The Childhood Things I Will Miss

There are some days I look forward to the days in the future  when my children will be more independent and self sufficient because this constant demand for mommy stage is exhausting. If it's not "Mommy, I need milk", it's "Mommy, come wipe my butt." It's "Mommy, read me another story. Mommy, she hit me. Mommy, write this for me. Mommy, I'm hungry. Mommy, I want this now. Mommy, Mommy, Mommy, Mommy." And on and on the list of demands goes. But as anxious as I am for them to wipe their own butts; feed themselves; tie their own shoes; be left in the car so I don't have to drag two kids out of their car seats just to run into a store for less than two minutes to get a galloon of milk; and to be able to go into a store with them without wondering is this going to be the moment they have an absolute meltdown in the store because I said no, there's an even bigger part of me that will miss so much more about these early years.

I am not a huge baby/infant fan. Most of the time I mention how if our third kid could come out at about age two that would be great. Infants and babies are cute and cuddly and it's nice that they don't move or get into things, but I love when they start to have their own individual personalities. Don't get me wrong I loved my daughters as babies but they were just like these little chubby logs with human features that cried and pooped a lot.

But as they move from infancy into their early childhood years, these are the things I will miss about these years that exhausted and stressed me out and pushed me to new limits.

I will miss my daughter telling her dad he is her prince.

I will miss them wrapping and gifting me their toys on my real and pretend birthday.

I will miss having a play doh meal served to me.

I will miss being their client while they put all 50 of their hair bows in my hair.

I will miss playing hide and seek and listening for their giggles to find them.

I will miss them happily eating leftovers while we eat carry out.

I will miss being able to make up lies and stories to get them to do something and they just believe them and obey.

I will miss them painting my toe nails and usually my toes too.

I will miss them wanting to hold my hand.

I will miss their random singing and dancing.

I will miss swinging on the swings with them.

I will miss rocking them to sleep.

I will miss them telling me they love me as much a big cow or whatever other grand object they can imagine in their little minds.

I will miss their innocence, the way only a child sees the beauty in the world.

I will miss the hilarious things that they miss pronounce like "Daddy, there's a deer. You can shoot it with your boner (bow)!)

I will miss the mischief they get into like covering their head in diaper cream like Daddy does with shaving cream when he goes to shave his head or putting make up and lip gloss all over their faces and sometimes hair.

There's so much to look forward to and so much to miss as it passes us by. For now, I hope to enjoy all these little precious moments and grit my teeth and bear the butt wiping and "I need you to do this right NOW!"  moments. I always hear from moms of older children that there's something different to love about every age. I should try to remember to do a list like this with their teenage years, but for now I have no wish to rush time.

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