What I miss now that Chip is not a baby

(I wrote this in March 2005 when Chip was 3 months old.)

What I will miss when Chip is no longer a baby:

• How tiny yet present he is.
• How just showing up makes him stop crying and start cooing and laughing.
• How simple his needs are.
• His goofy toothless grins.
• That he lets me cuddle and kiss him as long as I want to.
• How excited he gets when I get him out of his crib in the morning.
• How the top of his bald head smells.
• How great it is to kiss the back of his neck.
• That doesn’t yet know how to lift up his arms when I reach to pick him up.
• That he always manages to stick his little cold hands on my bare skin.
• That sometimes he gets so excited to nurse that he tries to eat his own hands.
• That when he gets excited he flails his body around as hard as he can, and how everything gets him excited.
• That he is my last baby.

And I was right. I miss all those things. Sigh…