Draw Nearer - Flashbacks

Dear Little Bear Cubs,
This morning Bradley and I cuddled in my bed as he watched cartoons. Karah stayed home sick and was sleeping in and Bryce also gave me the rare opportunity of an extra hour of sleep. I kept drifting off and would occasionally be awakened by the sensation of miniature "man hands" stroking my cheek. I opened my eyes and smiled at him. He pressed his forehead to mine and said, "You are my best friend". I melted into my pillow - wondering if I had been dreaming - only to be reawakened by his same strokes of affection. I had a flashback of holding him in the hospital on Super Bowl Sunday - the day we first met. I remembered vividly telling him he was "my best, sweetest, little boy friend". It seemed like yesterday. My baby was now a "big boy".

My heaven faded as the day progressed. Tiny hellish tantrums emerged... occasional "home sick from school" sibling bickering ... exhausted fits of sassafras back talking.... stubbed toes....scraped knees.... "she hit me's"....and "My Webkinz is going to throw up if I don't get online and feed him"... bath time standoff's.... and the cherry on top.... a bedtime meltdown.


In an effort to calm Karah down - I was laying with her, tracing her eyebrows with my ring finger...her eyes relaxing as she drifted off to dreams. I was instantly taken back to six years earlier when I sat in the same room....rocking her to sleep and going through the same soothing eye ritual. Where had the time gone?


I went upstairs to check on Bryce one last time. He looked like a juicy, little snail...pudgy diaper butt up in the air....chubby cheeks, pressed against his mattress. He looked enormous to me. Just yesterday he was swaddled tightly - rocking the day away in his swing. A feeling of loss swept over me...making my heart ache to the core. How was this happening?


You are each morphing before my very eyes. Tonight I realized that I get so caught up in the little hellish moments - that I forget to soak it all in and enjoy it...and then, BAM!....gone. In those difficult times I find myself wishing the day away...dreaming of the moment I can finally relax and take a minute to myself.

I suppose tonight was the light bulb moment that I don't want to rush into those moments of solitude...because soon enough, my day will be filled with them. I don't have to wonder what I will feel on the day that you are all in school and I am home alone. I already know that I will wish that I had savored this phase a little more...soaked in every moment...good and bad.


I will miss having a little one climbing on the dishwasher door - "helping me" unload the steak knives. I will miss scraping PBJ off the floor and fishing valuables out of the trash. I will miss my dryer being stopped mid cycle. I will miss urinating in front of a "crowd"...and begging you to at LEAST let me WIPE in private. I will miss little people begging for treats in the check out aisle. I will miss suckers at the bank and tantrums at the utility bill drive thru - where they DON'T have suckers. I will miss toilet paper strung through my halls....and band-aids for imaginary injuries. I will even miss my computer being turned off RIGHT BEFORE I press "save". Poopie Diapers and being bit on the shoulder. Emptied cupboards and fingerprints on the windows. I'll miss you begging for cartoons when I'm trying to get a Fox News fix....and mopping up my shattered eye shadow off the bathroom floor. Unflushed toilets and clothes NEXT to the hamper. Stinky fingers and morning breath kisses. I'll miss lost remotes and mismatched shoes. I will even miss negotiations to wear underwear an extra day because "I cant see poo in there". I'll miss baby babble "pretty birdie" and eardrum rupturing tantrums, too: "NnnnnnnnnnnnnO!" I will miss your innocence - as day by day you discover more about the world.

I will look back on all of this and wish I had cherished every minute and held on to it tightly...refusing to let time rip it away from me...even when at my wits end.

And so, little bear cubs, that is my plan for tomorrow. A fresh day. A new start. A do-over. A tight grip on the little moments. A "delighting" in your every move...good, bad, or ugly. I will soak you up and laugh, laugh, laugh. It is coming. Prepare to be relished.

I love you....(in the words of Karah this evening).... To the ocean....then to California...then to the moon....times one million.

The Mama Bear