The Small Things

The last blog post about our morning routine left me with the image of 5 bodies in one full size bed. Two adult sized ones and three kid size ones, in one full size bed. This is one of the reasons that I think our morning cuddle, or wrestle rather, doesn't last more than a minute or two. I just couldn't get that image of us squeezed into that bed out of my mind. It made me reflect on the series of conversations John and I have had about Small Things.

This conversation has played out several times in our lives. First about the size bed to buy. Full size, we reasoned it would promote closeness. I will spill the beans to the world that my strong construction contractor of a husband is a cuddler. No reason for anything bigger.

The Small Things conversation again happened when we were looking for houses. We very intentionally bought a small house. Easier and less time to take care of and clean would leave us more time for our family. Small spaces would force us to be near one another and hopefully interact (I've seen this play out with Maddie and Jack for good and for bad....but relationship building none the less). Cost was a factor of course as well, more money diverted to other things we need. Speaking of things, a small house forces us to think about what is inside it and to purge the house occasionally to keep things manageable.

This has proven to be a good idea thus far. I can imagine arguments over the one TV in the family room, the one computer...and it is true that all three of my kids will share a bedroom in the not so distant future. This was also done intentionally. There have been several nights of Maddie and Jack talking, singing or throwing stuffed animals back and forth to one another in their room, and this has been SO FRUSTRATING when all I want to do is sit my tail on the couch and eat Oreo cookies. I have also occasionally eavesdropped and heard the content of their conversations. Its very sweet and cute and they somehow manage to get along best when I'm not around. Imagine adding Noah into the mix and it is surely a recipe for disrupted sleep, messy room, fights and yelling. But that is part of growing up, and if they have to grow up why not do it together instead of separate rooms on different floors. I'm not crazy enough to think that the three of them will share a room forever. At some point they will each need some space, but the lessons that are learned in this situation are so valuable and simple, and the time to learn them passes so quickly.

The last Small Things conversation that John and I had were the ones where we decided to start having kids, and add to our family. We always said we would "have two and then a conversation". That plan happened, but not as anticipated. Two happened....hooray for Jack, hooray for Maddie. The conversation that followed after the "two" was a little different than we'd imagined. We knew right away that this was totally awesome and that not much would change, as we were already used to being in close quarters with each other....used to keeping things small, manageable, real and meaningful.