(Soon To Be) Teen Angel

My girl has gone and done growed up. Sort of right before my eyes, I've watched Molly magically transform into this very capable little preschooler who is less little each day. All around me are signs that she's crossing that hard-to-spot-but-very-much-there boundary from Mom's little girl (although in good daughter form, she's very much a daddy's girl) to my kid (my child, actually, she informed me the other day -- "Mom, I'm your child not your kiddo"). She keeps doing things that I have known she will eventually master but am still surprised when it actually happens. And it's the sort of successes that are due to hard work and determination not just doing something because her legs are finally long enough or her hair finally grew in enough. No, these are bona fide accomplishments because of her effort or overcoming her own risk aversion. We're both transitioning right now as I enter my new phase of life as a school mom. Our summer has been dotted with school picnics and potlucks and it's an interesting place to be, handing off your child to someone to play a role that so far, John and I have done ourselves. If finally mastering the monkey bars is a measure of readiness, though, she's passed her entrance exam and off she'll go to school this week. But it's more than that; it's something about all the pieces that she's putting into place in different areas of her life that have me getting choked up these days. It's that she is dying to take the school bus and that she really wants a bunk bed -- and I can see on the horizon that it will happen one day. It's that, with a lot of spelling help, she's writing notes and messages to people that make some sort of sense. It's getting over her nervousness at putting her head underwater and swimming on her own or biking without needing someone to help her stop on downhills. It's that she cut her doll's hair into a crew cut today because she "needed a little trim off the bottom" (wait, that got me teary for a different reason).

It's hard to describe this transition into bigger kid but it's there. It's like the leaps forward just get bigger and bigger and effort pays off. It's priceless to watch her face when she's done it -- when she's figured it out on her own or gotten over some internal road block. It's an amazing gift that I don't even think she knows she gives.