If you’re not into mushy mom stuff or bathing baby pictures, skip this post.
They don’t call them developmental leaps for nothing. I think Lincoln has learned more in the last seven days than he has in his whole life (other than maybe those first seven hours when he had to figure out how to exist in a world outside of me). His speech has changed dramatically (he is speaking his own little language now, all the time), he’s started walking, and he seems to understand so much more of what we say to him. It is all so new, fun, and exciting.
minus the whole “developmental leap” means poor napping thing, that I could do without
He’s also teething and was a trooper during our two day stint at a friends this week (it is hard work sharing your mom with other kids and then not waking up to your own crib when your mouth hurts at night). It all probably explains why yesterday at 9:20 am, while on the phone with my mother and Lincoln on my hip, I look down to find him nestled into my chest, fast asleep.
this boy hasn’t taken a morning nap in months
I sat down in his dark nursery, finished up my conversation with my mom, and the two of us snuggled like that for another hour or so. There was laundry to do, a kitchen to clean, and an inbox to attend to, but I wondered how many more times I’d be able to snuggle with my first baby and so we just sat there.
One thing I latched onto in my prenatal reading was the concept of making my baby feel loved. It was in a brain development book where it talked about the importance of safe and secure environments for babies to thrive (and how learning is all based on relationships and emotions). We pray for it at night, that Lincoln will feel safe and loved, and as I go throughout my day, I try to remind myself that the feeling of love in our home is more important than so many other things I could give him.
I hope he always feels it, that he always knows how much his mother loves him. I hope he discovers someday when he has his own child, just like I did, how a parent’s love is much deeper and stronger than ever previously imagined. I hope he takes comfort in it when things are hard and that it makes the joys of life a bit sweeter. But I know that I won’t always be the center of his world, and so I can’t promise that he will always feel my love, but I can promise that it will always be there. Right now that love means snuggling through naps, extra kisses throughout the day, and soothing the teething pains in the night. It also means planning healthy meals, washing his pajamas (we wear pajamas 80% of the time around here – snapchat is proof @elisabethmeg), and picking products that are safe and soft for him. It means putting my phone away and making eye contact while I try to imagine what his little stories are about and it means a few extra minutes chasing him around the living room just because it makes him laugh.
I’m finally filling up the frames of the gallery wall in his nursery (that have been hanging half empty for over six months) and I’m adding in a little reminder from me to the both of us. I’m still working on the final layout, but here’s a little rough draft I whipped up. It has always in many different languages (I used a cloud generator for this one and it separated the words in languages where there are two – so I’ll be fixing that). I have plans to hand-write it and add it to one of the smaller frames so that both Lincoln and I can always be reminded of the things in our life that are forever and always.
A big thanks to Pampers for sponsoring this post and for producing our very favorite diapers (I’ve tried 5 brands at this point and keep coming back to pampers from Walmart). You should also come hang out with me at the twitter party on March 3rd. It’ll be fun 😉 #MothersPromise
