What now?

Max is growing up way too fast.  I say that about both my boys, but it seems Max is growing at warp speed these days.  Babbling, crawling at high speeds, cruising along hanging on to furniture, playing games with me, Alex and John...He's 11 months old today. One more month and he'll be a year old. A YEAR OLD!!! MY BABY!!!

I'm in the process of weaning him, and I'm doing it slowly, mostly for my benefit because a) I HATE the feeling of being engorged and I dont much like the idea of cabbage leaves in my bra and b) This is the last time I'll ever nurse a baby, and that makes me strangely sad. 

I'm in denial a bit about Max moving into toddlerhood.  With Alex I couldn't wait for him to start walking and talking and being a kid, but with Max, every step forward is filled with contradicting emotions. I love that he's starting to be more independant, he's curious and funny and is really becoming his own person, but at the same time, again, LAST BABY EVER!  WAHHH!

Today I was out for a walk with the boys and thinking, as I do while I'm on walks (I don't listen to music, because usually the boys are really good and it's my only time to really just think about things) and for a few seconds I imagined having a third child, being pregnant again, giving birth again (not in a hospital, NEVER AGAIN in a hospital), having a teeny tiny baby again, and I actually surpirsed myself so much at the thought that I had to stop walking and take a breath.  Another baby?

No.  We won't be having another baby.

This was decided years ago between John and I, before we even had Alex, before we had our first pregnancy.  We would have two children.  We knew when we were trying to get pregnant with Max that he'd be our last.  He is our last.  I want him to be our last. 

I'm moving into another stage of life now.  I'm settled, married, happily career-less, I've had both my children and now it's time to focus on just living life.  Raising our boys, working on our marraige.  What I like to call "the big stuff" is done.  Working on a career, finding a mate, making a home, having a family.  Now I just get to enjoy it.  and maybe that's why my mind wandered down the "what if we had just one more" road again.  I'm not used to just living life. I'm always working towards a goal, whether it be to get promoted at work, find that perfect husband, having a child...And now, life just stretches along ahead of me, like a nice long flat road, beautiful scenery, just no real big hills ahead.

That's not to say we won't have challenges, I'm saying that my Big Life Plan has been fulfilled, I have no more plan.  I made it.  I did it.  I have everything I've ever wanted.  Now what?  I need to make a new plan I suppose.

But, for now, I'll take a break and enjoy this amazing life I'm so lucky to be living.