I have three children: two daughters, married (JS and MT), and an 18 year old son with special needs (JG). My kids amaze me each day. As if the miracle of their birth was not enough to leave me speechless and humbled, it is rivaled by the fact that they have grown up to be such strong, self confident, and likable young adults. I cannot claim a lot of credit in this; they taught me everything I know about parenting.

I was so afraid when I first brought my oldest home from the hospital. I had no idea how to go about the process of raising a child. I was so afraid that I would do something wrong, that would leave my kids scarred physically or emotionally. I had the uneasy feeling that surely I had not read enough books conveying the sage advice of professionals who sported whole chunks of the alphabet after their names. My own qualifications included nothing more than the sincere desire to do the right things for my kids, and the fact that I had experienced childhood myself.

One great advantage was that I was not attempting this feat by myself. My high school sweetheart/husband (DH) was beside me all the way. I can only imagine how hard it is to be a single parent. It is challenging enough when you have a Mom and Dad tag team to split the responsibility and double the resources (time, energy, patience).

Gradually, we realized that despite our qualms, we were getting the hang of this parenting thing. Our daughter grew and blossomed into a high spirited and loving toddler. Hey, we were doing great at parenting! It wasn't nearly as hard as we'd been led to believe. As a matter of fact, since we'd gotten so danged good at this, why not go ahead and have a second child? (if this was a movie, right now you'd hear the scarey "don't open the door!" sound track).

We brought our new daughter MT home, and from the first night, we realized that we were in a whole new world. M was disinclined to sleep that night (or the next couple of weeks), and three year old JS was pretty underwhelmed about the whole Big Sister role. My DH had to be at work at six AM, and it was now 2:30. In desperation, we buckled J and M into their carseats and headed down the road. Common wisdom reported that a car ride was likely to soothe a sleepless baby......and if not, at least we were driving in the direction of the hospital. We weren't REALLY serious about taking M back for a refund....I am sure we would never have actually done that.

Luckily, she fell asleep during the ride, and we turned around and headed back home. No Bomb Disposal Squad ever handled a ticking time bomb more carefully and gently than we handled our newborn, as we eased her sleeping little body back into her crib. Blessed silence! DH got two whole hours of sleep before work. Don't feel too badly for him. I was the one left at home with the clingy three year old, the fussy newborn.....not to mention sore nipples, sore ladybits, and rollercoaster hormones. DH was GLAD to go to work for 8 hours of relative sanity.

But, as is most often the case, things did settle down. But more about that later. After this stroll down memory lane, I think I need a nap.