The greatest moments my life are not only ones I’ve anticipated with great excitement, but also the spontaneous and unexpected.  This winter has been full of them.  If you’ve been a reader for any length of time, you know that I relish small moments.  Sixty degree weather in January ranks.  Taking off down the street for a walk with my one-year-old without an hour of bundling.  Playing hopscotch with my oldest daughter.  Going to the playground with both girls without hats, gloves, and boots.  Throwing bread to the seagulls on the beach.  These are not typically what the day’s activities consist of in January.  So, I’m very upwardly grateful for the small moments of appreciation this January brought.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2FgZn_idso]

In the light of all the adversity that life kicks us, it’s bright spots like warm days in January that literally show us why we should never loose hope.  Watching both my kids play on the playground…the older one finally conquering her fears of the ‘big’ slides…and the little one blasting down them too early for my comfort zone…. calls to mind everything I’ve been through with those two over the last few years.  Nothing bad.  No inadvertent challenges other than the normalcy of parenthood.  That brings along enough chaotic challenges of it’s own.

Now, as they both hit the racing slides together, I can’t help but think of each one’s birth instantaneously.  The anticipation of each daughter’s arrival…one late, and one early.  Brianne at Easter-time and Lauren on Father’s Day.  Brianne’s love for animals and Lauren’s love for “Barbies-a-Barbies-a-Barbies…”  Brianne skipping walking for running, and Lauren, always being absolutely fearless, barreling down the landing at ‘Ammy and Papa’s’ without contemplating a landing first.  The older one’s imagination takes her away to all kinds of  places, and her laid back little sister is thrilled just to follow her wherever she goes.

Brianne and Lauren, racing down the slides.

My daughters have such strikingly different personalities, which is why I feel they get along so well already.  Here they go, racing each other down the slides.  Competing for the climb up to see who can get to the slide fastest to race down again.  It’s a surprising moment of revelation.  It caught me off guard.  One, that they’d both play so independently at the playground.  And two, how sentimental it made me feel.  I guess it’s one of those moments when I just stand back for a moment and observe.  Just watch my kids….wondering how in the world they’ve grown up to this point already.

I love sixty-degree weather in January.

Happy ‘No-Snow’ Days!

Megs

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