Teeth and more teeth. Could it get any worse? Now she's started chewing the top of the crib--not the rails. The other day Al came to me with a very happy Alyssa in his arms. There were chips of paint surrounding her mouth and on her shirt, which was covered in drool. We're past Motrin, teething swabs, ice cubes . . . just about everything.

I'm in denial. She's nearly a year and a half, but she's still my baby . . . my last baby. I'm not ready to even think about putting her in a toddler bed. I want to freeze time, except when she whines for food, and keep this tiny, soft brown head on my chest. I want slobbery kisses that taste like cherrioes and tickle fights in the living room. I want peekaboo for hours and "what dat?" every five seconds. But then I find myself wondering what she's going to be like on her first day of preschool. Is she going to cry like Samantha or is she going to run around an introduce herself to everyone? And just like with Samantha, I get to be a fly on the wall in her preschool class and watch her change before me. I get to go through all those defining moments with her, building her memories. And I'll love it even though I'll think back to those days when I used to rock her to sleep--her head on my chest and her ear pressed to my heart--because I was the only cure for a toothache.