8 years ago, when we got married, I couldn’t have pictured this life we have now. 5 years ago, after Devin died, I certainly couldn’t conceive of a future in which I was happy and full, pleasantly busy, days filled with little joys. I remember when I was pregnant with Devin, looking around my house thinking that we were going to have a baby in here. I just couldn’t wrap my head around it. And yet here I sit, day after day. I am exhausted every single day because one or the other one wakes me, but I somehow survive on just enough. There are tantrums and whining and “why?” three thousand times a day. There is food spilled every time I turn around and toys are littered across the floor no matter how many times I pick them up. Getting shoes on, coats on, everyone outside and strapped into the car seems to take me over 15 minutes each time I attempt it every day.

And I love it. Oh, I don’t always love it, and evenings have become a very slow countdown to bedtime so I can eat some chocolate and do something by myself for more than 10 seconds. But the big picture is just so good. I marvel at all these things they learn, I delight in the many hugs and kisses I get. I love watching them grow. I love watching them become who they are. I love being here as they figure it all out.

I love having two of them. I wasn’t sure for a while, when Ember was a baby, I wasn’t sure if I was done or if there was a big part of me that wanted to do it all over again. Two is hard though. They are each very different, they each go through different yet equally frustrating moods and stages, and they both take turns waking up at night. I’m not quite sure how I would juggle three. Not saying that I couldn’t, just that… two is good. Two is enough for me. My heart is so full. (My arms are also very full, as both generally want to sit on my lap at the same time.)

They both are getting just so big, legs hanging off my lap. I’m glad I’m still nursing Ember, it’s some nice quiet cuddle time with her, makes me feel all soft and content. I wish I had some way of getting Kate to chill out and stop wiggling and climbing!

One Christmas when I was maybe about 8 years old I was given as a gift a nice little box with a bunch of beads. I’d never done much with beads but I liked the idea, and many of the beads I got were very pretty. I spent a lot of time putting the beads into the separated compartments of the box, planning what to make with them, sorting them by how much I liked them and how they might go together. I had all these ideas but I didn’t want to use up the beads that I had; if I used them for one project then I wouldn’t have them anymore for the next project, and I only had very limited numbers of the beads I loved the most.

I never used those beads. When I moved out they were still carefully sorted into the compartments of that box, stored in a cubby in my closet.

I still do the same thing. I still wait until every single duck is in a row, every possibility accounted for, every decision weighed and plotted – but of course few things in life can be mapped out so perfectly without deviation or uncertainty. I still wait for that next batch of spare beads that I never get.

And I’m not talking about things necessarily, either. Kate’s room is still only about 80% done because I couldn’t find the right wallpaper border – instead of a less perfect border there is a messy overlap of colors where a border ought to be. The frames I bought for my bedroom are still empty and unhung because I couldn’t decide which photos to put in them. I get lost in an ever-degrading spiral of options, I get overwhelmed, and then I walk away.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how much time in my life I waste being weighted down with what really comes down to inconsequential details. Will it ever really matter if I get Kate the ladybugs sheets or the nature sheets? Unlikely. Maybe in some small fashion. But I just spent several hours of my life – hours of my time that I really don’t have to spend – researching every possible option. Part of it, okay, I do like decorating so it starts out being fun. But it always ends with me being frustrated and overwhelmed and ready to abandon the entire project.

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Adolescence is a generally a time of making stupid decisions and taking risks. I, unlike pretty much any of my peers, was the one hanging back saying, “I don’t think that’s a good idea, someone’s going to get in trouble, this will inconvenience someone somewhere.” Which sounds really great in theory – how refreshing, a considerate, self-aware teenager! How wonderful! But there are lessons to be learned in adolescence, lessons about screwing up and getting back on your feet, about failure, about taking risks. Lessons that I never learned. I got through by always doing well, always getting the grades, always doing the right thing. I got through by being absolutely terrified of doing something wrong. That fear has never really left me.

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Kate is a lot like me in many ways. She is sensitive and cautious and thoughtful. All wonderful things, I love her personality. And I have to admit, having a kid who is cautious and listens to you feels like a great thing with a 2 year old. But I see in her all the tendencies that I have… the fear to upset people, the fear to do something wrong. I am trying to help her figure it out, setting her on her feet and telling her she’s okay… trying to tell her that she can fall and get back up again. But I worry. How do I teach something when I haven’t really learned it myself?

I remember reading on more than one occasion that no child is raised the same as another child (as it pertains to behavioral theory and nature vs. nurture and all that). I understood that logically, factually, but it didn’t really make full sense to me, I mean if kids are raised in the same house with the same parents and same values and such. My gut said it was pretty much the same. I didn’t fully appreciate just how different it would be until I had two kids.

Yes we are the same parents and this is the same house, but what a different experience it is to have only one live child as a baby as compared to having a baby when you have a toddler. There is so much more noise and bustle and things to do; more demands on mom and dad, less time for sitting and relaxing. The house looks totally different than it did when Kate was little as it is now cluttered with all kinds of toddler toys; what do you want to bet Ember wants to play with all those rather than the silly baby toys. The routine, too, is totally different. With Kate I made it all up as I went along, adapting our outings and daily lives around her naps and needs. This time, well, Kate takes precedence – she only gets one nap a day so by default is is the most important, Ember’s naps can and will fluctuate around that. Our outings are mostly for Kate, Ember is happy observing whatever goes on.

It’s now quite easy for me to see why there are certain similarities between first borns and youngest children – the family dynamics shift each each kid, adapting to the new structure. The older child has to become a little more independent, to do things themselves when they are capable; the youngest gets shlepped around and hopefully is okay with being put down while mama chases after a toddler or makes lunch.

I’m not saying it’s bad – far from it. It’s full, it’s different. You lose some one-on-one time with the kids, but gain the interaction between them. I find it fascinating from a scientific viewpoint.

I do a lot of writing about what the girls are doing, how they behave, what they are learning. I realized that I do very little writing about what is going on in the world around us. I want to get back to writing for me – my thoughts, my life, my opinions. I feel a little broken, though. I’ve become a lot more sensitive in the past few years, a lot less able to take a stand and hold an opinion. I don’t know why that is – I thought it would go the other way, but I’ve lost some confidence and conviction. It’s really bothering me right now and I need to find a way to get it back. I am unsure what I am going to do with this blog, either have everything here together or move the kids’ updates elsewhere. I just don’t know.

The other thing I thought about is how neat it would be for the girls to one day be able to look back at our life in the bigger picture, to see history unfold through our family’s eyes. Of course maybe they won’t care, but I always err on the side of writing everything down. I feel like I’m a hoarder of memories. I relentlessly toss stuff from my house but I keep every picture and note and journal. I know I won’t likely ever need the info, and the most the girls will do is compare their children to their own development, but I just feel like I need to have it just in case.