So lately, C has been an absolute joy to me. She's 27 months old, talking in complete sentences - which are generally hilarious - and she's increasingly engaging in real play with her toys. I love watching her "cook cook" at her play kitchen, or pretend that it's time for the Breyer horses (passed down from her previously horse-crazy older sister's collection) are ready to go to sleep in their big wooden barn. She has this fantastically entertaining and ongoing conversation happening with her hands lately where she says absurd things like, "It's okay hands! Pretty soon we'll be out of this carseat and we can play!"
Here is a video of C playing with her toy kitchen. Please ignore frightening animatronic monkey heads sitting on the dining room table. Suffice it to say that E went through a phase about four years ago where he was obsessed with monkeys, and we now have all these wildly expensive yet creepily lifelike electronic monkeys that we are trying to figure out what to do with.
And I also love dressing her at this age, in adorable little get-ups with smocked dresses, corduroy jumpers, tights and mary janes. It's truly like playing dress up with a doll, only she's cuter. And yet even with all this exciting verbal, intellectual and emotional development, she's still very much a baby. She has baby fat on her face and legs. She sleeps in little footed jammies, and she has sweet baby snores when she sleeps (she still sleeps with us). In some ways, this age seems pretty much perfect.
C in the bath at 27 months.
But one of the great things about raising four kids of four very different ages (mine are currently 2, 11, 14 and 18) is knowing that each age has its special charms.I know that age two will be followed by the the amazing pretend play of age 4, and the wonder of watching your child read for the first time at age 6 or 7. In late elementary school, they are sweet, yet incredibly independent and smart, informing you of amazing facts and bits of information you really didn't know. Middle school allows you to begin to see them blossom into adolescents, with the first, charmingly awkward romantic advances, and that changing body that is as amazing as the changes of baby to toddler. Then there are the teenage years, where you get to have honest-to-goodness, REAL conversations with this almost adult person. Occasionally they even give you advice that's so wise and smart that it knocks your socks off.
Yep, each age has its charms...and its horrors. And those horrors are different for every child and every parent: the sleeplessness of the newborn, the constant nursing of the seven month old, the nasty diapers of toddlerhood, the complete meltdowns of preschoolers, the hassles and logistical challenges (softball practice, the costume for the school play, etc) of the elementary years, the mouthy sullenness of early adolescence, and finally the terrors - absolute terrors - that come with having a teenage child.
I've now lived through each and every stage, and like every parent, I have my favorite and less favorite ages. I have some friends who could barely tolerate the newborn phase, feeling that their heads (not to mention their boobs) would explode from the constant neediness. Other friends love, love, love the Class Mom, PTA President, Costume-Sewing, Lesson Shuttling phase that elementary and 'tween years bring. Some parents I know are all about teenagers, and have houses filled with their adolescent offspring's friends each weekend. I think that each parent's favorite age and stage is a combination of the parent's temperament, and the child's. For parents who have several kids, favorite stages can be different with each child, too.
Given all this, I will now reveal my favorite stages thus far:
- Newborn phase: Love it. I feel literally euphoric, and drunk on babylove. I love a newborn's tint hands and feet, and how they make that little mewing sound when they nurse. I love those tiny little newborn nightties, I love bassinets and baby swings and all the accoutrements of newbornness. I love those first weeks of getting to sit around in my nightgown, enjoying the occasional prescription narcotic pain reliever (recovering from childbirth, of course), and soaking in every second of newborn deliciousness. Yep, this is a favorite time for me. (Maybe I'm actually a bumpaholic! Heh;-) )
C, one week old (so only 37 weeks gestation)
- Infancy: I find the stage from about 6-18 months to be THE hardest stage of early childhood. During this period, each of my children have seemed kind of, well, pissed off. It's like, once they can sit up at about 5-6 months, they really want to be able to DO something, but they still can't. And that leaves them whiny and me peevish. And they want to be carried all the time, everywhere, which is hard to do, even with a babysling or backpack (my two fave babywearing items). All of mine started walking between about 11-13 months, so not long after that, when they stopped careening into everything with the drunken stagger that comes with being a brand new walker, they seemed a lot happier. And I was too. But one year olds are still pretty tricky creatures, even after they learn to walk. They have a tendency to want to do ridiculous things like eat catfood from the bowl in the kitchen, and that gets really old. Lots of meltdown tantrums at this age, too. At least with all of mine. They were grumpy right before they learned to walk, and grumpy again right before they learned to talk. After each developmental breakthrough, however, they each cheered right up.
- Toddler: I've already admitted to loving toddlerhood, and why (see above).
- Preschool: Everything I love about toddlerhood, only better! They sleep in later on weekends (yay!), no longer require diapers on outings (yay!) and they say even funnier things. But there is, for me, a bittersweet quality to the preschool age, as I know that - as my grandmother used to say about children this age, "that baby will soon be all used up." I'm already finding myself having some of that bittersweet sadness oflost babyhood about two year old C, because I know she's almost certainly my last baby.
E - sheer joy at age 4 or 5.
- Elementary years: I have enjoyed the heck out of each of my three eldest kids' elementary school ages, except for one thing: the school part. I am just terrible at keeping up with all those school papers I am supposed to sign and diorama assignments and soccer practice start times. And school seems to get more and more complicated with each child, too. (I swear it wasn't this complicated when H was a third grader.) And I've already written extensively of my hatred, sheer HATRED for our homework system. However, leaving the school logistics aside, I adore kids this age. They are so open and physical; I like the sounds of bouncy children rushing around the house. I love watching them play with their toys, and the fact that they still like toys (wait til you see how hard it gets to buy holiday gifts for your kids after toys no longer hold any appeal). I enjoy seeing their peer relationships start to develop in a more independent way, and I love reading chapter books, rather than little kid books, with them each night before bed. Ten year old girls haven't yet figured out that they are "supposed" to live their lives for anyone else, and their confidence blows me away. Ten year old boys haven't yet figured out that they aren't "supposed" to give lots of hugs and kisses to their mamas, and I love that. Yep, the elementary age years are pretty darn great overall.
H (12), J (8), E (5) - Fiat the dog - still certifiably insane six years later...
J and me, Edisto. She's about 8 years old here.
E and me at my wedding to Jon. E was eight years old here. Still little enough to snuggle.
- Middle School: For those of you who haven't been through it yet, I don't want to freak you out or anything, but here's the deal: middle school is just as scary as everyone says it is. (Example: that whole "sexting" thing? It isn't just some made-up ratings grab story for Dateline. SEVENTH AND EIGHTH GRADERS ARE REALLY DOING THAT!!!! AGGGGHHH! Quelle horreur!) The best advice I can give you about parenting a middle schooler is to do whatever you can to keep your child from growing up too fast for as long as you can. Don't give in to the "everyone else's mom lets them" whining, because as it happens, not every 11-12 year old has a cell phone and yes, you do have a right to read your middle schooler's email. . I made a lot of mistakes during middle school with H, and the biggest one was that in too many ways, I let go of too much of my absolute parental authority (and I mean authority in the truest, non-PC sense of the word) far too early, believing that I had some obligation to accommodate his need for autonomy and self expression. I was, as I've written previously, flat out wrong. So hang onto the reins as long as you can and as tightly as you can during middle school. Err on the side of too much authority rather than not enough. Keep a super tight control on technology use. And remember that each child is going to be different. In my own case, H made middle school quite....challenging for his mama (I don't think he would mind me saying that), while J, who just started ninth grade, made it easy as pie. Same family, different middle schoolers...
- High School: H, who just turned 18 this month, also made high school....uhhhh....challenging.(if by "challenging," you mean that his mother thought she might keel over and die if the whole thing got any harder). So I am probably the wrong person to ask on this one. But H is doing some serious growing up recently; he starts a new job this week, and starts college in January. I am really proud of him. (But he owes me BIG TIME for what he's put me through. I'm just sayin'....)
H and me; he's a freshman in high school here.
H and me, Christmas '07.
H, just turned 18.
To me, as a parent, high school is scary. It just is. It's far scarier than I realized when I sent H off for that first day of ninth grade. No matter how hard you try, you cannot completely protect your high schooler from bad people, choices, influences...But having gotten one child to the age of 18, I can now say that I am MUCH more confident being directive and yes, strict, with my teenagers-coming-along. Parents have to get comfortable and confident saying no, or even HELL NO to things like texting after 11 pm, unfiltered internet access at home or mushroom-glorifying Grateful Dead posters on your teenager's bedroom wall - anything that voilates your values as a person and a parent. It may be a cliche, but it's true: your job is not to make them happy or to be their pal. It's to get them safely to age 21 with a well developed character, and with your sanity intact. And I gotta tell you, that's waaaaay harder than it looks.
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