Happy New Year
I always make a big, biiiiig list of things I hope and dream for the fresh new year.
Happy New Year!
How was your holiday??
Oh yeah, same. Except ours was Strep and stomach flu, not bronchitis this year. It only took about two weeks to blaze through everyone so that’s progress!
Hahahahaha, no, we also didn’t make it to midnight. Are you kidding? The kids sleep until at least 6 these days (hallelujah for ready-to-wake clocks amiright?) but something about just… keeping them occupied and alive while cooped up at home during the winter break takes it out of us. So we were in bed by 10:30. Is that normal?
Did you make any resolutions for the year ahead? I always do. I always make a big, biiiiig list of things I hope and dream for the fresh new year. I buy a mint condition planner with no kid scribbles and no broken promises to myself and no to-dos that turned into never-dones. I get excited about how this year we’ll bring structure to our days and establish a chores system and invite more neighbors to dinner. And then, almost always, something happens on New Year's Day to remind me that during these little kid and toddler years, just keeping them and our marriage healthy is enough.
You want to know what it was this time that did it? It happened even before 7am on New Year's Day. Our youngest went to play in the basement and – somehow, at some point – his diaper came undone on one side. And, naturally he pooped. And so this diaper full of poop was on the loose in his pajama pants, and he was on the loose in the basement, and by the time I went down to grab him for breakfast it was…
Sorry, I won’t share any more details. But it was a stark reminder that it’s ok to not be totally organized or motivated to take on more, more, more, when we’re still living that diaper life.
A crazy thing, though, looking ahead at 2025: this could be the year we end that diaper life. Somehow, our littlest is going to turn three during the year ahead. Three! That’s not baby anymore. I don’t even know what parenting looks like beyond baby jail. I’ve been a baby parent for nearly nine years; almost a quarter of my life. Maybe that’s the real resolution: enjoy letting these babies be big kids. Focus all that regained sleep and attention on big kid swim meets and learning to read and – dare I say it – self-care?
Here I go getting ahead of myself again. The big two just got in a knock-down drag-out screaming match and I’m already tired for bed and it’s 4pm. I have work projects waiting, sign-up deadlines for kid sports, and a sick (yeah, technically we’re still going through it) husband to cuddle. So we’ll probably just keep scraping by, day to day, snack time to snack time, trying to remember to sign forms and pay bills. And maybe that’s all the resolution needs to be: taking a minute here and there to be thankful for all of this as these babies turn into toddlers turn into little kids turn into gray streaks in my partner’s and my beautiful hair.
