Somewhere in there, things clicked
A week at the beach, an easier flight, and two kids starting to tell me exactly who they are.
Greetings from Hilton Head, South Carolina. I wasn’t planning to write this week, but I kept coming back to the same thought.
I think we’ve crossed into a new phase of parenting.
For the past few summers, we’ve made a tradition of spending a week at the beach with my husband’s family. Our destination and the houses have changed over the years, but the best part is always the same: a week of my kids running around with their cousins.
My daughter is almost six and a half now, my son three and a half, and for the first time I can remember, the flight was just... easy. There were no bottles, no breast milk to transport, no diapers, no chasing a toddler down the aisle and apologizing to strangers. They watched their movies, ate their snacks. (I was once slapped across the face by my daughter in front of an entire plane full of people, after she'd reached her absolute limit — a low for us both.) This is also the first summer neither of them naps.
Sitting in the rental car on the way to the house, I turned to my husband and cautiously asked: have we crossed into a new phase where this is actually easier?
I don't think parenting gets easier, exactly. But there's an ease that comes with kids who can communicate and express their emotions, who can tell you what's wrong, who have interests, who you can picture doing things with instead of just managing logistics — though there's still some of that too.
Growing up, I always assumed I'd have three kids (I'm the oldest of three, my husband's the youngest of three). But then real life set in: there's the financial reality, of course, but it was the emotional one that surprised me most.
After my son was born, that first year stretched me in ways I wasn't expecting. I've never considered myself someone with a particularly short fuse, but postpartum humbled me. We spent so much time dividing and conquering that it sometimes felt like we were parenting separately under the same roof. As my son got older, we stopped splitting up so much and started doing more together, as a family of four, and somewhere in there, things clicked.
I also realized I didn’t feel like someone whose family was incomplete. I felt whole.
So knowing he’s our last baby, watching him move out of the toddler years into something closer to a big kid is bittersweet. Part of me wants to freeze him exactly as he is right now: his cheeks, the way he still asks to hold my hand in the car from the front seat, his little pout, the way he calls me “Mama.”
And at the same time, part of me feels something closer to relief, like I can finally exhale into a phase where they still think we’re the center of their world, but they can also tell us what they need.
I’m watching my daughter become herself now. She disappears into reading books or coloring. She tells me about her day and silly observations that somehow reveal exactly how her brain works. She has opinions about what she wears, what games we play, what music we listen to. On the drive home from getting ice cream tonight, she proudly declared, "I like who I am."
Everyone tells you to soak up the baby years because they go so fast. That’s true, but no one really talks about this phase we’re currently finding ourselves in. The part where they’re still little enough to want to reach for your hand, but old enough to tell you how they feel.
We got a glimpse of that on our first night here.
Our son had a hard time going to sleep. We thought he’d happily sleep in his own room, but bedtime came and he got nervous. After an hour of trying to get him down, we ended up making him a little bed next to ours, and by the time everyone finally fell asleep it was close to ten. My husband and I were exhausted and more than a little annoyed.
The next morning he climbed into our bed to snuggle. I asked him how he’d slept.
He looked at me, very matter-of-factly, and said, “I had a hard night.”
Three and a half years old, and he knew his night had been hard. He also knew how to tell me.
Maybe that's the new phase, I think. Not that parenting gets easier, just that the people you're raising start meeting you halfway.
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You beautifully captured this phase <3
This looks and sounds like a dream. Love it!