Dear Laura

Dear Laura,

Look at you. So full of optimistic hope as to what a wonderful experience is ahead of you. You;ve barely even given birth yet and you already know sooooo much about how to raise children. You're so smart. You should teach mom lessons.

I know you're probably surprised to hear from me since you've got such a handle on all this stuff. But I did want to offer you a bit of perspective. You know, from hind site. So here it is...

Stop saying things you're "never" going to do.

Stop it right now.

Already you've said things like...

"I'll never have ugly toys in my house. Only wooden Melissa and Doug."

"I'll never let me child sleep in my room past eight weeks."

"I'll never let my child behave that way in public. Why can't parents control their kids?"

To your shock, all of these things will happen. All of them will be outside your control. And all of them will have absolutely no reflection of how good or bad of a mom you are. Might I suggest you begin giving yourself a not so gentle smack in the face every time you're tempted to say the word "never" in any capacity.

Pain now. Gain Later.

You'll thank me for this.

And real talk? The giant jungle-themed exercauser in your kitchen is going to straight save you during dinner prep. Your kids will sleep in your room til at least six months. And you might find yourself dragging a kicking and screaming two year old out of the toy aisle of Tuesday Morning while you're sweating from head to toe.

Shall we continue?

Stop being critical of other moms. I don't care what they do. I don't care who you think you are. You'll eat your words and drink your thoughts and they do not taste yummy. You might even feel the need to stop every mom you see in the Target diaper aisle, lay on their shoulder, and through your ugly cries say "I didn't know how hard this was? I'm sorry I didn't think this was hard before. Forgive me, please?!"

That's no way to make friends.

Stop worrying about sleep schedules, milestones, and percentiles. Yes, I know everyone asks how much your kid sleeps.

But here's a fun secret: They don't actually care.

Any friend on facebook who talks about how proud they are of so and so because they sleep all the time needs to be blocked immediately. Don't go all the way to the ultimate dis of "unfriending". You can be friends again once you realize how little you actually care how much your kids sleep. But until then, more than likely, you will read their boast post in the middle of the night while you're nodding off, infant attached to you. You might just look at your sweet baby and say something stupid like "Why can't you sleep like so and so?" Guess what? They will sleep. Then they'll go through stages of not sleeping. And back again. Then before you know it, they're 15 and you can't make them stop sleeping.

Percentiles. Bless them. You will feel the temptation to put a great deal of weight in these.

Don't.

As long as your babe is eating, growing, and sleeping (sometimes) you are fine. Chill out. Smile and nod when your friends brag about their kid having a head in the 90th percentile. Resist the urge of asking why that matters and just celebrate with them and their giant baby. Yours is little, yes. But take it from me, when she's two, she'll be asking for thirds on chicken pot pie and wearing a whole year size bigger leggings. And it still won't matter because all that does matter is that she's eating, growing, and sleeping (sometimes).

Finally we have milestones. These suckers are kind of like the SAT's during your junior year of high school. People will ask, again, because they don't know what else to ask. But while it seems like the most important thing in the world at the time. Pretty soon, it won't matter. You might have a (very) late walker. But she will walk... eventually. This is one of your first shiny new opportunities to not base the value of your kid on their actions. The same friend whose kid slept thru the night at eight weeks will also have the kid that's rolling over and dividing fractions at three months. See? I told you that blocking was a good idea. Again, celebrate with them and praise GOD that you're kid is right where they are.

Last thing...

Enjoy your baby. Smell her. Touch her, Sing to her. Laugh with her. Play with her. She's going to get big so fast... in spite of what her percentiles say.

Oh, and don't worry about your baby weight. It'll come off... eventually. Chill out and enjoy your job. Some say it's the best in the world. I say it's just going to get better from where you are now.

Sincerely,

Laura (two kids and LOTS of sanctification later)