I remember reading a blog post once by Kendra of Catholic All Year that The Magic Number is 10. She was referring to that life gets easier when you oldest child turns 10 years old! When I first read this our oldest child was 4 1/2 years old and we had just had our third baby. I remember thinking, ok, so I just need to get through the next 5 1/2 years right?! Well, mom's of all little ones, let me tell you one thing that I learned this weekend, our 5 1/2 year old is pretty awesome! As much as I hope that our house continues to improve its flow and that everyone learns to pitch in more in the coming years, this weekend reinforced how much our 5 1/2 year old does and how much I appreciate him.
My husband's cousin was getting married this weekend out of state and as much as we all wanted to go as a family it was too quick of a turn around with plane rides, naps, and schedules with little ones. After talking through a few options we decided that the best choice for the weekend would be for my husband to bring our oldest son and to have a fun father/son weekend. My husband and I both try to make individual time with each of our children, which we feel is really important the more children we have, but this was the first time a parent took only one child away from our home for multiple days. It truly was an interesting experience for all of us.
The other thing that was really different was to have a quiet house during nap time. Our oldest son stopped napping almost 2 years ago so it has been a really long time since I had afternoons to myself. We are so used to working on house work and homeschooling together while his brothers nap that I found myself getting my chores done within an hour and then just having TIME! I definitely appreciated this time for a few days having time to read, blog, and simply relax but am excited to get back into our regular schedule with everyone home. Our oldest son even asked the day before he was leaving to go out of town "Mom, tomorrow is a week day, who is going to do school with me?" I said "Well, I can pack your books and your Dad can work on it with you." He replied "That's ok, we can just work extra hard next week!" I love that his school routine is so much fun for him that he worries about missing a day.
It has really been starting to sink in with our oldest son that we are adding a new baby to our family this year and he has been talking a lot about him / her. The other day out of no where he said, "Mom, I think that the baby should share her bathroom sink with me!" He is already claiming territory to be the biggest helper, doing more than he already does. I asked if he was going to help change diapers and he said "No, but I could probably get my brothers breakfast or do laundry for you!!" YES!!
I know our oldest son had a blast spending time with his Daddy all weekend and I enjoyed my time with our little ones. Maybe hitting 10 years old will be this awesome magical number of a different level of help occurring in our home, but for right now I know now how thankful I am for our big kid and how much he does for our family and for the joy that he brings to our home!
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Older kids are absolutely a blessing and a help. I always say if you have 3 or more kids, and your oldest is too young to shower by themselves, you're in The Boot Camp Years of parenting. It's a ton of work, and physically exhausting.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I've got 4 teenagers at home, and there's a lot of driving them around and the interactions can be emotionally exhausting.
Fortunately, with 7 kids still at home, there's always somebody who likes me, LOL, and plenty of helping hands when needed.
Thanks so much for sharing!! It sounds like each phase of parenting has its ups and downs, but the great thing as you say is always having someone who likes you and helpful hands!! Love it!
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