Tonight, I put to bed a four year old for the last time and then came downstairs to set out gifts and special breakfast for the morning. He cried a bit: "I'm not sure I want to be five tomorrow." then bravely resolved, "I'll just have to get used to it."
When the youngest was a few months old, we had some family photos taken, and as we haven't repeated the occasion, they still decorate our living room. There are my three boys on the walls, smiling and posing, age zero, two and four. Which means that by my calculations, five minutes ago we had three under five and yet somehow tomorrow we have none under five. It doesn't add up.
Nine years into parenting I am reconciled to the old adage that the days seem long but the years fly by. Actually, now that we are at the civilised stage of having them all at school, the days don't even seem long either, for which I am often thankful.
Just when I felt like we'd found our groove with three little ones (and whenever we lost it, which of course we FREQUENTLY did, "three under five" was the perfect excuse) it's time to face up to "three under ten" with the new challenges which that entails, like internet safety and secondary school choices.
But I guess I'll just have to get used to it.
I wrote (butchered) this three years ago but it seems relevant today:
Ode to Early Motherhood
Season of milk and nighttime wakefulness; Close bosom-friend to my maturing sons, Conspiring with Him how to raise and bless These babes, now boys that round the house do run. We bent with change bags the various buggies, And filled our days with playgroups to the core; And stacked the blocks, and read the bedtime tales With a sweet cuddle; and set laughing more, And still more; later singing them sleep, Until we think sweet days will never cease, For God has o'er-blessed this little spell.
And the lovely original, in case you're unfamiliar with it:
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