seven months have passed so quickly

Wow. Seven months already. It's so hard to believe.

We saw a woman in the grocery store last night, right around the time when Jadon was supposed to be asleep but was trilling and shrieking just to hear his own voice. She has an 18-year-old and a 21-year-old. She said she used to hate it when women came up to her in the grocery store and said, "You better treasure this time because it doesn't last long." She said she'd always think, "It can't pass quickly enough. I'm ready to start sleeping again." And then, she said, the time had ended, and it was much too quickly and she wanted to go back or just remember…but memories tend to fade.

Her point was that all those women were right. And she was encouraging Ben and me to treasure our time with Jadon while he is young and still somewhat dependent on us for his needs, though he is quickly losing that dependency. We assured her that we are treasuring that time.

So, this morning, when the monitor lights flashed and Jadon's voice filtered through the speaker at 1 a.m.—unusual for this baby who has slept through the night since he was two weeks old—I pulled my weary body out of bed and reminded myself that though these times can be difficult, they will be gone much too soon. Ben had beaten me to the crib and stood cradling Jadon in his arms while Jadon writhed and screamed because his gums are hurting so badly. Poor baby. We just sat there and held him, then placed him back in the crib when we were certain he'd fallen asleep.

It's the third time this week that we've gotten a patched-nights' rest. But we are remembering that those quiet moments spent in the dark of Jadon's room, kissing his soft cheeks and tracing his turned-up nose in the glow of the moon, are more precious than a few more moments of sleep.

My little boy has begun crawling. He manages slowly, though he gets across a room quickly—mostly because he'll inch forward and throw himself the rest of the way. It's a funny sight to see. He has begun eyeing things he'd like to put in his mouth and deliberately making his way toward them. Most of the time Mama has to intercede because it's something he shouldn't be playing with. And then he will scream in anger. Yep. He's got that Patton temper. Poor thing.

He's eating solid foods three times a day now, which will ready him for the three meals a day he'll eat when he's older. He's still a good eater and prefers eating from the spoon, which will be good for weaning him off the bottle. We still have not been able to convince him to hold his own bottle and cup…he figures why do it when someone else will? That's his daddy in him.

I read to him often from the Bible and some of his Dr. Seuss books. Ben is the designated story time reader for bedtime, though, because he does great voices and is really silly like that. Jadon absolutely loves it.

We're discovering he's super ticklish. I'm sure most children are, but Jadon wasn't laughing about it until now. He'll scrunch up his nose and open his mouth wide and smile. It's the most beautiful thing I've seen.

Mama is a word in his vocabulary, though I'm not sure he knows it's me yet. But he says it mostly when he's crying, so I wonder if I am not giving him enough credit. Sometimes, when he's sitting playing with his toys and I'm lying near him, he'll pull my arm toward him and bury his face in it and call for "Mama." Precious Mama's boy. I'm eating it up.

I wonder if Jesus was a Mama's boy.