Don't You Ever Grow Up

No one ever tells you that registering your kid for kindergarten involves a boat load of paperwork, all of which asks the same general questions over and over until you begin to feel your eyes involuntarily cross. Needless to say, this tedious experience can give you a lot of time to think.

And as I spent what felt like a solid six hours filing out said paperwork, all I could think about was how I have absolutely no idea how I went from the shock of finding out I was pregnant with our first child to suddenly having a child old enough to be a kindergartener.

Layla was an extremely good baby, to make the understatement of the century. She's always had a happy, mellow disposition. In fact, the day she was born, she didn't even cry, which actually really freaked me out at the time. I had always sort of figured it was a requirement for babies to cry and if they didn't, it meant they weren't breathing. Layla was breathing just fine, but instead of crying she was just sort of looking around and moaning softly while she was being examined and wrapped up. Once the nurse put her in my arms, she looked at me like she knew exactly who I was, stopped moaning immediately and fell into a deep sleep.

Her disposition is so sunny, in fact, that she didn't even cry when the nurses gave her her first bath to remove all that lovely post-birth gunk. Not only did she not cry or appear upset about it in any way, she actually looked like she enjoyed it (in direct contrast with her brother, who screamed so loudly and for so long that I started to wonder if he was being bathed with nails). It wasn't until years later, when she became the kid who hated to be sticky or have dirty hands that it all made sense to me. She looked like she was enjoying it because the crazy kid actually was enjoying it.

 Not much changed after that first day.

Layla started sleeping through the night when she was three weeks old. She ate everything that was put before her (and still does). If you told her to stop doing something, she stopped. She's patient. She listens. She cooperates. Last week at her preschool, a child brought a type of juice that we don't allow her to have at home (way too much sugar). She knew it was against the rules to have it at home and assumed that rule extended to school too. So she didn't drink it. Most kids would jump at the opportunity to do something that their parents don't allow them to, but that's not how Layla rolls.

Layla is funny, sweet and kind. She's a morning person (just like her dad) and always thinks about others. She has grown from a fantastic baby to an amazing little girl.

The only thing Layla has ever done (be it completely inadvertently) was put the idea into our heads that we are the most amazing parents ever and that parenting is easy. Because of Layla, I had no idea why anyone ever said being a parent was a difficult job. Sure, it was a lot of work and could feel tedious at times, but she has had so few bad days or bad stages that it all felt like a cake walk. Which, of course, is why we had Ben, who has seemingly done everything in his power to take the idea that parenting is easy right out of our heads (but more about little dude later, this is Layla's blog).

I can only assume that my luck will eventually run out and that my perfect, angelic daughter will turn into a psychopath once she hits about thirteen and decides that out of all the people she hates, she hates her mom the most. I hope that's not the case, but because I'm not taking any chances, I'm going to enjoy every peaceful moment until that ugly beast called puberty strikes.

Anyway, back to registration. I can only assume that the purpose of all that horrendous paperwork is to keep all of us who can't believe our child is old enough to be in elementary school from bursting into tears and clinging to our children. While it is a solid attempt on the part of public schools, I'm sorry to say it didn't really work. It didn't distract me from reminiscing or wondering how we got to this point in Layla's life so fast. If anything, it gave me time to think about it more. And it definitely didn't distract me from crying my eyes out.

My baby is growing up and she's growing up way too fast. And I know that no matter how much I drag my feet or wish for her to slow down, I can't stop the inevitable. And no amount of paperwork will distract me from just how much that breaks my heart.