On the night of July 21st, I took this picture:

She had been rolling around and playing with her toys, being, as I thought, “so big”.

This morning, I took this picture:

You see, two days ago, Maia decided that laying down is for BABIES, and she’s no longer a baby.  Literally in the space of a moment, she started sitting up, and now she doesn’t remain lying down for long if she’s awake.  Today, she has yet to fall over and bonk her head on the floor, although for the past two days she’d done it numerous times (to the point where I gave her some baby tylenol because I knew that if I’d hit MY head that many times, I’d have a headache).

I laugh and tell people this is “scary”.  Scary that she’s moving.  Scary that she’s growing.  But honestly?

I am incredibly, perhaps even inordinately, proud.  I see her sitting up and playing with her toys, or watch her crooked semi-crawling across the floor and my heart threatens to swell right out of my chest. She looks so grown up.

For the first three months of Maia’s life, I carried her in my arms almost constantly.  Even when she’d cry in my ear, I still couldn’t imagine setting her down and leaving her alone when she was so upset.  There were times she would fall asleep against my shoulder and I’d just cradle her there, my cheek pressed to her downy head, feeling the heat of her breath soft against my neck.

And at times in those three months, I admit, I thought that I might not be doing her any favours.  There were moments I thought she might develop her motor skills slower than the books say is “normal”, because I held her so much. Because I didn’t give her tummy time.  Because I didn’t leave her to wiggle around on the floor unless she was happy to do so.  I accepted, in my mind and in my heart, that maybe, just maybe, this was the one time that mainstream North American parenting style might have an advantage over my way of attachment parenting.  Maybe someone else’s baby would be moving around far sooner than Maia.  Maybe Maia would be slow to learn to move.  I didn’t mind that too much, because obviously she’d learn to move when she was good and ready to, but maybe, maybe, maybe…

Those thoughts seem laughable now, because our daughter is ON THE MOVE.  She is ready to go, and for now, I am celebrating her independence.

Remind me of that the first time I catch her eating dog food.

Also, I have a guest post up over at Mamikaze.com today: Milk in bags and other weird things about Canada.  Please drop by & say hello!