Good bye, Emma

and thank you and yes the nanny is also named emma <3

It’s the nanny’s last week with us.

We asked her to stay for dinner to celebrate her time with us. We reheated Spaghetti and mixed together a bagged Caesar salad.

We served her a Stevia Root Beer and lit two candles at the table. The girls said grace and I said, ‘Thanks for Emma!’

The baby devoured the noodles with red sauce that tinged his skin and hair a shade of orange that made him look like the recipient of a bad spray tan.

We ate a little and asked Emma about her plans for nursing. We talked about her time watching the kids. I can’t believe Thomas was only five months when you started, he’s almost walking now!

Then Caroline had to go to the bathroom, and minutes later Kate followed suit. Clayton escorted Kate to the bathroom as the baby began throwing noodles onto the floor.

I lifted the baby from his high-chair and wrapped him in a towel to avoid the red mess spreading to my shirt. I filled the sink with water and sprayed off the mess.

Emma sat at the table alone finishing her dinner.

“Let’s get ice cream!” I announced when everyone returned to the kitchen. We decided it would be easier for Clayton and Caroline to pick up a tub of mint chocolate-chip ice cream and cones from Hyvee than the six of us walking to the corner shop for soft serve.

While we waited for dessert to arrive, Emma and I pushed Kate and Thomas around the block to enjoy the cool summer evening. We talked about her upcoming surgery, the work trip I’m leaving for tomorrow, the house that’s for sale on the corner.

I avoided what I wanted to say.

I avoided translating into words the thank you that was stuck in my throat.

Thank you for loving the baby. For showing up on time every single day—except for the one day you overslept and still apologize for. For sticking around to chat. For getting scrappy when we lost the screwdriver that starts the dishwasher.

For flying back from your vacation with two gigantic pink flamingos for the girls. For sending photos every time I asked.

Thank you for keeping your composure when the baby had a fever and I had a big meeting, and you told me, “Stay at work. He’ll be okay. There’s nothing you can do right now that I can’t.”

Thank you for holding him when he didn’t want to sleep in his crib, or when you decided to hold him a little longer, texting me a photo of his cheeks pressed against your arm as you rocked him because he was “too cute to put in his bed.”

Thank you for every day I’d walk out the door and say, “Take care of him, and call me if you need anything.”

And each day you’d say, “Okay, but I won’t need to.”