It’s children’s day today and the kids were like “WE SHOULD CELEBRATE!” and I asked them what they had in mind and they were all “how about some snacks and we can have fun together maybe go swimming or the playground” and then I was like “this is your entire life, guys – having snacks and having fun hanging out together” and they thought about it for a moment and were all “yeah ok, good point! let’s get on it.”
As it turns out, they’re all headed for a super fun children’s day carnival at church and for the first time this morning, Hayley announced that she was going to partake in this big kid activity because she’s a big girl and I was all kinds of here for it.
“Mommy’s not going to be there, but you’re going to have a great time with kor kor and jie jie ok?” She nodded, suddenly looking all grown up and decidedly unbaby.
“I’ll have so much fun!” she said, sounding just a little unsure, before planting a kiss on my cheek and hopping up the bus with her little backpack and all of the resolve she could gather. “I’ll miss you, mom!”
My heart isn’t built for this – saying goodbye, even if just for half a day.
//
For the first time in too many years, I find myself with zero kids and a whole lot of me time and I’m not sure what to do with myself. I thought about going back to bed and reading a book like I’ve been dreaming of doing for such a long time. Which I did for a while, and it was delightful. Then I had breakfast and went to the gym and blitzed through my inbox and had a second coffee and is this a sneak preview of how my future feels like?
I’ve scheduled my life around the kids since Truett came along 11 years ago and life feels grounded with them around. I’ve gotten good at finding pockets of time to do everything else while having the luxury of sneaking in a delicious baby cuddle in the middle of my day. Multitasking feels normal and the intensity of kid-related mayhem is comforting to me. My brain tells me that I should relish these moments of finding myself but when the kids aren’t here, things feel like they are all up in the air. I’ve suddenly got all the time in the world and guess what I’m doing? I’m sitting here making plans for how to spend the rest of the day once the kids are back.
My future can take its time to get here, is what I’m saying.
3 Comments
Hi Daphne, I’m still reading your blog from time to time and it’s amazing how you still keep up with blogging after all these years!
Can’t believe that truett is 11 now. I still rmb your post on truett’s first day in P1; I rmb that you only had 2 kids when we first met; I also rmb those posts when you announced number 3, 4, 5. :)
Always love your writing and enjoy reading about how loving your children are towards one another.
Just dropping by to say hi~ :))
Hi Yiwei!! So lovely to hear from you how are you? It’s been too long since melbourne, that was really fun :) Did you know that I used to have to google translate your posts because your chinese is like another level.
Yeah the kids are growing up way too fast and soon the 2 big kids will be teenagers, I don’t know if I’m ready for that.
Stay in touch babe!!
Amazing post-Daphne.
Thanks for sharing this with us.
Keep posted.