Have you ever seen a baby wallaby learning to hop? Hehe. Okay, you caught me. Neither have I, but I wonder if they’re as clumsy at the outset as human babies are when they start walking (a wallaby is a marsupial that’s kind of like a small kangaroo). My apparently not so wee baby (14.5 months) started bipedaling about two weeks ago, and is now tottering around on two legs about 65% of the time. I’m expecting her crawling days to be entirely completed by the end of the week.

Since Faith is our last little progeny, I am greeting every milestone she passes with a frustrating combination of joy that we are moving ahead to the next stage of our family’s life and despair that we are rapidly moving out of the stage of itty bitty kiddies that we’ve been ensconced in for the last nine years.

When I say it that way, it reminds me why I’m ready to move on to the diaper-free, non-napping stage of life. Nine years is a long time to be constantly pregnant, nursing and monkeying with babies, diapers and the myriad accoutrements that come with them! I can’t imagine what life will be like without those things. Very bizarre.

On the plus side, with all these kids (we have 5), in a mere fifteen or twenty years I’m sure to have the beginnings of a cadre of grandchildren to play with. Oh my gosh, that’s depressing on so many levels! How does it seem at the same time like 15 years will be ages to wait for a grandchild, oddly not that long in terms of years at all, and a terrifyingly close amount of time for me to potentially be grandparent material. Aack aack! Psychosis is coming!! Hmph.

Now, because I’m a weenie and whiskey makes me gag for five minutes as it peels all the nerve endings from my throat when it drains down, I’m going to go pour myself a glass of very smooth wine to go cry in for the next half an hour. My gosh, parenting is confusing. Funny how those vacuous parenting books that go around masquerading as mentors conveniently gloss over how parenting makes you completely crazy! Guess that’s what your own parents are for. Pity that we never believe them.

I very clearly remember my Mother telling us that she was perfectly normal until my brother and I were born, and neither of us believed a word of it. Come to think of it, I’m still not sure I believe it, but it does seem slightly more plausible now that I have five kids of my own. I’m fairly certain that my own nutso ratio has been listing toward the batty side of the equation. Oh well, they’re worth it. And they’re so cute when they’re learning to walk (somewhat less cute when they have three teeth coming in at the same time and cry all day, however, which Faith is also doing).

May your week be full of cheerful children, sunny smiles, and lighthearted laughter from the little ones in your care. May the Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make His face to shine upon you and be gracious unto you; the Lord lift up His countenance upon you, and give you peace. ~ Numbers 6:24-26

~ Rachel

Written by Rachel Shubin ~ Fiendish friend for effusive fun!