Are these the good old days?

Lately when I'm around friends pregnant with their first I think back to my first pregnancy and think-- those were the days. If I was exhausted, I'd go take a nap. If I was still tired, I'd sleep in the next day. No schedules to coordinate, no children inevitably waking up at 6:30, no matter how late their parents got to bed.  Then my thoughts wander to when I had "just one," who napped all the time, slept twelve hours like a champ, and who would happily be handed off to dad after the early morning feeding for a slothful mom to turnover and go back to sleep.  Fast forward to three children not yet school age and long days at home together.  I've gone from no caffeine back to (minimum) two cups of joe in the morning and back on diet coke in the afternoon (yuck).  Our baby mostly sleeps through the night, but on nights she doesn't I'm grumpy, mean and dramatic to anyone who crosses my path the next day. Mealtimes are like an exercise in seeing how long the children can keep me out of my seat-- getting milk, water, cinnamon for the apple slices, another spoon, cleaning up a spill, finding another napkin, finally getting food other than Cheerios in the baby's mouth, just in time to get seconds for everyone, then if I'm lucky I'll remember to eat a few slices of cheese for my lunch (and the diet coke). Some days I exclusively eat cereal until dinner time. 

Then we went out to dinner with two couples the other night who have 5 and 6 kids, respectively.  They were lamenting the middle-school drama of their eldest.  Then I read a blogpost from a woman who has six kids about how it was so easy when she had four.  It made made think-- will I look back on these days, when I had "only three" as the good old days-- back when I was well-rested? (Frightening!).  But the reality is-- my three are awesome.  They are good sleepers for the most part. They all "rest" for the same hour in the afternoon, with another hour of me quietly reading and cuddling Sean by himself.  On my more dramatic days I can go lay down during naptime.  My kids love each other and their biggest fights are over who gets to hold the baby next.  Sis is an "angel baby" according to the Baby Whisperer. Sean has started getting dressed by himself in the morning (today it's Hawaiian shorts, a long sleeve Furman shirt and Thomas socks). Jamesie is mostly making it to the potty. And, this time in our lives is almost over. Sean starts school in a few short months and that's this beginning of letting my babies go. These are the good times. I get to cuddle and pet and kiss them whenever I want. There are days it's physically exhausting, but there are just as many days sitting on the family room floor with books and Legos and k'nex for hours at a time.  

And one more anecdote to prove these are the good times-- last night as I was approaching 5 straight days without folding any laundry and our arm chairs were starting to become a clean-clothes avalanche threat I mused that I just needed someone to come into our house and "jump start" our laundry situation-- then my housekeeping skills would also be jump started. Just now as I brought the baby up for her morning nap I noticed (for the first time, as I think my eyes were still closed as I fumbled downstairs for breakfast (which was already made for me)) a huge laundry basket of clean, folded clothes at the top of the stairs. I looked at the laundry-chairs, I mean arm chairs-- they were empty. My amazing, well-rested husband spent his early morning folding laundry while I slept after being up with the baby.  These are the good old days, with "just three" great kids, built in nap times, a helpful and doting husband and a softer than soft baby to pet in the middle of the night.  Lord, let me live in these good days, and not just remember to remember them later!