Best Ever

Tonight, our family watched a video from a year or so ago where N had pulled my hair and I had made a gesture with my hands and must have made a loud noise because it hurt.  N was mimicking me in the video.  Putting his hands out in front of him and screeching.  You could hear Ash and me laughing really hard in the background and our little guy looked so happy as he squealed and finally crawled away at the end of the video. 

We looked through some other pictures from trips over a year ago and N seemed to have a carefree happy smile, and I began to feel guilty.  A year ago I had a limitless amount of patience.  I never complained about being a mom or rough days with my kiddo.  And tonight I started to feel guilty.  Is my two year old less carefree and happy because I no longer have a limitless amount of patience?  I'm pregnant so my hormones or the thought of a new baby entering the mix soon had me overanalyzing and I began to cry.  

Lately, N has been looking in the mirror, smiling from ear to ear and repeating over and over, "I'm the best ever.  Best ever.  Best ever."  The ever eventually gets exagerrated and begins to sounds like evah.  

We laid down together on the couch tonight face to face like we do every night when N is trying to fall asleep and he got a little restless and I had heartburn so we sat up.  He gave me a huge hug and I instinctively without thinking said, "I love you, you're the best ever."  A few seconds later he was repeating his new mantra to himself "Best evah.  I'm the best evah."

And I realized that my toddler sits and looks in the mirror and assures himself that he's the best ever because I tell him that every day and he hears me.  Loud and clear.