I remember reading this after I'd had Anna and looking at my then fourteen month old and feeling like this poem was so right. Now that I have two toddlers and a newborn I'm still left wondering when they stopped being cuddly little newborns! So this poem pretty much describes things around here, especially during nap time for the older two, because I want to enjoy cuddling my baby girl, since here in a few months she probably won't be quite as content to be held all day.
BABIES DON'T KEEP
Mother, oh Mother,
come shake out your cloth,
empty the dustpan,
poison the moth,
hang out the washing
and butter the bread,
sew on a button and make up a bed.
Where is the mother whose house
is so shocking?
She's up in the nursery,
blissfully rocking.
Oh, I've grown shiftless as Little
Boy Blue (lullaby, rockaby, lullaby loo).
Dishes are waiting and bills are past due
(pat-a-cake, darling, and peek, peekaboo).
The shopping's not done
and there's nothing for stew
and out in the yard there's a hullabaloo
but I'm playing Kanga and this is my Roo.
Look! Aren't her eyes the most wonderful hue?
(lullaby, rockaby, lullaby loo).
The cleaning and scrubbing
will wait till tomorrow,
for Children grow up,
as I've learned to my sorrow.
So quiet down, cobwebs.
Dust go to sleep.
I'm rocking my baby and babies don't keep......
~Author Unknown ~
Hey, thanks so much! I've never read the whole poem. I've know the "Quiet down cobwebs, dust go to sleep..." part for a long time, but the rest is good too. :)
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