Growing Pains

Ava and I have been spending a lot of time just the two of us the past few days. I don't have a concrete reason as to why, but we have spent most nights reading books to each other, and she manages to find times when I am on my own to just come and keep me company. Today I picked her up from school by myself, and we ran a few errands just the two of us. Most of it was fun things to do - trying to shop for clothes for her and getting some make-up supplies for the upcoming dance season - but I took the opportunity to talk to her about some things. There have been a few situations over the past couple weeks that made me feel I needed to talk to Ava about appropriate behavior, especially around boys. Very basic stuff, mind you - it's no longer really appropriate for her to run around trying to kiss boys' cheeks, she should never be in a room with a boy where the door is closed, she should never see a boy's private parts and vice versa. Again, nothing traumatic has occurred to bring on this conversation (don't want any of you worrying). I think this talk has been so long in coming much because for the longest time Ava pretty well ignored the existence of boys altogether. She would never remember the names of the boys in her preschool class, and at any playgroup she would immediately gravitate to the girls playing dress up or dolls. She had nothing in common with boys, so they were of no importance to her. Now, thanks to carpooling with our male neighbors and having formed some good friendships with boys, it seemed important that Ava know what her boundaries should be. It was a good talk - she was very receptive, engaged in the conversation with questions and comments. It was one of those times when I looked at my oldest daughter and was blown away by how grown up she is. I was reminded of when she was only 1-year-old and Ben was on deployment, and we hung out and talked together all the time. Our conversations were much different then than they are now. Time really seems to fly, and while a small part of me is sad Ava is no longer that innocent, naive baby, a much bigger part of me is so proud of the young woman she is becoming. I hope this is the first of many more good talks we share together.