Desperately in love...again...

I have a confession to make: I have never liked babies. It sounds terrible, but it's true. I liked kids once they were old enough to talk and play and interact, but I always thought babies were rather boring. They just cried and slept and lay there...they didn't do anything. And they kind of all looked alike. With 4 younger siblings,
I spent a lot of time around babies and babysat a lot, but I never was really a "baby person." I believe at one point I even swore I was never having any!

When I was pregnant with Joseph, my first baby, I was actually really worried that I wouldn't like him. I was excited about having a child but I thought I would just have to endure the baby phase until he was old enough to be interesting. Everyone kept reassuring me that I would love MY baby once he was here, but I was afraid they were wrong, and I felt secretly guilty over it. Well, of course they were right and I was wrong. I feel deeply and completely in love with this 9 pounds of baby boy and never got over it! I wouldn't leave him at all, with anyone, and I didn't really even like to let other people hold him. I had to take a grad school final that I'd missed while giving birth to him about a month after he was born, and it almost killed me to leave him for those 2 hours. Robert had to come to UNM with me and hold Joseph in my office while I took the final so I could see him the very moment I was done, and I couldn't concentrate too well because I kept thinking about my baby while I was supposed to be writing...I had been planning to go back to grad school after taking a semester off, but that final convinced me otherwise. I was never leaving my baby again!

Joseph as a baby

When James came along, only 14 months after Joseph, I didn't feel ready for another baby. I loved Joseph so much that I worried I wouldn't be able to love James as much. Once again, silly me, I was proven quite wrong. I fell in love all over again with James...but I still loved my toddler Joseph every bit as much. It was like those commercials for Double Mint gum: "double your pleasure, double your fun!" Two babies to play with, two babies to obsess over and worry about and adore.

James as a baby

 When Gabriella was born, it was easier. I knew I would love her just as much, and I was REALLY excited to have a girl simply because I hadn't had one yet. Everything was so different with her because she WAS a girl - it was all new and exciting. Pink clothes and ruffles and tiny dresses...oh my! I was in heaven.

Gabriella as a baby

But when Elora was born, I worried again (can you tell I'm a worrier?!), not that I wouldn't love her, but that I wouldn't be so excited. We'd already had boy and girl babies, so there wouldn't be anything new there. Fourth baby in five years....everything had already been done. We knew exactly what to expect; how could there be any more surprises? Well, you'd think I'd learn, considering how often I had been wrong! Her very birth was a surprise - with a quick, quick labor and extremely easy delivery, right into the hands of her waiting Daddy, since nobody, including the midwives, got there in time!

and...Elora!

 It was such a sweet and perfect moment, just the three of us, and I have the fondest memories of Elora's birth out of all of them! There were a few rocky months in getting adjusted to having 4 - as I discuss in this post - but mostly that was because of the older kids. Elora  was my favorite because she couldn't destroy anything yet! ;-)

To my relief, my fears of not being as taken with this fourth baby were groundless - I am every bit as crazy about her as I was about all the others! 6 months old, she is so sweet and chubby and fun. Our favorite nickname for her is "Elorable" because she IS! She is so interested in everything her big brothers and sister are doing that she will sit and stare at them for hours. She wants SO badly to participate in everything that she is scooting/army crawling across the floor and grabbing things off the table. Her enormous smile is punctuated by her two little teeth that finally popped through. She can stand up holding onto things and I wouldn't be surprised if she just started walking one of these days and skipped crawling all together. I love her differently - but every bit as much - as each of my other children.

It is such an amazing thing to me that you can love 4 children - and one husband - SO much that they are all the most important person in the world to you...at the same time. Love is the only thing that multiplies when you divide it. (I like this kind of math!) I think I have finally learned this lesson and I will not have to worry if I have another baby - or even if I have 10 more babies! I know that I will fall in love with each and every one of them.