**Every time I come back it's with another kid

It has been close to two years since I last blogged, and while part of me hates it, a part of me misses putting my thoughts down in writing and creating a memoir for my children. Every post that I go back to read immediately transports me back to the time in my life when it was written. I can feel the feelings again, as if I'm right back in that time, and I like that.

Life is too short, too complicated, too busy to stop to take in the moments that matter. That truly upsets me because I see first hand what regret looks like to a person who's life is cut short. I try to drink in the moments, savour each kiss so to speak and not let the world get to me in ways that are too easy to let happen.

I am reading a book right now! This is a FEAT for me, as anyone who knows me well can attest to! I haven't read a book since the Fifty Shades of Gray trilogy (which to be honest was only because of the hype). I'm reading "BLOOM" by Kelle Hampton and it's a book written by a beautiful mom who got her start writing a blog about her child. She now has three children, one was born with Down syndrome, and she drinks in life in the way it should be done. That sista knows how to rock a parenting moment, let me tell you! Honestly my return to this blog is without a doubt because of this paragraph she wrote (and geez I know nothing about copyright laws but I hope nobody is upset by me quoting her):

"I cried when I traded in the 3-6 month sleepers for the 6-9 month ones...Everything was just so....memorable. I began to feel like I was cupping my hands, attempting to hold water when it just trickled through my fingers and there was nothing I could do to keep it there. I wanted to remember everything. My mom has always talked about dreams she'll have to this day - dreams where we're little again and she's pushing strollers and rocking babies. She says when she wakes up and realizes it's not true-that those days are gone and we're all grown up - that, for a minute, she feels like she can't breathe. Because she wants to feel it again so badly, to hold our little bodies and rock them close to her chest just one more time."

This is how I feel every time I kiss my daughter who just turned one. Like if I take a deep enough breath when I kiss her that I'll breathe a piece of her scent into my soul and feel it forever.

Today is a particularly emotional day. Our final maternity/paternity leave is over. For the first time since I pushed my first baby out (almost 12 years ago) we have to rely on someone else to care for our children. Up until this point we have had our children in someone else's care so little that I can count on my fingers. Once or twice their grandmother watched them, and a few times some awesome friends stepped in. And the stupidest things make me upset. I watched our new nanny wipe my 3 year old's face the other day after he ate a banana and I got so sad. **I** should be washing his face! **I** am his mother and that is **MY** job! He looked at me as if he was feeling the same way but saw that I did nothing to stop this horrific action of cleansing my child so he moved on. I guess if it seems okay to me, he thinks it's okay. But it's not okay. He's my boy.

I am fully aware that this sounds ridiculous to the general population, but to me (and my overly sensitive husband) it's a big deal. Unfortunately, no matter how well versed you are in living in the moment and enjoying each day, you still have no choice but to let some memories pass you by because of circumstance. We have four kids to support, to put through university, to pay for weddings, clothe and feed into adulthood. We need to be a two income family. So our nanny will wipe faces and play cars and tickle my little one's tummy when we can't. It stinks but it's life.

You only live once. Make the memories count. Tell people you love them. Breathe in your babies, and for goodness sake, live for today; not tomorrow or the next. Strive for inner happiness and peace. Act how your heart tells you to act, and feel every moment of it as if it were your last.