Growing up so fast!

My niece was crying on a bed the other day – had fled there to escape rough words spoken in another room prior to my arrival. I tickled Her bare little brown toes and convinced Her to sit up and be read a story. Soon all was well again and She put those toes into sparkly sandals and we went out and sat on the front steps. She found ants to stomp on and butterflies to chase, and all was well in Her world again.

She is growing so fast. As She lay sprawled across that bed, I marveled that She is no longer a tiny pearl swallowed up in the soft shell of the quilt but a lengthening child who can touch the headboard with Her feet almost dangling off the back of the bed.

I remember when the odds and ends of Her childhood debris – Popsicle sticks, candy wrappers and such -- slipped innocently out of Her baby hands and drifted to the ground as She finished with them. Then came the “hand everything properly to the accompanying grown-up” stage. Yesterday, as we sat on the steps, She tossed Her ice cream sandwich wrapper playfully my direction and then tightly balled up Her gum wrapper and flicked it into the grass in the casual manner of Schoolgirls everywhere.
She is growing, so fast.