Ruminations

Thursday, January 5, 2012

Mommy Days

Heads up: this post is just some ramblings on, things I want to remember and feelings I hope to hold on to when the inevitable and all-too-frequent tough days of being a homemaker hit. :)

I wish my kids would slow down. They're growing up too fast. And although I find each new phase and stage delightful and amazing, I still want to just hold on to how things are right now. I want to hold my children and just be as we are for a lot longer than I'm given. It's exciting to see the adventures of the days that unfold before us, but I feel the loss of the days that are gone and cannot be recovered. But I am thankful for the days I have and the memories that are mine.
Yesterday was a Mommy day for my four-year-old. Charlotte has those sometimes - in fact, each of the kids have them sometimes (even my older kids). She wanted nothing but to be with me. She followed me around the house, and when she couldn't find me, she'd yell out in a bit of a panic, "Mom, where are you?" I was there. She said she wanted me to stay where she could see me. So I did.
On Mommy days, I get to have a little shadow. I love it. We baked dinner rolls together, then we traipsed off to the library to get "just a few books, right?" Forty books later, we waddled back to the car (those books are heavy!), then popped off to the store. Back home, we had lunch then cuddled up on the couch to read some of the treasures we unearthed in the library. Naturally, I fell asleep reading, bitten by the sleep bug. Sweet Charlotte agreed to "watch something" so I could nap for a good long 20 minutes - just enough to satisfy the sleep bug. The rest of the afternoon we played board games then took down Christmas decorations. When she got bored with that, she found some toys and played literally at my feet (that girl has an astonishingly deep well of imagination, by the way!). Then it was back in the kitchen to cook dinner while we waited for Eleanor and the boys to come home from school. My little helper chatted away the whole time, interrupted only by spontaneous hugs and kisses from both of us to each other. Oh, my heart...how my heart did smile. Charlotte needed me, and I was there. Turns out, I needed her, too.
That's how it works. Our hearts are turned to each other and we both end up with our proverbial buckets filled to overflowing.
I thanked Jeff last night for supporting our family so I could be home. I remember how hard it was to leave my baby to go to work, even though I knew we needed my income and even though I enjoyed my job. I admit that occasionally I wonder where I'd have been in my career had I kept it up, but then Mommy days like these wipe out any twinge of longing for worldly success and accolades. I wouldn't trade a Mommy day for anything. I may not be a "real" lawyer anymore, but to one little girl yesterday (and to three other sweet little people), I was everything that mattered, worth more than the world itself. It's nice how that works - I get to be their world, while they, and especially my husband, are my world. Cheesy as it may sound, there's nothing more real, nothing deeper, nothing truer, and nothing more liberating than the ties that bind husband and wife, and parents and children. I am thankful for Mommy days, and so very grateful that I was there.
I just wish I could freeze days like those and exist in a perpetual Mommy day. Somehow I'd have to arrange it so all four kids had a Mommy day on the same day, and I had enough of me to divvy out without being overwhelmed...Ah, yes, reality hits. Well, I'll just enjoy what I have when I have it and be grateful that I can be there.
Oh, speaking of being there, wanna know the best part about this past Christmas vacation? Having my husband and kiddos around for days at a time. Would that it were months at a time, or even eternity... ;)

6 comments:

  1. What a perfectly beautiful tribute to the fulfillment of motherhood! I love the glow on sweet Charlotte's face as she basks in her hero's attention. Thank you for your example!

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  2. You are a perfect an example, I don't slow down enough to allow the ankle bitters to get a good chunk out of me, albeit they are constantly swarming like mosquitos for my love blood.

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  3. you're such a good mom, steph! so patient and loving! glad you had a great day with char-char :)

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  4. Love this post and love those kids! I fall asleep reading to Finn too, EVERY SINGLE TIME! xoxo

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