New Joys, New Worries

Two days before her eight month "birthday", Anika has astounded us with her agility and can now climb up the three little stairs that go up to our second level of the house. We are so proud that she has been developing physically and has the mental determination to scale these stairs! However. However. Now that she can pull herself up onto things (she also loves scaling boxes and suitcases that are left on the floor) my mommy brain jumps to all the things that are dangerous that she can access, the toilets being one of them. I have been trying to get in the routine of closing the seat everytime, but now I think I am just going to keep the doors to our bathrooms closed. I also now have to be cautious when I am baking or have the oven open to make sure she is not around to reach up and grab the inside of the door. With every stage of life that Anika passes through come a new set of worries and terrible things on which my overactive imagination can spend too much time. When expressing these things to my mother, she said something that summarized this new chapter of our adventures perfectly. "Welcome to parenthood." And we are only EIGHT MONTHS in to what will hopefully be the next sixty years of our time together on this earth. The importance of the vows on Anika's baptism take on a whole new meaning when physical dangers start popping up all over the place. Anika is ultimately God's, not mine. I need to trust and pray that I can watch over her and keep her safe as far as it depends on my responsibility; but earthly dangers aside, I trust that Anika is in the arms of Jesus and her Heavenly Father, which is the safest place for anyone to be.