I teared up while paying for groceries looking longingly at the lady behind me struggling with three children clamoring to her legs and climbing in and out of the grocery cart while she balanced a really chubby darling baby on her hip.
It has happened: I have become one of those sweet older ladies who leans over to young mothers and whispers “please drink the marrow out of your days with those children being so little…it will be over before you can blink.”
I wonder if she would have really thought I was nuts if I had begged to hold that sweet baby. I should really get more daring.
I cried when Lucy’s preschool teacher came to visit for parent/teacher conferences.
Yeah, I know parent/teacher conferences are generally held in the classroom, but Lucy’s teacher is quite extraordinary.
She had changed Lucy’s life.
Her strict structure and no-nonsense personality are exactly what Lucy has needed for the past two-and-a-half years.
And I told her so while begging her (jokingly…but kind of serious) to move up with Lucy to kindergarten next year with tears of gratitude pricking at the back of my eyelids.
She just laughed and told me Lucy could just stay in preschool forever. I’m sure Lu wouldn’t mind.
And then I cried, like really cried when Dave and I passed the most darling baby in a high chair on the way out of a restaurant.
Don’t worry, I waited until I got to the car but all I could do was blubber to Dave all the way home about how grateful I am that he gave me our babies. How grateful I am that he made me a mother. How grateful I am that he gave in and let me have Lucy. (More on that back here.) It makes me tear up again just thinking about it right now.
And then I cried when I told my kids during family testimony meeting on Sunday how I watch them sleep every night before I go to bed. And more often than not, Max is still awake reading his scriptures in the soft glow of the pool of light from his lamp.
I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Maybe it’s all this Thanksgiving mumbo jumbo on my mind, but oh how very grateful I am to be a Mother.
Their mother.
You're making ME cry! I am still in the young children stage (one is almost 3, one is almost 6). I hate the feeling that their childhood is slipping through my fingers. I truly wish I could stay at & around this time forever a lot of the time. I know I will miss it. I know I should cherish it every moment even though I get distracted and don't always. Oh man, I've got tears falling into my lap. I better pull myself together 😉
Now this is the good stuff mamas are made of…your tears (and mine, too, now after reading this) are inspired and from the heart. As moms, the love we have in our hearts for our children–at every stage– is so powerful and at the same time, ever so humbling. I just wish it didn't all have to go by so fast. My son is 5 now and it just seems like yesterday I was rocking him to sleep in his nursery for bed time. That is so sweet that Lucy had such a wonderful connection with her preschool teacher–it sounds like she had a gem for a teacher! 🙂
Oh goodness, now I'm crying! Thank you for your example of a true mother heart, it helps me get through the days!
Oh man, I wish that my brother would read the bible like Max does! He's a sophomore now, and he's becoming very detached from the family. He's got a girlfriend now, even though there WAS a strict "no dating" policy in our house, and he listens to scary metal music. I showed him Skillet, a Christian rock band, and he likes them thankfully. Thanks for sharing this post! It reminds me that we have to take time for the little things… 🙂
I'm in the young mom stage–three years old, one year old, and another cooking. I cried all weekend because of pregnancy hormones and the fact that the three year old will NOT poop in the toilet. Thanks for bringing back some perspective.
Thank you for your consistent reminders to enjoy this time I have with my young children. You have influenced me to take more joy in the small, day-to-day moments that make up motherhood. Thank you for your blog!
As a young mom I can remind you that you will most likely be looked at as a saint- not nuts- if you offer to hold that baby in the grocery store line!
Thank you so much for this post! I love reading all of your posts, they are very inspiring, but this one was especially needed today! I have two young children (3 and almost 1) and I LOVE them so much, but it has been a difficult morning 🙂 so this post just reminded me to not worry about "getting stuff done" and just enjoy being with them. Thank you!
Oh! Thank you for taking the exact thoughts and feelings in my heart and giving them a voice, as mine never does them justice!!! Thank you for making me feel and remember that the thing I longed for most was to be a mother and that nothing I ever do in this life will compare with how wonderful that is.
You give mothering a voice.
Loved your post today! So sweet, so heartfelt, so beautiful!
Best part of being a women…free excuse to blubber a lot!
You made me cry!! My baby boy is only 7 weeks old and since we know he is our last, we are thoroughly enjoying his baby-ness as long as we can!! It's crazy how much your perspective changes when you become a mom. Even though I am still in the "young kids" stage, I appreciate each moment with them and tear up myself when I imagine my 2 year old going to preschool next year…
the way you write is so beautiful and spoken straight from the heart. When I try to do that the translation gets lost and it doesn't come out quite how I felt. You are an amazing mother. Thanks you for sharing your talents with all of us!
Thanks for the beautiful post! I have a 4 year old, 2 year old, and 6 week old … and I feel like we are a three ring circus wherever we go :).
right now i'm that mom struggling with 3 little kids in the grocery story…one of them being an adorable chubby baby on my hip, and i would have gladly let you hold that chubby baby for me at the check out…i'm pretty sure i would have let you even if you were a complete, but very nice looking, stranger to me.
Oh, thank you for voicing how you felt about Dave! Life has been quite an adjustment and a bit crazy and I feel like everything that has anything to do with the baby is me, me, me. That part you wrote made me stop in my tracks (mentally) and remember how important my husband is and that I really need to show more patience and appreciation and even respect.
🙂
Because of your blog, I am a more deliberate mother. You have such a great way of putting it in perspective that one's children are only little for so long, (I have one that is two, and another that is six months.) Whenever either of them are having a less than pleasant moment, I try to remember that this is only a season. I know that someday, I will long for these days. I will even miss the fits, the sleepless nights, and the whining, if only it would mean they were little again…
Having my children and marrying their father are the best, most gratifying things I have ever done in my life. And your blog reminds me of that on a regular basis. Thank you! 🙂
Try not being able to have kids on your own! That way the ones you do get make you extremely grateful to be a mom 🙂
Such a sweet post Shawni. Thank you.
As I was reading today's blogpost, I thought. "This is exactly like me!!! I cry when I see a baby. I long for one. But my reasons are so very different than yours. I lost my baby girl on 3 December last year. She was still born. She was my first, and I am so longing to have her with me, and I am also longing to have another, but so far it has not happen for us. Your blog inspire me. And hopefully in the near future, I will be able to be a good mummy like you 🙂
Thanks for sharing! I just came back from a grocery store trip with 4 kids 5 and younger. It ended with my 4 yr old screaming at the top of her lungs . . . it was brutal!
this post made me cry. and after reading all the comments i am bawling. the love a mother has for her children is so big. i can feel my heart overflowing. i am so glad i read this post and allowed myself to really feel that love for a while.
Oh, there is nothing quite like the love of a mother. I have 11 children, 8 are grown and the last three are still home. My baby is now 11 and I find myself loving other peoples babies. I sometimes just want to tell them to cherish those crazy, difficult moments, because they will miss them. And a great teacher is priceless!!
I thought of you tonight, I honestly did! We were at a restaurant and our two babies were crying and I was exhausted but as I drove home, I thought of how quickly this phase will be over and how much I will miss it one day!
I am right there with you! I tear up almost daily when I see babies, hear my son talk of college, see my kids play with Tate, etc. Motherhood just makes me cry.
Thank you, because of you I make sure to enjoy all the little moments with my babies. I just had my second 2 months ago and my first who was my baby is getting bigger and bigger. I can't imagine what its like to have all your kids out of the baby stages, but I am sure I will know soon enough.
I love you Shawni! You are exactly what I need to keep me going as I mother these 3 little ones. I celebrate and honor the gift of motherhood, but sometimes I also weep and tell Father in Heaven I just can't do it anymore. Life's greatest challenge AND joy, right? Thank goodness for prayer and a positive attitude! 🙂
I'm crying as I read this. I'm single, have never married & still want children of my own so badly. This feeling has never gone away.
When I tell members of the church how I feel I either get the millenium lecture ("Don't worry, you'll be a Mum in the millenium") or they tell me that teaching other people's children at church is the same as having your own. Believe me, that is NOT true – especially when they can't even remember you 10 years later:(
I'd give anything to have to get up to feed a hungry baby in the night or to deal with
a 2 year old going through the terrible two's.
Sometimes I don't think I'll ever fit it in this life.
Thanks for a great blog:)
This post made ME cry too. Darn you! Thank you for all your wonderful insight. I love reading your blog and learning from you.
And me too! When I read Saren's blog this week about the evolution of you four sisters I just marveled at how the time has flown by and now those little sisters are big sisters with babies of their own. Suck in in! Such great advice!
What a lovely post, I could seriously cry. I truly believe that being a mommy is the best role in life. I'm single at the moment and it's at the top of my prayers everyday; for God to bring the one He has for me in my life (hopefully sooner rather than later lol) and then bless us with babies to love with every inch of who we are. I even respectfully baby my parents- I'm just so maternal and eager to live a part of life that means so much to me. Thank you for sharing Shawni- you're such a blessing to younger and older women 🙂
this is beautiful. I can't wait for the day that I get married and can have children!