packing up the newborn clothes.




Joe, day 1
today i packed up the newborn clothes (well, minus the pants because you are so skinny that's the only size that really fits you).

 today i packed the newborn clothes. you still seem so tiny, yet they are impossibly even smaller than you.

 today i folded the first outfit you ever wore and i remembered that strange, sleepless, dream-like hospital stay in which you entered the world. where we met face to face for the first time.

 has 10 weeks gone by? or has it been one? or a thousand? it's so fast, yet so much has changed it's hard to imagine it's been only 10 weeks. it's hard to imagine a time you were not here.
Joe, a few weeks old
as you drifted off to sleep in my lap, i traced the outline of your face. i'm looking down at my forehead and eyes, yet you look just your father. but then you flinch, i see your aunts, your father's sisters. but if you half grin as you dose off, you pull your mouth back on one side like my nephew, like my father.

Joe, a few weeks ago
today, after i packed up your newborn clothes, i got tears in my eyes. i held you a little tighter. not because i can stop or change anything, but because i wanted to breathe in the moment a little more, because i realized they are limited and finite and fleeting.

sweet baby, every morning my heart echos the psalms that the Lord is good and his mercy endures forever. i hope you hear this resounding in your ears as you grow.

sweet baby, every day that you grow up a little bit more, my heart aches in a bittersweet way. i remind myself that the best is yet to come, because God's promises endure and his mercies are new every morning.

 sweet baby.
Joe now
Joe now
we love you so.

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