There's nothing new to say here today. I have said it before, and I think I'll continue to say it, over and over again, every time she grows, achieves, commits, or changes. But it's startling to me, each and every time. I get so caught up in the toast crumbs and the shoelaces that the actual accumulation of age passes me by. The years have seemed short, indeed. And sometimes I barely notice them going by.

Because once again I'm saying to myself: Wow, my baby's growing up.

It's the little things, one after the other after the other, that are marking this transition from Baby to Toddler to Girl. Mostly, her own consciousness of the change; and not just the consciousness of it, but the thoughtful seeking out of Big Kid status.

"I don't play dress-up much anymore," she says, with a sigh. "Or Polly Pockets. Those are really for littler kids." (Though it doesn't stop her from playing with either one of these things within days of that statement.)

"Gosh, I really must look older than I am," she says happily, after a visitor guesses her age at 6. (A full four months before her actual sixth birthday!)

"Oh, I just love holding babies," she coos. "Liking babies is really a big girl thing to do." (And I wonder if she actually does like babies--I think she does--or if it's just a purposeful putting on the of big-girl persona, a mimicking of the teenage cousins and babysitters and family friends that she knows.)

"Mama..." She comes up to me with a frown creasing her forehead. "What are some bigger kid things to do?" (And I want to shake her and tell her she's crazy for wanting to cast off her childhood so quickly--at the ripe old age of 5--but instead I remember all my childhood longings to be bigger, to be better, to be cooler, and we discuss soccer and painting and other activities that are still enjoyable but acceptably mature in her eyes).

She's not a baby anymore. She's clawing her way into Big Girl, no matter what her mother may think about it.