Years and Tears

It's almost 5 am and I've been awake since 3.  I'll barely lay my head on my pillow and it'll be time to start the day.  I've been wrestling with a soft, squishy little chunk of a man-child and my eyes are getting so heavy.  My cheeks, just minutes ago wet from sweet, slobbery kisses are now wet with tears as I think about how quickly the years have rolled by.   This little baby boy who I carried in my womb not too long ago is now a year and a half.   He still wakes several times in the night and so sleep,  once a necessity, is now a luxury.  But that's ok.   For now I'll take these precious times of nursing and cuddling and wrestling and shooshing because I know that all too soon these days will be gone...and the tears flow again.

I have learned to cherish the days of sleepless nights and stains on my clothes.  A year may be a long time if you're moving a pile of rocks from one place to another; but a year in the life of a baby is way too fast.

We didn't quite get 2 years with our first child.  He was taken from us much too soon.  This year...this month in fact...Our sweet firstborn would have been 19 years old!  I'd give anything if I could hold him one more time and run my fingers through his curly red hair.  Oh but the blessing of eternity!  I wonder if it would be ok if I spent the first few years in heaven just holding my boy...

As I consider each child and how the years have flown by so quickly, I think of my own precious mama and how she must long for the days when she was a young mama and the pitter patter of little feet filled her house as my sister would leave her own bed and come crawl into my crib...and the tears flow again as I realize that one day that will be me.  One day my own house will be quiet and I will think back on the time when it was filled with the sound of children playing and laughing. It will be clean and everything will be in its place...and all my little arrows will have left my quiver. 

So for now I'll deal with the messy house filled with noises and smells and I'll cherish every second of it.  I'll wake up 7 times a night if I have to and hold my sweet baby boy.   Sleep will find me eventually....maybe...