Too Fast

"Time is the most undefinable yet paradoxical of things; the past is gone, the future is not come, and the present becomes the past even while we attempt to define it, and, like the flash of lightning, at once exists and expires." ~Charles Caleb Colton

Anna turned 11 months old today.

And, honestly, it scares the heck out of me that my baby girl will turn a year old in one short month. Last night as I was drifting off to sleep, the electric blue light from the alarm clock by my bed shown through a half-empty bottle left over from her bedtime. And it hit me. In four short weeks, there will no longer be bottles by my bed. No more nipples filling the dishwasher. No more formula towering in the pantry.
I would love to have (ok, receive) enough babies to fill my house ten times over. But, somehow, I know this is it for us. Our family is complete. For as much as I love babies, I love the ones I have enough to know that I don't have enough to give. Mentally, emotionally, physically, or financially. The limit is different for every parent, but we have reached ours.
I have my son. I have my daughter. My baby days will soon be over.
And, honestly, it hurts. But what I ache for isn't more babies. I ache for the ones I have. Every goodnight kiss is another day that's passed us by. These kids are my life. My world. My everything. The speed at which their lives flash before me is dumbfounding. The love I feel for them is all-encompassing, fierce, wild, instinctual, unwavering, and unending. It's beautiful, wonderful, exciting, and awe-inspiring. And it's scary. Scary to love something so deeply. Scary to be at the mercy of this almighty love.

But I wouldn't trade it for the world.