You're Gonna MissThis

 

Remember the country song You're Gonna Miss This by Trace Adkins?

 

I sing it to myself sometimes. A lot of times actually.

 

You're gonna miss this,

You're gonna want this back,

You're gonna wish these days hadn't gone by so fast...

 

These are some good times

So take a good look around

You may not know it now

But you're gonna miss this

 

I feel like this song is the soundtrack for my life. Honestly and truly.

 

I am so guilty of wishing for the future and wallowing in the past that I don't notice the present. I'm guilty as charged. I just don't know how to live in the present very well I guess.

 

When I was a teenager I couldn't WAIT to get married, be done with dating. Couldn't wait to have my own place and pay my own bills. Oh the freedom I anticipated would come with it was delightful!

 

A few years into marriage when my younger sisters were dating I'll admit I was a little jealous. I didn't want to change my circumstances. I just wish I had enjoyed my teenage years more. It was depressing when I would hear about their first date or a kiss and realize that never, ever, again would I have a first kiss. Yes, I love the coziness of a relationship and the comfort that comes with it. But thinking I'd never have the butterflies of anticipation wondering if a boy would call or the newness of getting to know someone in the beginning of a relationship...well, it was just sad that I didn't appreciate it more while I was in that stage of life.

 

Soon after, probably weeks after in reality, I started begging JP to have a baby. I. Couldn't. Wait. It was ridiculous. It consumed me. Our first year of marriage revolved around basal body temperatures and ovulation predictor kits and a calendar marking my fertile times of the month. When most newlyweds are enjoying the sexual side of their relationship I was busy making it a chore. One baby followed another and here I am today, mother of five and sometimes I feel sad that I didn't enjoy my newlywed years a little, okay a lot, more than I did. I can never go back. Even when JP and I are once again empty nesters it won't be the same. We won't be young, we won't be fresh in our relationship. It will be different. Not bad different. Just different. Knowing what I know now, I wouldn't change the children I have, I just would change how quickly I had them. I wish I could go back, delay having children a few years while JP and I reveled in the newness of our marriage. Travelled. Slept in on Saturdays. Stayed up late on the weekend. Had sex for the fun of it, not for making a baby. I wish I could get those years back. But I can't. My reality is I was so busy planning my future I forgot to live in gift of the present.

 

Here I am, raising my beautiful blessings. Five of them to be exact. They are beautiful. Magical even. And also maddening and exhausting. Every now and then I find myself saying..."Someday JP and I will be able to sleep in again." "Someday JP and I will be able to travel alone somewhere..." "Someday..." and fill in blank with any wonderful and magical thing you could ever possibly think of doing without children and then I find the words You're gonna miss this... creeping into my mind and I'm jilted ever so abruptly back to reality.

 

If I've learned nothing from the past I've learned this at least...The future will come whether I want it to or not. Time will pass. Days will fade. It's inevitable. Nothing I will ever do will slow it down or make it not so. I only have control over whether I enjoy today or whether I choose to be absent from my life.

 

That's it.

 

There are moments in every day that are impossible to enjoy. But there are moments that are beautiful if I can just open my eyes and stop daydreaming of days gone by or spending so much time feeling sorry for myself about lost opportunities.

 

This is my reality. I rushed to grow up too soon. I ended my newlywed years too quickly. I've spent a lot of my children's days wishing for nap time or bed time or for when they are old enough to (fill in the blank). But I can stop that right now. Immediately.

 

Today I have a darling little baby girl who is on the verge of walking. She's my last baby. Though it can seem boring and monotonous sometimes to sit on the floor while she climbs over me for the millionth time, or teach her the words to everyday objects I someday will miss these simple moments.

 

Today I have a four year old little boy who is recovering from a stomach bug. He is whiny and cranky and sad. Though it would be easy to lose patience with him, someday I will miss the opportunity I have right now to dote on him. To cuddle and snuggle and lay on the bed with him while he watches the same cartoon over and over again because it makes him happy.

Today I have a girl is is just days away from turning seven. She loves to color and she loves to paint nails. When she was three and four years old I used to paint her nails  a few times a week. And then the moment I 'd paint them she'd make me crazy because though I'd told her to keep her hands still until they were dry I inevitably would need to repaint them a second or third time because she' scrape them on something. But now she's gone at school all day and my hands are always so busy I don't make the same time to do this for her. But someday her sweet little hands will be as big as mine and she won't want me to paint them. I need to make more time to do this for her now, while I can.

 

Today I have a nine year old boy who adores playing games. Any type of board game. He's so smart and so good at them too. I love playing games actually but don't make the time like I should to play them with him. I wonder what would happen in his world if I spent 30 minutes a day playing a board game with him? This time is passing and pretty soon another girl will fill his thoughts. A girl that isn't me. I need to be his girl right now.

 

Today I have a 12 year old daughter. She's learning about how to be a wife and mother from me. She begs to spend time alone with me, and I'm always so busy with little people that I don't have extra to spare very often. I see the timer ticking down to when she won't want to hear what I have to say or tell me what's on her mind. Someday I'll miss her coming into my room well after her bedtime to tell me all the things I think are silly, but that she finds important. It actually drives me a little nuts. But I try to catch myself and really listen to her. Because if I don't listen to the little stuff, she's not gonna share the big stuff. To her, it's all always been big stuff.

 

Someday...someday I will have time for a spotless home, ironed clothes, manicured nails. Someday I'll have time to sleep in, read a book cover to cover, watch an adult show all the way through in one sitting. Someday I'll eat my meal while it's hot without people complaining they don't like it, have an uninterrupted conversation, run errands all alone.

 

Someday.

 

Someday I won't have to tuck someone in five times before they stay in bed for good, or cut some one's food up for them, or wipe a nose. Someday I won't have to let little people "help" me make cookies or read them a story or play barbies. Someday cartoons won't play on my TV, I'll have a meal without someone spilling and I won't have the words of primary songs stuck in my head.

 

Someday.

 

And I'll miss every single one of those things. Terribly miss them.

 

Because it also means I won't have tiny soft hands that rub my back when I have a bad day or slobbery kisses on my cheek. I won't have cute little voices that tell me they love me and fun traditions at the holidays.

 

There will be so much to miss. And it's gonna happen whether I want it to or not. Whether I wish today away or not it's going to pass.

 

But I have the choice to enjoy the beauty of today so that someday when it's gone I don't have the regret of  having wished it away, wishing I'd enjoyed it more.

 

My life is beautiful. My life is a gift.

 

You're gonna miss this

You're gonna want this back

You're gonna wish these days hadn't gone by so fast

These are some good times

So take a good look around

You may not know it now

But you're gonna miss this

 

I think Trace Adkins wrote this song for me.

 

He's right. I am gonna miss this. Every. Single. Thing. I'm gonna miss it all. The crying. The fighting. The spills at the dinner table. I'm gonna miss all the craziness. Already I miss it all just thinking about it.

 

But I don't have to regret it. I do have that in my control.

 

So today, just for today, I am gonna live in the present with my children.

 

Today is a gift.

 



Six and a Half

It is truly impossible to put into words how quickly time passes.

 

Why even though some days seem never ending, the years just slip right by. It's so cliche...

 

And I totally get now what my parents meant when they said "if time goes by fast for you now, just wait until you are older; it goes by even faster".

 

True.

 

So. Very. True.

 

In my mind I am still 19 years old, 20 at best. Even though I look in the mirror and it's clearly obvious by the wrinkles and lines on my face that I am no where close to that anymore. I just don't feel like I should be turning 34 in a couple of weeks. How in the world did that happen?

 

I know that I was pregnant with each of my children; And sometimes those pregnancies seemed like they'd never end. But looking back I can hardly believe that so many years have passed. It honestly felt like it went by so quickly. It seems like we were trying to get pregnant with our first child and I woke up and realized I had five children. Sometimes I can't even believe they are all mine, can't believe how blessed I am. Other times I don't feel old enough, it doesn't feel real enough that they are all mine. And sometimes, I feel like I am just the babysitter and I wish their mother would show up and save me from the insanity...probably more often than I should admit.

 

Since JP and I got married almost 14 years ago we have been building our family. Our focus has been on having more babies and getting everybody here.

 

It took quite a while to do that part of it, and at the same time, it took no time at all. It's hard to believe that part of our life is over.

 

I came to a realization after Julianna was born. It was scary.

 

And very sad.

 

 

13 years we worked on building our family. THIRTEEN!

 

But as soon as Julianna was born there were only six and a half years left before Lauren turns 18.

 

Do you know what that means? Though we spent 13 years growing our family, we only have six and a half years with all of our children under one roof.

 

Only six and a half years where our family will be complete, together, whole, before children start becoming adults and leaving to start their own lives away from our home.

 

Six and half years.

 

Does that number scare anyone else besides me?

 

Does that number seem so small to anyone else?

 

Does anyone else think it's totally unfair that we had to spend so much time and effort and work building our family? That it took so many years just to have it all be over in six and a half years?

 

Depressing.

 

I'm just not ready to even think about that. It is just too overwhelming for me to even comprehend. Not only do I not feel old enough for that, my heart doesn't feel ready enough to start sending my children off into the world so soon. Not ready enough to let them fly solo. Not ready enough to not tuck them in at night or cuddle on the bed while we read stories or sing songs.

 

Not ready at all.

 

And don't you even try to tell me that Lauren turning 18 is so far off I shouldn't think about it. Did you not just read a thing I said? Do you not realize how quickly the last 13  years have gone and I only have half of that left.

 

Before I know it....

 

So, these last six and a half years that I have all my children home, that I have my family completely under one roof, all together, are going to be precious to me.

 

It's such a short time we are given to all be together.

Christmas Miracle

I've always been a bit of a perfectionist. It started in my early teens. I remember vacuuming the living room and getting so mad at my brothers and sisters if they walked on the carpet, messing up the lines, before I was finished with the whole room.I'm sure we could find a whole list of psychobabble reasons...my life was so out of my control with my parents divorcing and remarrying that it might have caused this need for me to control my surroundings ....but lets not even get started on that!

 

This carried over into my married life and home. Having children has only somewhat curtailed this. I still pride myself on keeping a very clean and organized home. Recently I received a compliment from a house cleaner we hired after my foot surgery in October. She was shocked that we had five children and said she couldn't tell by how clean my house was that there were so many little people running around. It's not that I don't want there to be evidence of children in my home. I love my kids. But I don't think having 5 children should be synonymous with chaos and destruction either.

 

I have had to let some things go since having Julianna. I just can't keep up with all I used to do and still feel like I am spending the time with her that she needs and that I want to give her knowing she's my last baby. My kitchen floor doesn't get mopped on a daily basis anymore. Sometimes not even on a weekly basis. Shh. Don't tell my husband, I don't think he's noticed.

 

This Christmas I turned a corner. In my attempts to control my OCD and still enjoy my children and allow them to make childhood memories I've always helped them decorate the tree. Really, it wasn't so much "help" as it was I handed them an ornament and told them where to put it.

 

Something happened this year. Something finally clicked in my mommy brain. There were Christmas trees before my children came. There will be many more Christmas trees after my children leave. In fact, in my lifetime there will be more Christmas trees not decorated by my children than years I will have them living with me to help hang the ornaments.

 

My focus has been totally wrong. Right now it's not important to have a perfectly lit, perfectly decorated tree. There will be many years in my future as an empty nester to have the perfect tree. But never again in my whole life will I have the opportunity to have little hands hanging five ornaments on the same branch so that it hangs so low it touches the ground.

 

This is the only time in my life when I'll have children pulling hand made ornaments out of the box and displaying them proudly front and center on the tree. I've been paying too much attention to the final result...the perfectly decorated tree...and not enough attention to the process. It doesn't matter how beautiful my tree is if the process to get it wasn't enjoyable for my children. We are meant to find joy in the journey, not in the end.

 

This realization made me sad. It made me desire the perfect tree even less when I realized that in order to have the perfect tree it meant my children would be grown and gone.

 

This year I didn't hang a single ornament. I just picked up the camera, turned on the music, and let my babies delight in the magic of a Christmas miracle...mommy finally got it. Sometimes I feel sad for my older kids that I've had to practice on them...sometimes I think how lucky Julianna is that she gets to have the wiser mom that has already learned so many great lessons on the older kids. I wish all of my kids could have the mom that Julianna gets to have.

 

These little ones are growing too fast. Right now I want the imperfectly decorated tree. I want the tree with three of the same ornament right next to each other and the hand made ornaments front and center on the tree.

Because I know when my hair has turned grey I'll miss these little peoples hands decorating the tree for me. I'm just glad I realized this before it was too late. I've realized that a perfect tree means my children are all grown and that is just way too sad to think about. As it was, this year I realized that if I were to rotate through the children, starting with Lauren, and let them take turns putting the star on the Christmas tree, Lauren would only do this one more time besides this year before she turns 18. *sigh* Where did the time go?

 

As the kids decorated our tree, I hung stockings from the mantle. Since Brynna was born JP and I haven't hung stockings for ourselves. Even though I couldn't find matching stockings, I made sure every single person in our house had a stocking this year. I can't even put into words the feelings I have when I look at my mantle and see so many stockings hanging there. I did that. JP and I made this family. Look at all those stockings! It made it a little more real to see it hung there, plain as day. Our family is complete. No one is missing and our mantle displays it so beautifully.

 

There is a time and season for all things. And I'm enjoying the season I'm in, perfectly imperfect tree and mismatched Christmas stockings and all.

 



8th Month

Can't you see the determination on her face?

 

It's all happening too quickly. One day she was a toothless, immobile baby. Then, within a matter of just two weeks she went from sitting to crawling, cutting two teeth, pulling herself up and cruising along furniture. She's even letting go of the furniture and standing for short periods of time all on her own.

 

I'm in THAT place. You know, the one where you are totally heart broken that your baby is approaching toddlerhood. Where you see all the work ahead of you with baby proofing and chasing little ones out of dangerous situations.

 And yet, in that same place you are so proud and so excited to watch your little person who is so amazing and so smart do all of these new wonderful things.

 

Ugh.

Why does watching your baby grow have to be laced with so much sadness?

But every day, every single day, I give thanks for this beautiful baby girl. I never knew how much I needed her until she came and landed softly in my heart.

Do you see what this little stinker is up to? Is it just me or is she trying to get her leg up so she can climb on my coffee table? Oh am I in for it this time!

I honestly cannot believe how quickly the time has gone. I was looking at the clothes she wore when she was brand new and my heart broke. I cannot  believe she was ever so little and how quickly and how much she's grown. In the blink of an eye she's grown leaps and bounds. I've probably held her more than I've held any of my other babies and yet I still feel like I haven't done enough.

Julianna has started doing some of my favorite things in this last month.

She grabs hold of my face and kisses me.

The. Best. Kisses. EVER.

She's pretty much abandoned all baby food and just eats whatever we are having for dinner. The girl is not picky at all. She puts her brothers and sisters to shame!

She reaches for me too.

Can I tell you how awesome that is? She reaches up for me!

You know I'm a sucker for her anyway, but when you add in that gorgeous smile and her two sweet little arms reaching up to me and I'm done!

Totally wrapped around my heart.

 

 



Pearly Whites

We've been busy in this house...

 

Growing these pearly whites!

 

Aren't they just super duper adorable?

 

Oh man, I could stare at her all day.

 

Between her soft blond hair, her captivating blue eyes, and her velvety, milky white skin...I'm a goner.

 

Now, we have to add in those two adorable pearly whites!

 

Take me out of the oven...I'm cooked!

Everything about her is magical. She is perfectly dainty and feminine.

Seriously...How'd I get so lucky?

 



Are You Smarter Than a 3rd Grader?

I'm constantly amazed at what my kids have learned in school. They are so much more well rounded than I ever was. They aren't just taught to read and write but they learn about the entire world around them. It is amazing.

 

In second grade Jacob had already written a research paper on his own. He did the research on the Internet, compiled all the research, wrote a rough and final draft and then made a power point presentation. It's amazing.

 

He asked what Julianna was going to be for Halloween.

 

I was so excited to put together her cute costume.

 

Mom: She's going to be a peacock

Jacob: But she's a girl.

Mom: And?

Jacob: Girls can't be peacocks

Mom: Yes they can. There's boy and girl peacocks.

Jacob: No they aren't called peacocks. Boys are peacocks. Girls are called Peahens.

 

I totally didn't believe him. In fact, in all my 33 years I'd never been told a female peacock was called a peahen. Now, I did know that the male peacocks were the ones with the pretty feathers. I was taking creative liberty here. But female peacocks had a different name all together? Nah!

 

I called his bluff. I googled it.

 

And I lost.

 

In fact, only the males are called peacocks, females are called peahens and their babies are pea chicks.

 

After I humbled myself I told Jacob he was totally right (which he wasn't surprised in the least) and asked him where and when he learned that information.

 

Apparently 2nd graders are smarter than I am.

 

Sheesh. I'm in trouble.



Let The Games Begin...

And so it begins...

 

Baby, meet mischief.