While I wasn't looking

...this little guy has suddenly gotten not so little. *sniff* It really hit home with me a couple of weeks ago, when the lineup at Cindy's house changed a bit on account of the school year ending. Some of her charges have parents whose work schedules change (or cease & desist) in the summer, so they no longer come. Suddenly, Liam is the oldest regular at Cindy's house.

It was quite startling when I first made the realization. I still remember his very first day there, when he was the youngest of the bunch, so well; and wondering how he was going to do as a tag-along to the other kids. Now, they're the ones tagging along after him. There is still one girl older than Liam who's there once or twice a week, but he is the head honcho most of the time.

Cindy is doing a great job of making the most of it with him. She has some games reserved just for him - flash cards, concentration, that type of thing. She will sometimes wake him up from his nap a little bit early so that he can have some one on one time with her to use these things before the little girls get up (goodness knows that Mallory would disrupt the proceedings). I'm glad that she is making the effort to keep him busy and happy like this; where I used to worry that he would never be able to keep up with the other kids, now I worry that the other kids are holding him back. I know that I'm being silly about it, and that there is lots of stimulation for him; I hear constantly about his walks, his playing in the (kiddie) pool, his trips to the library and the towers of blocks he builds. Still... I never thought I would be glad to send him off to school, and yet here I am, with that day still more than a year away, thinking that it will be a good thing for him. A whole new set of challenges and opportunities. A good thing... but one that is still coming way, way too fast.