Annoying at the time, but I miss it now

Last night was another long evening of putting Harry to bed and suffering through his convoluted bedtime routine (a series of actions and phrases that must be repeated in a particular order and that if deviated from necessitates starting again. Very frustrating!) Once again, I got myself through it by promising myself that it won't be long before he won't want me putting him to bed, and I'll miss it when that happens.

It reminded me of some of the other annoying things that I had to do when they were small children, and that how when you are in the middle of something you don't appreciate that it's just a phase and will one day come to an end.

For example, toddler Harry went through a Button Moon stage. He played it with play dough, with cardboard props, watched episodes over and over, and for his third birthday he had a Button Moon cake. Throughout this phase, for lunch every day he would have a 'Button Moon sandwich', which was a circular Marmite sandwich with four holes in the centre. Then he demanded 'cheese around the edges' - so I had to cut up little cubes of cheese and arrange them artfully around the edge of the plate in just the right way to satisfy him. It was really annoying and made preparing his lunch quite a chore. But now I miss making him a shaped sandwich, he really did love it!

Also at mealtimes we always had to prepare a small bowl of food for his cuddly Giraffe. This was a little bowl of food from the toy kitchen filled with some scraps of green felt to make pretend food. It was really sweet - I'm sure that he doesn't remember but he's still so attached to Giraffe, I bet he'd love it if I made Giraffe a bowl of food tomorrow!

Bedtimes have always been a bit of a struggle in this house, and for a long time as part of the bedtime routine with both children we used an app on the tablet called Nighty Night. It's a picture of a farmhouse, and you click on the windows to put each animal to bed. There's a short and a long version, and I used to find it so boring sat there, desperate for some quiet time after a day spent with a toddler, waiting for them to painstakingly slowly put all the animals to bed. Then suddenly one night we didn't do it anymore and it was all forgotten, and now I quite miss it!

I used to dread the walk home from nursery after lunch with toddler Mia. It wasn't far away so I would take her scooter, which used to fill me with fear for the first part of the journey as she had to scoot alongside a busy road. Then soon after that she'd just give up and I'd have to push her home, balancing both rucksack and my handbag as I leaned over at an awkward angle. She was so slow, always wanting to stop to look for pine cones, even when I could see that there weren't any there, and she wanted to be lifted up to stand on every post that we passed. But now I miss our little chats and that time that we had together.

However one thing that I definitely don't miss about small children is the night times! They really were both such awful sleepers - Harry in particular with a couple of hours of screaming in the early hours every single night. I also don't miss those 4.45 am starts - even though he's still an early riser at least he can entertain himself in his room until we need to start getting ready for school!

What do you miss about the toddler years? And what will you definitely not miss?!