New Things

One of the things I love about a growing family is the addition of things along with the people. I don’t mean twenty-five thousand versions of the newest toy or baby gadget, but the simpler things.

Today I did the laundry for the first time in about a month or so. Since we had been living with my in-laws when Calvin was born I hadn’t done much laundry (or at least not the whole family’s laundry) since his triumphant entry into the world. I was so overjoyed to be able to add another little person’s stack to the crowd. And then this evening we celebrated a first for Daisy. She brushed her teeth.

Yes, she is a little old for this to be her first experience with dental hygiene, but I have a reasonably good excuse. She didn’t cut her first tooth until she was 14 or 15 months old. And what about the last four months? Well, we’ve been pretty busy. We were making the three-hour trip down to Ft. Lauderdale from Frostproof once a month for a while. Each trip was a visit with the mid-wife and a stay overnight with my in-laws. Well, then we had to start going every two weeks. And then we had to just move in with down there until Calvin was born. So you see, it was just a little hectic. I use the same excuse for not having Perry potty-trained yet.

Anyhow, Daisy did wonderfully—at brushing her teeth, I mean. I let her pick out her toothbrush from a package of four brightly colored brushes David bought the other day. Daisy chose pink—she’s such a little girl! She walked all the way from the kitchen to the bathroom saying “awh” and resting the toothbrush on her protruding little tongue. Then she sat on the toilet seat and let me brush her teeth and watched Perry as I helped him. She was having so much fun she didn’t want to stop.

The warm reminder of this event hit me this evening when I went to put something away in the bathroom and I saw Daisy’s little toothbrush resting next to Perry’s. I look forward to the day when I have the entire kitchen table filled with stacks of everyone’s clothes and the day that we have to bring a second or, Lord willing, even a third cup into the bathroom to hold all the children’s toothbrushes.