Serious Flashbacks

Last weekend I went Fargo to meet some very special new people.  Two of my bestest friends recently had babies! Hip Hip Hooray!  My friend Maranda had a beautiful baby girl, named Imaya.  And my other friend Sadie had twins! Isabel and Everett.  During Sadie’s baby shower we took this picture together.

Holy crap – KIDS!  I started thinking back to “the good old days”. Here is the three of us during life before kids as we now know it….

This was taken at my bachelorette party, so that explains the silly hats. Actually that explains a lot of things when looking back through those photos…. like wearing sunglasses inside….

and wearing one hundred boas at once (or a boa at all for that matter)….

and riding in a shopping cart with a fistfull of cash…..

Oh yeah, and by the way, the girl with the sunglasses on inside? Yeah, she had triplets last year…Here is us with our SIX children in less than 4 years….

Are we all baby making machines OR WHAT?

So I guess, looking back, had you asked me (or probably any of us for that matter) if this is where we’d be in 2009, I might have laughed at you.  Let’s see… 4 friends, 10 babies (Madelyn, Wyatt, Anna, Holden, Henry, Hadley, Brooklyn, Imaya, Isabel and Everett), 5 years. Whoa. Baby.  That averages 2 babies per year.

When I think about my life today, I can’t imagine myself without Wyatt and Brooklyn.  But looking back at old photos, I definitely can remember that I did have a life before them. A life all of my own, with no worries of feeding schedules and doctor’s appointments and school supplies and bedtime routines.  Sometimes I feel like it’s easy to lose myself in the everyday chaos (and sometimes structure) that children create. Remember the days of not worrying about what time you went to bed because it was Friday and what is there to do on Saturday anyways but sleep in?  Oh yeah – kids don’t know that Saturdays are supposed to be for sleeping in. Remember the days when you could take off for the lakes at the drop of a hat-no questions asked? Oh yeah – Wyatt has school I wouldn’t want him to miss, and I HAVE A JOB NOW and besides, Brooklyn might not sleep great if she’s not in her own bed.

But as much as I miss some of those “good old days” I wouldn’t trade my life now for the world.  It must be that crazy thing they call unconditional love….to an outsider parenting can look, well, not so appealing (poop, barf, spit up, temper tantrums, potty training mishaps, whining, loss of freedom, lack of sleep – SIGN ME UP!).  But to us insiders, us lucky ones who have gotten to experience first smiles, first giggles, first words, first steps and first I love yous – we know.  We know that despite all the trouble, terror and tears, our babies are worth more than their weight in gold.  In fact, make that platinum.

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