greater than

A few weeks ago Matt posted a question on his twitter account that intrigued me. The question was, “what is your greater than?” What in your life is greater than something else. My initial response to that was Starbucks > Folgers, haha…let’s be honest, its true. Later that night, or in the middle of the night rather, when I was feeding Norah, I started thinking of another ‘greater than’ statement…

Norah is a very smiley baby and has been smiling; legitimate, purposeful smiles, since her very first days - which is unusual for babies.

This picture was taken just hours after she was born and her first smile…its not the greatest quality of photos, but trust me, it was a smile.

The second one below was taken at 4 days old.

　

As with my other babies, I become energized with their pure beauty and innocence which helps me through those first few rough weeks of sleepless nights. When I hear the crying on the monitor and I have to drag myself out of bed, its those precious little faces that calm my spirit and keeps me going. Norah though has been even more so a burst of light in the 3a.m. darkness…that little girl is so incredibly smiley when she sees me, it just warms my heart.

　

So my initial 'greater than' was this -- Norah’s smiles > sleep.



  

 HOWEVER…

As I was rocking her in the chair and thinking about HOW tired I truly was, I thought, “well, her smiles are greater than sleep but probably can't sustain me like sleep can.” ;)

So here it is…

Norah’s smiles are greater than, but not equal to, sleep.

I love knowing that no matter how long or hard she has been crying, as soon as she sees me she starts kicking her legs and smiling like she’s going to burst with excitement. I’ve wanted to take pictures of her in the middle of the night or get it on video to capture it forever, but its just too dark in her room at that time of night to do so effectively.

These are the smiley moments I don’t want to forget and will cherish about her babyhood.