Slow your roll and gratitude.

Today I had the immense privilege to doula for a friend, to help welcome their sweet son into the world. To shed happy tears when he was placed on her chest and to listen to his sweet little newborn cries. To watch two happy parents with their love swelling for one another and for their new baby. To hear them whisper how much they already love him and how they will take care of him. What an honor to be a part of such special first moments.

I was thinking about how newborn cries fade into cooing.... that fade into belly laughs....that fade into babbling....that all of the sudden turn into words and sentences and much, much more.

Piper just turned 5 months old the other day, I feel like I was just holding her to my chest when she was born and listening to her sweet little newborn cry. But, those sweet little cries are in the past now, only in my memory and when I hear another little newborn cry it transports me back there.




Now, we have full on belly laughs (which are SO FUN) and babbling and her learning how to make different sounds with her mouth. All of the exploring and changing she is doing is so fun. But, sometimes I just want to snuggle her and tell her not to get any bigger. Can I do that?

Can't I keep her small for a little longer?






 I think Clayton asked Hannah if she would not get any bigger a while ago, but yet, she gets bigger and older every single day.

Since I know she is only going to continue to get bigger it makes me treasure nursing her to sleep at nap and then laying next to her watching her sleep. Enjoying her open, relaxed hands and her completely content face.

I can make a complete fool out of myself to make her laugh, to hear and enjoy those joyful sounds and her big toothless grin. To let her grab my face and give me big slobbery kisses. To blow raspberries on her belly and get more laughs. To watch Lucy and Hannah do their own special things to make their sister laugh. It's all such a joy to experience in the moment.

Let's be clear, all of the moments aren't unicorns and rainbows. But after reading 1,000 Gifts by Ann Voskamp I am reminded that counting these little blessings in life are what brings contentment and joy in our life. To see these things for what they are, little things that later we realize were the big things is to help us to enjoy life to the fullest. To not always be looking to the next "best" thing. I am as guilty of it as the next, to be thinking about what the future holds, instead of enjoying the moment God has placed me in now. The good ones, the hard ones, the funny ones, the sad ones and the snuggly ones. They are all moments to be treasured.

Take a moment today to write down 5 things that happen today that are little blessings. Ones that you may not have thought of as being a "blessing" but that if you were to look back on it, it would bring a tear to your eye or a smile to your heart.

Like me calling Piper Stinky McStinkerton when she needed a diaper change and the smile and laugh that came after that. Dirty diaper, a blessing? Ha, well maybe not so much, but that moment was! It is all dependent on the view in which you are looking at the situation. Do all dirty diapers illicit this response in me? Well no, of course not. But sometimes when I slow down and look around, there are so many things to be thankful for, that normally I just pass by.

So here's to counting more blessings every day and enjoying the joy and contentment that come from practicing seeing these moments.

So here are my 5 things today.
1. Lying next to a sleeping, content, Piper
2. The moment a mom holds her newborn baby.
3. Newborn baby cries.
4. Piper's Belly laugh when I kiss her
5. Lucy and Hannah loving each other with genuine words of praise.