Good to the last drop

You know how you crave something absolutely delicious and the first bite tastes like it was created right in Heaven's own kitchen....or you stumble into the kitchen after a rough night and that first sip of coffee is savored as though it was the first and last drink you'd ever take?  But then you get to the last bite of the cake, or the last sip of the coffee and it's not as good as the first?  It's like the best of what that indulgence has to offer is found within the novelty of it...the first part.

I always wondered if large families experienced that.  If the whole new baby thing got old.  Back when I only had a couple, it seemed absolutely impossible to my mind that a 4th child, or a 6th, or later models could experience the same adoration as the first few golden children.  The token first boy, or first girl, the baby that came after waiting so long, or the one that the couple tried so long for.  Would subsequent children be greeted with the same fanfare?  I always wondered about that.

I remember reading an article in a parenting magazine that discussed bringing a new baby home and how to make it easier for the older sibling.  I only had one child at the time and the idea that the new baby would be fawned over more than the first was foreign to me.  I would look at my firstborn and think no one could top him.  That there was no way I'd love a new baby as much as I loved him.  I just couldn't wrap my mind around it at all and honestly wondered if it would be fair to any subsequent children to enter our family when my first was so completely adored. 

So I did go on to have more children and towards the end of each of my pregnancies, I'd fret "Will I love this baby as much as the others?"  Will this baby be the one that gets the short end of the stick?  Because all the others are pretty darn amazing in all their crazy stages.  I still look at my firstborn and think "Wow, he's pretty neat..."  Waiting for baby seven produced much of the same emotions in me, as my youngest toddled around being the epitomy of cuteness, I'd ask myself "How can this new baby top it? How will I feel about her?"

And the answer is: crazy in love.  From sunrise to sunset, and all the hours in between, I just have to glance at this sweet chubby baby and my heart swells.  I lay with her at night and think "Why me?  Why do I deserve this sweet little human?"  She smiles, I melt.  She cries, I rush in to see what I can do to help.  She watches her hands in wonder, I tell everyone what a genius she is to find them so quickly.  I see her older brothers and sisters falling for her too and I get all teary, and mushy, and sappy thinking "This is what life should be about...." 

Only God knows if there will be another baby placed into our crazy family, and once again....I'll ponder and fret and wonder if the newest will be as good as the last...or the first, or any of them in between and I'll look back at this post and remember how good it always is and always will be.