Monday, December 14, 2009

Milestones

Why is it that every milestone that I look forward to, every step towards the girls' independence, makes things 1000 times more difficult for me? Each skill they master, I convince myself, will give me more down time, as they start taking care of things for themselves I will start to gain the legendary “down time” which I once had hours of? I haven’t really had a moment of down time, with a few notable exceptions, since the lovelies arrived. But I keep thinking… the bigger they get, the more I will have. Right?

Take crawling, for example. The art of locomotion via rolling is an inexact one at best, so the kids, if they wanted something, needed me to get it for them. Crawling, I thought, will make that so much easier! They will be able to seek out their own toys, amuse themselves, frolic around the house and tire their cute little selves out! Sure, I may have a couple of extra toys to pick up here and there, but it will make things SOOOO much easier! I shall sit and drink martinis whilst the little ones crawl about the family room.

HAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

First of all, forget about the family room. Why would you want to be on that mushy carpet when the rest of the house is covered in wonderful, unforgiving tile? And why would you stay in there where there is NO cat bowl to lick, when there is a cat bowl in the kitchen, a mere 6 feet away? I can not count how many times I have pried the cat food bowl out of Sophia’s clutch, her screaming the whole while. And Soph is still only scooting, Olivia is the one who really means business. We put up the pool gate, in the event that she should figure out how to open the sliding glass door and get out on the patio. Sounds crazy, but if you know this kid you know that may not be that much of a stretch.

And feeding themselves. That SURELY will make things easier. Whatever will I do with all the downtime I will gain not having to shovel little spoonfuls of puree into their adorable pie holes? I will TELL you what I will do with all that extra time! PICK UP CHEERIOS OFF OF EVERY SURFACE IN THIS HOUSE. HOW do I get Cheerios in my hair every day? Or stuck to my butt? Wasn’t the dog supposed to help me clean underneath the high chairs when the girls started feeding themselves? When did he become so damn finicky? Last night the girlies had whole wheat pasta, which, I have learned, is a perfectly acceptable finger food. They did an amazing job of feeding themselves. It still took me 20 minutes to get all of the sauce off them, and all of the pasta off of the floor and out of the high chairs.

Soon they will be talking. Sophie already says “Co-da” when she sees the dog. (Wait a minute. Shouldn’t MAMA be her first word? After all, he doesn’t even clean up under the damn highchairs. I feed them AND clean up. Also I brought them into the world and all that. And he gets top billing? Unfair.) When they are talking, you see, things will be easier. Because they will be able to tell me what they want. Oh CRAP. THEY WILL BE ABLE TO TELL ME WHAT THEY WANT. Probably pink clothes. Noooooo….

I am not complaining. They are meeting and exceeding all of their milestones. I know that there are those who are not so fortunate. All too soon these will just be memories. If I am lucky. Truthfully I have a terrible memory, which is why I take so many pictures. And it’s why I force myself, every day, to take a deep breath and just enjoy things the way they are. Even if it’s just for a moment, even if the moment I’m enjoying is imperfect. They are already 8 months old. There are so many milestones to look forward to. But there are already so many that we have passed. I just know that when they are walking things will get easier. And I will have so much down time I will have to take on a hobby to keep from getting bored. Right?