Patience is a virtue…

One that I am grateful to possess 99% of the time. Especially since I have an almost 3 year old who wants to be Miss Independent. I love, love, love Tae’s independence. I love the person she is growing up to be. I thrive on nurturing that independence and inner strength. I adore the thought that she will grow up to be her own person, with her own ideas and values, and that she will be strong enough to stand up for them. And like I said, I am so grateful that I have patience because a 3 year old with the desire to be a “Big Girl” and do everything like Daddy and Ashley can be trying to some people, I am sure. Prime example. Yesterday Tae and I went to the grocery store for a few little things. Daddy and Jo stayed home because we had a service guy installing our new dish. Tae always wants to ride in the car grocery carts. Those are the ones that are a regular cart with a giant plastic car on the front with 2 seats in it. Works out well for her, we buckle her in and go and she is entertained for the whole trip. Doesn’t always work out so well for me since the cart is now double the size of a regular cart and usually very hard to steer. Well last night she wanted the car cart and I figured that we were getting enough stuff to need a cart, but not enough that it was going to be a pain to drive the stupid cart around the store so we got one. Grocery trip went well and we were soon loading up the car. Here is where the patience comes in. I stood there for at least 5 minutes while she tried to get out of the car cart without any help because she is a Big Girl. And, that thing looks ridiculously difficult to get out so I don’t blame her for taking 5 mins! When you try to help she says, “I want to do it”, and we WANT her to do it so we stand and wait, and wait, and wait, resisting the desire to help. It would have been easy to lean into the car and scoop her up, but I didn’t, I waited and she finally accomplished her task with the biggest smile on her face. Made my day… This face always makes my day!

I think about it all the time, how much she has changed from when I first came into her life. I remember her bouncing, teetering down the hill in our front yard because she couldn’t walk very well and her momentum made it hard to stop. I remember she couldn’t say “Ashley” for the longest time, it was “Asheeee”. I remember when she couldn’t sit on a real potty because she was too small. I remember taking this picture of Tae abusing, er I mean holding Momo when she was just a baby herself. These are the moments I want to slow down time… And ironically now with our new dish instead of cable, I can... Well I can pause live TV at least, doesn't that count for something?