Transitions

This week the Rabbit finally began using walking as her primary mode of transportation. She is 16 months old, which is later than my other kids (but not much later). As I've been watching her stagger around the last few days it has occurred to me that she really is a "toddler" now. Then I realized that she is my only toddler, because in recent weeks Roo has definitely arrived at the linguistic and developmental markers that place her as a "preschooler." And Fish, my former preschooler, has recently been showing a lot of desire to tackle the more rigorous mental exercises of school-aged children. Bean, for his part, just finished his math book that took him through multiplication and division and factoring.

So it seems all my children have moved up the ladder. I shouldn't be surprised, but in a way I am. You know your children are going to grow, but sometimes it seems like they're stuck at a certain place (like my Rabbit crawling for more than 8 months). You get used to things being a certain way and it seems like it will be that way forever, yet you know that eventually they will move on. Then one day you wake up and realize that they have moved on. And you're sad and happy at the same time.

After I first wrote this post I then checked my Google Reader and viewed this post from my friend Janet, which, while not on exactly the same vein, resonated with me stronger than it normally would have if I hadn't just written this. I really enjoyed it, so I'm sharing it here.