Every once in a while I have a moment where I’m engaged in something with Katie and I feel like someone hit the fast forward button on my DVR.  Just some little thing she says or does makes it seem like she leapfrogged, exponentially, in her development, and I how did I miss the steps between the ground floor and the penthouse?  A lot of times it’s something  she says – a turn of phrase or a new vocabulary word – that will make me stop and wonder:  where did THAT come from?

We just got back from a walk around the neighborhood – well, I walked; Katie was on her scooter.  Just yesterday she was out on the same scooter, right foot planted solidly on the cross bar and left foot never stopping:  pushpushpush.  She’d wobble a little but that left foot never joined its pair up on the scooter platform – it just did its constant pushpushpush with the sidewalk, up the street and back down again.

Today, suddenly, it’s pushpushpushGLIDE …. pushpushpushGLIDE.

Several years ago, when Katie was between one and two, we were at the dealership waiting on car service.  Since Katie had just gotten her own wheels, so to speak, being a new walker, I let her roam the showroom while we waited.  At every car, Katie had to stop, get in the drivers seat, and pretend to drive.  She’d do that for a few minutes, then I’d say, “Time to go, Katie”, and she’d hop out, little legs propelling her onto the next car.

We were sitting in a convertible when a man with his teenaged daughter stopped.  He looked at his own daughter, and he looked at Katie, finally locking eyes with me.

“Don’t blink,” he said.  “You’ll miss it.”