Still little.

“They’re not little anyone,” I say to Arnauld as I pause at the row of magnetic photos the girls have lined up in the playroom, right next to Arnauld’s makeshift office.

I wanted him to tell me that they were, that they were still sloppy toddlers and chubby cheeked babies-irrational as that would be. “No they’re not,” he said. “They’re all getting so tall.”

They’re getting tall but I still find signs of little.

Wren yaps my ear off on the ride to and from dance class. She tells me about school, their fundraiser, and the new girl who is so “kind.” She uses this word to describe her dance friends too, some old, some new. I’m proud that this is the word she chooses, this is what she sees in others. Then when we make a quick stop at Target, she lets me hold her hand, not just when we’re walking through the parking lot, but the whole time we’re in the store.

When we get home from the store, Adi is half asleep on the couch. “Let’s go up to bed, Ad,” I say. “I’ll carry you up.” As I lift her, her tall body adjusts and wraps around mine just like she did when she was a baby. Her head finds that perfect place in my shoulder and I could stand there and sway and rock her all night.

Rose, my rocking baby. I rocked her to sleep until she turned three. She loves to be cuddled. Even now, before I leave the house each morning, we go through five or six rounds of, “just one more hug…I love you so much.”

These are my babies. May I always be able to find a little of their little.