I have to put down my to-do list and a million other nagging tasks in order to acquiesce the preschooler when she comes to me dragging her entire “family” of bedraggled, stuffed cats, begging for them to be carefully swaddled in the muslin blankets I should probably be washing and then rationing for the imminent newborn, but most of the time I laugh and put down my planner or the basket of clothes and wrap the cats.
(If you think you’ve seen something cuter than a 3-year-old pretending to nurse a swaddled Beanie Baby, you’re wrong.)
So, newer moms reading along, wondering if you’re slowly losing your minds (spoiler alert: you are), if the baby is ever going to sleep through the night, if you’re ever going to fit back into your jeans, and whether you’ll someday have more than an hour to yourself in the evenings, I’m standing about a mile down the road from where you are now, waving back at you and cupping my hands around my mouth shouting “the future is now, and it’s pretty awesome.”
And you more seasoned moms? I know I’m kind of in the eye of the storm right now, that this is simply the lull before the oncoming collision of evening activities + hormones + peer relationships + technology woes.
So I’m savoring it, falling dead with exhaustion into bed at 9 pm from the physical pursuits of mothering a 2, 3, 5 and 7-year-old plus baby on board, but relishing the evening shift where they all stay quietly and sweetly in bed for 12 solid hours.
I know these days are numbered, too. So I sit up too late with my Kindle, sipping hot tea or a cocktail and unwinding with a good book and thanking God that they’re all tucked safely under my roof, that my greatest present concerns are heartburn and ear infections and whether or not I remembered to pack everyone’s lunch.
The days are long, but the years are short – and getting shorter. And as time starts to warp into hyper speed, I’m trying to slow down and look into little, quickly-changing faces and memorize button noses and rosebud lips, peering ahead into the not-so-distant future to a time when nobody needs a peanut butter delousing after lunchtime or to be “held like a baby, mommy” after suffering a punishing blow in the playroom.
And I kind of already miss it.
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This article originally appeared at Mama Needs Coffee.
