Perfect Sunday morning with my kid

I’ve imagined and written about what a perfect morning or perfect day looks like for me. But being the new dad I am, I’ve never thought about a perfect morning with my kid.

Until today. When it happened for real, organically:

I woke up at 3am for a quick pee, but ended up not being able to sleep, so I woke by 4:50am to get a headstart on my side project. Sunday mornings are great for deep work. Everything’s sooo quiet. Then by 8am my toddler wakes. My wife’s still asleep – we let her sleep in some more. He opens the door, peeks out. I walk over, picks him up, and we walk around the house and chat for a bit. After a leisurely moring stroll around the house carrying him, we wash up. I let him brush his own teeth for the first time, with him standing on the toilet bowl. He usually refuses his teeth-brushing, but with the newfound autonomy, he did it with glee. I finish up the parts he missed. Then we’re off to the kitchen. He asked for cherries, and I asked him to help me with it. He takes the stalks off, while I remove the cores. We throw in a few of his favourite mini sponge cakes, and a dollop of Greek yoghurt. He asks to eat standing up on a wooden stool at the pantry. I agree. We chit chat while he eats. For a three year old, he’s pretty chatty when he wants to. I start eating my yoghurt with blueberries and pecans, and he starts joking about how pecans look like cockroaches. It’s true, isn’t it? Have you ever thought about pecans are cockroaches? I didn’t. We laugh, then proceed to crush some ‘cockroaches’ into his yoghurt, and he had fun playing along with the joke. We giggle some more. In time, he finishes his breakfast, all by himself, without any nudging needed, without drama, without fighting, without power struggles, without any tears and crying that’s often typical of breakfast. What changed? I don’t know for sure, but I’m guessing it’s got to do with the autonomy he got, the full participation he had in starting his day, and (hopefully) the full presence of a parent attending to him.

Sunday 25 June 2023. A perfect Sunday morning with my kiddo.

New core memory created… for me.

[Edit:] My wife re-posted this from an IG account and thought it was perfect to describe what motivated me to write this perfect Sunday morning post:

Dear Husband,

There’s a life in the future with little faces in photo frames instead of before our eyes, and artwork and abc magnets won’t adorn our fridge.

There’s a bed big enough, where little elbows and knees won’t prod us in our sleep and only our feet will swing out in the morning.

There’s a vase placed in reach of little arms because there aren’t any, and mugs will daringly sit on the edge of the table.

There’s a bank balance that looks a bit more forgiving and a bag I leave with that isn’t overflowing.

There’s a free calendar that isn’t packed with swimming lessons, dance classes and muddy sports shoes. And we’ll get to know each other for a third time, before them, with them, and then when only two jackets hang at the door.

There’s a clean car, the only noise is the hum of the radio. There will be no endless questions in a high pitched voice from the back seat, there may even be days we don’t hear from them at all.

There’s a date night with no curfew, my mums not needed for babysitting, and we aren’t sleeping with one eye open waiting for the shuffle of feet down the hallway. A type of freedom that feels heavy.

There’s a house that’s clean, maybe our couch is new, we aren’t stepping on Lego or toy cars either. In fact there’s not much colour anywhere. Remember how it came with so much happiness?

There’s a dinner table that feels big, we aren’t negotiating bites of vegetables or wiping little hands and mouths. But sometimes there’s a knock on the door & the table is full once more.

There’s a shower that doesn’t sound like baby cries, a coffee that is warm and my body will be my own. We won’t wear tired the same way but time will have aged us anyway.

There will be hard moments to come that will make these moments look easy, but we’ll remember.
We’ll remember the first words, the curls, the “I love you’s” the moments we almost broke, & how we held each other through it all.

There’s a life in the future and it’s coming for us. So let’s get swept up in the beautiful chaos in front of us.
Let’s make the future wait a little longer.
Because I love this life with you so much,
this one right now.

– from @jessurlichs_writer