I did something right.

When Cadence was exactly one week old, I cuddled with him and cried.  I couldn't believe it had already been a week since I gave birth to him, and it confirmed that they weren't lying when they said it would go by fast.

This morning, nearly six and a half years later, my son unexpectedly ran and jumped into my lap, wrapped his arms around me and gave me the biggest hug EV.ER.  At first I thought he was crying because he wouldn't let go.  I asked him, "did you get hurt?  What's wrong?"  He replied, "nothing."  "Well, what's up??"   With a huge grin on his face, he looked at me and said, "my room!"

Back up two hours:

I have this odd disorder that causes me to stress if there isn't a clean room in the house.  Like, really stress.  I lose it.  One clean room - even a bathroom - is the difference between a relaxed and happy mommy or a stressed and psycho mommy.

I know...you don't even believe me.  It's totally true though.

So amid a week filled with dog sitting (which resulted in 3 different pee offerings throughout the house), giving blood (which knocked me out for the rest of Monday afternoon), church, Bible study, grocery shopping, hiking with the girls, basketball awards, classes....this list goes on and on...amid ALL of that, our house refused to clean itself (cue Shawn Spencer:  "Whaa??").  Since today's itinerary was simple (i.e. blank), I woke up this morning ready to attack one room.  Which room?  Well, my son's room of course, because it's the least-visited room in the house.  My son does not change his clothes five times a day, nobody cooks in his room, we don't eat in his room, we don't do laundry or even shower there.  =)  All in all, once cleaned, the room has a better than average chance of staying that way, which results in a less-stressed mommy.  Seriously guys...one room.

My son often migrates to our bedroom after Stuart heads to work (sometimes before, and he sneaks onto the end of our bed..it's so cute, really it is), which gave me the perfect opportunity to get up early and "clean" his room for him (hey, he hasn't noticed anything missing yet),) pull the sheets off and lug all the laundry to the garage, vacuum, organize, and fold to my hearts content  Let me tell you, I walked out of there a happy and stress-free mommy.

However, the only thing my son knew this morning was that mommy went in and cleaned his room for him!    It never dawned on me that something I was doing for myself would mean so much to him.  And to have my 6-year-old son jump into my lap took me right back to our first week together and reminded me that he's still my baby boy.