Wednesday, November 5, 2014

The Baby

Tom asked me this morning if Olivia is really going to be eight this month.

Yes. Yes, she is really going to be eight years old this month.

He expressed his surprise at this confirmation. Not because we wonder where the time has gone. We’ve definitely been here, present, all these years and while, sure, they’ve flown by, I can also see the lines of every single one of those eight years on my face.

Instead, the reason it seems so outrageous that our baby is almost eight years old is because, well, she’s still such a baby in so many ways.

See, Olivia is really easy to baby. She’s got this delicate, baby-like air too her. She seems to fragile even though she’s not really. She’s sweet, sassy and loves to have others take care of her.

Yeah, we’re a couple of suckers, is what I’m saying.

Here’s the thing…Tom or I still feed Olivia her meals at home.

At Gram’s house, Olivia feeds herself perfectly well. But at home, when we sit down to eat, Olivia will look at her plate, look at me, look back her plate and say, “What about feed me?”

And yes, it’s a cleaner process for either me or Tom to shovel the food into her mouth.

So our eight year old is still very much our baby. And it’s our fault.

We’re not doing her any favors at all by doing this. I know this. I also know that we need to just get over the issue of the mess and just make her feed herself.

And we will…on November 28, when she’s really and truly eight years old.

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