GRIZZLY PEAR
Having a second kid really made us realize how quickly our daughter is growing up.
It’s not that the baby of the house just became a giant relative to her brother.
It’s also watching him grow up reminds us of all the stuff she went through that we’ve forgotten.
The two of them together are a constant reminder that time files (and has flown) so quickly.
My daughter is coming to grips that she doesn’t own the world. I’m certain being the only grandkid skews your view of the universe, but she now has competition.
And the competition is now heating up. Over the past couple weeks, our boy has realized that he can make a fuss for what is his. Or at least what’s in his hand that he wants to shove into his mouth against the wishes of those around him.
As parents, we freely give of ourselves to our children, but it’s so easy to spoil them. It’s an interesting balancing act, I’m certain we already have and we will screw up quite a bit along the way.
Why does this tree make my daughter so happy?
Is it the presents? I’m certain it doesn’t hurt.
Or is it the promise of presents? She was excited about this tree, even when it was barren underneath for a few weeks.
Maybe it’s the ornaments? She loves turning on the lights every evening.
This decorative item full of garish flourishes should be anathema to architects, but on this we ain’t fighting the tide of culture.
Our family does not do Santa, but we do presents at Christmas
About five or six boxes saved up over the year to put under the tree.
Hiding them wasn’t so hard, but now I have to find a discreet time to pull em out and wrap them!
No one warned me about this little parenting conundrum.
Last night I warned my wife that the boy had figured out how to pull out the drawers on the dresser. We gotta keep an extra tight eye on him now.
A few minutes later, she found me fast asleep on the bedroom floor. The boy had crawled to the bathroom, sat himself comfortably and was chewing on the plug of our humidifier.
This parenting business is tiring, and they move fast!
My son stood on my wife’s lap, laughing and giggling.
Watching his sister hamming it up, dancing to the programmed tunes on our casio keyboard.
Neither realized how precious it was.
To have a private clown show, and an adoring audience of one.
Or for us to watch them both.
My buddy had his first kid three months ago. Here’s to you man, you just made it through the first quarter of the rest of your life!
If my past five years are any indication, the first few months are a shock that fly by. The shock settles down, the change becomes permanent, and time flies by faster and faster.
Just last night we were reminded of this while watching Mary Poppins with the girl.
I’m watching our boy engrossed with a plastic toy duck, staring at it, pushing it around, and trying to put it in his mouth.
It makes me wonder what other objects have been overlooked. What items are worthy of such concentration that I now longer see in front of me?
There are psychological studies that show that parents are not nearly as happy as they think they are. And I think it’s true, having kids are a heck of a lot of work, and that’s speaking as a guy whose in-laws and parents have been giving us a hand the whole time.
But there are those moments when your kid accomplishes something, or just turns and smiles. And what a high!
I’m certain it’s all biochemical circuitry to encourage us to indulge in our evolutionary imperative, but dang, there are a reason why people with kids had a hard time fathoming life without ’em.