The Truth About Bedtime

To all the kids out there who are convinced the fun really starts after they go to bed (and who, I’m sure, faithfully follow this blog), I have a top secret, confidential, your-eyes-only message for you:  you’re right.

 

 

Your parents have a great time after you head off to la-la land.  As much as they love being around you during the day, taking care of you, playing with you, and learning from you, there’s something special about the time your parents have with each other at the end of the day.

 

 

In our home, it’s the time after negotiating the delicate balance between preparing dinner for John and me and getting Jacob into bed.  I thought the little man had a way with printers in utero, and now he seems to have an unnatural ability to get hungry right as the buzzer on the oven goes off.  Oh, the many talents of our little boy!

 

John and I haven’t had much of our evenings to relax together lately because he’s been studying for a big exam.  But now that the exam is over, we have more time to appreciate each other again, to get past the daily chronicles of Jacob, the news in John’s workplace, and the list of things we should do . . . sometime, and have conversations about books, movies, and life in general.

 

It’s these conversations that remind me why I married John.  In the six years we dated, we spent hours upon hours just talking, talking, talking, about anything and everything, agreeing on a lot, and learning from each other otherwise.  Now that we have a window of time to have these conversations again, I am reminded that there is always truth behind a clichéd phrase:  John really is the guy I want to talk to first thing in the morning, and the last person I want to talk to at night—after the baby has gone to bed.

An Early Father’s Day for This Mama

Although it’s still a few weeks away, I’m already thinking about Father’s Day.  It’s the same week as John’s birthday (my favorite secular holiday of the year), which means the third week of June is a double-celebration for us from now until the end of time.  And considering I plan dinners and weekend desserts at least a week ahead of time, you can imagine when I start planning for double John celebrations.

But before we look forward, we must always look back, right?

Dreams of steaks and sweet treats aside, last night I had a moment that made me grateful all over again for the blessing of my two favorite guys in my life.  Come with me into my memories, please.  Don’t worry, I’m not going to go all Inception on you or anything.

Jacob went to sleep early because he missed a nap, so John didn’t get a chance to hang out with him in the evening.  When this happens, we anxiously await a cry for a diaper change so that John can have some face time with the little man, even if it is in the dark.  As I sat in the glider waiting to nurse our Peanut, I remembered a very special moment from just after Jacob was born.

If I think back to brand-new Jacob, the image in my mind is this photo:

I was in a non-clinical kind of shock after he was born.  Although I remember seeing his feet in the doctor’s hands, I can barely remember the first time I saw the little guy’s face.  What I do remember is that as I held him, with John standing over us both, John gently asked, “Can I hold him?”  And it was a moment I don’t know that I have the words to describe.  Yes, I was “meeting” this little person to whom I had been physically connected since he came into existence.  Seeing and holding him was a brand new and amazing experience, for sure.

But somehow I had the presence of mind to put myself in John’s shoes for a moment.  He had felt Jacob kick and he knew the ins and outs of my pregnancy, but holding Jacob was a whole new ball game for him in a different way than it was for me.  Touching our baby, holding him, was something he’d waited for in a physically disconnected way.  There was so much love in his patient waiting, and in the serenely joyful way he asked me for a chance to hold our little guy in his arms.  He was then, and is now, a completely natural father.

I am so grateful that Jacob has John as a dad.  And I am so grateful that I have him as my partner in parenthood.

Every day is Father’s Day in these parts.  But don’t think that doesn’t mean I’ve got a heck of a dessert in mind for the “real” holiday!

The Best of the Best

Making a friend is fun.

Falling in love with a friend is great.

Marrying the friend you’ve fallen in love with is wonderful.

But nothing beats the look in your little boy’s eyes as he watches the friend you’ve fallen in love and married (or less cryptically, his daddy) goof off on a playground.

Needless to say, we had a good time at the park this weekend.  And needless to say, I love my boys.