don’t think about it at the time. We’re so caught up in the chaos of our everyday lives as mothers to young babies that we have no way of seeing it until after the fact.
Then just like that—it’s gone.
Maybe it’s because he’s my last that I’ve started to take notice. Or maybe I’m more of a baby person than I thought. But all I know is not a day has gone by in the last year that I haven’t stopped to soak in the wispiness of my second son’s ash blonde hair or the way he greets me with a smile every morning when I lift him from his crib.
And that other one? The one who made me a mama in the first place? I’ve learned to take long moments for him, too. The half-smirk I get when he rounds the corner of the school bus aisle and he tells me about his day as we walk hand in hand up our driveway after school. The way he has started calling me “mama” instead of “mommy” both melts and breaks my heart because I know that before too much longer, he’ll simply call me “mom” and I’ll miss being called by either of the former for the rest of my life.
While most days I go to bed tired and I still wish some of these days away, I am grateful to be conscientious enough to know that they won’t last much longer.
So for now all I can do is ask God to grant me the patience each day to remember.
To remember the way one laces his fingers through his afghan blanket as he sits with me in the recliner.
To remember the way the other one has mastered the art of the perfect pout face that makes me hope he thinks to thank his mom in his Academy Award speech someday.
To remember the way one was the actual embodiment of the cover of “Love You Forever” just the other day.
To remember the way the other one still lets me kiss his forehead before I turn out his bedroom light each night, though it probably won’t be much longer until he’ll think that’s uncool.
To remember the way they both still ask me for a refill of their juice, even though their daddy is standing right next to the refrigerator.
To remember the wispiness of the locket of dark brown hair that resides in a baby book upstairs and also the ash blonde lockets that still sit atop the head of my last baby.
All I can ask of God is to please, don’t ever let me forget the wispiness.
You may also like:
Don’t Let Me Forget Their Littleness
Why Tired Mothers Stay Up So Late
Want more stories of love, family, and faith from the heart of every home, delivered straight to you? Sign up here!