Baby's First Word

I'm sure every parent remembers their child's first word. Or at least what they think was their first word.....da da, mama, cookie, ball...etc. But do you remember where you were? What you were doing at the time? I do. When Jacob said his first word, he was 5. Not months, years. 5 years of my little boy not talking, responding when I told him I loved him, or saying mama.

He was 2 1/2 years old when he started attending Southwood, an ECFE school in our hometown. He had the best teachers, and made friends. I loved the class he was in, a class for kids with Autism. I think there were about 6-8 kids in the class. From what I remember, most of them were capable of talking. (in my head it was, most of THEM were capable of talking!!) Those kids were awesome. Always interested in what was going on, and wanted to see everything. I don't remember everything that Jacob did, except gag at play dough, but what I do remember was the rule that when you got there to pick up your child, you waited in the hall until the teachers opened the door. There was a narrow window in the door, and we all peeked in periodically hoping that our kids wouldn't spot us, so we could see what they were doing! One particular day, I was standing there peeking, when Jacob spotted me. He got a huge grin on his face and yelled, "Mommy!!" I flung open the door, sorry Jennifer, but I think it was warrented this time ;-) and said to everyone, "Did you hear that? Did you guys hear that?? Jacob just said Mommy!" I'm pretty sure I had tears running down my face with a grin of my own. I will never forget that day.

Jacob will be 9 in March. NINE. Do you know what that means? (In my head, I just said that as Doc Brown. For those of you not familiar with Back to the Future, the next line is, "It means that this damn thing doesn't work at all!") Ahem. It means that next year he'll be in double digits. How does this happen?? Babies aren't supposed to grow up, are they? They're supposed to be little forever.

He may be growing up, but no matter how old he gets, how many times he screams out of frustration, he'll always be my baby. <3