Quiet Morning

It's 8 am and Tim is still sleeping having spent most of the night up and down with Mister so I could play catch up on my rest. Nadia is sitting on the floor eating cocoa puffs and looking so.... BIG.... that it just hurts my heart to see it. I can't believe how quickly she has grown up, and looking at her I find myself wondering when she stopped looking like a baby and started looking like a kid.


Her hair is all ruffed up in the back from sleeping and her head is tilted back a bit and to the right. Her legs are like mine used to be when I was small: long and skinny with the knees poking out ever so slightly. She lets out a little laugh at the cartoon playing on the TV and once again I am struck by how much she has grown. It astounds me that she gets the humor, that she understands the joke and why it's funny.


Mister brings my attention back with a little baby grunt. He is propped up in the crook of my arm for the first of his many meals today. The difference between him and Nadia is drastic. I snuggle up to the top of Mister's soft babies' head and shower his downy fluff hair with kisses and wonder how long it will be before he's sitting in front of me on the floor with his hair sleep tousled and watching morning cartoons, laughing at the jokes.


I sit there, and stare at his face and his precious baby features: The little fat rolls around his eyes, his squished up baby nose, his tiny perfect puckered baby mouth... his chubby cheeks with the dimple he gets on one side when he eats.... How long until his baby face vanishes into the air like smoke, leaving behind his kid face? The time seems to be slipping away already.


I give him a little squeeze and say a silent prayer that the world slows down just a little bit. I pray that the quiet of this morning will last... just a little bit longer, but it never does. Already the to-do list of the day is ticking off items in my head. Errands to be run, groceries to be bought, chores to be done.... but at least for now, I can nuzzle that downy fluff for just a minute and oggle at Nadia watching cartoons and growing up right before my eyes.