You can tell there is a newborn in the house. The piles of overflowing laundry. Random diapers strewn across a variety of surfaces. The Itzbeen timer constantly in company with the phone and television remote. And with having a newborn again, I feel my perspective is constanly changing and being renewed. The 2 year old baby boy I cuddled the night I went into labor, morphed into a lean articulate little man the day I came home and had him up on the changing table after his little brother.
I keep discovering that it is the smallest things that are the biggest markers of my life right now. As much as I didn't seem to recognize how far removed we actually were from having a "baby" in the family before Little Bear got here, now that he's here, its the accessories of this renewed way of life that are the largest markers of how far Scootch has grown beyond it. And how the time really has flown by.
Today my project was cleaning out the cabinet to make room for the bottles. I really switched out one type of bottle for another. I packed away all of Scootch's Nuby cups, which he really hasn't used in almost a year, to put up the Playtex Drop Ins for Little Bear. It really made me pause as I was rifling through the various rings and nipples and caps. As much as I record milestones, I don't know if there really is such a thing as the record of the "day" your son or daughter stopped doing something. Stopped nursing in favor of regular milk before bedtime. Stopped eating baby food in favor of table food. Stopped using a baby bottle in favor of a soft spout. Or finally stopped using a soft spout because s/he could be trusted with a regular cup. I think that's why there are still jars of baby food and puffs in the pantry, and I'm just now packing away all the soft spout Nuby's. The first night it could be a fluke, the second night you're giving it a week, and by weeks end, you've already adapted so well to the change that it probably doesn't occur to you that something significant has just happened. And now is the time I should be making promises to remember this with Little Bear, since this is my third and final chance to savor the journey. But I don't want to lie. The reality is that this is my THIRD. And I'm sure it will be even harder just to remember to jot down all the firsts, nevermind remembering the lasts.
But tonight, I am remembering. I'm holding Little Bear, and remembering when I was holding Monkey, or holding Scootch. I'm comparing their faces and hands and hair in my memory. And I'm trying to remember that even though life is a journey, there were certain points of interest I wanted to visit along the way. Even if to only snap a picture.
