These days it seems to me that no cliche is more true than "like sands through the hour glass, so are the days of our lives".  Recently my days have metamorphosed from hauling infants and herding a gaggle of small children from place to frustrating, time consuming place; to hauling big boys and herding a gaggle of men-in-the-making to and from all the places they need to be.  My conversations circle more around material possessions like cell phones, video games, music and large quantities of food than pirates and action figures.  Even my 4 year old baby is more interested in what's on Netflix than building with blocks.  Daily searches for pubic hair, lose teeth, soccer cleats and swim goggles have left me reeling lately, struggling to orient myself to the fact that I have entered a new phase in mommy-hood.

Pretty soon all four of my precious boys will be too big for me to carry, too interested in the outside world to sit and ponder a bug crawling across the floor, and far too big to spend all of their time with me and I'm a little sad about that.  Never more have I desired to capture who they all are at this very moment and lock it away in a jar and put it on a shelf.  I want to bottle their sweet toothless smiles, the naivete that Joe and I are the authorities on everything, and their amazing belly laughs as they discover each other's sense of humor.  I want them all to remain untouched and un-jaded by the world to know that they are loved regardless of what they do, and remain true to themselves.

Life has always seemed to move fast since I conceived my first child (except, maybe, all those sleepless nights).  We seem to always be riding the waves of organized (mostly) chaos, but in the past 3 months or so I find myself trying to catch my breath more often from day to day as they all melt into weeks and months.  I look at new parents with a nostalgia that I never imagined I would possess and feel a little sad that those days are gone.

I am at the dawning of the age of teen spirit, I hope I can only maintain my memory of what that was like and impart the wisdom that needs to be given.  I do wish I could put a cork in the hour glass for awhile and take this all in for a time.