The Princess loves the idea of married people and babies. She is constantly trying to clear these concepts up.
One day, while sitting on our front porch, I asked her, "So ... are you going to live here with me forever?"
Swinging her short legs back and forth on her chair, she answered, reluctantly, "No."
"But why? I want you to stay here with me," I said, while looking hard at her sweet little face.
She looked up into my eyes and with a touch of exasperation in her voice, she said, "Well then ... where will my babies come from?"
She had sort of cleared up that married people have the babies and she proceeded to tell me that she wanted eight (she'll change her mind about that!). I told her that sounded like a liter - like puppies - and she laughed.
Shortly after that day on the porch, she asked me, "Do you first get married and then have babies?"
I told her, "Yes. Why?"
She then said, sweetly, "I just wanted to know." And then she said, "If not ... the babies would come to the wedding."
I'm not going to tell her, for a long while ... that that ... sometimes happens too.
She is my last baby. And ... as much as I hope that she finds a husband deserving of her and babies to fill her home with love and laughter and promise ... I'm not quite ready, not right yet ... to imagine this baby of mine ... someday having babies of her own.
On the upside ... my husband and I have been married for 24 years. I am very happy that my children have been witness to our commitment to one another and love of family. If nothing else ... we have worked very hard ... to give our children this. To offer our children this ... this same dream for themselves.