Twenty Six Months

My sweet little girl,

You are blossoming before my eyes. You are on balancing on the teeter totter between baby and little kid. You once spoke in single words but now the words come together in twos and threes. Soon whole complete sentences will parade out of your mouth in your little kid voice and your baby laugh will loose its nasal tone.

You are jumping! Mostly your jumps are upwards for a fraction of an inch and then plummeting onto your bottom, but I did really see you defy gravity and take both feet from the ground then land back on them. Congrats, little one!

I think two is the most fun of all ages - you're independent and dependent; you use words to communicate and I understand a majority of the time. You laugh at me, yourself, and the kitty cats. Daddy and I, we laugh at the things you do.

When I'm leaving and ask for a kiss, I sometimes get a kiss from your lips, but usually you hold out your right palm for me to kiss and then your left palm. No, I have no idea where you got this idea, but I can understand the importance of having redundant kisses.

We started last week at Little People's Workshop, a co-operative parent run pre-pre school. Daddy and I both liked the atmosphere, the parents, and the kids; we knew it was time for you to be around those your own age. I wasn't prepared for the shock of sending you to a place by yourself though! I know you'll be fine, but I'm so used to our routine established over the last year of Mommy, Daddy, Nana shuffle that it's strange to throw a foreign entity into the mix. I'm just scared; scared of what I haven't identified.

I knew you were with my departure if you wave at me and say "bye, bye mommy." I know you were also saying "I'll be okay mom, don't worry about me."

Ah, but I do worry. I try not to worry. I think about many other things so I worry less, but after I gave birth to you the second line in the prophetic motherhood implicit instruction manual was, simply,

You will worry like you have never worried before.

The first line, in case you were wondering, was "You will love like you have never loved before." That's just the way it is.

This morning as I walked into my office I thought of a line from an old 38 Special song, which I will take on as my mantra in progress:

Hold on loosely, but don't let go. If you cling too tightly, you're going to lose control.

It's so hard to know what's right, to trust my instincts, to think before acting instead of reacting. Our moods are so interconnected, I get tired when you're tired; you get crabby when I'm crabby. I guess that's just the way the mother-daughter unbilical tie goes.

With love, worry, and everything in between,
Mommy