Every so often, someone will ask me if we'll have a fifth child to "try for a girl." I have to stop myself from bursting into laughter. For one thing, our fourth child was a surprise beyond all surprises and miracle beyond all miracles. Don't get me wrong, I'm convinced that Fall2 was meant to be with our family. He fit in seamlessly with everyone else and if my family can agree on nothing else, we all agree that Fall2 is about the happiest and most joyful baby you'll ever meet. It's just that we're not going to try to make more of anything. Besides, I have four boys. If I had five children, I'd probably have five boys. I wouldn't trade my boys for anything but four is plenty, thankyouverymuch.
When I was pregnant with Fall2, some friends told me that he must be my girl. I knew, just knew, that he wasn't. And that was fine. I'd made peace with being a mom of all boys long ago. I will miss out on alot of girly things but that's okay. As far as I'm concerned, being the only female in the family means I have no competition for queen/princess/goddess of the house. Plus, I have a nice matched set of children. And what kind of girl would I have with three big brothers? Probably a girly girl wearing a dress but carrying worms around in a purse. Would she ever be asked out on a date? As protective as my boys are of me, I can only imagine what they'd be like with a little sister.
I hope to have one daughter-in-law who likes me. The odds seem good. My own mother-in-law is a great role model...everyone likes her. I pay careful attention to friends' in-law horror stories because I definitely don't want to be the dreaded kind of mother-in-law.
Daughters-in-law are waaaay in the future. Right now, I content myself with nieces and friends' daughters and stories about their girls. Some of these stories make me realize how loud and active my boys are. Some of these stories make me grateful for my loud and active but far less dramatic boys. Regardless, I have four wonderful, healthy, happy and funny children and I am grateful for those little men every day.
Anyway, Summer10 and Spring7 are sure that one of the goldfish must be a girl. Maybe I could just glue a pink bow on the hermit crab's shell? Um, maybe not.
Well said - I always thought I would have girls because I'm really girly - but I don't know what I would do without these amazing boys!! It takes a special woman to raise boys - and you've got twice as many as me! I also have a niece and daughters of friends to indulge my girl fixes when I need them.
ReplyDeleteYah, my in-laws have the same, and when asked why they stopped after 4 boys, they responded "because we didn't want 5"
ReplyDeleteBesides, I think 4 girls would be waaaaay more trouble and drama- oy! My girls do wear princess dresses and put toy cars in their purses (they have rescue mission for worms in the garden). One of the boys wears dresses, too...