To ask you about the good parts of having children?

[ValidUser]

Name changed because some people from work know my usual name and don't want to share my family planning details with them. DP (soon to be DH) and I are planning to TTC from September.

I'm very excited and just wanted to ask about the nice parts of parenting.

Please indulge me. Or throw buns.

My 5 year old recently learnt how to skip (not with a rope), this evening we both skipped down the road and it was an utterly joyous moment. People should skip more.

My Ds used to bring us a beer from the fridge. We'd pay him in bottle tops. He soon got wise and started to demand cash. We had to get our owns beer. It was good while it lasted.

When you make them belly laugh so cuteand strangely satisfying as a baby/toddler. Even now that they're older they seem to find me funny at times.

I've got 3 different ages to give you an idea of the range of loveliness you can get from children.

Best things about DNephew (age 15):
Knows all the words to the Disney movies we watched obsessively when he was a kid
His laugh is infectious
He loves all things Marvel
He has a collage on his bedroom wall of photos of me and him from babyhood to now
He's always thinking about how others feel
He remembers my Gran and talks about her
The love I felt for him when he cried at her funeral
The way he loves DSD and DS like they are his siblings
How cute he was when he crawled around in his nappy
His first word was my name
The time he learned sweet child of mine on the guitar because it's my favourite (he was 12)
When he held my hand at my stepdads funeral so I could get through reading the eulogy
He can rest his chin on my head but he's still my first baby

Best things about DSD (age 11):
The way we quote Mean Girls to each other in every situation
She makes me tea in the mornings
She takes hundreds of photos of everything so there's always photos from nice occasions
She writes/draws comics
She wrote a story about DS as a superhero that I have framed because it's fills me with pride
Her hilarious dry wit
Her compulsive tidiness
The pride ExP and I felt when we taught her to swim
She loves to go swimming with me
The way her hair falls when it's clean and she let's me blow dry it
When we snuggle under her unicorn blanket and watch teen movies while the boys are out

Best things about DS (age 3):
Getting excited about playing shopkeeper/cooking dinner
Being amazed when seeing a real helicopter fly over
Saying "look mammy there's a birdie"
Choosing his bedtime stories, or telling me he wants cereal not toast
The way he smells after his Sunday night bath (it's a long one instead of the quick dunking he gets the rest of the week)
When he's playing with Velma and Shaggy and he calls them mammy and daddy
When he asks for "sitting down cuddles" and I know he means he's tired and needs a snuggle on the sofa
His delight when he's jumping on my bed
How his arms feel round my neck
His innocence and joy in everything

Feeling like you have the sweetest, kindest, most talented, best looking, cleverest, kindest most unique and special children in the whole world. Even though I accept this must be how everyone feels I still think it’s actually true!
Sometimes I almost burst with pride, they are my best achievement by a mile.

DS holds onto my top when I carry him.
I absolutely love it. His tiny hand, holding onto me.

Frog when ds was a baby he would root out those annoying little ribbons in my top to play with while I fed him and to hold onto while being carried. He didnt like that his dad didnt have any.

When they're 18 you can send them to the shop to buy wine

Seriously, it was all good. Hard work a lot of the time but good. I don't regret a minute of it.

They look after you when you’re old ?

The laughs.

I love hearing my boys laugh together at some weirdness they've discovered, and this happens most of the time when they're not trying to murder each other.

Ds2 frequently comes out with stuff like "mummy wouldn't it be funny if you did a poo shaped like the bat signal?", and i have to say, "yes darling, it would be quite funny. And possibly uncomfortable."

So from that moment on, going for a dump became "putting out the bat signal"!

Went to dd1's sports day this morning. She made me do the parents' race. I told her I really can't run and she said "it's ok mummy, you just have to do your best" and true enough she was beaming proudly after I came last. I felt very loved. And then dd2 and I went to watch her play her violin and toddler dd2 was making her teddy's arms clap and saying "we all very proud" which made my heart swell. Just exploring and seeing things through their eyes is the best bit for me. They're really good company on a boring errand like going to the supermarket. Congratulations OP!