What a great reminder for my sweet baby’s 4week “birthday”
dearbaby:
(Dovie, running free in a field near our house)
Everly has taught me some really valuable lessons about being a better person and a better parent but there is one thing that stands out above all the rest. The lesson…Don’t rush it.
Don’t be in a hurry for your baby to sleep through the night or to start solids or to sit up or crawl or walk. If I can offer you one bit of advice, it’s to just enjoy the stage your baby is in right.this.moment.
It’s human nature to look towards the future - to imagine all the fun that comes with the next milestone in your child’s life… but looking back on the nearly 21 months since my daughter was born, I am shocked at how fast my tiny baby has been replaced with a little girl. I sometimes go and study pictures of her when she was infant. I look at those deep thigh rolls that are all but gone now - at her small limbs that are now stretching up and out and I can’t believe how quickly her infancy passed.
Of course It’s important to stimulate and encourage your child - but I feel like I was far too focused on trying to ensure that she was advanced. I found myself (despite knowing better!) comparing her to her peers and worrying unnecessarily when a friend’s baby crawled before she did or reveling in the fact that she was one of the first among her peers to walk. I’d rattle off a list of her accomplishments at every pediatrician appointment so that our doctor would tell me how impressive her development was. In so many ways I felt as if her advanced development was a reflection of my success as her mother.
I look at Everly’s first year now and I realize that I didn’t take enough time to just enjoy the fact that one day soon she wouldn’t sleep with her knees curled beneath her on my chest, sit content & happy in a bouncy seat or chew on her chubby toes for entertainment. Any of you who read this blog and have a child Everly’s age or older can agree that they all roll over, they all sit up, they all learn to hold their own bottle, they all crawl, and cruise, and walk and run eventually. All of them - each will do it on their own schedule - but they all get there.
Armed with this revelation, I am taking my sweet time this go round. Instead of focusing on whether Arlo is advancing at a the same rate (or faster or slower) than his peers - I am letting him lead the way. Even as I watch more and push less, he is still moving forward and growing at what feels like the speed of light. I am savoring each stage more as I know that it will be gone and replaced with a new one far too soon. The same now goes for Everly - no more over eagerness to move her into her next stage of development. We are filling her life with love, creativity, and adventure and letting her decide how it will manifest into new abilities within her.
So that’s it. My two cents. Slow down. Let go a little. Delight in this moment, dear mothers. The tiny newborn. The squishy infant. The crawling, the cruising, the walking… it will all come and go faster than your heart can possibly imagine.
Love,
M
![in-north-carolina:
Atlantic Beach, NC at sunset [x]
(submitted by sheriffpanda).
2 weeks from today we finally have vacation!!! I get to see this and smell the salty air and just breathe for that whole week, which being that week is going to be #35 out of 40 in this whole baby growing thing =WINBut first, there is a baby shower and birthing class and lots of nesting urges to accommodate.](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_loa6w2AwLy1qavdvko1_500.jpg)
![Oh, to have this framed in my house. After this week, there are few things, if any, that would make me happier than this feeling.
emphasisadded:
When I saw this image on my dash, only the top part was visible above the fold….so I thought it read:
“I long for Salt”
and my reaction was: Oh my god, me too!
You see, I LOVE salt. (It’s sort of a problem- I tried giving it up for Lent one year. That was short lived) Simon and I make regular trips to Spice House for gourmet seasoning and are always on the hunt for exotic, interesting, colored salts. We just recently discovered what can only be described as the greatest salt on earth:
Maldon // Sea Salt Flakes.
Do yourself a favor, go out and get yourself some. You’ve got to try it!
….oh and that salt air in my hair thing would be pretty nice too.
[via insidetheloop:PinkLemonadeDesign]](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_llgkwcexAn1qbdj40o1_400.png)
