My middle child will graduate from kindergarten next week. And a little part of me is dreading it in a big way.

Why is kindergarten graduation so emotional?

It's just kindergarten.

Graduation 7

It's just the portal to the rest of their academic career.

It's just the threshold that separates the still semi-babies from the real kid era.

It's just the dividing line where kids leave their Dora days behind for Shake It Up.

Play dates become sleepovers. Little girls suddenly want pierced ears and hair chalk. Stuffed animals are traded for purses. And the Veggie Tales queue on Netflix is abandoned in for an iPod and a playlist.

I'm not quite sure I'm ready for it. I wasn't ready for it the first time. I know the next 12 years will fly by. I'm afraid to blink for I'll be transported to her high school graduation and find myself packing boxes for the big college send-off.

It's not that I don't want my kids to grow up. As someone once told me, it's better than the alternative. It's just that I don't want them to grow up so fast.

Lightening fast.

This world is a big, scary one these days.

Although, my grandmother said the same thing more than a few times when I was growing up

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