Shayla loves to go up and down and up and down escalators when we pass them, so we indulge her here at Barnes & Noble's. :)
There is faith, hope and love, but the Greatest of these is Love.
Wow. She let me take a few photos this morning. She was standing still for them and required no bargaining. Change happens...
There is faith, hope and love, but the Greatest of these is Love.
It is really so exciting as a new father to witness all the rapid cognitive progressions that take place practically, it seems, overnight with my young daughter. She's 2 1/2 and already talking about the difference between hexagons and octagons when we go places and she sees these shapes represented. Once every few days she'll say something that makes me snap my head around and mouth a silent OMG. So far, for the most part, this has been an impressed OMG and not a troubled one. :)! Yay.
We have been really fortunate as a family in that I have been able to stay at home with her up to this point. Hopefully this can continue. We'll see. I say 'fortunate' because I know all too well that if this little 'sponge' of mine were to be in some sort of preschool daycare she'd be picking up some of the habits around her. This is natural, but I'm Really liking that we're getting the opportunity to lay some 'foundational behaviors' before she becomes more consistently exposed to other caregivers/teachers ideas and patterns as well as the manners of the kids around her.
They just do what they see for the most part. Today I was scratching my head and I just happened to look over at her and she was scratching her head just then in exactly the same place. Funny. That's just how much of this 'mimicking' mechanism they have hard wired inside of them. It's what they do; that's who they are at this point and I know that will continue for years to come, even as it becomes less overt down the road.
Mixed with all this there are the moments that you see with crystal clarity where your child is becoming there own person--where THEIR person is peeking through all the movements in approval and rehearsal. It is with Beauty and Sadness that you see 20 years into the future and know this person will one day be their own. It is a bittersweet taste that this epiphany gives you. Happiness for the person they are becoming, and a sadness for the departure of sorts that this blooming is a harbinger for. However, it's still Joy All the Way because you Love this being like you've never Loved anything in all your Life. So you know, already....now...in this moment .....that this eventual heartbreak is a sweet one---sad and sweet in that it Bears you Up and rounds out Life.
God Bless this Process for there is nothing like it in All the World.
We have been really fortunate as a family in that I have been able to stay at home with her up to this point. Hopefully this can continue. We'll see. I say 'fortunate' because I know all too well that if this little 'sponge' of mine were to be in some sort of preschool daycare she'd be picking up some of the habits around her. This is natural, but I'm Really liking that we're getting the opportunity to lay some 'foundational behaviors' before she becomes more consistently exposed to other caregivers/teachers ideas and patterns as well as the manners of the kids around her.
They just do what they see for the most part. Today I was scratching my head and I just happened to look over at her and she was scratching her head just then in exactly the same place. Funny. That's just how much of this 'mimicking' mechanism they have hard wired inside of them. It's what they do; that's who they are at this point and I know that will continue for years to come, even as it becomes less overt down the road.
Mixed with all this there are the moments that you see with crystal clarity where your child is becoming there own person--where THEIR person is peeking through all the movements in approval and rehearsal. It is with Beauty and Sadness that you see 20 years into the future and know this person will one day be their own. It is a bittersweet taste that this epiphany gives you. Happiness for the person they are becoming, and a sadness for the departure of sorts that this blooming is a harbinger for. However, it's still Joy All the Way because you Love this being like you've never Loved anything in all your Life. So you know, already....now...in this moment .....that this eventual heartbreak is a sweet one---sad and sweet in that it Bears you Up and rounds out Life.
God Bless this Process for there is nothing like it in All the World.