The Long-Awaited Blog on Seth

I'd hate to forget Seth. For all of the obvious reasons but mostly for the reason that all mothers of more than two children children fear. Number three always seems to be getting lost in the mix. It's what well-meaning but unthinking visitors say to you when you're still recovering in the hospital with #3: ""You'll never be able to do for three what you could have done for two." Or how about what I could have done for one? I mean, I certainly can't do for THREE what I would have done for NONE. Where does the logic begin and end in that statement? Who has decreed that "One is good. Two is best. Three's a crowd!" I say "well-meaning" because I know that they don't actually realize that in your postpartum state your few precious hours of sleep are already subjected to vicious nightmares of what MIGHT happen. And now that I have four, I know that there were no "ifs" or bad dreams involved: incompetence and insufficiency are inevitabilities! There just aren't enough eyes or arms or laps to make all four of them kings & queens for a day. But that's not to say that Seth doesn't try...

Seth has never been the child to get lost in a crowd. Even now, at the grown-up age of four, he'll beg me to hold his hand in the store. Yesterday we were downtown in a parking lot and he refused to get out of the van on his side. I asked him why and he said "Because I might get hurt by those cars zooming down the road." The kid really is street smart! He seems to have his eyes and ears everywhere and, much like his older brother Brandt, he's inevitably searching for The Big Picture. He doesn't just ask when Daddy will be home. He wants to know the schedule and the menu that follow. For this reason, his least favorite hymn is "Trust and Obey."

Seth also has incredibly sweet moments. The grandmothers at church are thoroughly smitten by him because they rarely see him dig in his heels or blow me off. All they see is this enormous blonde head and eyes sized to match, hugs and kisses at the ready. He looks at them when he's telling a story and nods his head with a VERY knowing look--honestly a look of perceptiveness that you might see on an average 30-year old. And then he says something like "Yes. YES! I don't mind at all. I PROMISE I'm pulling your leg!" Never mind that most of the language is entirely inappropriate to the situation at hand... His look and his manner will convince you and all grandmothers that he is fully cognizant of what he's saying.

Seth loves to do puzzles, read books, and do heaps and heaps of math workbooks. Don't worry; he gets even weirder. Connect-the-dots seem to be the discovery of the year and have followed hard on the heels of coloring with markers, the results of which would provide a thesis for Freud. He doesn't color with multiple colors. Nor does he skip around coloring different characters on the page. Nope! He picks up the black or brown markers (his two favorites) and proceeds to cover the entire page ... METICULOUSLY! No amount of pleading that he try a different color will do. He is going for the prize: Most Painstaking 4-Year-Old Artist Ever!

The most delightful development in our family to include Seth is that The Boys (a.k.a. Brandt and Gresham) have found the grace and motivation to include him in their games and their imaginings. Whereas just a few months back his entry into the room elicited groans of "Can't we save this to play later Mom, when little ones are asleep?" Now they all tear around the house together with their knights and pirates, legos and paper airplanes. Part of this is a notable maturity in our little boy so that he is mostly able to deal with conflict in a more peaceable way than piercing screams. But moms everywhere know what I really mean: It's a work of God. A tiny, everyday miracle that would perhaps be lost on most people if they hadn't been around two weeks ago to hear the howling as it began to abate.

Do I have enough of myself to go around? Never! But I have a Savior who does. The Bible says that His love is "an everlasting love." It never runs out. And He has condescended to entrust our imperfect family with a body and soul in Seth. He most certainly will give us whatever we need to cause this breathtaking soul to bloom and thrive.