Baby Jack

A few weeks ago Ellie's primary teacher allowed her to hold his couple-month-old baby while he taught the lesson.  She was instantly enamored with baby Josh and ever since that day,  Ellie has been begging us for a new baby brother or sister.  We didn't beat around the bush telling her that that she would always be our "baby" and not to get her hopes up on that front.  Eventually she started begging for baby playdates instead.  She insisted that she just wanted to play with a baby and that she would fully take care of him while he was at our house. 

Once again, I had to squash her enthusiasm when I told her that most mommies didn't let their tiny babies play at people's houses yet and that babies were a little harder to take care of than it seemed.   

Luckily where her Mommy and Daddy were unable to help, Uncle Matt and Aunt Karey came to the rescue. 

On Thursday night, my sister-in-law Karey gave birth to a very prompt (on his due date) little guy.  It was a whirlwind delivery, taking place a mere 5 minutes after arriving to the birthing center, but he was healthy, strong, and big (8 lbs. 13 oz.) and they were inviting us to visit as soon as we could get up to their house. 

So, today we went to visit.   

...and we were all enamored.    It may be 7+ years past the birth of my last baby, but I still feel right at home snuggling a little newborn.  

Baby Jack slept almost the whole time we were there, which did nothing to dispel Ellie's notions that babies are anything more than cuddles and cuteness. 

None of us could  get enough of this little bundle of sweetness and we often found ourselves just staring at his tiny little features...

Even Spencer was in love, bragging that baby Jack was one of the cutest babies he'd ever seen in his life. Although I agree fully with Spence's assessment on Jack's cuteness, I think Spencer was extra in love because Jack's middle name is Spencer. 

The only one of the kids who showed no-interest in holding or ogling over Jack was Adam.  He came close a couple of times, once to see if his pointer finger was longer or shorter than baby Jack's foot (longer), but other than that just did his own thing and ignored all the baby talk. 

 Glen tried to convince Adam to try holding him by demonstrating  how it is properly done.  The demonstration did get the "baby" to laugh, but did not change his mind about wanting to hold a baby himself.

And the happiest kid of all there was Jack's big brother, Lincoln....

He was so mad at his Mom when, after experiencing some false labor, they came home from the birthing center without a baby.   Now that Jack is here though, he was all smiles and bragged about how his parents had chosen his favorite name for his brother.

I left their house with a huge smile on my face and feeling a little nostalgic, not only for the warm cuddles of a newborn and the entertaining conversations with a 4-year-old, but also for the comparative simplicity of parenting in those early years.  I'm not saying that those early years are easy by any stretch of the imagination, but looking back on those years from our current parenting standpoint,  they just don't seem quite as complicated as enforcing curfews, teaching morality, driving lessons,  and worrying every time they came home a few minutes late.    And even those seem downright simple compared to the life-and-death worry that has consumed us through most of this year. 

Afterward I was thinking though that Ellie might have been onto something...

....maybe a baby playdate every now and then is a great idea. 




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