I WASN'T READY YET!

I know that with which each passing day, our children bring us so much joy and new experiences. I know that in the weeks to come, Jackson will be taking his first steps. There is so much to look forward to in the next coming year that I can't even wrap my mind around it. But on the same token, I am sad for the things I will never have again... at least not from him.

He grew out of so many things (not just clothing) before I was ready to say "Ok, we can be done with that now." It was hard that it wasn't MY decision to put them away. I wasn't ready to switch him from the newborn size diapers to the size 1. Didn't size 1 seem SO big compared to those tiny NB ones? This was the first of many that I had to say goodbye to before I was ready.

I knew the time was coming near to pack away his newborn clothes and pull out the 0-3 mos and 3-6 mos. So for about two weeks straight, I alternated my two favorite outfits on him. Just so that I felt better when I had to pack them away.

Before Jackson was 3 months old, his naps were quite sparatic. My favorite part of the day was sitting on the couch watching my soaps while Jax slept on my chest face down. I remember one time Paul came home from work, which is when I realized that Jackson and I had sitting on the couch for 4 hours without getting up. :) I would rub his back and feel his chest rise and fall with each breath. I knew at that time that I wasn't going to take it for granted. I knew it wouldn't be long before he wouldn't sleep on me anymore. So I did my best to soak it all in. When he was three months old, I made the difficult decision to start putting him in his crib for all the daytime naps. As much as I loved that time with him and craved for it, it was more important to me that he learned to sleep without me.

I used to love dancing with Jackson. I would still love to dance with him, if he would tolerate me :) But he doesn't have the patience to rock back and forth in my arms anymore. Most nights after his bath and before his bedtime bottle - I would turn on some music and sway with him in the living room. He's my little man, my Baby Man and as much as I want to him to grow up - I also don't want there to be distance between us. I just hope that as he does grow up... I also grow - into the idea of him being an individual and no longer completely dependant on me. But I'm not ready for the D word yet ;)

He recently went into a new big boy carseat. This also was a change for me. However, more of a good one. I had gotten to the point where I was just leaving the infant seat attached to base anyways because I couldn't lift it with Jackson in it any longer. Too darn heavy!!

This is Jax showing me how big is his in his new car seat.

I realized one day that I seriously needed to man up and just go buy him new pjs. Those 6-9 were hardly snapping anymore because he had outgrown them... but I didn't want to get 12 month size. I wasn't ready! I was at walmart looking at their fleece zip up sleepers. I couldn't believe how big that 12 month size looked to me! I took the hanger and actually "stood" the pjs on the floor to see how high the pjs came up on my leg. It came up to my upper thights. I was like "NO WAY, is he going to fit in this!" And the footies had grippies on them. I wasn't ready for him start walking! Well, seems my son has been growing underneath my nose without me realizing it :) They fit him almost perfectly. There's just a bit of room in the footies.

There is so much to look forward to. It just seems like a lifetime ago when we brought him home.