Time Well Spent

This is Camdyn at approximately 8 months old (and me at damn near 29). She was crawling, weighed over 20 lbs and would be walking a month from the date that this picture was taken. In those days, when I was new to mommyhood, I thought that time was standing still. I felt like the exhaustion, demands, sleep deprived nights would last forever. Now, I realize that they didn't and they won't and that time clips by at a pace that makes me want to put a harness on it, dig my heels in, and tug my body weight against it. Suddenly, my chubby, delightful, baby girl is a spirited, energetic, talkative 3 1/2 year old. She is her own little person with her own thoughts, ideas, and agenda. She has an imagination that makes me wonder what in the world happened to my own. She engages in pretend play all by herself and when I find myself staring at her and wondering how she got to be so independent already, she'll look at me and say, "Stop watching me, mom. Go away." "Sorry sweetie, didn't realize I was staring."

So, I know that babies don't stay babies forever and I look at my newest baby girl and realize her baby days are numbered. In 3 days, Chloe will be six months old. Last night, she was in her jammies and snuggling against me while we were all in the bathroom supervising Camdyn's tubby time. I asked Chris, "What if? What if this is the last little baby we'll ever have and hold?" His response, "That'd be great!" His position on 2 is the limit does waiver from time to time. Truthfully, I don't really know if I could keep up with 3 kids. My two little girls have me spread thin and stressed out most of the time, but I think the realization that Miss Chloe Belle is rapidly approaching toddlerhood now has me a bit disturbed and forlorn. Chloe is already rolling over (both ways) she's starting to sit on her own, she tried to eat my quesadilla last night and if she develops like Camdyn, she'll be walking in 3 months time. They morph so quickly and I question if I've changed as much as they have. Of course I have, I've tasted the sweetest part of life, the part that makes you want to live forever, the part that makes you realize that life is fragile, people are valuable, and that families are God's greatest gift to us. Not only am I just older, I'm mommy. I'm the most important person to two little people and they depend on me, love me unconditionally, and at this point, think I can walk on water. Of course all that has changed me...profoundly.

My mom had an old counter-cross stitched or crocheted wall hanging that adorned our basement walls for years when we were younger. It was fashioned out of 1970's olive green, orange, and mustard yellow yarn. It pictured an old fashioned woman, bun on top of her head, holding a swaddled babe in a rocking chair and it said the following:

Cleaning and Scrubbing Can Wait til tomorrow

For Babies Grow up We've learned to our Sorrow

So Quiet down cobwebs and Dust go to Sleep

I'm Rocking my baby and Babies don't keep

Yes, I recall that from memory and I totally get it now. I am understanding how it feels to watch your children grow and thrive. How every moment, stage, and age is fleeting and the time evaporates faster than water on the sidewalk under the noonday sun. I can't stop it, I can only savor it and remember it. So, I take tons of pictures of my little girls, I have them on video doing things that are less than remarkable, and I enjoy it. I enjoy them and motherhood (even the yucky parts).

I guess instead of wondering where the time has gone, I should be celebrating the fact that it's all been time well spent.