Emrick is exactly two and a half years old today. This is his 913th day of life. It feels like the 913th day of mine, too.
When I was pregnant with Emrick, I was still teaching here in Utah. Another teacher gave me a children’s book that I didn’t read in its entirety until a few months after Emrick was born. It’s called Mom Says I Can.
It’s about a little boy who has several imaginary adventures, always hunting the “world’s greatest treasure.” In one adventure he’s a superhero; in another he’s a cowboy; in another he is a pirate, and so on.
He always has his mom’s encouragement: “Mom says I’m so tough!”/”Mom says I’m so brave!”/”Mom says I’m so cool!”
At the end of the book, after all of his adventures, he puts on his pajamas and sits in a chair with his mom. When she asks him why he’s not dressed for another treasure-hunting adventure, this is what happens.
He tells her he doesn’t need to hunt for the world’s greatest treasure because she is the world’s greatest treasure.
Sidenote: my hormones, which had me ugly-crying at diaper commercials when I was pregnant with Emrick, have never quite returned to normal. So the first time I read this to Emrick, when he was about four months old, I got choked up. I got really choked up. Of course at the time, Emrick understood books to be little more than a teething toy. Still, for the next year at least, I could not read this book to him without a quiver in my voice at the end. And that’s not because I think Emrick thinks that I am his greatest treasure, but because he is mine.
I can read this book just fine now. No quivers, no tickle in the throat, no mist in the eye. But recently I have been telling Emrick daily that he is my greatest treasure. Sometimes I tell him at night, when he is worn out from passionately and tearfully resisting bedtime, lying defeated in my arms with his head on my shoulder. And sometimes I tell him during the day, and in response he grins and repeats, “greatest treasure.” He doesn’t know what that means, but he will soon enough.
Emrick is 33.25 inches tall and weighs 26 pounds, 10.5 ounces. Marcus and I think he’s the greatest thing since… ever.
We love you, Pookie Pie!
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Boy! Reading this made my hormones kick into overdrive too! Such a wonderful Mom and Dad. Such a lucky little boy!
Perfect fit.
I feel the love — Can you feel me hugging you?
Very lovely. We know the feelings as grandparents, especially since we have just had a visit from Nick, Kristin and Henry.
Have you read the one “Love You Forevr” by Robert Munsch? THAT one still makes me cry. Mom and I were in Target once and she found it and we read it there in the store, and both of us got choked up right there. Emrick IS “sliced bread”!
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Thanks, Eric and Harriet. I hope Nick and his family are doing well. In the pics I’ve seen of Henry, he looks like a mini-Nick. 🙂
Samantha, We have that book, too! It’s a sweet story, and Emrick loves the pictures in that one, but for some reason it doesn’t trigger the same teary response in me, even though I certainly identify with all of its sentiments.
LOved it all. Thank you Marcus for giving me this
info to be able to follow the ‘Sorensens’ affairs. Praises be to modern technology. I’m still here until June of 2014, at least.
I love the photos of little Emrick, and Sona’s
remarks help me ( so far away) to know her better. Love Always,