Imperfections

One of the dangers of blogging, especially blogging about kids, is that I tend to put my best face forward. And Josiah's best face forward. It's human nature, but it's a bit deceiving. I've confessed to Jonathan and others that I get envious after reading some blogs: their spouses are perfect, and their kids are perfect and their hair is perfect - how is it possible?

I know I've been encouraged when I read blogs in which people are real about life and parenting. We're a family of sinners in a fallen world. While I won't turn this into a full confession booth, I thought I'd present a few of the less rosy stories of parenthood. I don't want to complain either because the overarching truth is that we are abundantly blessed.


Josiah's been fussier lately. Early wake-up times, and then this week he's had a cold. Plus, his personality is just developing: he knows what he wants and doesn't want. We're learning as parents how to decipher this and also treading the early waters of discipline.

We went to Olive Garden last weekend with my parents. Josiah's been practicing high-pitch squealing lately and was exercising his vocal skills at the restaurant. They were happy noises, but the people shooting us annoyed looks apparently didn't know this. I turned to Jonathan and said, "It's official, we are those people."

Several weeks ago, I put Josiah down for the night. Normally he goes down without a fuss, but after ten minutes of quiet, he started wailing. Sometimes he cries for a few minutes before settling, but this cry sounded different to me, distressed. So I cracked the door to check on him. I was shocked to see something outside the crib. The poor thing and straddled his crib bars and gotten his chunky little thighs stuck. It was like Pooh Bear in Rabbit's hole.

Then the other day I put baby sunscreen on him for our normal walk. We've used this same exact bottle several times before, but this time he started rubbing himself all over and breaking out in hives. He had an allergic reaction to it! We had to rinse it all off him.

So there you go, a little bit of the gritty side of parenting. Does everybody feel better that you're not alone?