big week for Abby

Sometimes you can go weeks or even months without the reality of how fast a child is growing up hitting you... and then you have a week like this. Yesterday Abby learned to tie her shoes.

Sidebar: For all those educators and overzealous, overachieving parents (or grandparents, for that matter!) out there - YES, I realize that she's 6 years old and almost done with Kindergarten. I just don't see this as critical at this point in our lives. She has shoes. She can put on her shoes. They're elastic and don't need tying. It works well for all of us, including her school teachers, as we're not constantly stopping to tie shoes. Everyone knows that kids can't keep their shoes tied. It's about efficiency. I'm not really concerned that it's on the Kindergarten report card as a necessary fine motor skill - her fine motor is terrific. She can use scissors better than I can! However, when we received our 3rd notice of the year AND a wooden practice "shoe" with laces this week in Abby's backpack it occurred to me that maybe Mrs. Schindewolf thinks we don't OWN any shoes with laces and THAT is why Abby hasn't learned to tie. So, I gave in. We got out a shoe - a REAL one, and Abby learned to tie yesterday. She can now tie a shoe - of course, they're mine since she doesn't have any shoes with laces, but whatever. more photos here

Back to the issue at hand. I've been getting tired of watching Abby ride her training-wheeled bike around while the little neighbor girl down the street, a year and a half younger than Abby, goes tooling past on her 2-wheeler. So, after our triumph yesterday with the shoes, I decided that today was the day. She was a little hesitant, so she put on Jacob's skateboarding pads and we headed out. She got the hang of it pretty quickly - fortunately I didn't have to do TOO much running up and down the street keeping her balanced. I'm not in shape for that kind of physical activity. Before I knew it, she was pedaling herself down the street without any help at all. She didn't even have any real falls. By the end of the night we took a family bike ride around the block, and at times we had trouble keeping up with her!

Our little girl is growing up - between the reading, the teeth, the tying and the riding, she's a completely different kid from when she started Kindergarten only 9 short months ago. It's going WAY too fast...