My lil happy Munchkin is back!

I just had the best evening.

The past few days leading up to Monday were kind of miserable for Baby. With this hot Rexburg heat she developed a heat rash over her chest/tummy/neck/head over last week/the weekend. Needless to say, my happy baby was pretty emo and not herself for a few days. Luckily, with some good advice from friends, I baby powdered her chest up, and the next day her skin was lookin' good! And thankfully, her sweet attitude returned to normal, as well, and only got sweeter in the days following.

One thing I do enjoy while she is sick (not the fact that she is sick, but..) is that she doesn't mind cuddling and rocking in the recliner with me. She is not a cuddler, so when she curls up in my arms and lets me rock her, it takes me back to those good o'l days of newborn-ness, where she had no choice BUT to cuddle! mwahaha!

Anyway, I guess I am one spoiled mama, but I get soo frustrated when Baby's not her normal self. It just throws our whole days off. She gets frustrated and whiney and it makes it harder for me to do my job as happy mama and I get frustrated that nothing I do pleases her. Not that I expect every day to be easy, but it helps when we're happy. These are the best days of our life, right? I want all of her memories of baby days to be happy ones. (Yes, I know I'm living in my own lil bubble!)

So, having my sweetie-pie, "ney-nah" saying, screaming in excitement, giggling-'til-she-can't-breathe baby back, we've been having soooo much fun. Seriously! Yes, I said "we've" as in, me too! I do have fun with her. Today was a blast. Our great day kind of started earlier when we were laying in bed and I showed her a picture (the one at the very bottom) of me kissing her and I said, "Look, it's Mommy kissing the Baby Girl." and then she would lean in and give me a wet slobbery kiss, over and over. It was super precious. I love Baby time.

But later, after dinner, when Jonathan was gone and we were all alone, I kept growling at her and making silly noises and she was just giggling away! Then I would sneak around on my hands and knees around the recliner. She thought I was going one way, and as she'd start to follow, I'd meet her back on the other side and say "getcha!" without her knowing I was even there and she'd go into a giggling fit! She loved being "scared." Oh, we had such a fun time. I must've gone around the chair at least 15 times. Then we laid on our backs in front of the fan and she would crawl on my tummy and give it hugs. She is the sweetest thing. 

I definitely will not take for granted my happy baby any more.

I was talking with a friend about our babies and our good and bad moments, and she mentioned how when she struggles all night with her baby, which doesn't happen very often, she thinks of other mothers who have to go through that every single night. It was very humbling for us, because when we have children who are relatively easy to raise, it's easy to forget about the moms who go through tough nights (and days, consecutively) all the time. I have a few friends with fairly new babies who are still trying to get some sleep (and trying to function) while baby-raisin' and sometimes they feel like failures and want to give up. Sometimes it's so hard to not get discouraged and want to just skip past this distressful time.

In a way, I think they're stronger than most moms because their work is harder. And the work just never ends. But you strong moms try your best, because you know the result is worth it, even if the present experience is exhausting and sometimes.. heartbreaking. I wrote a post similar to this topic about raising human beings, last month.

The other day Jonathan and I discussed how looking back now, it's so very hard to remember Lydia as a newborn. I look at new babies now and get kinda sad that I can't remember every perfect detail about her that I thought I would totally remember, back then. And I so wish I could. All I have are pictures and faded memories. (I'm also thankful I blog.. glad I wrote it down somewhere.) It seems that the older she gets, the memories of toddlering seem to push newborn memories out of the way. With each tiny accomplishment, those precious first memories seem to dissapate, and I wish I could stop it and remember forever. Every detail. Mom's hold on to every tiny moment. Here's a quote that accurately describes how fast wee ones grow:

"The baby you hold in your arms will grow quickly as the sunrise and the sunset of the rushing days." - Pres. Hinckley

I'd like to end with what President Gordon B. Hinckley said; it couldn't be more perfectly stated. I encourage you to read the whole thing. In his 2000 General Relief Society Conference address called Your Greatest Challenge, Mothers, he says:

"You have nothing in this world more precious than your children. When you grow old, when your hair turns white and your body grows weary, when you are prone to sit in a rocker and meditate on the things of your life, nothing will be so important as the question of how your children have turned out. It will not be the money you have made. It will not be the cars you have owned. It will not be the large house in which you live. The searing question that will cross your mind again and again will be, How well have my children done?

If the answer is that they have done very well, then your happiness will be complete. If they have done less than well, then no other satisfaction can compensate for your loss."