Tell me about a perfect moment from your life :)

[CheerfulYank]

I just had one, all snuggled up in bed with DS (6) and DD (8 months). We're so warm and cuddled up while it's freezing outside. They're both sleeping on their stomachs in their cozy pajamas and I love the sound of their sleepy even breathing. :) DS doesn't have school tomorrow (President's Day) so no morning rush ahead of me. It just struck me as a wonderful moment I should try to remember...DS looking so little while he sleeps, DD's chubby baby hands on my pillow.

It got me remembering a night I spent once when I was 21, lying in a field and drunkenly talking to a boy. It was the most gorgeous summer night, with a breeze and a huge moon and the smell of grass everywhere, and it really seemed like I would be 21 forever.

Just little moments like that, that you keep and remember, times when you wouldn't trade your life for anything. :) What are some of yours?

What a wonderful thread.

I have a few but the most special...

Hearing DD1 heartbeat - 12 weeks pregnant, we were in Cuba and i'd had heavy bleeding, they suspected baby was lost. They saw me quickly but the 10 minutes wait felt like forever and the moment we heard her heartbeat and the doctor said, 'baby is there and happy'. That moment will never leave me.

Night my DH proposed, it was totally unexpected and beautiful. We just stood and watched the sun set, feeling completely in love.

Thank you OP, this has seriously cheered up my Monday!

I had a horrible pregnancy but when ds was born it was amazing and when we took him home it was Christmas Day and there were fireworks going off everywhere . It was lovely.

Also my wedding day was amazing I just felt so so lucky and in love.

Also whale watching with dh, felt so amazing and surreal to be so close to these huge creatures.

Also when dd was a few months old and I just suddenly felt like she really was mine. I always loved her but when she was born I had a bad time physically and then ended up with PND and felt very guilty that I hadn't been filled with the same elation as I had when ds was born. When she was a few months I just remember looking at her and realising I had just as much of a bond with her as I do with ds and it just made me feel so relieved and happy.

Oh and when very pregnant with dd the midwife couldn't find her heartbeat and was calling for a doctor and scanner when I asked to try because I could feel how she was lying and there it was like a thousand horses clip clopping along.

Ah those moments of ecstasy which are so common in teenage and early 20s years and become fewer in number but more precious as we get older.

I was with a man I absolutely adored and a couple of good friends in the sea in West Wales in 1997. I was 22. We were fooling around on a couple of surfboards and I looked around and the people I was with, the sea, the cliffs and the hills, suddenly acutely aware that I needed to savour every nanosecond, because this time would never come again. That was my most memorable one.

I had one a few weeks ago. Clear, sunny winter's day, I was in the kitchen making breakfast for me and the girls (4 and 1), they were in the living room.

I was just going through the normal weekday morning checklist when I heard them laughing. I've no idea what they were doing to make each other laugh, but first one would laugh, then there was a pause, then the other started.

It was just beautiful.

When dc2 started school it was a lovely warm week.
I walked with dc3 in the sling to pick up dc1 & 2 from school. (We normally went in the car)
We walked home along a path i walked many times as a child. Dc3 was big enough to walk part of the way home. The sun was glistening through the trees, birds were singing and the children were walking and chatting happily to each other.
I felt very blessed (& still do)

Shakinstevens I'm so sorry for the loss of your beautiful baby x

So true Hester.

When I was 15, my boyfriend was away on holiday with his family. One evening it was warm and wet, post summer rain kind of atmosphere. I was at work in the local cafe. When I came out, I heard my name and turned round. There he was. I can still feel my knees giving way, and touch and smell him.

Oh to be there again, where every sensation is so magnified. I'm happy in middle age, and love my boring life. But... Omg.

Standing in a little courtyard garden in Sri Lanka (OK I smoked then and was having a quick one) when all these little fireflys started flying around me! It was like being in a Disney film!!

Got a bit obssesive about fireflys for the rest of the holiday...until I thought I saw one down by the beach but after creeping up on it in silence discovered it was the cigarette end being held by a very big, and shocked, security guard holding a fucking great gun! We both did that scream like in E.T but luckily he didn't fire.

A couple of years ago it was my birthday. My children were off school as it was the Easter holidays and DH had taken the day off work. After lunch at home we decided to go out for the afternoon.

We went to a local country park and started walking. The DCs ran on ahead and my DDs (teens) were looking for log pile houses and playing Gruffalo with their little brother who must have been about 4. DH and I were strolling behind them, holding hands, much to the disgust of our DDs

After our walk we went into the cafe and drank tea and ate cake. It was smashing.

In the early 80's..with my boyfriend....came out of a gig at our local venue on the coast and it was one of those perfect, clear calm nights. Sat on a bench looking over the sea towards the French coast with a full moon reflected in the shimmering waters of the channel and I remember some coloured lights above us gently moving in the breeze. I thought then - I want to capture this moment and remember it - we were cuddled together on the bench, not speaking, it was one of those times where we felt so comfortable and at peace in each others company. BF is now DH of nearly 30 years.

One of mine was sitting on a sofa with my then 20 mo ds, feeding him orange segments, shafts of sun coming through the window. He said 'thank oo mama' and gave a little giggle after each segment. Not sure why it made me feel so happy other than he had spoken no words at all before that, and it just felt like he was starting to be part of the world.

My wedding day was pretty amazing, nothing fazed me it was perfect although probably lots of things that didn't matter went wrong

The birth of each of my Dcs. Ds1 of course as it was the moment I became a mum and my life changed forever.
Ds2 because he looked at me with those big dark eyes and I fell in love. Ds3 because it was the most perfect labour and I thought at the time my last
Finally the birth of dd. I fully expected to have another boy so when mw held her up and I said it's a girl I'd never been so shocked and delighted in my life. I spent the next hour on a high telling her all about equality and being strong and independent while dh looked on bemused. Then we took her home to meet her big brothers and they each fell in love with her and melted my heart. I've never felt so lucky and happy in my life and I couldn't ask for any more than my 3 amazing boys and one amazing girl

Hearing my DD do her first cry just after she came out of my c-section. I heard her before I saw her. After five years and six miscarriages I couldn't take the off my face

Hiding under Bournemouth Pier on a boiling hot day with the man I loved so dearly at the time. He was laid down on the sand and I was laid with my head on his stomach whilst he played with my hair. We had just decided that we couldn't see each other any more but neither of us were quite ready to break the spell and go home.

A few minutes later we got up and silently got a taxi back to the station. We went through the barrier together then stood at opposite ends of the platform and got into different train carriages. I have never seen him since but I will always remember that perfect moment that marked the end of our 11 week, 3 days and 4.5 hours long affair. It was the perfect summer...

When my grandmother was dying I would stay over at the weekends to look after her. I climbed into her huge double bed in the morning. We held hands and had eye contact for ages that said she knew I loved her and I knew she loved me and that only we understood how much and how close we are / were.

I love this thread too, because it's reminded me I need to start living more rather than holing myself up. Bit numb at the moment.

I'm so glad I started this thread, and so glad people are enjoying it! These are so lovely they've given me chills. I think it's beautiful to have moments like these to hold onto.

Shaken , thank you for sharing your memory of your DS.

Another of mine...13 or 14, in the dead of winter. My dad had made a fire in the wood stove and I was sitting by it, reading James Herriot, with wool socks on my feet, and Dad brought me a cup of hot sugary tea that tasted like oranges and spice. I just felt so warm and cared for.

Also the moment my pnd with DS started to pass. He was 4 months old and I was rocking him to sleep when I realized I loved him down the depths of my being. I sang that song that goes "button up your overcoat/when the wind is free/take good care of yourself, you belong to me" to him for a bit, shakily, and then he went to sleep in my arms and I cried and cried with relief.

Oh Sauce that is beautiful. My grandmother died on Christmas eve this year and I hadn't seen her in over a year. :(

Seeing DS's tiny wee heart beating away on the monitor at our 7 week scan after nearly 4 years ttc.

Holding same DS skin to skin and watching the sun rise on his first full day in the world.

Every day as he has his evening bottle snuggled up on me and I look down on his utterly perfect baby face.

When i left my arsehole ex. Me & my dd were in the car & she looked up at me with tears in her eyes & stated 'we can do what we want now mummy, i love you' Made me realise i had done the right thing 100%.

When i knew that no-one else was going to love me like my now oh. I realised this moment when we were laying on Bognor beach throwing stones into the air on a boiling hot day.

When he confirmed this on xmas day 2 years ago. I was crying because i thought he didnt like his present, went into the garden to calm down & stop the tears. Come back inside into the living room & he was on two hes to old for 1 knee knees with an engagment ring & dd sat beside him shouting 'well mum?' I said yes

When i later asked dd if she was happy with me being engaged & she said 'only because i was engaged to Mr Overit to be of course

I love them.

Just thinking of the moments after DS (DC2) was born. It was also amazing when DD was born in the pool and lifted up onto my tummy for a few moments in the water. But then she was given to DH to hold whilst I got out and she cried for a bit before I could get her back and settle her at the breast (after being weighed as well, which she wasn't happy about at all)
So, understandably, I wasn't quite so confident in how to settle DD straight away as she was my first and there's a lot to take in.
But with DS (DC2) I was an experienced and confident tiger mother and put in my birth plan that he could only be weighed after I'd given him a good cuddle and he was more settled. So I got him straight up and onto the boob and both he and I were wonderfully happy and content

• sharing a lovely, peaceful hour or so with no disturbances, before perhaps I went for a shower and we slowly got ready to go home

I've thought of another one. Last year we went to Japan to Kyoto. We'd taken the shinkanzen in the morning, and arrived early afternoon so went out for a walk to view some of the temples before it got too late. We were walking around one near our hotel, and it started raining like crazy. Given it was all outdoors, we could hardly stay so we jumped into a taxi and I picked another temple off the list nearby, and asked the driver to take us there. He took us up the hill to this road with lots of traditional style houses and cobbled streets, and told us we had to walk the rest of the way. We arrived at kiyomizu dera which sits in a forest at the top of the hill. It was just amazing - the rain softened, there was a mist over the hill and it was so quiet. It also smelled amazing - of incense and rain. We just walked around stunned for about half an hour. It was the best.

Not so much a perfect moment, but the last time I felt perfect peace: The morning of my sons' funeral, my youngest son, my partner and I were stood with him in his coffin, just the four of us for one last time at home and together.
All our friends and family were outside waiting for us and you could honestly feel the love and support.
That was perfect peace and calm, I won't ever feel that again.

and this is the entrance you arrive at