Satin Ribbon Loving 7/365, originally uploaded by Mellahoney.

From his bedroom window we watch the snow tumble down in stark white clumps and marvel as it piles up our driveway. Maybe we should have some cocoa, he suggests, sound like a good idea?

He speaks like a bonafide little person now and associates snow with cocoa, because it's what we drink after coming in and emptying our boots of damp snow sludge, after we hang our wet mittens above the pellet stove and stuff our socks in the washing machine.

He associates cocoa with warmth and being home.

So we have some cocoa and then he plays, quietly though as his sister naps.

First we try a puzzle, but since it is one he has long since mastered, he loses interest quickly. So we color, write our letters and talk in hushed voices about how much fun we're going to have when Lila-Bean wakes up, when Daddy comes home, when we have cupcakes after dinner. For him, life is all in the anticipation, in the wondering what's going to come next.

I'm a big boy now, I'm not a baby anymore, he tells me. And though it's true, my heart still winces at his words. Because for me, life is all in the moment, the exact moment we're living in. And after they're tucked in at night, I long to have the moments back, to replay hugging their wriggling warm bodies fresh plucked from the tub. To have again the giggles and crumbs and silly outbursts over who's toes would taste better with ketchup at the dinner table. To have them reaching for me, calling for me, wrapping their arms around my legs.

My husband worries that their clinging is overboard, that they reach for me too much and I need to be careful not to cater to their every whim. Which I certainly do not. But I do make exceptions. I'm only human, I bend. And how can I not? If they only want one moment more in my arms when it's all I want from them as well?