Every morning when my son wakes up I ask him if he had any good dreams. This morning (at 6:30 am on the dot) my son sleepily wanders into our bathroom where I am getting ready for the day. After we did our good mornings I asked him if he had any good dreams last night. He responds with “yeeaahhhh race cars, dump trucks and takin a bath and playing outside and rainbows.” 

Dream big buddy, dream big. 

I’ve always been a dreamer. I’ve always been someone who could so easily get lost in my own thoughts, to the point where I could tune out the rest of the world. When I was a child, my family often joked around that I was always in my own little world. It’s true. Back then, I could daydream my way through anything. Spanish class, long car rides, laying in bed waiting to fall asleep. 

As a kid, I often caught myself daydreaming about what my life would be like when I grew up. I never dreamed that I would be president or cure cancer and travel to the moon. Truthfully, the daydreams I had about what life would be like as an adult weren’t anything out of the ordinary. Grow up, go to college, get a job. Somewhere in there I would meet my soulmate of course. My best friend. We would date and get to know each other. He would take me out for a fancy dinner one night, only to get down on one knee holding something sparkly. I dreamt of us dancing among our family and friends and promising to spend forever with each other. Renovating, redecorating, and then entertaining in a place that we poured our hearts and souls into. A place we would lovingly make ours. In the dream there were always dogs. Some traveling. And just this overall feeling of contentment. 

And then one day when we were ready, I would excitedly show my husband the peed-on stick. We would talk about baby names, fold tiny onesies, and take baby bump pictures. One cold January night we would rush to the hospital. Hours and hours later we’d hear those sudden piercing cries ring out through our hospital room at 12:15 am, and again on a hot and humid July morning just 2.5 years later, in that very same hospital room, at 3:11 am. Those first moments of blood, sweat, and tears, a precursor to the fun that awaited us. 

I’ve dreamt of becoming a mom, and everything that came along with it, for as long as I can remember. The sleepless nights and early mornings. Clothes covered in spit up and breastmilk. Toys everywhere. Wiping bananas out of the baby’s hair and frequent trips to the store for coffee and baby wipes, car seat in one hand and tiny toddler hand in the other. Mommy will you play, mommy I need help, mommy, mommy, mommy, all day long. Trips to the park and the pediatrician and library story time.

My hands never free. Always cooking something, cleaning something, holding someone. Being accompanied by two little ones everywhere I go. Alone time suddenly becoming a thing of the past. Those gummy baby smiles and the random “mommy I wuv you.” Trying to make dinner with a baby hanging on my leg and a toddler making yet another mess somewhere… 

And in the dream, finally the garage door opens. It might as well be God himself walking through the door. The toddler shrieks with delight, and the baby’s face lights up. The dogs bark and wag their tails and carry on. But no one is more excited than me. Our person greets us all with hugs and kisses and we sit down to a dinner that is anything but relaxing. We cut up food into tiny pieces, and get up from our seats no less than 10 times - for water, more spaghetti, a fork, the ketchup. We power through dishes and baths and bedtime routines. Our tired bodies and minds are so close to the finish line now. I pick up the baby and take her upstairs to bed and I soak in those last few, finally quiet moments of the day.

I think about all this that I have, all this that I once dreamed of. I have this healthy, happy little family who I love with my entire being. And it suddenly doesn’t seem so ordinary anymore.