The First Haircut! (She’s Growing Up Fast)

The first haircut, where has the time gone? As my daughter sat on my lap getting a trim, while my wife was snapping pictures, all I could think about was about how fast she’s growing up. It all starts with a haircut, then asking for money for clothes, and then asking for a wedding that costs more than my house. I wanted to shed a tear, but men don’t do that (especially in a salon!)

Somewhere between 12 months and 16 months she went from baby to kid. The things she does now completely baffles me. Things like parrots phrases I didn’t even know I say much, like “Ah, Man!” or “No way!” all the time. You can point to things and say what it is and she’ll point and repeat it exactly 400 times (even while nodding off to sleep). She insists on bringing a toy along with her for car rides (ones that make noises). She wants to feed herself everything, even open the package and take it out. She’s smart enough to know when we don’t want to want her to eat something (like Halloween candy) and hide it or eating it while trying to act like nothing is in our mouths (she’ll try to open your mouth like Superman bending iron).
And last night about 10 minutes before her bedtime she walked up to my wife, rubbed her eyes (our signal she’s tired), and said “Nigh-Nigh”. She then walked to her room. Whaa?! Somewhere when we weren’t looking, an alien took over our child. That’s my only explanation.

I remember complaining about how time wasn’t moving along fast enough. She needed to get out of that baby stage so we could do more, but now in retrospect it’s a little sad. Time goes by FAST and when I take a second to look at her, I see this little kid who looks like that little baby I once knew - the one who would just laugh, poop, eat and sleep. I sometimes wish that baby were back on the days when my daughter throws spaghetti on the wall and yells “no!” But then I get a little proud when she peels the spaghetti off the wall and starts eating it. No baby can do that.