Baby Clothes

Here I sit surrounded by piles of baby clothes that you’ve already outgrown. For only ten months of life you already have enough clothes to fill two tubs ready to be stored in our basement. When I look at the tags of your clothes now, I am reminded of the days where I thought these 12 month onesies would swallow you alive and now they stretch taut over your growing frame. As the seasons change and summer fades into autumn, memories descend into my mind like falling leaves and I’m consumed by the fact that it was this time last year we were in the final stages of preparing for your arrival.

I think one of the things that packing up your baby clothes reiterates the most is that we are rounding the bend of the last of the firsts. There are not many moments of the calendar year that you have yet to experience for the first time. As I fold miniature pjs, I see the outfit you wore just days after your birth for your first Thanksgiving. I stack the onesie you wore to church for the first time with the piles of newborn zip ups that fill my memories of maternity leave with you. I sniff the red striped jumpsuit that you had a blowout in just before the Christmas Eve service at church. I wrap up the arms on the set of PJs you wore on your first Christmas morning and the one that took you late into the night on your first New Year’s Eve. I fold the outfits that I once stuffed into ziplock baggies to send to your first days of daycare and others that I dressed you in on treasured mornings when I had delayed openings at school in those beginning days away from you. I crease the “Cuter than Cupid” outfit and pile it with the collared Easter button down. I see the pajamas that filled our challenging bedtimes and the sleepless nights that I thought would never end. I spy the clothes you wore when your baby fresh skin felt the first warm sun rays of spring and I tuck away your first swim suit.

The weird thing about baby clothes is that you won’t open up this box in the winter the way I cycle through my seasonal wardrobe change. This realization shouts the finality of your infancy and exclaims that you will never be as little as you once were.

While I will miss your teeny tiny-ness, know that I also love the little boy you are becoming. Yesterday, we laughed for fifteen minutes straight as you knocked over the ten month sign that I kept trying to prop up for your monthly picture. You do silly things like squint your eyes when you laugh and I gain a sense of your ever growing personality. Now you daily crawl over to me and pull up on my legs. You say, “ma ma ma ma ma,” over and over again and I know the days are just around the corner when you will start to associate those words with me. Your crawl will soon turn to a walk and you know what, as much as I’m sad to be packing baby clothes I’m loving every minute of having more and more of a relationship with you. I just can’t get enough of you.