Seasons

A Change in the Seasons of Life

Today I watched my 7-month old nephew, Ashton. He is just starting to eat a lot of baby food and make big messes in the highchair. As I cleaned his face, hands and the tray I realized that it has been at least two months since Sheldon (who is 16 months) has even been in the highchair. I haven't cleaned the tray forever, either. Sheldon sits at the island with Zane and Abigail, now. He eats bowls of cereal with a spoon by himself. He hardly makes a mess at all. He has also graduated from sippy cup to regular cup. We only use sippy cups in the car, now.

I remember the days when I dreaded cleaning highchair trays, three or more times a day. I remember feeling and complaining to my husband that, that was all I did all day. I had a very small break between each child where we did not use the highchair, but for the most part I have been in the baby season for almost 6 years now! I have known nothing but pregnancy, breast-feeding, diapers, wipes, sippy-cups, messes, diaper bags, more messes and being tired!
I realized today though, that I am out of the baby season! I'm not sad at the realization, though! I'm very excited to hand the torch over to someone else...anyone else. I am ready to enter my next season of life. I don't even know what it will be called, but I am ready for it!
We have a year or so until Sheldon is totally potty-trained, but otherwise the evidence of the baby season is practically gone. He will be weaned from breast-feeding in two short months. The baby time of life is quickly fading! Soon, there will be no more diaper bags to pack with way too many extra diapers and an extra set of clothes for diaper blow-outs in the carseat; no more wiping snotty noses; no more spitting up on clean sheets or on me; no more waking up in the middle of the night to nurse and change an infant. I have actually slept through the night a few times this month. It has been 6 years since I have slept through the night! I count pregnancy because you do not sleep through the night! Unless, you are fortunate and didn't have to go pee all night, or eat during the night, like I did. Maybe some of you are fortunate to have babies who slept through the night, but I never did. Abbie didn't sleep through the night until Sheldon was born. I finally feel rested after 6 years of caring for infants. I am still tired during the day but not so "mentally" tired from giving so much of oneself to helpless infants. It is a welcomed feeling.
All in all, I know I have been blessed with a baby season that has been virtually free of huge medical problems, pregnancy and breastfeeding problems, colicky babies or anything else major. It has been a good season....a very hard one, but good. I have tried to be a selfless mom and I have poured myself into my babies. I didn't always do the right things at the right times. I wasn't always the most most patient mom! I vividly remember telling Zane when he was 3 or 4 months old that "I was going to throw him away" when he woke up for the 4th or 5th time in one night. I remember yelling at him when he was two because he would not eat his peas....he still won't eat them and I have finally accepted this! I remember yelling at Abbie when she was two, for piling every item of freshly folded clothing that she owned into a big pile in the camper. And I still say the d-word about some thing or another during the week. I picked up this bad habit in the camper from the stress of having 3 babies in a 28-foot space. It used to be a daily thing and now it is weekly, so I am getting better!
Anyway, my baby season has been a special time...a worth-while time...a time I will never forget and a time well worth treasuring...but I am actually glad to see it go. In a good way! I am ready to embrace parenthood past two years old...I don't even know what to call it yet. I have made it through the baby season, so I know with the Lord's help I can make it through my next one, and do it better than ever...I hope!
I am pretty happy that I can do things now, that were hard to fit into my schedule before. Just going anywhere in the car used to be this huge, big deal. Now it is getting much easier...unless we have a lot of places to go and then it is downright stressful. Church is nice now since I don't have to lug around the infant carseat, and deal with a squirming, cranky, hungry child. Zane sits through church, while Abbie and Sheldon are in the nursery. Pretty soon, Abbie will be sitting through church, like a big girl, too. I can actually sit through the whole sermon, which is so awesome!
I know some of you reading this are in the middle of your baby season, or you are just starting it. It is hard; very hard. Just keep chugging along and try to make the most of each day. I know from experience that some days there is not even one thing that seems good or goes right that day. Just try to do better each day. You cannot be perfect, so there's no sense getting yourself down about it. Just do better the next day! If you feel like you are in a rut and you keep doing the same bad things over and over, just forget everything else and re-tie those heart strings with your babies and toddlers....read books, play on the floor, whatever. Don't get yourself down; you are human and raising children can be so taxing on whomever shares the majority of time with the children. You have to be self-less. There is no other way around it. If you want good kids, that is. Putting aside self is incredibly hard; especially if you are with the children 24/7 (you Army wife friends of mine)! You do need time alone...but when you are with your children you must be self-less. This is not only for the baby season...even with preschool children, and I am assuming with older ones, this concept is the same!
The good thing about seasons, though, is that they are just that....seasons. They pass and change. They each have good and bad things about them. You just take the good along with the bad and keep going. Some seasons are easier than others, I am assuming...hoping. I have only been through the early marriage season and the baby season, so I am hoping that whatever my next one will be, is easier!
I didn't care about seasons before I was married...I don't even think I knew they existed at that time. I guess it was one big season called "childhood". We all grow up, though, and we realize that there really are seasons in life. The Bible even tells us so in the familiar passage in Ecclesiastes...."There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the sun." Eccl 3:1
Here is a little poem I found recently. I will close with it. It tells you just how special being a mom really is...

Only One Mother
By: George Cooper

Hundreds of stars in the pretty sky,
Hundreds of shells on the shore together,
Hundreds of birds go singing by,
Hundreds of lambs in the sunny weather.

Hundreds of dewdrops to greet the dawn,
Hundreds of bees in the purple clover,
Hundreds of butterflies on the lawn
But only one mother the whole world over.