I am 36 weeks pregnant. I've spend the day making the final preparations for the arrival of my new baby girl, Charlie Maria Bella. Her crib is sitting in my room with fresh, new blankets. The space it left in her sisters room seems gaping, and completes the look of Alex's "Big Girl Room". It's crazy how something as simple as moving a crib out of the room seems to make Alex seem that much older.
And as ready as I am for this pregnancy to be over, I know that I must savor and cherish these last few weeks as just the four of us. It has been just the four of us for four years. We have all learned our routines. We each know what part the others play in our family dynamic. And I love it. It will be a bittersweet passing for me.
Tonight is a quintessential moment of perfection as "just the four of us".
David and I went out on a date. Perhaps the last date where we are leaving just two babies at home instead of three. Dinner was divine. Instead of going to a movie afterwards, we decided to buy "Kung Fu Panda" and go home and watch it with our babies, Jakob and Alex.
We return home and call upstairs to the kids to come down and see the surprise we've gotten them. Jakob comes down the stairs, wearing just his shortes and a robe with sports balls all over it. He looks like a little man. Alex comes down wearing her princess tee shirt and some too-small pink sweats. We show them "Kung Fu Panda" and they respond as if they've been given the gift of immortality. Alex, running down the hall to her Nana, is exclaiming, in her sweet voice, "It's what I've always been wanting!"
We settle down on the couch to watch the movie. Alex, wrapped in a blanket and laying in what's left of my lap; myself and David, sharing a blanket; and Jakob on the other side of David, in his robe. Jakob leans over to David and tells him "Daddy, I can't wait to laugh!"
We are sitting watching the movie, and I am suddenly overwhelmed by the perfection of my life at this moment.
My funny, stubborn, willful, thoughtful daughter who has beautiful feet. My husband, who fought so hard for me, even as I was breaking his heart. And my sweet, sensitive, witty, bright son who loves to make his sister laugh. It becomes almost surreal in it's perfections. Rockwellian in it's tenderness. Simpson-esque in it's humor.
At this moment, I feel like the luckiest, most blessed girl (I still don't think of myself as a woman!) in the wide world.
I shall cherish this scene in my heart for the rest of my life. Even as I look forward to moments that will equal, perhaps surpass, this one in emotion, I know that right now, at this time, there are no other three people in the world that I would rather be with.
It's funny how at such unseeming times, God reveals himself in something as simple and complex as a family. I wasn't particularly seeking Him. Honestly, I wasn't even thinking about him. But, looking at my family, it's undeniable that he is here. Watching "Kung Fu Panda" with us.
I can't wait for Charlie to join us, and be a part of something so sacred.
