The Calm Before the Storm

I smile at W as he happily takes each crayon out of his box and plops them into another container.

He spends hours (Okay, maybe only about 10 minutes) meticulously lining up the crayons only to scatter them all over the room in a disorganized mess.

At almost a year and a half, my toddler is at a really great age.

He understands me… for the most part.

I understand him… for the most part.

I can trust him to play without sticking everything and anything in his mouth… for the most part.

He even sleeps through the nightI better have not just jinxed myself. 

I just get a kick out of the little person he has become in such a short amount of time. I look at him again. He has moved on to sticking the crayons into various crevices in furniture around our living room. I’m sure to find those crayons months later.  

The Calm Before the Storm

The whole scene makes me want to pull a Zach Morris and freeze time. I don’t want to find the crayons months later when he is two or three.

To be honest, two and three year olds scare me a little.

I spent an entire summer during my college years shuffling back and forth between a room of twelve 2 year olds and even more 3 year olds.

2 and 3 year olds are seriously crazy. 

I talk with other moms of older toddlers and it makes me even more scared. Words like time out, temper tantrums and attitude give me the shivers. Mommy in Sports even wrote an article on threenagers. I don’t think I ever want to find out if my baby earns the title of “threenager” or not.

Can’t I just keep my almost one and a half year old just as he is for the rest of his life?

How could there ever be a scowl on that sweet face? I can’t even imagine his feet stomping across the floor dramatically making his point known.

It’s a bittersweet feeling when you realize your son is approaching a new stage in his life.

It’s the calm before the storm.

Once you get a routine down and start feeling sure of yourself, you are thrown for a loop and faced with a whole new set of challenges. It happened when W left the newborn stage. It happened when he became a toddler. It will happen again when he becomes an older toddler.

And, as much as I love this stage in W’s life, I know I will love the next stage just as much, even if it’s in a different way.

He may start to throw temper tantrums, but that also means he will be able to better express himself.

He may start to have more attitude, but that also means that he is using his brain to get what he wants.

He may start getting out of his bed or be scared of the dark, but that just means he is becoming more aware of his surroundings.

Ultimately, we can’t slow down time. It’s going to keep marching on. The only thing left to do is to hold on, take each moment as it comes and learn as you go.

All of a sudden I hear the distinctive sound of a tiny foot firmly plant itself on the ground followed by the squawk of a very strange bird.

I glanced over at W.

There he is… beet-red in the face, stomping his feet, yelling at the sofa for presumably stealing his purple crayon.

I shake my head and laugh.

We may be approaching the next stage sooner than I thought.

The Calm before the Storm

What stage are you in with your child? Let me know in the comment section below! 

 

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