Growth Chart

When Nick was born, I moved this dresser into his bedroom. It was one of the dressers we had when I was a kid. It used to be cream with gold detail, but after I spilled a tube of magic bubbles on the top, it got scraped down to a natural wood. It's a great piece of furniture - still sturdy, still working.

I shared this dresser with my sisters. I can't even remember what was in it. I think it was in my room, and then maybe in Anne-E's room. But eventually it ended up in the hallway, and various shirts were kept in it. We also had a huge closet, and whenever one of us needed anything that wasn't immediately in our closets we went to this huge closet and it was probably hanging in there. Along with various forgotten sweaters, jackets, ugly dresses, and clothing from the 1980's my mother used to wear. We had so much storage space, and when I thought back to it I always thought it was weird that we had our own rooms but still couldn't fit all our stuff in one closet or dresser.

I'm getting off topic. How surprising. Not.

Anyway, Nick had this dresser, and I remember being very pregnant and putting his newly laundered little onesies and footie outfits in there. His clothing was so tiny. I put all the newborn things in the top drawer, with short sleeves on one side and longer, warmer items on another side. The next drawer had the 3-6 months, the next drawer had 6-9 mos, and finally the next drawer had the 12 month items I felt he'd never actually grow into.

And he had clothes - Holy Moly, this kid had 3 complete sets of clothing. More things than I did, I promise you. And once he started wearing his things, I was the one who was more concerned about wearing a clean shirt. Baby might be wearing his third outfit of the day, all nice and cozy, but I was wearing a maternity shirt that smelled like puke and sweat.

Sorry... where was I?

This dresser. I still have the dresser. When Nate came along I just used some of the drawers for Nate and some for Nick. Eventually I started having to put some things in storage to make room.

And then Andy came along...

And then there was no more room. I had to use another dresser, one that used to belong to my other gramma. The drawers don't open and close as easily. It has a mirror that has always warped reflections - It was in my room all through high school, so I should know.

The boys have all split these dressers. Shirts are in one, pants in another. Socks and undies are spilt. In fact, Nick's socks and underwear take up as much room as all of his newborn stuff put together. Andy's pants fill a drawer - if they are all clean, the drawer won't close.

So now the boys are getting their own rooms, and I realized I'm going to need at least one new dresser. Possibly two, if I can find a place for Gramma's with the mirror - the drawers really don't close properly and clothes are all over the floor...

It's just that, all of their clothing used to fit in this one piece of furniture, and now it's hardly enough for one of them. It's not just the boys that grow. They really do start to take up more room.