Late night musings

I can't sleep and have tried everything so I am just going to give up and do something else. Hopefully, writing this blog post will do the trick.

This week Eve - my baby - turns 2. She is acting just as a two year old should. She is into every thing, very very busy, and is even talking more. She is starting to put words together, for example, today she wanted to sit in my seat and said, "no mummy, my seat." Though, when I type it it sounds much more polite than it did when she said it..er screamed it.The point is, she is ready for her birthday. I, on the other hand, might not be.

One night last week she woke up screaming I think because of a nightmare. It took some time to calm her down, which is unusual. I had to stand and rock her, just like I did when she was a baby. I caught a glimpse of us in the mirror, and chuckled. How could my baby look so big?Once she had calmed down I sat and rocked her until she fell back asleep. I confess that even after I knew she was asleep I kept rocking her. It just felt so nice to hold her. I realized that there might not be that many more times when I would get to rock her like that.

As parents, we always get excited about firsts - first teeth, first steps, first days of school. Especially with our first child we remember these things. For example, I remember that Alice gave her first smile on Father's day 7 years ago ( to her Dad, of course). Many of her other "firsts"are recorded in her baby book. If I want to know how much she weighed at 6 months, I can look it up. With the second child it is a little hazier and not all recorded in a baby book, ( sorry Jackie) but I can still tell you that Jackie's first word that wasn't Mama or Dada was "what's that" ( what's dat) followed shortly by "no thanks" ( no tanks). She was a talker. Now with Eve, who very well may be THE baby of our family, I am reverencing the "lasts" of childhood more than I did with the others.

As parents, some lasts we know about and even plan for. For example, I knew last year when I went to girls camp that it would be the last time I nursed Evie. With Alice I was so happy when she was finished nursing. But with Eve, I cried ( let's face it, we both did). I AM looking forward to the last time I will have to buy diapers and I hope that day occurs sooner rather than later.

But some "lasts" just slip by unrecognized. I do not remember the last time that Jackie needed her special star blanket to go to sleep, or the last time Alice asked me to kiss an owie for her. I just know that those times are past. Other "lasts" of childhood are looming. When will be the last time I carry Alice in sleeping from the car? I already can't lift her onto her bunk bed by myself. When will be the last time Jackie asks for "milk in a sippy cup that is warm"? Her dad wishes that had already come, but I think she will hang on for a good while. (In an attempt to get to sleep tonight, I had some warm milk - it is good stuff. Maybe if I'd had it in a sippy cup it would have done the trick.) And even though I will try to notice, I won't know when the last time I get to rock Evie to sleep. But with Evie, I'll probably notice more quickly when that time has past. That's the way with your baby.