a toast and a prayer.

Look at my baby tracker! 15 days, it cheers! Depending on my mood, I'm either yelling at it ("15 days, you say?! I want him out NOW!!!!") or marveling at the grand passage of time it signifies ("Wow, I remember the day I find out I was pregnant...") One thing is for sure: In a month or less, our little family of 4 will expand into a unit of 5. Cue gushy, sentimental musings.

It doesn't help that my husband and the kiddos were gone for most of last week. I went almost a whole week without my precious boys... the longest I have ever been away from them. Thankfully I was not the emotional mess I thought I would be, instead slipping into some strange limbo-state where I was able to survey my life the way some people describe out-of-body experiences on the operating table. I caught up on the laundry - cleaned out and organized the kids' closets - and thought about my existence in no small terms.

But I will not bore you with those thoughts (at least not right now, ha!) This morning is our first morning back. Daddy is at work and the boys are delighting in returning to the slow, easy routine we've been doing almost every morning for months. For me, however, many things are like a pleasant surprise: Have they always sounded so sweet asking for cake this early in the morning? ... Always been so clever, to cut to the chase and remove ALL their toys from their place in one go? My 3-year-old grew a foot, I swear. And my 1-year-old is definitely the funniest person in the whole world.

Here's to distance making the heart grow fonder; here's a prayer that hundreds of miles won't always be necessary to teach that gratitude is always in order for the people right here next to us, all day every day.