she's officially a teen

sunday was the girl's 13th birthday. i am still mentally reeling from the enormity of that. i think i probably say this every year, especially with her in the last few years, because she is changing so quickly. it seems like they are babies/toddlers for a long time, then they are kids for 1/2 an hour and holy shit they're grown. what? really, how did this happen?

i think it is because as babies/toddlers they are like sponges and every single thing is new and they crawl and then walk and then they're talking and feeding themselves and each month you can physically see the changes in them. then that slows down for awhile and while you might look at school pictures or other photos and see a gradual outward growth or change, most of the growing is in their minds. then they hit puberty and the physical changes come faster again.

i look at how much she's changed in just a year. there's the obvious, boobs, butt, getting taller (only 2 inches shorter than me now), starting her period, getting her first pimple. but i also see her maturing, growing, blossoming.

this girl, this baby we waited so long for, has turned into a girl who knows the words to almost every taylor swift song, makes craft projects out of duct tape or yarn or folding paper, who recently got her ears pierced and is now obsessed with sparkly, girly earrings, who's watching chick flicks constantly but still reading the mysterious benedict society series in between rereading all of the twilight books. she's had a foot in both world's for awhile--that of being a child and that of being an adult--and i see that foot in the child world disappearing more every day.

i have no doubt that there will be hard times, aren't there always with teenagers? but, i also know that she is smart and funny and wise and i am excited (and yes, a bit sad) to watch her grow up.

saturday night she had friends sleep over. we went to the movies--she and her three friends and the boy and a friend saw the chipmunk movie while the hubs and i watched it's complicated (GO SEE IT IT IS HYSTERICAL) in the next theater. we've never done this. another milestone. it was a typical sleepover, giggling girls, movie watching, snacks. at 3:30 am the girl came and woke me up because they were scared. she and the two girls who spent the night were sitting together on the couch in the den, scared. they kept hearing noises--it was the rain. i sat w/ them for awhile and then went back to bed once they calmed down. they slept, all sitting up together, on the couch all night.

sunday we had the family over for cake and ice cream. i kept looking at my baby niece and nephew and wondering how my own child had gone from that to 13 in such a short amount of time. i managed not to cry, but sometimes just thinking about it chokes me up.

what a gift it is, to have these people, to be responsible for these people for so long. to mold them, love them, hold them, comfort them. they are amazing and make me realize that if i do nothing else, ever, in my life, i have helped give the world two incredible people.