Ode to Jane, but mostly Wendy

You can't read all that much aloud in 5 minutes a night, or less. After making extremely slow progress in Peter Pan for weeks I thought about reading to Prince and the family at the breakfast table. We defeated the pirates six weeks before and were still trying to get the children back home!

The first morning I tried, it was a very difficult morning. The children clearly woke up on the wrong side of the bed and it was shaping into a very long day for Joy. As I read, though, the children calmed down and peace reigned, for a little while anyway. Joy thanked me for being inspired to read to all of us. This might become a new tradition, we thought.

The second morning was last week Thursday. We finished Peter Pan.

This was tragic.

When Wendy returned diffidently she found Peter sitting on the bed-post crowing gloriously, while Jane in her nighty was flying around the room in solemn ecstasy.

'She is my mother,' Peter explained; and Jane descended and stood by his side, with the look on her face that he liked to see on ladies when they gazed at him. 

'He does so need a mother,' Jane said.

'Yes, I know,' Wendy admitted rather forlornly; 'no one knows it so well as I.' 

After 19.5 months of nursing, it was time to let Princess leave the nursery. We had been down to only two feedings for a few months, first thing in the morning and last thing at night. This was the morning of letting go. Joy had been preparing her verbally for several days, while I had been preparing Joy emotionally.

I hadn't forgotten about it in the slightest - I was the one who got her dressed and read to her before scriptures and breakfast. 

But after the triumph the morning before, I was eager to finish the story.

'If only I could go with you,' Wendy sighed.

'You see you can't fly,' said Jane. 

The children were happy as the story ended and Prince and I settled on our next book (Treasure Island). Then I looked at my beloved and saw the tears held bravely and barely in check.

and thus it will go on, so long as children are gay and innocent and heartless. 

Not to mention their fathers. I wished very much that I had thought just a little in advance and not read just that to everyone that particular morning.

Princess is a little sad about it but is handling the transition remarkably well. She cries very loudly for Mommy at bedtime ... just like she did before. Only now she does it while I'm putting her to bed instead of after Mommy leaves the room. She's figured out very quickly I'm the new go-to person all night long. She's started calling for Daddy first. She's also falling asleep faster, staying asleep just a little longer, more able to quiet herself, and she's even happier to read scriptures as a family first thing so she can be with Mommy again.