Sunday, November 6, 2011

Savings

Daylight Savings.  It ended today.  Again.
Every year when we get one extra hour.
If feels pretty good until April comes around again and we start 'saving daylight' again.
And every year I try to be conscience of how I use that extra hour.  But that gets tricky.  When is that extra hour?  Is it before I go to sleep?  Is it when I try to sleep in in the morning?  I hope the extra hour isn't really at 2am because then it is wasted when I am not around to enjoy it.
But this year, I knew exactly when my extra hour came.  At 9:30am I was up and showered.  The kids were also cleaned and dressed and mostly fed (it is fast Sunday so they weren't all fed), and ready for church.  We usually aren't this ready until after 10 for sure.  So there I was...staring at my extra hour.
I played with my baby.
Part of me thought, there must be something better I should be doing with this hour.  I still had one more chapter to read for Sunday School, I still hadn't called either of my Grandmas to see how their new houses are.  I didn't change the batteries in the fire alarms (i still need to do that).  Nor did I review the contents of our 72 hour kits.  I laughed and cuddled and sang and smiled with my baby.
OK, maybe I only actually played with her for 30 minutes, the other half of the hour I was getting her dressed, changing a diaper, trying to see if she wanted to eat.  But all the while I was with my baby.

Then it hit me.  This may be the last time I get to spend daylight saving extra hour with one of my babies.  :(
I don't know if I will have another baby.  I think right now the chances are 50/50.  Life is crazy.  Life is expensive.  We still live in a townhouse.  And, I am getting older.  This last pregnancy took quite a toll on me and in turn the whole family.  It may be that another baby just isn't going to happen.  And...6... ... ...that is a lot of kids to take care of.  With all of these thoughts in my head, it makes each moment with Erica more precious to me.  I want to savor it, to NEVER forget it.  She is still so little. So demanding. So constant.  But I can't imagine my life without one of these little souls clinging to me and I clinging to them.
I know I am blessed.  And I have 5 wonderful daughters to care for, to teach and to raise.  There will be tough roads ahead and they will need me, just like I needed my mother.  Being there for them as they grow up is just as important as being there for them when they were babies.  But, I will miss being the mother of a baby.
Elizabeth 
Rachael

Maire
Sarah


So for now I am making memories,
and saving them.

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