1m2aSandbox

Recently I spent a few quiet moments downstairs one weekend afternoon, blissfully working away at getting a headstart on the upcoming week. Daddy was taking a well-earned nap, and as I plowed through the menu planning and grocery list, I gradually became aware that I hadn’t heard from the girls for a while.

At all.

Not one peep. Or outraged scream.

So I went upstairs to investigate, and found Cora’s door closed. Peaceful murmurs could be heard behind it, but since I was there I decided to look further. I knocked on Cora’s door and opened it.

Cora’s had a lot of milestones recently, and you can see one of the results almost constantly: she’s bursting at the seams with pride, and in her head is practically a different person that she was two weeks ago. We’ve joked that relatives won’t recognize Cora any more, and that she’s so grown up that there’s nothing left for her body to do now until high school. As we drove home from church the other day, talking in this vein, I heard Maddie say to herself quietly, “I haven’t done anything at all recently. I’m not any bigger in anything.”

I started to think about this, going back over the last few weeks, and realized that while she may not have had any spectacular fireworks moments in her life recently, Maddie is indeed a different person than she has been.

It seems the girls are moving ever-faster towards adulthood; whereas they used to give me some breathing room between developmental or physical milestones, now we seem to be knocking one down before the last one’s even in our rearview mirror.

Cora, for one thing, with her two front teeth last week. I started the week with a sweet baby girl, a smile full of milky baby teeth, and ended the week staring at a little girl with a crooked, gap-toothed grin. Losing two teeth in a row has given Cora’s face a completely different look, and even as I enjoy the sweetness of her soft lisp now, I know it’s simply a sign that she’s growing up. Friday afternoon I kept staring bemusedly at her sweet smile, thinking of how much she’d accomplished in one week.

But Cora decided she wasn’t done – and finished off the week by learning, once and for all, how to ride without training wheels.

Last week the girls played an elaborate game over several days, involving a trip around the world. Cora was a girl and Maddie was her cat, and they packed a car and went for a global drive. Included in the car was a very comfy carrier/bed for the cat, copious snacks, a reading corner in the back seat (apparently the cat was going to take a shift driving so the girl could read), and some changes of clothing.

And a first-aid kit.

At first I didn’t realize what was in the shoe box they’d packed in the “rear window” of the car, until it came time to finally break the game down and put everything away. When I grabbed the box I said, “What’s this?”