You know that moment you gave your precious bundle their first cup of juice. They roll in around in their mouth, suck on their precious little tongues, and drool in utter bliss down their chins, necks, and bibs. Then look you get like, “wow you are the coolest thing ever, you must really love me, this is so awesome”. Us mom’s know that look, and we cherish it for years to come. It revitalizes us during those moments when big brother puts sisters barbie in the toilet about the same time that baby pulls off diaper in the middle of the kitchen.
Those moments where we bring our children joy and they let you know for sure that is exactly what you have done, become fewer and farther between as our children age. Before you know it, it becomes more and more difficult to earn those sweet appreciative glances.
The joy of those “I love you awesome Mom” moments are those that most often they sneak up on you, and take you by complete surprise. Recently one of those moments caught me. I was shocked at how easy it was to be the “awesome mom” to my now seven year old boy. All too often I forget that the simple things matter, in fact they matter a lot. Sitting down on the couch after having recently doctored up my thumb, Pumpkin noticed I had a bandage. Yes, a bandage of all things got me the “awesome mom” smile. My cool bandage was a Finding Nemo character, yes I am the cool mom. That wonderful smile grew upon his face and before I knew it his eyes met mine. His warm sweet smile, a moment where he found something in me to relate to, filled me with a sweet joy, and yet that bittersweet feeling that yes, my little boy is growing up.
Here more recently Pumpkin had the rare opportunity to pick out a toy as a reward for a job well done.I was very proud of his efforts and in turn followed through with a reward. However, the mean mom that I am put some stipulations on the reward. The major being it needed to be age appropriate. By that I dont mean that my son is drawn to things much more advance, but that he tends to find things that are very simple, gets rather bored, and then it was a wasted effort.
Pumpkin can build anything he puts his impressive mind too. Really I am rather jealous of his talent. He picked a toy that was build for children several years younger. I told him that he could not pick that toy. He was devestated, and I felt terrible, I got the opposite look, you know that extrememly dissapointed, my mom is terrible look? Yeah I got that one. However, once he got a jist of what it was that we were hoping for him, not only was he relieved, and extactic.
You can’t beat the “look” twice in one week. We heard all about this building toy the entire way home. He was so excited to get building on it that he started organizing his supplies as soon as we got home. The next morning he woke early to begin work on his masterpiece. He got it together in record time, as usual, brought it out to demonstrate the moving parts. He paused during his long explanation of the fabulous functions of this amazing toy, and said “mom I am sorry I was upset when you told me to put the other toy away, you are right this is a good toy” and then it came, the smile. The big smile that grew across his face. The appology was warm and sincere and he expressed his understanding that I was not being the mean mommy. Yet that genuine appology was nothing compared to the “I love you Cool Mom” smile.And because I couldn’t help it… what do cool moms turn into?
Cool grannies 🙂
–Jenn