Today, Lucy is two years old.

She’s been walking around the house this morning, repeating, “Ha’ buffday, Cici!” (Yes, she still calls herself Cici. I kind of hope she never stops.)

I got cookies for her class at daycare. Her little classmate saw them and started yelling, “My cookies!” Lucy just looked at him coolly and said, “MY buffday.” Like, step off mah cookies, yo. (Gotta say I can totally relate to that feeling.)

If you ask her how old she is, she holds up her entire hand and says, “I TWO!”

She is hilarious and amazing and exhausting and a complete and utter terror. She is so much like me that it freaks me out. Her stubborn streak, her need to sleep with a million stuffed animals all around her like I did when I was little, the way she wants to do everything herself (both “I do it!” and “no help!” are in heavy rotation in her vocabulary). I already worry about how we’ll butt heads when she’s older because we’re so much alike. But she is utterly fantastic.

The other milestone is that today is Catie’s last day of kindergarten.

First day of kindergarten:

Last day of kindergarten:

Her school had an end-of-school pizza party where the kids did a little performance for all the parents, which was really sweet and funny.

(You probably don’t really want to watch a video of my kid singing “First Grade, First Grade,” to the tune of “New York, New York,” but I filmed it anyway because I knew my parents would want to see it.)

And you know, I guess it should feel weird to say that I now have a 2 year-old and a first grader. But for some reason it hasn’t really fazed me at all.

So many people I know get nostalgic about every single one of their child’s milestones, and I see so many of them say things like, where did the time go, they grew up so fast, things like that. I kind of understand that in a way, but I don’t feel that way at all. I mean, sure, I tell Catie that I’m going to tie a brick to her head to weigh her down and make her stop growing, but that’s because she keeps outgrowing her clothes, not because I think she’s getting too grown up.

Instead, with every milestone, I feel like I can let my breath out a little bit. Like, ok, we survived that part. Now let’s get through this next bit. Parenting to me feels like a marathon that I’m running, which is full of hills. I survived Lucy’s first two years. There’s a hill. I got Catie through kindergarten. There’s another hill.

And I know – I KNOW – that I should stop and savor them while they’re so little, because time is fleeting. I get that. But at the same time? Toddlers are JERKS, man. I honestly just want a fast-forward button to get me through Lucy’s next two years. Terrible twos are rough, and I seem to recall that three year-olds are even worse. Four was a good age. You can (try to) reason with a four year-old. They’re generally potty-trained, sleep through the night, and are somewhat self-sufficient. Can’t we just skip ahead to four? Has anyone figured out that technology yet?

Although, I admit that there I do like comparing pictures from last year to now. If nothing else, there is quite a significant change in Lucy’s hair. Like WHOA.

So, maybe I’m not nostalgic about it. That’s ok. But I do have a pretty awesome two year-old and a completely fantastic first grader. And for that, I’m thankful.

They’re pretty cute too.