Good Times

Parents see this.  Whenever they look at their 40 year old child they see this baby with chubby hands and no hair.  I do this all the time when I think of my kids.  No matter what they do in life or where they go they are this to me.  Infants.  I see the chubby little fingers and the drooling faces and those big bright eyes that sparkle.  I cherished this time in their lives.  Every squeeze and every little laugh they gave me were pure magic.  I'm thankful for all the pictures I took of them and the videos we made time to record.  I don't have a lot of the videos right now because my ex husband is working on a video of Taryn's life and someday it will be ready to watch.  Much like this blog I'm writing one day at a time.  He said he can't watch too much of it without feeling sad and sometimes breaking down.  I feel the same way about the pictures and things that flood my mind with questions.  Why didn't I do a better job of being in the moment with Taryn?  Why was I always so pre occupied with things and not paying enough attention?  Why didn't I put everything down and just sit holding her hand?  Well for one thing she would have looked at me like I was NUTS.  This is the look I got when I did stuff like that....

Eyyyyahhh that's about it.  Mom?  Have you lost your mind??  hahahaha  Quit being so WIERD.  Sigh.  Mothers are not popular with teenagers for the most part.  We ask too many questions.  We nag about things like oh, homework and chores.  We ask those questions they don't want to answer such as, have you thought about what you want to do after high school?  Where's your report card?  You're failing math??  Okay time to QUIT Mc Donalds and do your school work.  Not popular.  However it did get Christian through to graduation and that was pretty amazing.  

Even during graduation and their first jobs you see that little baby up there.  The time that flew by so fast you don't know where it went.  Now, with everything I've been through I still miss that baby in my arms.  That little girl who I could cuddle and who would stick her little fingers under her bedroom door at night because she didn't want to go to bed yet.  I'd go take a bath and come out and she'd be sitting in the middle of our bed with a big bowl of popcorn watching MASH with her father.  He'd grin at me and nothing needed to be said.  I only wish I had pictures of that.  I do somewhere, I'll get them added to this blog soon as I find them.

That was a happy time.  There were lots of those when the kids were babies.  I was very happy and content.  It was challenging but raising kids is hard and it's not the kid part that trips you up, it's the YOU part.  Adapting your own personality to being there for your family.  Taming your impulses and your anger sometimes.  Picking your battles and making sure you're not over reacting to something that won't matter tomorrow.  Little feelings matter more than a clean house.  Stuff like that.

Life wasn't perfect but no life is.  That's the time you learn those important lessons.  You stop expecting so much and start being happy with what you have.  I miss being a young family.  I miss the nights of sleeping in my bed knowing my children were in the next room.  I miss the routine of taking care of them, cooking for them and cleaning up after them.  I never thought I'd miss those things but I do.  I miss their silliness and their picky eating habits.  I even miss them fighting with each other and whining about stuff.  I got so good at diffusing arguments and being a referee.  

That's my life's work.  I loved and still love being a mom.  It doesn't seem all that long ago.  The house on Stockbrook Road, Butterfield Elementary School and those horrible hot summer California nights.  I loved it all.  Taryn was right in the middle of it all.  Literally my middle child.  I used to joke that she never had middle child syndrome because she was the only girl.  That made all of them special.  I guess this is a day for nostalgia.  Reaching back for that sweet feeling I used to take for granted.  All my little chicks in the nest.  Good times.