About... Stolen Moments

I envisioned stacks of boxes taking up all of the closets for the next dozen years, but it isn't happening like that. Over the past couple of months, she has thrown out, and given away most of the junk. She has it down to three boxes. I giggle behind my hand at what is most important to her now... her hat collection. Her purse collection. Her strict instructions to her sister about not removing the racing posters from the wall until she tells her to... her hope chest. I told her to leave her clothes in her drawers until she gets her first leave then she can go through them and take back with her what she decides she wants to keep (I'm sure it will be little or nothing, but we'll see. She's sentimental about souviner t-shirts and things like that...). She's packing a little at a time. Last night, she went through her hope chest. I made it for her the Christmas right after she turned 7. My sister's was full of new dishes and linens and crap when she was that age. But no, not she. She brought to me ticket stubs, "Hey, Mom! Remember when we..." oh yes, I remember. She pulled out her porcelain doll and took it out of the box and hugged it. Then she went through her button collection. She passed a stack of them off to her brother. SADD. Say No To Drugs. I saw one with a kitten on it go to her sister. She kept two. One was her Class of 2005 pin. The other, well, suprised the heck out of me. The other button was a good sized blue one. It says "I have a new baby brother..." and the name of the hospital where DS was born. It was given to her by a nurse when she was 13 MONTHS OLD the day the boy was born. I had no idea she'd stashed it away all these years and it was that important to her. Amazing.

The other two are like the gruesome twosome right now. No hateful words or sibling rivalry. It's almost scarey. While the other one was doing the walk down memory lane through the hope chest... the other two were sitting on the couch teaching each other new songs on the guitar. It always freaks me out when they actually get along...

Then this morning. I was pulling my boots on under my jeans getting ready to run out the door to work. Katie and Matt were interviewing a family where the mother put the kids crap on E-bay for sale. She rushed up to me and hugged me and said, "Mom! Don't sell my stuff on Ebay, please???"

I wouldn't dream of it sweetheart...