He knows the way........

This little guy...........

knows the way to his momma's heart.

Last night, it was about 10:15pm and this kid was still up and going strong. And I was exhausted and SO ready for bed. My mom had come over for the night and was leaving, so I put Tommy in his bed and told him I'd be back to check on him in a few minutes. He whined a little while I was telling my mom bye and then got up a few times. I was starting to get frustrated. He kept asking for a gookger (cracker), so I gave him two, let him eat them and then took him back to his bed to lay down. I went back to my room and Tessa was wide awake, but being quiet, so I turned on her magical sea horse (because it always does the trick of getting her to sleep) and layed down in bed. Juuuuuust as my eyes were closing, the thunder started. And Tommy started fussing. I could tell he was kind of scared, so out of sheer tiredness, I risked all the hardwork I'd done the past few weeks getting him to fall asleep in his own bed and yelled for him to come to my room.

And that did me in. I could hear him hurridly climbing out of bed (I'm sure, thinkin, "I've got to go before she changes her mind!") and his little feet pitter-pattering to my room. He ran to the bed and reached his arms up for me to get him and I. Was. DONE. Completely melted into a big, puddly ball of mommy love. I pulled him up into bed and he cuddled right up next to me. I had my arm around him, but moved it to get a little more comfortable and even though his eyes were closed and he was drifting to sleep, his chubby little arm starting flailing around in the dark until he found my hand and pulled my arm back over him.

And that moment took me back to this moment..........

........when my guy was a little tiny boy who slept on my chest for hours instead of a wriggly almost-2-year-old who doesn't let me hold him or love on him anymore. I miss that little boy. I love, LOVE cuddling my kids so it's hard now that he doesn't want to anymore. But I SO needed that moment, falling asleep with him in my arms while it was storming outside. It was perfect and peaceful and lovely. And we slept like that until I woke up at 4am because of the storm. I MADE myself put him back in his bed so he wouldn't wake up when Tessa started crying for her bottle (which never ended up happening because she slept through the night until 7:45am!!).

But I'm so grateful for those moments that I start out dreading, but end up caving in because they usually turn out to be sweet memories. I love you, baby big boy!