It's the 27th again, so another month has gone by in the timeline of Jemma's little life. I was running this morning, thinking about that, and thinking about how she's changed over the course of this summer. Nothing big stuck out to me then, but as the day went on I found myself noticing little things: how she doesn't need my help to climb up her slide; how I don't automatically jump up and run towards her, breath held, when she descends our cement steps out front; how she tells me she needs to have her diaper changed and runs over to lie down on her changing pad; how she eats with a fork and spoon more often than not. So I guess she really is growing up, even though, seriously, pretty much all her clothes from May still fit fine.
I was really looking forward to that infamous 18-20 month "language explosion," and she has added some words to her vocabulary over the last month or two. I wouldn't call it an explosion, though; it's more like a few geysers spouting feebly across a barren dessert ("thank you," "digger," "Ah-dee," and "more" being the most faithful) and, in the middle, one giant, constant stream of hot, sulfur-tinged water representing her word of the month, "MY." All day long, she says it while reaching for a pretzel or claiming a toy from Annie, and all day long I correct her: "We say 'more, please' and 'turn, please.'" She runs down the hallway, "My my my my my."
Mention going anywhere and she comes running towards the back door, getting her shoes on herself and bringing me my flip-flops, too. Mention snacks of any kind, and she stands at the snack cupboard or follows me around incessantly until I have given her something, preferably a "teet." Mention the fact that, in four short months, we'll be celebrating her 2nd birthday and I really, really won't have any babies around here, anymore, and I am 99% shocked and saddened. It's all going by too quickly. But there is 1% of me that revels in her capability, in the curious, generous, hilarious person she's becoming right before our eyes. For now, luckily, she's still "my."
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