The littlest of our bunch just moved into her big-girl bed. She's three now, and two days before her birthday we disassembled the crib, borrowed the biggest's top bunk (with his grudging approval, on condition that it was only temporary until we can afford a bed), and set up her new slumber station. She is pleased as punch. She's clearly ready for it, too, because she has not once climbed out of it when she wasn't supposed to.
And now the crib is destined for a relative's home, to be used by a future baby. And so that's it? The kid spends three years of her life in this little protective cocoon, and now just like that she's grown up? No, of course not. She's still a little goofball of a babe. She's still in diapers. She still has a paci (although as far as she knows, three-year-olds leave their pacis in their beds). She isn't in school yet. She's still very much a baby, just a baby who is allowed to get herself out of bed in the morning to play. But I'm totally bummed out when I think that she is growing and changing. If I had my way, I'd always have a two-year-old.
I didn't really have this thought when Biggest and Middle left their cribs. The cribs then were just moving to the next in line (or to the dumpster, as the case was with the hand-me-down crib that got squeezed through too many tight doorways and never quite made it back to rectangle shape). So the parental anxiety about the Big Kid Bed was evenly matched with the excitement of a new baby--a replacement baby. But now, with Littlest, no one is coming up from the minors to replace her as the baby in the lineup. She's it, at least as far as we know.
Which may get me to the real point (not that I had a point when I started writing beyond announcing the Big Girl Bed). We have three. We've replaced ourselves in the population plus one, doing our part for the future of social security (for better or worse). (This is more than most Europeans can say.) With three kids, we have reached the point where other people say, "I don't know how you can manage with three." Seems silly: three is not much harder than two. Three kids is not a big family. My grandmother had nine siblings. We both grew up as one out of four.
Anyway, now here is the point (maybe). We talk about whether or not we are "done," or whether or not our family is complete. But...is it up to Us? I think we are both trying hard to discern whether God has more children in store for us. Our own progeny? Adoption? Foster care? When I think of the so-called roadblocks--money, time, space, age, health--I get very discouraged about growing our family, although I don't really feel like we're complete. But then I think of people I know who are raising more kids with less, and I think that we could do that, too. Some nights, though, I check on my kids as they sleep, and I think that we five make a whole. All of this is to say I'm beginning to sense that perhaps He has plans for us. Not that He's told me what they are.
And so we talk and pray and wonder and wait. And we hold on to our faith in His mystery. I guess that's the real point.
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