Blink

Today is Liam's last day of school.  I snapped the picture below to commemorate the day.  It really amazes me how much he has grown since he first started the program in January.  He is such a little man.  And I guess today I am just a little sentimental at how much/fast my kids are growing. 

A little over a year ago he was in speech therapy because he probably couldn't say more than 10 words.  But today he is so verbal that I have to sometimes stand back and just take it all in.  It also means that Eric and I are having to be extra careful about what we say because of how he processes it.  Sometimes it can be funny, but I can see how it could be trouble later on down the road.  I have to remind myself that he is only just three years old and his world doesn't have the basis for experience that ours does; that he is still a little boy and I can't expect more from him than what he can give.  I love that he still lets me hold him like a baby (even though it looks like a child holding another child).  I love his blond curls and long eyelashes.  The way he is starting to share my passion for reading and the adventure that comes from slipping into another time and place.  He is fearless and it both terrifies me and makes me proud, because of how cautious I have been my whole life.  He will always be my baby no matter how old he gets.  I look forward to what God has planned for both my kids lives.

Ansley is my little sweetheart.  She is extremely vocal, as I have heard most girls are.  She will probably achieve more milestones a little earlier than her brother.  Whether it is because she is a girl or whether she is a second child I have yet to determine.  At almost six months old, she has started to army crawl across the floor.  It is bittersweet for me because she will likely be our last baby.  I am reminding myself to cherish these days.  I look forward to the moment where she is old enough to actively play with her brother, and we can travel the way my family did growing up.  The way she kicks her legs with excitement when I go in to retrieve her after she wakes up.  Her constant wonder at learning her body can be manipulated by her sheer will.  The way she lights up at seeing her big brother, daddy or the dogs. 

I want to capture this time in a little bottle.  The smell of sunscreen and sweat as we all play outside into the twilight, chasing the fireflies that have started to appear.  The aroma of Johnson and Johnson's Nighttime Baby Wash and Burt's Bees Shampoo on their sweet skin. The content sighs of children settling into a deep sleep.

The other day while I was picking Liam up from school I met a woman picking up her grandchildren.  We got to talking and she revealed to me that her only child had been murdered awhile back.  I felt immediately sick as I remembered the ongoing coverage on the news.  He was the owner of a Christian recording studio in the area.  He and a friend were gunned down in a robbery attempt as they worked late one night by two men riding the DART train and looking for a target.  I was obsessed with the coverage for so many reasons.  Partly because the victim was my age.  Perhaps it was because he had two children that are about the same age as mine are right now.  Or maybe it was because it was the same train that Eric had been taking to work on a daily basis.  Maybe it was because both victims seemed to be leading purpose driven lives, chasing after God.

The woman and I stood in the corridor of the church and cried and hugged.   At that moment her granddaughter, one of her only links to her "baby" boy ran up to us.  We quietly brushed away tears and I chocked back more as I saw this perfect little girl who had lost so much.  My heart hurts at all the pain in the world.  The unfairness at a light being extinguished by hate. But his mother said that shortly before his death he was convinced that God had a plan for his life.  While our plan doesn't always match God's, as the last few years have taught me, I know that his plan is better and bigger than ours could ever be. 

Each night as Eric and I put our babies down,  it is so easy to be worn out by the day.  But we breathe in their innocence and our immense love for them.  Eric reads Liam a nightly story by flashlight, we pray and sing songs.  We hold our babies close and thank God for letting us be part of their world.