My Life (for now), With No Apology

This is a little poem that I discovered when Princess #3 was a baby, and it always brought life with a new baby back into perspective for me. Now with 4 children, I find myself repeating the last stanza almost as a mantra to keep myself from getting too down on myself for all the "stuff" in life that is not being kept up with now that the Prince is in our midst.

It's hard to get perspective when there is so much that should getting done and so much that absolutely has to be done and stressful trips to organize and plan and and and. However, as my mentors advise and remind me, this time with a baby and even young children will be done so quickly and then gone (except for the daily baby-fit or two). And when it's gone you won't remember how clean the house was (or not, in my case), it will be the memories of time spent with these little blessings that linger.

If you think that I'm being selfish, lazy, a bad housekeeper, and am spoiling my baby as I rock and care for him instead of the house too bad. He's my baby and babies don't keep.

Mother, O Mother, come shake out your cloth,
Empty the dustpan, poison the moth,
Hang out the washing, make up the bed,
Sew on a button and butter the bread.

Where is the mother whose house is so shocking?
She's up in the nursery, blissfully rocking.

Oh, I've grown as shiftless as Little Boy Blue,
Lullabye, rockabye, lullabye loo.
Dishes are waiting and bills are past due
Pat-a-cake, darling, and peek, peekaboo

The shopping's not done and there's nothing for stew
And out in the yard there's a hullabaloo
But I'm playing Kanga and this is my Roo
Look! Aren't his eyes the most wonderful hue?
Lullabye, rockaby lullabye loo.

The cleaning and scrubbing can wait till tomorrow
But children grow up as I've learned to my sorrow.
So quiet down cobwebs; Dust go to sleep!
I'm rocking my baby and babies don't keep.

- Ruth Hulbert Hamilton