The Dog Ate Your Baby Book

When my children were born without a glue gun clenched in their tiny fists, I took it as a sign, a sign that motherhood had nothing to do with scrap booking their precious milestones, and  that I was free to enjoy their childhoods without documenting like a scientist observing lab rats, every new thing they did.  Tooth development, motor skill gains, verbal advancements--it was enough just to applaud it.  I didn’t have to keep a faithful record.  Whew!  I should have been relieved, should have stuck to my story, but I didn’t.  Cuteness made me falter.

Swept away with love for my first baby, a slightly pre-mature five pound boy we named Samuel, it didn't

matter to me that I was off the hook as far as baby books were concerned, and so without hesitation, I bought a blue book, put on my lab coat, and started scrutinizing everything he did.  First tooth, first time rolling over, first word, first wobbly step—all of it was cataloged, because that’s what adoring mothers do, right?  They write down every detail…until they’re pooped.

I didn’t take the time to preserve for history’s sake the number of diapers I changed for Samuel, but it was a lot.  And just about the time he got the hang of going potty in the toilet, Julia was born, and before she was two, Caroline followed, and before she was launched, Victoria made her appearance.  And somewhere along the way I took off my lab coat, threw it on top of the laundry pile, and stopped writing down their every milestone.  I applauded, I hugged, I kissed, I twirled them around, but the day Victoria’s incisors poked through her pink gums is lost forever, as is the minute Caroline let go of my fingers and despite her iffy balance took a step toward her coaxing daddy.

There’s a seven year gap between Victoria and Charlotte, a big enough lull that the baby book flames were fanned, a pink book was purchased, entries were made, and I was on a roll until just as Charlotte turned fifteen months, Scarlett, her little partner in crime, was born.  Having six children is a bit like the Alamo—your survival hinges on understanding that you’re out numbered, so the sooner you turn your lab coat into a flag of surrender, the better.  A pink book wasn’t purchased for Scarlett, and there are things I wish I knew--her first sentence, what made her laugh as a baby, and what she said when we told her she was going to be a big sister to a baby boy we named Peter.

There are times I wish I would have found a way to keep wearing my lab coat and that on our book shelf, stacked one beside the other, were seven baby books chock full with precious information. And Madame Guilt, my old friend, whispers there should be.  What was my problem? What the heck was the matter with me anyway?  Sure seven kids is a lot, but other mothers with big families somehow succeeded at doing it.  Michelle Duggar probably has nineteen perfect baby books chronicling her children’s childhoods, each one, no doubt edged with ruffles she glue gunned into place.

   

I should have done more, tried harder.  Those priceless memories of tiny fingers caught in my hair, of milky breath, and toothless smiles—though it spanned twenty years (we like to stretch things out) it was a whirlwind.  Some of the memories are gone now, but some still swirl inside me, and this blog is my attempt to catch them and press them between pages, as well as share my thoughts on this thing called motherhood that is my life’s work.  No more excuses, no more saying the dog ate your baby book.  It’s time to get busy and make a new kind of baby book.  So here we go.