Little Reminders

 There are times, more often than I care to admit, I sink into a woeful funk. Usually, it happens when I come downstairs, freshly showered after cleaning the tornado aftermath that was my house, and step into a mound of crushed sour cream and onion chips. Or when I finally get a hold of a scheduler to set up a doctor's appointment after being on hold for twenty minutes and suddenly the girls decide to throw themselves into a migraine-inducing full-scale screaming/screeching/hair-pulling/pinching/kicking match over who has more Littlest Pet Shop toys at that exact moment. Events much akin to those are usually the triggers. I get annoyed and resentful...and at my darkest moments, I end up asking, "And I abandoned my promising career for this? To serve as a glorified yet unpaid maid?"

And then I stumble across images like this:

Or this:

And this:

Perhaps it's because she's our last baby, but pictures of her this little...they're the perfect little reminder that I, in fact, WILL MISS THIS. 

When it's just the Mister and I, in our quiet little house with a vegetable garden in the back, and gleaming floors and countertops, I know I will mourn for the days of crushed Doritos under the table...of the sound of muffled giggles behind the closet door when the girls sit in there and play with flashlights...the blaring volume from Mister D's PS3...even the fighting and the tears...especially the urgent calls for "Mommy!"

One day, they won't need me to clean up their mess or break up fights and have them hug each other until they laugh. One day I will be the one pacing the floor excitedly until my grown up babies come over for a visit with babies of their own. And so I am thankful for those little reminders that set me straight back on the road of grateful living. Yes, that career I left behind pales in comparison to the role I hold providing the way I am doing for these little ones. Yes, it is worth it and more. Thank goodness for little reminders.